Whether people liked him or loathed him, he was in many ways a puzzling and contradictory revolutionary. He was one of the most radical innovators Rome ever saw. He exercised such influence over elections that the popular democratic process withered...He controlled the Roman army by directly hiring and firing the legionary commanders and by making himself the overall governor of all the provinces in which there was a military presence. He attempted to micromanage the behaviour of citizens in an entirely new and intrusive way, from regulating the sex life of the upper classes, who were to suffer political penalties if they did not produce enough children, to stipulating what people should wear in the Forum — togas only, no tunics, trousers or nice warm cloaks. And, unlike anyone before, he directed the traditional mechanisms of Roman literary patronage towards a concerted, centrally sponsored campaign. Cicero had been eager to find poets to celebrate his various successes. Augustus to all intents and purposes had writers such as Virgil and Horace on his payroll...'I have given them empire without limit' (imperium sine fine), Jupiter prophesies for the Romans in Virgil's The Aeneid, national epic, instant classic and a book which landed straight on the school curriculum in Augustan Rome.
— Mary Beard, SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome
Quintili Vare, legiones redde! translation
— Octavian's famous reaction to the Battle of Teutoberg Forest.
