Our knowledge of Naevius is thus, of necessity, very limited and fragmentary. From the testimony of later authors it may, however, be gathered that he was a remarkable and original man. He represented the boldness, freedom, and energy, which formed one side of the Roman character. Like some of our own early dramatists, he had served as a soldier before becoming an author. He was ardent in his national feeling; and, both in his life and in his writings, he manifested a strong spirit of political partisanship. As an author, he showed great productive energy, which continued unabated through a long and vigorous lifetime. His high self-confident spirit and impetuous temper have left their impress on the few fragments of his dramas and of his epic poem. Probably his most important service to Roman literature consisted in the vigour and purity with which he used the Latin language. But the conception of his epic poem seems to imply some share of the higher gift of poetical invention. He stands at the head of the line of Roman poets, distinguished by that force of speech and vehemence of temper, which appeared again in Lucilius, Catullus, and Juvenal; distinguished also by that national spirit which moved Ennius and, after him, Virgil, to employ their poetical faculty in raising a monument to commemorate the power and glory of Rome. [Footnote 27: Cf. Lewis, Credibility of Early Roman History, vol. i. chap. ii. 14.] [Footnote 28: Cf. Lewis, Credibility of Early Roman History, vol. i. chap. ii. 14, 15.] [Footnote 29: Horace, Epist. ii. 1. 161-3.] [Footnote 30: Cic. Brutus, ch. 28.] [Footnote 31: Brutus, 18.] [Footnote 32: Epist. ii. 1. 71.] [Footnote 33: viii. 138.] [Footnote 34: xxvii. 17.] [Footnote 35: Miles Gloriosus, ii. 2. 27.] [Footnote 36: Brutus, 15.] [Footnote 37: Mommsen remarks that he could not have retired to Utica till after it fell into the possession of the Romans.] [Footnote 38: De Senectute, 14.] [Footnote 39: 'Ye who keep watch over the person of the king, hasten straightway to the leafy places, where the copsewood is of nature's growth, not planted by man.'] [Footnote 40: 'Like one playing at ball in a ring, she tosses about from one to another, and is at home with all. To one she nods, to another winks; she makes love to one, clings to another. Her hand is busy here, her foot there. To one she gives a ring to look at, to another blows a kiss; with one she sings, with another corresponds by signs.' The reading of the passage here adopted is that given by Munk.] [Footnote 41: De Senectute, 6.] [Footnote 42: Etiam qui res magnas manu saepe gessit gloriose, Cujus facta viva nunc vigent, qui apud gentes solus praestat, Eum suus pater cum pallio ab amica abduxit uno. ]