2. HORACE AND ANCIENT ROME
That Horace refers to being pointed out by the passer-by as the minstrel
of the Roman lyre, or, in other words, as the laureate, that his satire
provokes sufficient criticism to draw from him a defense and a
justification of himself against the charge of cynicism, and that he
finally records a greater freedom from the tooth of envy, are all
indications of the prominence to which he rose. That Virgil and Varius,
poets of recognized worth, and their friend Plotius Tucca, third of the
whitest souls of earth, introduced him to the attention of Maecenas, and
that the discriminating lover of excellence became his patron and made
him known to Augustus, are evidences of the appeal of which he was
capable both as poet and man. In the many names of worthy and
distinguished men of letters and affairs to whom he addresses the
individual poems, and with whom he must therefore have been on terms of
mutual respect, is seen a further proof. Even Virgil contains passages
disclosing a more than ordinary familiarity with Horace's work, and men
like Ovid and Propertius, of whose personal relations with Horace
nothing is known, not only knew but absorbed his poems.
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