"_Poeta nascitur, non fit._"--Can any of your correspondents inform me who
is the author of the well-known saying--
"Poeta nascitur, non fit"?
I have more than once seen it quoted as from Horace, but I have never been
able to find it in any classical author whose works I have examined. Cicero
expresses a similar sentiment in his oration for the poet Archias, cap.
viii.:
"Atqui sic a summis hominibus eruditissimisque accepimus, ceterarum
rerum studia, et doctrina, et praeceptis, et arte constare: poetam
natura ipsa valere, et mentis viribus excitari, et quasi divino quodam
spiritu inflari."