Having thus brought down the history of satire from its original to
the times of Horace, and shown the several changes of it, I should
here discover some of those graces which Horace added to it, but
that I think it will be more proper to defer that undertaking till I
make the comparison betwixt him and Juvenal. In the meanwhile,
following the order of time, it will be necessary to say somewhat of
another kind of satire which also was descended from the ancient; it
is that which we call the Varronian satire (but which Varro himself
calls the Menippean) because Varro, the most learned of the Romans,
was the first author of it, who imitated in his works the manners of
Menippus the Gadarenian, who professed the philosophy of the Cynics.

This sort of satire was not only composed of several sorts of verse,
like those of Ennius, but was also mixed with prose, and Greek was
sprinkled amongst the Latin. Quintilian, after he had spoken of the
satire of Lucilius, adds what follows:- "There is another and former
kind of satire, composed by Terentius Varro, the most learned of the
Romans, in which he was not satisfied alone with mingling in it
several sorts of verse." The only difficulty of this passage is
that Quintilian tells us that this satire of Varro was of a former
kind; for how can we possibly imagine this to be, since Varro, who
was contemporary to Cicero, must consequently be after Lucilius?
But Quintilian meant not that the satire of Varro was in order of
time before Lucilius; he would only give us to understand that the
Varronian satire, with mixture of several sorts of verses, was more
after the manner of Ennius and Pacuvius than that of Lucilius, who
was more severe and more correct, and gave himself less liberty in
the mixture of his verses in the same poem.