at reform on political lines only was without
any element of stability, and that he knew that it was far more
important to touch a spring in the feeling of the people, than to occupy
himself, like Sulla, in mending old machinery or inventing new. If he
could but induce them to believe in him as the restorer of the _pax
deorum_, he knew that his work was accomplished. And I believe that we
have what is practically his own word for this conviction; not in his
Res Gestae, the _Monumentum Ancyranum_, which is a record of facts and
of deeds only, but in the famous hymn which Horace wrote at his instance
and to give expression to his ideas, for use in the Secular Games of 17
B.C., to which I am coming presently. Ferrero has lately described that
hymn as a magnificent poem,[908] an opinion which to me is
incomprehensible. It is neat, and embodies the necessary ideas
adequately, but it is far too flat to be the genuine offspring of such a
poet as Horace. To me it reads as though Augustus had written it in
prose and then ordered his poet to put it into metre; and assuredly it
expresses exactly what we should have expected Augustus to wish to be
sung by his youthful choirs. I shall refer to it again shortly to
illustrate another point; all I need say now is that he who reads it
carefully and thinks about it will find there the conviction of which I
have been speaking, that prosperity and fertility, whether of man,
beast, or crop, depend on the Roman's attitude toward his deities;
religion, morality, fertility, and public concord are the points which
the astute ruler wished to be emphasised.[909] That this hymn was a
really important part of the ceremony is certain from the fact that it
was given to the best living poet to write, and that his name is
mentioned as its author in the inscription, discovered not many years
ago, which commemorated the whole performance: "CARMEN COMPOSUIT Q.
HORATIUS FLACCUS."[910]

If, then, I am right, this strange movement was not merely a revival of
religious ceremonies, but an appeal through them to the conscience of
the people. A revival of religious _life_ it, of course, was not, for
what we understand by that term had never existed at Rome; but it was an
attempt to give expression, in a religious form and under State
authorisation, to certain feelings and ideas not far removed in kind
from those which in our own day we describe as our religious experience.
Whether Augustus himself shared in thes