PERSIUS Flaccus (Aulus), a celebrated Roman satirist, was a native of Volaterra in Etruria, and descended of an equestrian family of considerable eminence in the state. The little that we know respecting his personal history is chiefly derived from a slight sketch commonly ascribed to the pen of Suetonius. He was born a. d. 34, in the twentieth year of the reign of Tiberius, and died a. d. 62, in the twenty-eighth year of his age, and in the eighth of the reign of Nero. He lost his father at an early age; and his mother, Fulvia Sisennia, removed to Rome, that her son might enjoy the best education which the imperial city could furnish. He studied first under the grammarian Rhemmius Palaemon, and the rhetorician Virginius Flavus; and when he reached his sixteenth year, he was placed under the Stoic philosopher Annaeus Cornutus, to whom he became passionately attached, and from whom he imbibed those tenets by which his writings are characterized. In his younger days he was much in the company of Paetus Thrasea, whose noble character must no doubt have tended to form the mind of Persius to virtuous habits. He was also intimately acquainted with Lucan, who had been his fellow-pupil under Cornutus. His admiration of the Satires of Lucilius is said to have first turned his attention to the study of poetry. His character was austere, his mode of life pure and blameless, and his affection for his friends strong and unbending. He left a considerable property to his mother and sisters; and his books, which are said to have consisted of seven hundred volumes, he bequeathed to his friend Cornutus. The philosopher recommended to his mother that she should commit to the flames all his manuscripts except his Satires. These were accordingly preserved, and consist of one book, divided, according to some, into five satires, and according to others, into six.

If we consider the nature and general scope of the writings of Persius, we shall find the severe tenets of the Stoics everywhere pervading them, and that the poet, unable to conceal the virtuous indignation which naturally rises in his breast, in contemplating the ignoble and vicious lives of those by whom he was surrounded, pours forth in strong and unmeasured language the feelings which occupy his soul. He disdains, like Horace, to laugh at those vices which he regards with such deep-felt abhorrence. He has none of the lively and playful humour of Horace; and there is a sternness and an austerity in his remarks, which leave a painful impression on the mind. He shows that he is entirely occupied with his subject, and that his sentiments flow from a mind deeply convinced of their truth. His language, however, is at times so obscure and enigmatical, that it is difficult to attach a meaning to it, even with the assistance of the ancient scholia. This circumstance has tended to detract much from the merits of Persius; but Quintilian and Martial, amongst the ancients, have both expressed a high admiration of his talents and writings.

The best edition of his Satires is that of Ruperti, published along with the Satires of Juvenal, Leipzig, 1819. The best separate edition is that of Franz Passpw, with a metrical translation and introduction to the life and writings of Persius, Leipzig, 1809.