Horace (65–8 BCE,) fully Quintus Horatius Flaccus, was a Roman poet of the Augustan age. A notable satirist and literary critic, he is best known for his Satires (c.35 BCE,) Epodes (c.30 BCE,) Odes (c.23 BCE,) Epistles (c.20 BCE,) and Ars Poetica (c.19 BCE; The Art of Poetry)—these literary classics have been the cornerstones of Western poetry.
Much is known about Horace’s life from a biography by Suetonius and Horace’s own testimony. Born in Venusia (modern-day Venosa in southwest Italy) to a former slave, Horace was sent to Rome and then Athens for an education matching that of a usual upper-class Roman of the time. In Athens, Horace joined Brutus’s army as a junior officer. However, with the fall of Brutus, Horace’s family lost much of its property. Horace returned to Italy under a general amnesty, wrote his first poems, and made friends with Virgil, Varius Rufus, and Gaius Maecenas.
Horace’s standing as the most significant Roman lyric poet rests on the excellence of form revealed by the Odes, and on the depth and detail of his self-portraiture in his literary works. He was considered the principal authority on the composition of poetry; his Ars Poetica set the standards for poetry to govern literary criticism even in the present day.
Horace’s proficient mastery of a wide variety of lyric forms is matched both by the wealth of his subject matter—ranging from politics to love, poetry to ethics, and daily life to biography—and by the multiplicity of his tones, which shift from satire to didacticism and from affection to diatribe.
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Who can hope to be safe? who sufficiently cautious?
Guard himself as he may, every moment’s an ambush.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Safety
Why harass with eternal purposes a mind to weak to grasp them?
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Persuasion
He who has made it a practice to lie and deceive his father, will be the most daring in deceiving others.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Deception, Deception/Lying
One gains universal applause who mingles the useful with the agreeable, at once delighting and instructing the reader.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Authors & Writing, Applause, Writers
The chief pleasure in eating does not consist in costly seasoning, or exquisite flavor, but in yourself. Do you seek for sauce by labor?
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Eating, Diet
The disgrace of others often keeps tender minds from vice.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Vice, Virtue
In the word of no master am I bound to believe.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Independence
In labouring to be concise, I become obscure.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Brevity
This is a fault common to all singers, that among their friends they will never sing when they are asked; unasked, they will never desist.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Singing
He has the deed half done who has made a beginning.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: One liners, Beginnings, Action
In peace, as a wise man, he should make suitable preparation for war.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: War
Tear thyself from delay.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Procrastination
Whatever hour God has blessed you with, take it with a grateful hand.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
I am not bound over to swear allegiance to any master; where the storm drives me I turn in for shelter.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Loyalty
Begin, be bold and venture to be wise.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Goals
Mix a little foolishness with your serious plans: it’s lovely to be silly at the right moment.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Fools, Foolishness
Pale death with an impartial foot knocks at the hovels of the poor and the palaces of king.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Death
Punishment closely follows guilt as its companion.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Guilt
He is armed without who is innocent within, be this thy screen, and this thy wall of brass.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Innocence
Words will not fail when the matter is well considered.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Words
Live as brave men and face adversity with stout hearts.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Adversity, Bravery, Courage
Curst is the wretch enslaved to such a vice, who ventures life and soul upon the dice.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Gambling
The power of daring anything their fancy suggest, as always been conceded to the painter and the poet.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Risk
Choose a subject equal to your abilities; think carefully what your shoulders may refuse and what they are capable of bearing.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Religion
It is of no consequence of what parents a man is born, as long as he be a man of merit.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Virtues, Ancestry, Virtue
The great virtue of parents is a great dowry.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Family
They change their climate, not their soul, who rush across the sea.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Tourism, Travel
Ask not what tomorrow may bring, but count as blessing every day that Fate allows you.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Joy
The mind that is cheerful at present will have no solicitude for the future, and will meet the bitter occurrences of life with a smile.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Cheerfulness
Shun the inquisitive, for you will be sure to find him leaky. Open ears do not keep conscientiously what has been intrusted to them, and a word once spoken flies, never to be recalled.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Topics: Gossip
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