ilization are understood that the direct
and vital connection between past and present is seen, and the mind is
no longer startled and incredulous when the historian records that the
Acropolis has had more to do with the career of architecture than any
other group of buildings in the world, or that the most potent influence
in the history of prose is the Latin of Cicero, or that poetic
expression is more choice and many men appreciably saner and happier
because of a Roman poet dead now one thousand nine hundred and thirty
years.

HORACE AND HIS
INFLUENCE

I. HORACE INTERPRETED

THE APPEAL OF HORACE

In estimating the effect of Horace upon his own and later times, we must
take into account two aspects of his work. These are, the forms in which
he expressed himself, and the substance of which they are the garment.
We shall find him distinguished in both; but in the substance of his
message we shall find him distinguished by a quality which sets him
apart from other poets ancient and modern.

This distinctive quality lies neither in the originality nor in the
novelty of the Horatian message, which, as a matter of fact, is
surprisingly familiar, and perhaps even commonplace. It lies rather in
the appealing manner and mood of its communication. It is a message
living and vibrant.

The reason for this is that in Horace we have, above all, a person. No
poet speaks from the page with greater directness, no poet establishes
so easily and so completely the personal relation with the reader, no
poet is remembered so much as if he were a friend in the flesh. In this
respect, Horace among poets is a parallel to Thackeray in the field of
the novel. What the letters of Cicero are to the intrigue and turmoil of
politics, war, and the minor joys and sorrows of private and social life
in the last days of the Republic, the lyrics and "Conversations" of
Horace are to the mood of the philosophic mind of the early Empire. Both
are lights which afford us a clear view of interiors otherwise but
faintly illuminated. They are priceless interpreters of their times. In
modern times, we make environment interpret the poet. We understand a
Tennyson, a Milton, or even a Shakespeare, from our knowledge of the
world in which he lived. In the case of antiquity, the process is
reversed. We reconstruct the times of Caesar and Augustus from fortunate
acquaintance with two of the most representative men who ever possessed
the gift of