University of Virginia Library

THE SECOND CHORUS FROM SENECA'S HERCULES OETAEUS

What harming hurl of fortune's arm thou dreadest,
Let fraught of faith the burden of care relieve,
And take thou such, to fear approved by proof,
The unpicked locks of certain trust to hold;
For geason is the faith, and rarely kept is trust,
Where puffed sails from best forewinds be fallen.
The weight of scepter's sway if choice must bear,
Albeit the vulgar crew fill full thy gates,
And hundred thresholds with their feet be smoothed:
Though with thy gleaves and axes thou be armed,
And root full great do glory give thy name,
Amid the view of all these sundry sorts
One faultless faith her room even scant may claim.
The golden ledge full wrathful spites besets,
And where the gates their posts draw forth by breadth
More easy way to guiles and passed safe.
Heed then the clocks of warned harms with good,
And let the hidden blade not wrong thee work,
For when most show by gazers' eyes is spied,
And presence great thy honor most advance,
This gift retain as fellow to thy room:
Disdain may frown, but envy thrust thee through.
No ofter doth the east the night's care release
And makes the shady dark with light abash
Than kings be made in an instant short, and marred;
So icy is their joy and hopeless woe.
The love of kingdom's rule observed with care,
But for himself a king but few regard.
The court's luster a stale guest made for me,
Delighted with the shine no woe forthought.
And this man seeks the nearest room to prince,
To glittering view amid the streets he comes;
While broiled is with cark the miser's breast
In search of gainful grasp his name to spread.
In compass of the hoarded heaps to find
One bit to slake desire's wave he seeks.
Not all the coast where Istrus' trade doth haunt,
With gems bedecked through hue of diverse kind,
Nor Lydia fair with sweetest streams suffice
To quench nor answer all such thirst by half;
Nor yet the soil that bides Zephirus' slave,
Abashed at golden shining Tagus' beams,
Nor Hebrus' service may content at full,
Rich though Hydaspes' hedge his fields throw out,
Though Ganges' course his confines all do graze
With filled force to water all his lands.
To greedy grating wights enough not all
That nature well doth please his lack not so.
This man doth homage unto kingly force,
And harbor Rome adores where last he haunts,
Not meaning that this plowshare should advance
Like crooked hind his master's gain with clots
By murdering the ground; no ease of toil
Though thousand leas his husbandmen turn up.
Well pleased rests his hearth with goods even such
As pleasure may by gift another need.
A badder sort the prince's court regard
With foiled foot that stumble gives at all
And each to lose with no avail to one.
That might may equal harm they power achieve
Whose living's thread drawn out is of such length
Whom hap nor takes ere nature calls away.
The horned newed moon them blessed calls
Whose wane them misers judges when day doth fall.
A man full rarely happy is and old.
More surer sleeps thee downy turfs procure:
All Tyre, where purple woven is and made,
Not so sound slumber doth his owner yield.
The gilded roofs the quiet rest bereave,
And waking nights the purple draws from ease.
O that the breasts of rich men naked were,
The smoothed dreads of lofty lucks that hide;
The Brutian stream more milder course doth hold
When eastern wind him strikes with force's stroke.
In franched mind from care the silly soul possest,
A pot of beechen tree full sure he keeps
With steady hand that fears no snatch from hold.
No sudden fright affrays, no thief he dreads;
With ease y-got and single show he feeds
And recks not for the girded blades to thigh.
The golden cup of bloody mixture keeps.
The wife that is y-tied to man of mean estate
No carking hath in order pain to set,
Nor shining gift of reddy sea she wears
Her ears free from the pluck of gemmy weight;
No stone of Eoas' waves her cumber makes.
Soft wool ingrained with Sidon's purple fair
Drinks not the red for use that her befalls;
No Maeon needle filleth she with skeins
By parted hues that give the shade with art.
The silky land that lies to sunny east
Needs not the fruit from eastern tree to pluck;
Every herb the colors' die may mix
That distaff fills with yarn that skill not spun.
She nursed not the doubts of wedlock bed;
Of lewd suspect of weary works she shuns.
The wrathful lamp Erinis lighteth up
The feastful day adorns by pestering rout.
The poor man deemeth not his happy state
Till wealthy folk by fall it show.
Who so, therefore, the middle way eschews
The wry and crooked balk's most sure to tread.
While Phaeton boy one day of father got
To rule the reins and eke his wain to guide
In leaving wonted walk and worned ways
Which by slide, while the uncouth skies he shares
Such place as heat of Phoebus' flame knew not.
His ruin was the world his fellow plain.
Daedalus yet more larger scope and broader took,
Who never yet a sea by name did grace.
Though Icarus sought the true and living birds
By guile to pass and win the tryer's right,
His father's feathered wings despised with scorn,
To Phoebus near with swifty gait he hies,
And christened by this slip the sea was sure.
Evil bought the great where ill exceeds the good.
Let one full happy be and highly flee.
God shield that mighty me the vulgar call.
The lee of shore my silly boat shall loathe,
Let no full wind to depth my bark bequeath.
From safest creeks doth fortune glide and shun,
With search in middest sea for tallest ship
And takes its dearest prey the nearer to cloud.