After the death of Brutus, the world of letters shared in the universal change which transpired in the political world, so that literature under Augustus soon assumed a new and general tone entirely its own. The first five centuries of the republic formed the foundation on which the whole superstructure of the Augustan age was built. Literature was the last and least thing for that people to produce, and no indications of valuable fruit appeared until the end of the first Punic war. About two centuries later, Cicero, who became the representative of eloquence, philosophy, and sounding prose, was succeeded by Augustus, under whose auspices passed the golden age of Latin poetry. A hundred and fifty years later, classical literature died with Hadrian; chilled by the baleful influence of his tyrannical successors, the literati who had been patronized by the luxurious court sank into contempt. The only appropriate epithet which cotemporaries employed to characterize the age, was "iron," and it must have been both hard and cold. Sensual enjoyment deteriorated popular taste, and impotent revery took the place of energetic thought in the higher order of minds. Since Cicero, the flourishing period of eloquence had disappeared, and insipid daintiness of language was the only linguistic excellence admired. Seneca referred to this national degradation in literature, when he said, "Wherever you perceive that a corrupt taste pleases, be sure that the morals of the people have degenerated." Varro, Cæsar, and Cicero contributed most to the perfection of the Roman dialect. The period of its greatest elegance extended from the reign of Augustus to that of Claudius, A.D. 54. By that time the struggle for liberty had been extinguished in those public calamities which plunged so many leading families into wretchedness, and caused the national spirit to be completely broken down. The period which embraced the lives of Cicero and Augustus constituted the best epoch of both prose and poetry. Dramatic literature, it is true, never recovered from the trance into which it fell after the days of Attius and Terence, yet Æsopus and Roscius, the great tragedian and the favorite comedian in the time of the greatest orator at Rome, amassed great wealth. But the theatrical entertainments which had now taken the place of legitimate dramas, were termed mimes, and were ludicrous imitations of popular customs or persons. The name was Greek, but the composition was entirely Roman in style and purpose. Their indecent coarseness of burlesque dialogue gratified the populace, and prepared the way for modern pantomime.