[87]
All our other poets follow a long
way in the rear. Macer and Lucretius are, it is true,
worth reading, but not for the purpose of forming
style, that is to say, the body of eloquence: both
deal elegantly with their themes, but the former is
tame and the latter difficult. The poems by which
Varro of Atax1 gained his reputation were translations, but he is by no means to be despised, although
his diction is not sufficiently rich to be of much
[p. 51]
service in developing the resources of eloquence.
1 Varro of Atax in Gaul (82–37 B.C. ) was specially famous for his translation of the Argontautica of Apollonius Rhodius. he also wrote didactic poetry and historical epic.
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1922.
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