of Philippi, where, by his own confession, being seized with timidity, he abandoned the profession of a soldier, and returning to Rome, applied himself to the cultivation of poetry. In a short time he acquired the friendship of Virgil and Valerius, whom he mentions in his Satires, in terms of the most tender affection.
Postera lux oritur multo gratissima: namque
Plotius et Varius Sinuessae, Virgiliusque,
Occurrunt; animae, quales neque candidiores
Terra tulit, neque queis me sit devinctior alter.
O qui complexus, et gaudia quanta fuerunt!
Nil ego contulerim jucundo sanus amico.—Sat. I. 5.
> Next rising morn with double joy we greet,
> For Plotius, Varius, Virgil, here we meet:
> Pure spirits these; the world no purer knows,
> For none my heart with more affection glows:
> How oft did we embrace, our joys how great!
> For sure no blessing in the power of fate
> Can be compared, in sanity of mind,
> To friends of such companionable kind.—Francis.By the two friends above mentioned, he was recommended to the patronage not only of Mecaenas, but of Augustus, with whom he, as well as Virgil, lived on a footing of the greatest intimacy. Satisfied with the luxury which he enjoyed at the first tables in (174) Rome, he was so unambitious of any public employment, that when the emperor offered him the place of his secretary, he declined it. But as he lived in an elegant manner, having, besides his house in town, a cottage