Most evident it is that, whether he imitated the
Roman farce or the Greek comedies, he is to be acknowledged for the
first author of Roman satire, as it is properly so called, and
distinguished from any sort of stage-play.
Of Pacuvius, who succeeded him, there is little to be said, because
there is so little remaining of him; only that he is taken to be the
nephew of Ennius, his sister's son; that in probability he was
instructed by his uncle in his way of satire, which we are told he
has copied; but what advances he made, we know not.
Lucilius came into the world when Pacuvius flourished most. He also
made satires after the manner of Ennius; but he gave them a more
graceful turn, and endeavoured to imitate more closely the vetus
comaedia of the Greeks, of the which the old original Roman satire
had no idea till the time of Livius Andronicus. And though Horace
seems to have made Lucilius the first author of satire in verse
amongst the Romans in these words -
"Quid? cum est Lucilius auses
Primus in hunc operis componere carmina morem" -
he is only thus to be understood--that Lucilius had given a more
graceful turn to the satire of Ennius and Pacuvius, not that he
invented a new satire of his own; and Quintilian seems to explain
this passage of Horace in these words: Satira quidem tota nostra
est; in qua primus insignem laudem adeptus est Luciluis.
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