His Art of Poetry is not a complete
theory of poetic art, and is supposed to have been written simply to
suggest the difficulties to be met on the way to perfection by a
versifier destitute of the poetic genius. The works of Horace were
immediately popular, and in the next generation became text-books in
the schools.
Cornelius Nepos was a historical writer of whose life almost no
particulars have come down to us, except that he was a friend of
Cicero, Catullus, and probably of other men of letters who lived at the
end of the republic. The works that he is known to have written are all
lost, and that which goes under his name, The Biographies of
Distinguished Commanders (_Excellentium Imperatorum Vit?_), seems
to be an abridgment made some centuries after his death, and tedious
discussions have been had regarding its authorship. The lives are,
however, valuable for their pure Latinity, and interesting for the
lofty tone in which the greatness of the Roman people is celebrated.
The life of Atticus, the friend and correspondent of Cicero, is the one
of the biographies regarding which the doubts have been least. The work
is still a favorite school-book and has been published in innumerable
editions.
This brief list of celebrated writers whose works were in the hands of
the reading public of Rome during the time of the republic, must be
closed with reference to Virgil (Publius Vergilius Maro), the writer
who stands at the head of the literature of Rome, sharing his pre-
eminence only with his younger friend, Horace.
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