Quintus Horatius Flaccus (65 BC - 8 BC), commonly known as Horace, was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus. The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his <i>Odes </i>as just about the only Latin lyrics worth reading: &laquo;He can be lofty sometimes, yet he is also full of charm and grace, versatile in his figures, and felicitously daring in his choice of words&raquo;.<br />Horace also crafted elegant hexameter verses (<i>Satires</i> and <i>Epistles</i>) and caustic iambic poetry (<i>Epodes</i>). The hexameters are amusing yet serious works, friendly in tone, leading the ancient satirist Persius to comment: &laquo;as his friend laughs, Horace slyly puts his finger on his every fault; once let in, he plays about the heartstrings&raquo;.<br />His career coincided with Rome&#39;s momentous change from a republic to an empire. An officer in the republican army defeated at the Battle of Philippi in 42 BC, Horace was befriended by Octavian&#39;s right-hand man in civil affairs, Maecenas, and became a spokesman for the new regime.<br />Today we present to our readers one of Horace&#39;s most beautiful works, <i>Ars Poetica</i> (The Art of Poetry), written around 10 BC and dedicated to the Pisos, translated into English in 1874 by John Conington.