Page:Virgil's Pastorals, Georgics and Aeneis - Dryden (1709) - volume 1.pdf/57

 Ac veluti magno in populo, cum sæpe coorta est Seditio, sævitque animis ignobile vulgus Jamque faces, ac saxa volant, furor arma ministrat. Tum pietate gravem, & meritis si forte virum quem Conspexere silent, arrectisque auribus adstant. Ille regit dictis animos, & pectora mulcet. Piety and Merit were the two great Virtues which Virgil every where attributes to Augustus, and in which that Prince, at least Po∣litickly, if not so truly, fix'd his Character, as appears by the Marmor Ancyr. and several of his Medals. Franshemius, the Learn'd Supplementor of Livy, has inserted this Relation into his History; nor is there any good Reason, why Ruæus should account it fabulous. The Title of a Poet in those days did not abate, but heighten the Character of the gravest Senator. Virgil was one of the best and wisest Men of his time, and in so popular esteem, that one hundred thousand Romans rose when Rh