In Horace there is no madness of the crusader, no fantastic gallantry of knighthood. We are glad of their absence. Pagan literature is a place of mental rehabilitation. To be _en rapport_ with a pagan of Horace’s day it was necessary to enjoy with him. To be _en rapport_ with a modern it is necessary to weep with him. We play the _comédie larmoyante_. Modern art cares for sensations. Heart-throbs are the thing! It might take for its motto:—_Fac me tecum plangere_. Today it is only the artist (whose soul is always pagan) who finds life good. Anatole France says that without him (the artist) we might doubt the fact. Surely there is no one more fit to read in a garden, under the moon of autumn, than city-bred Horace with his plea for rustic merriment. He loved country life. He pictured it. They had in his day a fresher feeling for simple things, a nymph-like nearness and affection; delight in fresh grass, cool running water, young flowers with dew on them. Simple things were precious enough to be mentioned on equality with chosen guests to make happy a holiday. To the poet is given clearer vision of such things. He is equipped by nature to take pleasure in them. In addition, Latin races have had vivid sense of _reality_. It is one source of their strength. Horace loved the banks of Tiber, as Keats the green English Thames-side, Hafiz, valley of the Roknabad, and Tu Fu his bamboo-shaded rivers. Each has been emphatic in dislike of going elsewhere. Each painted the home country he loved. There are scenes among the poets, bits of landscape, more real, more endeared to me than any I see in life. They are changeless. They are superior to time. They give illusion of things that do not grow old. By sympathetic folly I remain young with them. They are always waiting for me untouched by the season. I know just where to find them. After time has made me old, to go back to them, affects me like going home. In fact, one of my ideals has been realized in the changeless things of art. How different were the adjectives which Horace applied to natural objects from those we use! In them I can see the clear, unvexed mind that observed. He seized description by a different corner. His impressions were fresher, quicker. To him clouds were _steep_ clouds, (_nubibus arduis_). He saw first the striking thing. For this reason his descriptions give the sensation of looking at an etching, crisp, sure, before repeated reproductions have blurred it. An advantage was with him. He had the world before it became second-hand. He has shown attractive scenes.