Horace's idealism is not Christian idealism, and is only in a limited
way even spiritual idealism. When he prays, it is likely to be for
others rather than himself, and for temporal blessings only: for the
success of Augustus at home and in the field, for prolongation of
Maecenas' life and happiness, for the weal of the State, for the
nurslings of his little flock, for health of body and contentment of
heart. His dwelling is not in the secret place of the Most High.
Philosophy, not religion, is his refuge and his fortress. In philosophy,
not in God, will he trust.

In a word, Horace is logical, self-reliant, and self-sufficient. He sees
no happy future after this life, is conscious of no providence watching
over him, is involved in no obligation to the beings of an eternal
world. He looks this world and the next, gods and men, directly in the
face, and expects other men to do the same. Life and its duties are for
him clear-cut. He is no propounder of problems, no searcher after hidden
purposes. He lacks almost absolutely the feverish aspiration and unrest
which characterize Christian and other humanitarian modes of thought and
sentiment, and whose manifestation is one of the best known features of
recent modern times, as it was of the earliest Christian experience.

But Christianity was a religion of men, and therefore human. If its
exaggerations were natural, its reservations and its reactions were also
natural. There were men whose admiration continued to be roused and
whose affections continued to be touched by Virgil and Horace. There
were men whose reason as well as whose instinct impelled them to employ
the classic authors and the classic arts in the service of the new
religion. Christianity possessed no distinct and separate media of
expression and no separate body of knowledge which could bear fruit as
matter of instruction. Pagan art and literature were indispensable