we are told, recommended him to general esteem; and he had the good
fortune to obtain the patronage of Cicero. When he came to be known as a
poet, all these circumstances would naturally contribute to increase his
reputation for ingenuity; and accordingly we find his genius applauded by
several of his contemporaries. It appears that his works are not
transmitted entire to posterity; but there remain sufficient specimens by
which we may be enabled to appreciate his poetical talents.

Quintilian, and Diomed the grammarian, have ranked Catullus amongst the
iambic writers, while others have placed him amongst the lyric. He has
properly a claim to each of these stations; but his versification being
chiefly iambic, the former of the arrangements seems to be the most
suitable. The principal merit of Catullus's Iambics consists in a
simplicity of thought and expression. The thoughts, however, are often
frivolous, and, what is yet more reprehensible, the author gives way to
gross obscenity: in vindication of which, he produces the following
couplet, declaring that a good poet ought to be chaste in his own person,
but that his verses need not be so.

Nam castum esse decet pium poetam
Ipsum: versiculos nihil necesse est.

This sentiment has been frequently cited by those who were inclined to
follow the example of Catullus; but if such a practice be in any case
admissible, it is only where the poet personates (68) a profligate
character; and the instances in which it is adopted by Catullus are not
of that description. It had perhaps been a better apology, to have
pleaded the manners of the times; for even Horace, who wrote only a few
years after, has suffered his compositions to be occasionally debased by
the same kind of blemish.