The works of Horace, translated into verse :: :: University of Virginia Library

The works of Horace, translated into verse

With a prose interpretation, for the help of students. And occasional notes. By Christopher Smart ... In four volumes

Smart, Christopher (1722-1771)

VOLUME I.

[dedication]

THE FIRST BOOK OF THE ODES OF HORACE.

THE SECOND BOOK OF THE ODES OF HORACE.

THE THIRD BOOK OF THE ODES OF HORACE.

II.

VOLUME II.

III.

VOLUME III.

IV.

VOLUME IV.

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I. VOLUME I.

Libera per vacuum posui vestigia princeps,
Non aliena meo pressi pede, qui sibi fidit
Dux regit examen.
—Hor. de seipso.

To the Right Honourable Sir FRANCIS BLAKE DELAVAL, KNIGHT OF THE BATH.

THE FIRST BOOK OF THE ODES OF HORACE.

ODE I. TO MÆCENAS.

Different men have their several pleasures: Horace affects the name of a poet, especially in the lyric cast.

Mæcenas, of a race renown'd,
Whose royal ancestors were crown'd;
O patron of my wealth and praise,
And pride and pleasure of my days!
Some of a vent'rous cast there are,
That glory in th'Olympic car,
Whose glowing wheels in dust they roll,
Driv'n to an inch upon the goal,
And rise from mortal to divine,
Ennobled by the wreath they twine.
One, if the giddy mob proclaim,
And vying lift to threefold fame;

One, if within his barn he stores
The wealth of Lybian threshing-floors,
Will never from his course be press'd,
For all that Attalus possess'd,
To plow, with sailor's anxious pain,
In Cyprian sloop th'Egean main.
The merchant, dreading the south-west,
Whose blasts th'Icarian wave molest,
Praises his villa's rural ease,
Built amongst bowling-greens and trees;
But soon the thoughts of growing poor
Make him his shatter'd barks insure.
There's now and then a social soul
That will not scorn the Massic bowl,
Nor shuns to break in a degree
On the grave day's solidity;
Now underneath the shrubby shade,
Now by the sacred fountain laid.
Many are for the martial strife,
And love the trumpet and the fife,
That mingle in the din of war,
Which all the pious dames abhor:
The sportsman, heedless of his fair,
With patience braves the wintry air,
Whether his blood-hounds, staunch and keen,
The hind have in the covert seen,
Or wild boar of the Marsian breed,
From the round-twisted cords is freed.

But as for Horace, I espouse
The glory of the scholar's brows,
The wreath of festive ivy wove,
Which makes one company for Jove.
Me the cool groves by zephyrs fann'd,
Where nymphs and satyrs, hand in hand,
Dance nimbly to the rural song,
Distinguish from the vulgar throng.
If nor Euterpe, heavenly gay,
Forbid her pleasant pipes to play,
Nor Polyhymnia disdain
A lesson in the Lesbian strain,
That, thro' Mæcenas, I may pass
'Mongst writers of the Lyric class,
My muse her laurell'd head shall rear,
And top the zenith of her sphere.

To the three greatest honours of Rome; to be either ediles, prætors, or consuls.

ODE II. TO AUGUSTUS CÆSAR.

Many storms and tempests are inflicted upon the Roman people, to avenge the death of Julius Cæsar. The sole hope of the empire is placed in the safety of Augustus.

Surely at length it may suffice,
These frequent storms of snow and hail,
Which Jove, commission'd from the skies,
So dreadful to prevail!
And hurling from his flaming arm
His vengeful bolts, 'midst thunder-show'rs
Has o'er the city spread th'alarm,
And smote the sacred tow'rs.
Thro' all the world th'alarm is spread,
For fear of those portentous days,
When Proteus on the mountain's head
Made his sea-monsters graze.
On topmost elms the scaly race
Stuck where the ring-doves us'd to be,
And tim'rous deer, expell'd their place,
Swam in the whelming sea.
We saw the sandy Tiber drive
Huge billows from th'Etrurian strand,
And e'en at Vesta's fane arrive
To mar, what Numa plann'd.

Whilst vengeful 'gainst the will supreme
He fondling hears his wife complain,
And flooding to the left his stream,
He glories in our bane.
Thinn'd by our crimes our sons shall tell,
How Romans whet the sword and spear,
(Against the Persians had been well)
And all our broils shall hear.
What pow'r to save her sinking name
Shall Rome invoke, what urgent suit
Shall Vesta's holy virgin's frame
In hymns that bear no fruit.
What worthy, for the nation's aid,
Our crimes t'atone shall Jove assign,
Come white-rob'd Phœbus, as we've pray'd,
Do thou thyself divine?
Or if thou rather wouldst befriend
Glad queen of Eryce's perfumes,
Whom love and pleasantry attend
With their ambrosial plumes—

Or, Mars, if thou at length wouldst speed,
O founder of the Roman race,
To visit thy neglected seed,
Now sunk into disgrace:
Too long indulg'd thy cruel sport,
Whom noise, and polish'd helms delight,
And the fierce Moor's determin'd port,
And aspect in the fight.
Or if the part you can sustain,
By thee the righteous deed be done,
You , which yourself a mortal feign,
O gentle Maia's son:
Late may'st thou be again receiv'd,
And long in gladness rule our state,
Nor thee at all our vices griev'd,
Th'unwelcome gale translate!
Here rather be the triumph priz'd,
And, father, emp'ror dear to Rome,
Delight thine ear—nor unchastis'd,
Let scamp'ring Medes presume!

Ilia, the mother of Romulus, was cast into the Tiber; and hence (as some will have it) poetically called his wife. It is likely she was very fond to walk by that pleasant river, till she was wedded to the place.

The poet here supposes Augustus to be Mercury, in a human shape. There are many reasons (says Rodellius) wherefore Augustus might be likened to Mercury: for if the courier in ordinary of the Gods was expert in business, quick, and resembling a lively youth, Octavius, the minister of providence for the repose of mankind, was all this also, at that time being twenty-three. Mercury was the God of genius and address, Octavius a very great patron of the one, and a most consummate master of the other.

ODE III.

[So may the queen of Cyprus' isle]

He prays that the ship may have a good passage, which was about to carry Virgil to Athens: after which he, with great spirit inveighs against the temerity of mankind.

So may the queen of Cyprus' isle
And Helen's brethren in sweet star-light smile,
And Æolus the winds arrest,
All but the fav'ring gales of fresh north-west,
O ship, that ow'st so great a debt,
No less than Virgil, to our fond regret!
By thee on yon Athenian shore
Let him be safely landed, I implore:
And o'er the billows, as they roll,
Preserve the larger portion of my soul!
A heart of oak, and breast of brass
Were his, who first presum'd on seas to pass,
And ever ventur'd to engage,
In a slight skiff, with ocean's desperate rage;
Nor fear'd to hear the cracking masts,
When Africus contends with northern blasts;
Nor Hyads, still foreboding storms,
Nor wrathful south, that all the depth deforms;

Than whom no greater tyrant reigns
Whether the waves he ruffles or restrains.
How dauntless of all death was he,
Whose tearless eyes could such strange monsters see;
Cou'd see the swelling ocean low'r,
Or those huge rocks, which in Epirus tow'r!
Dread Providence the land in vain
Has cut from that dissociable main,
If impious mortals not the less
On this forbidden element transgress:
Determin'd each extreme to bear,
All desp'rate deeds the race of mortals dare.
Prometheus, with presumptuous fraud,
Stole fire from heav'n, and spread the flame abroad,
Of which dire sacrilege the fruit,
The lank consumption, and a new recruit
Of fevers came upon mankind,
And for a long delay at first design'd,
The last extremity advanc'd,
And urg'd the march of death, and all his pangs inhanc'd,
With wings, not giv'n a man below,
Did Dedalus attempt in air to go.
Th'Herculean toil, exceeding bound,
Broke through the gulf of Acheron profound.

Nothing too difficult for man,
He'll scale the skies in folly, if he can;
Nor by his vices every day
Will give Jove leave his wrathful bolts to stay.

This ode is to be referred to the year of Rome 734, in which Virgil made a voyage to Athens, intending there to put the last hand to his Eneid at his leisure. He was scarce arrived, when Augustus returning from the East to Italy, brought him back with him; but being taken ill on ship-board, he was put ashore at Brandusium, where, the year following, he died, aged fifty-one.

ODE IV. TO SEXTIUS, A PERSON OF CONSULAR DIGNITY .

By describing the delightfulness of spring, and urging the common lot of mortality, he exhorts Sextius, as an Epicurean, to a life of voluptuousness.

A grateful change! Favonius, and the spring
To the sharp winter's keener blasts succeed,
Along the beach, with ropes, the ships they bring,
And launch again, their watry way to speed.
No more the plowmen in their cots delight,
Nor cattle are contented in the stall;
No more the fields with hoary frosts are white,
But Cytherean Venus leads the ball.
She, while the moon attends upon the scene,
The Nymphs and decent Graces in the set,
Shakes with alternate feet the shaven green,
While Vulcan's Cyclops at the anvil sweat.
Now we with myrtle shou'd adorn our brows,
Or any flow'r that decks the loosen'd sod;
In shady groves to Faunus pay our vows,
Whether a lamb or kid delight the God.

Pale death alike knocks at the poor man's door,
O happy Sextius, and the royal dome,
The whole of life forbids our hope to soar,
Death and the shades anon shall press thee home.
And when into the shallow grave you run,
You cannot win the monarchy of wine,
Nor doat on Lycidas, as on a son,
Whom for their spouse all little maids design.

Though this Sextius always had favoured his friend Brutus, and even at this time respected his memory, insomuch as to preserve busts of him in his house, yet Augustus, in love with such fidelity, not without prodigious applause for his generosity, chose him his colleague, in the year of Rome 713, from whence, I conjecture (says Rodellius) that this Ode was written the year following, there being no reason to call Sextius happy before his consulate, and the season of the consulate itself not being for indulging the genius in matter of festivity.

ODE V. TO PYRRHA.

Horace has escaped from the allurements of Pyrrha, as from a ship-wreck. He affirms such as are ensnared by her love to be in a state of wretchedness.

Say what slim youth, with moist perfumes
Bedaub'd, now courts thy fond embrace,
There, where the frequent rose-tree blooms,
And makes the grot so sweet a place?
Pyrrha, for whom with such an air
Do you bind back your golden hair?

So seeming in your cleanly vest,
Whose plainness is the pink of taste—
Alas! how oft shall he protest
Against his confidence misplac't,
And love's inconstant pow'rs deplore,
And wondrous winds, which, as they roar,

Throw black upon the alter'd scene—
Who now so well himself deceives,
And thee all sunshine, all serene
For want of better skill believes,
And for his pleasure has presag'd
Thee ever dear and disengag'd.

Wretched are all within thy snares,
The inexperienc'd and the young!
For me the temple witness bears
Where I my dropping weeds have hung,
And left my votive chart behind
To him that rules both wave and wind.

ODE VI. TO AGRIPPA.

Varius, the tragic and epic poet, will with more address sing the atchievements of Agrippa. Horace is only fit to celelebrate revels, and take pictures from middle life.

Brave and victorious in the fight,
Our Varius with Mæonian flight
Shall thine atchievements blaze,
Whate'er, beneath thy great command,
The troops have done by sea and land,
In fierce desire of praise.

Agrippa, I cannot attain
The grandeur of the epic strain,
Tho' rous'd by deeds like thine,
Nor colour up the glowing page
With Peleus son's immortal rage,
Nor reach the great design

That artful hero to recount,
Who could by sea such toils surmont;
Nor sing the barbrous race
Of Pelops, while the bashful lyre
Thy praise and Cæsar's on the wire
Forbids me to disgrace.

What mortal pen can Mars recite,
In adamantine armour bright,
Or with the life compare
Meriones in dust involv'd,
Or him, Menerva's aid resolv'd
The Gods themselves to dare?

I sing of sports and am'rous play,
(For all these things are in my way)
And nymphs of sportive veins,
That are so apt to scratch and tear
With nails which to the quick they pare
Against their fav'rite swains.

ODE VII. TO MUNATIUS PLANCUS, A PERSON OF CONSULAR DIGNITY

Some writers praise one city or region, and some another. Horace prefers Tibur to all the world, in which place Plancus was born, whom he exhorts to the washing away of care by wine.

Let others sing the praise of famous Rhodes
Or Mytilene, or th'Ephesian pride,
Or chant the walls of Corinth in their odes,
Wash'd by a different sea on either side,
Or Thebes for Bacchus, Delphi justly fam'd
For Phœbus, or Thessalian Tempe's vale;
Some make the seat of Pallas, nymph unblam'd,
The theme of one uninterrupted tale,
And run all lengths to wear an olive-crown—
Many for Juno, with poetic zeal,
Argus so apt for cavalry renown,
And, rich Mycenæ, boast thy public weal.
With me nor patient Sparta, nor the plains
Of high-manur'd Larissa e'er cou'd take,
As where Albunea's tinkling fount remains,
Or Anio roaring down into the lake.

And old Tiburnus' grove for ever green,
Where flow'ring orchards give a strong perfume,
Where marshal'd trees upon the stream are seen,
And in the waggling waters wave their bloom.
As the white south at times serenes the skies,
Nor are his gathring show'rs for ever rife;
So thou, O Plancus, 'gainst thy cares be wise,
With mellow wine dismiss the toils of life,
Whether the camp, with shining standards gay,
Detain you ready for the hour of fight,
Or in your native Tibur you shall stay,
And in the dense embow'ring shades delight.
When Teucer by his father was oppress'd,
And driv'n away from Salamis he fled,
He thus his weeping company address'd,
As, wet with wine, the poplar bound his head.
“Sped on by fortune, kinder than my sire,
“O my co-mates, we'll go where'er she pleases;
“Despair of nothing and to all aspire—
“By Teucer's guidance Teucer's auspices.
“For Phœbus has of certainty foretold,
“That in a land to us advent'rers new,
“Fair Salamis a doubtful name shall hold,
“O brave companions, O my faithful few!
“Ye that with me have harder things endur'd,
“Than all the evils which ye now sustain,
“This day your grief and care with wine be cur'd,
“To-morrow sends us to the depth again.”

Munatius Plancus, upon the death of Cæsar, at first sided with Octavius, and was consul with M. Lepidus, in the year of Rome, 712. After that he went over to Antony, and did not return to Augustus till 722, who, in consideration of what was past, perhaps not putting any great confidence in him, made no use of him in the war, which that very year was denounced against Antony and Cleopatra. Plancus upon this, being in a state of chagrin, stood in need of that consolation which Horace endeavours to give him in this ode.

ODE VIII. TO LYDIA.

He animadverts upon Sybaris, a youth distractedly in love with Lydia, and wholly dissolved in pleasures.

I charge thee, Lydia, tell me straight,
Why Sybaris destroy,
Why make love do the deeds of hate,
And to his end precipitate
The dear enamour'd boy?
Why can he not the field abide,
From sun and dust recede,
Nor with his friends, in gallant pride,
Dress'd in his regimentals, ride,
And curb the manag'd steed?
Why does he now to bathe disdain,
And fear the sandy flood?
Why from th'athletic oil refrain,
As if its use would-be his bane,
As sure as viper's blood?
No more his shoulders black and blue
By wearing arms appear;
He, who the quoit so dextrous threw,
And from whose hand the jav'lin flew
Beyond a rival's spear;

Why does he skulk, as authors say
Of Thetis' fav'rite heir,
Lest a man's habit should betray,
And force him to his troops away,
The work of death to share?

ODE IX. TO THALIARCHUS.

The greater the violence of the winter, the more we should indulge in festivity.

See high Soracte, white with snow,
Still more and more a mountain grow,
Nor can the lab'ring woods their weight sustain,
And motionless with frost the sharpen'd streams remain.
Dissolve the cold, a rousing fire
Upon the social hearth aspire,
And four years old with bountiful design
Bring in the Sabine jar the long-expected wine.
Leave to th'immortal Gods the rest,
For when they shall have once supprest
The winds, that on the boiling surge contend,
Nor cypress shakes a leaf, nor yon old ash-trees bend.
Enquire not of to-morrow's fate,
And whatsoever chance await,
Turn to account, nor fly from sweet amours,
Nor let the dance be shunn'd by such address as yours.

While yet your vig'rous years are green,
Nor peevish age brings on the spleen,
By turns the field, the tenis-court repeat,
And whispers soft at night for assignations meet.
Now glad to hear the damsel raise
The laugh, that her retreat betrays,
Steal from her arm the pledge for theft dispos'd,
Or from her finger force, with sham-resistance clos'd,

The pronoun tu being emphatical in the original, it is likely that Thaliarchus was an excellent dancer.

ODE X. TO MERCURY.

Whom he praises for his eloquence, his parentage, for the invention of the lyre and palestra, for his great address in pilfering, and for the offices that he discharges.

O thou, which, eloquent and chaste,
From Atlas sprung, rough man to rule,
And form our sons to toil and taste
As in th'Athenian school.
Thee will I sing, great Jove's courier,
Inventor of the lyre confest;
Expert to steal and disappear,
And turn it to a jest.
Thee when a boy, with threats injoin'd
To bring the steers you had withdrawn,
Apollo laugh'd aloud to find
His quiver also gone.
King Priam likewise, thee his guide,
Deserting Troy with all his wealth,
Atreus his haughty sons defy'd,
And hostile camp by stealth.

The pious souls to realms of love,
Your golden rod compels to go,
O grateful to the Gods above
And to the pow'rs below.

A school for wrestling, and other manly exercises.

ODE XI. TO LEUCONOE.

He advises Leuconoe to indulge in pleasure, regardless of all care for the morrow, by deducing his arguments from the brevity and fleetness of life.

Seek not, what we're forbid to know,
The date the Gods decree
To you, my fair Leuconoe,
Or what they fix for me.
Nor your Chaldean books consult,
But chearfully submit,
(How much a better thought it is?)
To what the Gods think fit.
Whether more winters on our head
They shall command to low'r,
Or this the very last of all
Shall bring our final hour.
E'en this, whose rough tempestuous rage
Makes yon Tyrrhenian roar,
And all his foamy breakers dash
Upon the rocky shore.
Be wise and broach your mellow wine,
Which carefully decant,
And your desires proportionate
To life's compendious grant.
E'en while we speak the moments fly,
Be greedy of to-day;
Nor trust another for those pranks
Which we may never play.

In order to imitate the metre of the original, the longest measure in the English tongue (much in use amongst our old poets) is here introduced: but, for convenience of printing, one line is severed into two.

ODE XII. TO AUGUSTUS.

Having celebrated the Gods, heroes, and certain famous men, at last he comes to the divine honours of Augustus.

Clio, to sing on pipe or lyre,
What man, what hero is your choice,
And with what God will you inspire
Glad echo's mimic voice?
Or in the Heliconian shade,
Or Pindus or cool Hæmus sped,
Where the vague woods at random stray'd
With Orpheus at their head?
E'en he who, by his mother's art,
The loud cascade, the rapid wind
Cou'd stop—and ears to oaks impart,
To his soft airs inclin'd?
First then the usual form of praise
Is his, who men and Gods impow'rs,
The earth, the sea, the world he sways,
The seasons and the hours.
From whom no greater can proceed,
To whom no being's like or near;
Yet Pallas challenges the mead
Of secondary fear.

Nor thee, brave Liber, will I slight,
Nor thee, fair Forrester, the foe
Of beasts, nor thee which aim'st so right,
Dread Phœbus, with thy bow.
Alcides next, and Leda's twins,
In chivalry and cestus too
I praise, whose star, when it begins
To bless the seaman's view,
Its brightness makes the waves subside,
The winds are still, the clouds disperse,
And smooth at their command's the tide,
That roar'd but now so fierce.
Now shall I Rome's first founder sing,
Or Numa's peaceful reign commend,
Or Priscus great and mighty king,
Or Cato's glorious end?
Great Regulus I will enroll,
The house of Scaurus, Paulus write,
So lavish of his godlike soul,
And grateful thee recite,
Fabricius, with rough Curius join'd;
Him and Camillus too for arms
A hardy poverty design'd
In their paternal farms.

As imperceptibly the pines,
Marcellus, so thy fame aspires:
The Julian star, like Luna, shines
Amongst the lesser fires.
Sire and preserver of our race,
From Saturn sprung, do thou convey,
That Cæsar hold the second place
In thine eternal sway;
Whether o'er Parthia's threatning host
At a just triumph he arrive,
Or, subject to the eastern coast,
Confed'rate Indians drive.
Subordinate to thee alone,
He o'er the happy world shall reign,
While thou shalt thunder from thy throne
On each polluted fane.

A word attempted in the peculiarity of Horace—grant by deligation, make over your right.

ODE XIII. TO LYDIA.

He is very uneasy that his rival Telephus is preferred to him by Lydia.

When Lydia to my rival tells
How Telephus, her Telephus excells;
And harps upon his manly charms,
His neck so rosy-red, and iv'ry arms;
Alas! I boil with jealous ire,
And all th'internal man is set on fire.
Then are my pow'rs of reason weak,
My colour comes and goes, and down my cheek
The trickling tears of anguish steal,
Proof of the ling'ring fever that I feel.
I burn, if in th'immod'rate broils
Of liquor thy white sleeves the tipler soils,
Or in a raging am'rous fit,
Has left his mark upon the lips he bit.
Believe me, Lydia, in the end
You cannot hope his love will long extend,
Who to your kisses is so rude
By Venus in nectareous balm imbu'd.

O happy thrice, and thrice again!
Who without breach still hug the pleasing chain;
Nor ever any bick'ring strife
Can part them till the last extreme of life.

ODE XIV. TO THE REPUBLIC OF ROME, ON THE RENEWAL OF THE CIVIL WAR.

New floods of strife that swell the main,
O ship, shall bring thee out again;
O wherefore venture? 'tis your fort
To keep your station in the port.
Do not you see your sides bereft,
Till not a single oar is left,
And, wounded by the rapid blast,
Groan the crack'd sail-yards and the mast?
Nor are there scarcely farther hopes,
That your old keel, despoil'd of ropes,
Can longer hold it out to brave
The fury of th'impetuous wave.
Thy canvas is no longer tight,
Nor Gods to sue in evil plight,
Tho' once a Pontic pine you stood,
And daughter of a noble wood,
May'st boast a vain descent and form—
The tim'rous seaman in a storm
Trusts not in painted planks—be warn'd,
Lest by the hissing winds you're scorn'd.

Late my vexation and my care,
Still my desire and constant pray'r,
Yet may'st thou from those isles be free
That glister in th'Ionian sea.

ODE XV. THE PREDICTIONS OF NEREUS CONCERNING THE DESTRUCTION OF TROY.

When Paris ship'd in base deceit,
Against all hospitable laws,
Fair Helen in th'Idean fleet,
Nereus injoin'd the winds a pause;
And hush'd into the peace, they hate
The rapid murm'rers, while he sung
Each cruel circumstance and date
Of distiny, that o'er them hung.
“Ill-omen'd her you take to Troy,
“Whom Greece united shall reclaim,
“And Priam's ancient reign destroy,
“And your connubials with the dame.
“What deaths attend the Dardan realm!
“What toils for man and steed to bear!
“See Pallas now her shield, her helm,
“Her car and all her wrath prepare!
“In vain, presumptuous in the aid
Of Venus, you your hair shall tire,
“And grateful to each list'ning maid
“Run soft divisions on the lyre.

“In vain the spears and Cretan dart,
“So dread to amorous delight,
“You shall avoid with timid heart,
“And Ajax swift to urge your flight.
“Yet late, too late, adultr'ous swain,
“You shall your locks in dust besmear,
“See there Ulysses, see the bane
“Of Troy with Pylian Nestor near.
“The Salaminian Teucer speeds—
“See warlike Sthenelus arrive,
“Who, if there's need of martial steeds,
“Is excellent those steeds to drive.
“Thou too, Meriones, shall know,
And more heroic than his sire
“Hear Diomed, thy deadly foe,
“In wrath to find thy post inquire.
“Whom you in panting haste shall fly,
“Tho' Helen heard another tale,
“As harts the wolf they chance to spy,
“Heedless of pasture in the vale.
“Long as Achilles' wrath shall last,
“Thy Phrygian dames shall stave their doom,
“But Grecia's flames, some winters past,
“Shall Trojan tow'rs consume.”

ODE XVI. TO HIS MISTRESS.

He is reduced to sing a recantation; for he begs pardon of a young lady whom he had offended with certain Iambics: and he shifts the blame upon his passionate temper, whose uncontroulable violence he describes.

To that lampoon against your fame,
O fairer than the beauteous dame
That bore thee, put what shameful end you please,
Whether in flaming fire, or Adriatic seas.
Cybele, nor the priest possest,
Phœbus himself an inward guest,
Not Liber can the settl'd temper shake,
Not Corybantian drums with all the noise they make;
Like baleful ire, which neither blade
Of Noric temper has dismay'd;
Nor ship-devouring seas, nor fire-flakes red,
Nor Jove himself up-roaring in tremendous dread.
'Tis said Prometheus was controul'd
To work into the human mould
Some portion took from brutes of every kind,
And to the stomach's pride the lion's wrath assign'd.

'Twas wrath that could Thyestes quell,
By such a downfal, great and fell,
That final overthrow of towns, where now
O'er the raz'd walls the foe drive their insulting plough.
Take warning and suppress your rage;
Me also, in my blooming age,
Such sallies cou'd seduce too far to dare,
And in the keen Iambic satyrize my fair.
But now I would myself endear,
And for the gentle change severe,
Provided she my recantation view,
And be again my sweet, and all my hope renew.

ODE XVII. TO TYNDARIS.

He invites her to Lucretilis, shewing her sundry advantages that she should reap from the place.

Brisk Faunus oft Lyceus flies,
And to Lucretilis applies,
And there defends, in situation sweet,
My goats from showery winds, and from the burning heat.
Secure without another ward,
The wives of their unsavoury lord,
At large on thyme and arbute shrubs are fed,
Nor do their kids fierce wolves or lurking adders dread.
But more especial is their peace,
If you the imprison'd notes release,
And those sweet strains, O Tyndaris, you play,
Ustica's sloping groupe of marble piles repay.
The Gods protect, the Gods espouse
My lyric muse, and faithful vows,
Here you shall fully taste a welcome guest,
The horn of rural honours heap'd for thee and prest.

Here in a valley's close retreat
You shall avoid the dog-star's heat,
And here shall harp upon the Teian string,
Penelope and Circe vying for the king.
Here shaded, innocent and light,
You shall partake the Lesbian white,
Nor to your bow'r shall Mars himself betake,
Nor Semele's Thyoneus his disturbance make.
And, though suspected to be here,
You shall not ruffian Cyrus fear,
Lest his rude hands should not your sex forbear,
But pull your chaplet off, and the poor night-gown tear.

ODE XVIII. TO QUINTILIUS VARUS.

Wine moderately taken, makes the heart glad, but drank to excess, creates madness.

Varus, you shou'd no tree prefer
Before the sacred vine,
If you to plant the kindly soil
Of Catilus design.
For to the droughty all things hard
Has Heav'n and nature made;
Nor can we rankling care escape
Without the bottle's aid.
Who make a racket in their cups,
Of want or war's distress,
Nor rather Bachus, sire of joy,
And graceful Venus bless?
But lest we shou'd transgress and take
More liquor than we ought,
The Centaurean battles warn
O'er such carousing fought.

Great Bacchus is a warning too
As most severely just
Against Sithonians right and wrong
Confounding in their lust.
To thee my candid Bassareus
I will not do despite;
Nor bring from underneath the leaf
What best had shunn'd the light.
Restrain your Berecynthian horn,
And hush your savage drums,
After whose clam'rous din, self-love
In partial blindness comes;
Vain glory next, with empty head
Aloft, is wont to pass;
And tattling treachery succeeds
Seen through as clear as glass.

Quintilius Varus having enjoyed great posts, and even the consulship itself at Rome, was at last overthrown in Germany with a very great slaughter, called the Varian defeat, and esteemed most deplorable in the judgment of Augustus. This defeat happened shortly after the death of Horace, which (I suppose) makes Rodellius doubt whether this Quintilius Varus, to whom this ode is addressed, be the same.

The English metre is the same as in ode the eleventh.

A name of Bacchus, from the Hebrew Bassar, which signifies to work in the vineyard.

ODE XIX. OF GLYCERA.

That he is inflamed with her love.

The mother of the fierce desires
And Semele the Theban's son inspires,
And wanton wilfulness assures
To render up my heart to fresh amours.
Bright Glycera my soul inflames,
Whose lustre e'en the Parian polish shames,
And her sweet archness fans the blaze,
And slipp'ry looks that balk the lover's gaze.
Her Cyprus now deserting quite,
Venus on me careers with all her might,
Nor lets the Scythian be rehears'd,
Nor Parthian furious with his steed revers'd,
As things impertinent to sing.
Here, lads, in rolls the living verdure bring,
And frankincense and vervain place
With wine of two years old to crown the vase.
A victim welt'ring in his gore,
Her presence will propitiate the more.

ODE XX. TO MÆCENAS.

He invites Mæcenas to an entertainment by no means sumptuous.

Dear knight, with me you shall partake
In sober cups of Sabine wine,
Poor bev'rage of Horatian make,
Which with these hands of mine
Was well secur'd that very day,
When such applause in thund'ring roar
Was giv'n your merit at the play;
Till from the sounding shore
Of your own Tiber, back it came,
And at Mount Vatican arriv'd.
There echo, pleas'd t'augment your fame,
The gen'ral peal reviv'd.
You on Calenian juice can dine,
And may rich Cæcuban afford;
But Formian or Falernian wine
Appear not at my board.

Tiber takes its rise from Tuscany, the native country of Mæcenas.

ODE XXI. TO APOLLO AND DIANA.

He exhorts the damsels and boys to sing their praises.

Ye tender virgins, Dian sing,
Ye lads, the smooth-fac'd Phœbus praise;
And lov'd so much by heav'ns high king,
Latona likewise grace the lays.
Praise her that loves the streams and groves,
Such as cold Algidus o'ershade,
Or in black Erymanthus roves,
Or Cragus ever-verdant glade.
Ye vying youths of Tempe tell,
And Delos, Phœbus native place;
Him, whom the bow becomes so well,
And lyre of true Mercurial grace.
He, if he tearful war inflicts,
Or wretched famine, as you pray,
Against the Persians and the Picts
From Cæsar shall the plague convey.

ODE XXII. TO ARISTIUS FUSCUS.

Integrity of life is on all sides in security, and that he proves by an instance of himself.

One sound and pure of wicked arts
Leaves to the blacks their spear and bow,
Nor need he deadly tinctur'd darts
Within his quiver stow.
Whether the suns of southern flame,
Or barb'rous Caucasus he braves,
Or goes, where of romantic fame,
Vast tracts Hydaspes laves.
For careless, out of bounds to rove,
(A song on Lalage my plan)
Me swordless in the Sabine grove
A wolf beheld, and ran.
A monster, such as ne'er was fed
In warlike Daunia's beechen plain,
Nor e'er that nurse of lions bred,
E'en Juba's dry domain.

Me in those lifeless regions place,
Where trees receive no fost'ring gale,
Whence Jove has turn'd away his face,
And clouds obscure prevail;
Or place me, where the sun too near,
No huts can stand the heat above,
Sweet-smiling, sweetly-prattling dear,
My Lalage I'll love.

ODE XXIII. TO CHLOE.

There is no reason why Chloe should shun the touch of man, whom in the maturity of her bloom she is now fit for.

Me, Chloe, like a fawn you fly,
That seeks in trackless mountains high
Her tim'rous dam again;
Alarm'd at every thing she hears,
The woods, the winds excite her fears,
Tho' all those fears are vain.
For if a tree the breeze receives,
That plays upon the quiv'ring leaves
When spring begins to start;
Or if green lizards, where they hide,
Turn but the budding bush aside,
She trembles knees and heart.
But I continue my pursuit,
Not like the fierce Getulian brute,
Or tyger, to assail,
And of thee life and limbs bereave—
Think now at last 'tis time to leave
Thy mother for a male.

ODE XXIV. TO VIRGIL.

Who lamented inconsolably the death of Quintilius.

What can abash the mournful strains,
Or bounds prescribe to grief, like this,
For those most precious dear remains,
Of which we have so great a miss?
Melpomene, do thou the dirge inspire,
To whom Jove gave the liquid voice and lyre.
Has then eternal sleep possess'd
Quintilius, mod'rate, just and kind,
Where shall our grievance be redress'd,
Or where will ye his equal find,
O modesty, and faith, the fair allies
Of justice, and the truth without disguise?
—An object of exceeding grief
To many, virtuous, did he fall—
But thou, O Virgil, art the chief,
More inconsolable than all—
In vain, alas! you to the Gods resent
Him, who was not on such conditions lent.
What tho' your own majestic lays
Shou'd, sweeter far than Orpheus' lyre,
Give ears to laurels and to bays,
You cou'd not make his corpse respire,
Or bid the blood in that cold image flow,
Which Mercury, the minister below,

Has to the gloomy crowd compell'd,
In locking up the doors of fate,
Nor will he be by pray'r withheld,
However musical and great—
'Tis hard—but manly patience must endure,
And make things lighter, that admit no cure.

This Quintilius is not the same with him to whom the eighteenth ode is addressed, but a native of Cremona, a poet by profession, and a near relation of Virgil; which latter circumstance particularly endeared him to Horace.

ODE XXV. TO LYDIA.

He insults her, that now being old, she is deservedly contemned by her gallants.

More sparing the young rakes alarm
The window-shutters of their toast,
You now may sleep secure of harm;
The door affects the post,
Which mov'd so oft its pliant hinge—
—You hear that serenade no more,
“Sleep'st thou, while dying lovers winge,
“O Lydia, at thy door!”
Jilt, thou the scoffing sparks shalt soon
Lament, neglected in a lane,
When, at the changing of the moon,
The north-west blows amain;
While love and vehement desire,
Such as the mares for stallions seize,
Shall set your blister'd breast asire,
Join'd to complaints like these,
That gladsome youths on ivy green
And constant myrtle rather glote;
To Hebrus winter's comrade keen,
The wither'd leaves devote.

ODE XXVI. TO THE MUSE, CONCERNING ÆLIUS LAMIA.

It is not fitting that the votaries of the muses should be liable to solicitude and grief. The poet recommends his friend Lamia to the Pimplean muse.

Friend of the muses, fear and pain
I throw into the Cretan main,
To be the sport of ruffian tempests there—
Who the cold north shall sway is far beneath my care.
I in peculiar unconcern
Profess myself, whatever turn
The great affairs of Tiridates take,
And all th'alarming dread, that keep his thoughts awake.
O muse of the Pimplean hill,
That lov'st to taste the genuine rill,
Weave me those flow'rs that brightest beams receive,
Yea elegance and fragrance for my Lamia weave.
Without that influence of thine,
Vain are the honours I design,
Thou and thy graceful sisters ought to smile,
To him devote new strains, and in the Lesbian style.

This is the same Lamia with him, ode xvii. book iii. where we shall have more occasion to take notice of him.

101

ODE XXVII. TO HIS BOTTLE-COMPANIONS.

That they should not quarrel and fight with their cups, as is the manner of barbarians.

With glasses form'd for joy to fight,
Is what the Thracians do in spite;
Let Bacchus know no barb'rous customs here,
But keep the modest God from bloody discord clear.
Can such strange contraries agree,
As wine and lights in social glee,
And sabres such as savage Media wears—
Cease your vile noise, my friends, nor quit your easy chairs.
Me too!—shall I your revels join,
And sour my good Falernian wine?—
No, let the brother of the Locrian fair,
Rather his lovesick joys, and darling flame declare.
He will not—On no other plan,
No other terms I take my can—
Whatever damsel e'er thy breast inflam'd,
Was of ingenuous birth, nor need you be asham'd.

103

Whatever be the case speak out
To friendly ears, nor make a doubt.—
“Ah wretch! how thou art hamper'd in a straight,
“A lad, whose matchless worth deserv'd a better fate.”
What sorceress, what magic art,
What pow'r divine can ease thy smart?—
E'en Pagasus to clear thee will be loth
From one compos'd of whimsy , wantoness and wrath.

Chimæra. Προσθε Λεων οπιθεν δε Δρακων, μεσση δε Χιμαιρα. Hom.

105

ODE XXVIII.

[Archytas, born to compass land and sea]

Archytas a philosopher and geometrician is introduced remonstrating to a certain sailor, that all must die, and beseeching that he would not suffer his corpse to lie unburied on the shore.

Archytas, born to compass land and sea,
And of the countless sand thy charts to make,
A little boon of dust suffices thee,
Which on Matinian shores thy relicks take.
Nor is there profit in those airy dreams,
When you the houses of the planets try'd,
And the round world determin'd by your schemes,
Since in your death all these grand projects dy'd.
The sire of Pelops in like manner fell,
Tho' with the Gods he feasted in the sky;
Tithonus chang'd into a sauterelle,
And Minos in Jove's secrets wont to pry.
Death too has got Panthoides again,
Tho' having taken from the wall his shield,
He cou'd so well the Trojan times explain,
Nor ought to death but skin and nerves cou'd yield.

107

This was no mean professor in the ways
Of truth and nature, as you did presume—
But night, a gen'ral night, its wing displays,
And all at length must travel to the tomb.
The furies some expose to martial rage,
The greedy sailors perish in the wave,
The funerals increase of youth and age,
None from fell Proserpine themselves can save.
Me, e'en Archytas, the outrageous south,
Upon oblique Orion sure t'attend,
Where that Illyric opes her gulphing mouth,
Involved at once in an unlook'd-for end.
But thou, O sailor, do not check thy hand,
Nor grutch on these unburied bones to throw
A little portion of the common sand—
So may the eastern blasts, whate'er you owe,
Whate're they threaten to th'Hesperian floods,
(Thee safe) make Venusinian forrests pay,
And Jove and Neptune, with great store of goods,
Thee to Tarentum's port, in peace convey.
But shou'd you this benevolence neglect,
A fraud about to hurt your sons unborn,
Perchance, a due reward you may expect,
Of equal terror, and of equal scorn.

109

If not my prayers, my curses must prevail,
And no atonement can thy conscience clear,
'Tis not so much (tho' you're in haste to sail)
To sprinkle thrice the dust in kindness here.

[_]

See this ode finely imitated by Matthew Prior.

Pythagoras, asserted that his identical spirt, about seven hundred years before, was the soul of Euphorbus the son of Panthous, who was slain at the siege of Troy.

111

ODE XXIX. TO ICCIUS.

It is a marvel almost up to a prodigy, that Iccius the philosopher, laying aside his studies, should take a turn to arms, through desire of riches.

My friend, you're now invidious grown,
To make th'Arabian wealth your own,
And 'gainst unconquer'd Saba war declare,
And for the barb'rous Mede his future chains prepare.
What virgin, when her love is slain,
Shall be a handmaid in thy train?
And, when thou din'st, what youth from out the court,
Shall stand with essenc'd hair, thy splendour to support?
An archer of paternal craft,
Skill'd to direct the Indian shaft!—
Who now denies but streams their ways may force
Back to the lofty hills, and Tiber change his course,
When you choice books so dearly bought,
On doctrines that Panætius taught,
And your Socratick stock for armour sell,
Whose taste for better things at first set out so well?

113

ODE XXX. TO VENUS.

He requests the goddess to come to the temple, which Glycera had dedicated to her.

Leave Cyprus, thou that art the queen
Of Guidus, and the Paphian isle,
And with my Glycera be seen,
Where, in her temple deck't and clean,
With frankincense she courts thy smile.

With all his ardour bring thy boy,
The nymphs, the graces loose and free;
Youth's goddess too, that has no joy,
With Mercury, whose mirth wou'd cloy,
Without thine influence and thee.

115

ODE XXXI. TO APOLLO.

He asks not riches of the God, but only a sound mind in a sound body

What shall the pious poet pray
Upon the dedication day;
What vow prefer to this Phæbean shrine,
While from the bowl he pours the first-fruits of his wine?
Not the rich crop Sardinia yields,
Nor of Calabria's sunny fields
The herds I ask, nor elephants nor gold,
Nor grounds of which still Liris leaves the tale untold.
Let the Calenian grape be press'd
By those whom fortune has possess'd;
Let the rich merchant in gold cups exhaust
The wine, which to replace his Syrian venture cost:
Dear to the Gods, since thrice or more
In one year he can travel o'er
Th' Atlantic sea undamag'd, while with me
Sweet olives, mallows light, and succ'ry best agree.

117

Grant, God of song, this humble lot,
But to enjoy what I have got,
And I beseech thee keep my mind intire
In age without disgust, and with the chearful lyre.

So-called from Atlas the highest mountain in Mauritania, which is the extremity of Africa towards the streight of Gades (now Cadiz) beyond which the Romans at that time had but little notion of land.

119

ODE XXXII. TO HIS LYRE.

He addresses his lyre, and requires of it assistance, and that it should not cease to accompany his song.

If e'er at leisure in the shade
We've play'd a lesson to remain:
My lyre, the like be now essay'd,
A true Augustan strain.
Thou whom that Lesbian touch'd so sweet,
Tho' with his soldiers arms he bore
Val'rous, or moor'd his shatter'd fleet
Upon the swampy shore.
Yet Venus and her clinging boy,
And wine to musick wou'd he set,
And on fair maids his skill employ,
With hair and eyes of jet.
O pride of Phœbus, grateful shell,
Accepted where the gods regale,
Thou, that can'st sooth my toils so well,
'Tis Horace bids thee hail!

Alcæus.

121

ODE XXXIII. TO ALBIUS TIBULLUS.

That he should not grieve out of measure, that his rival was unjustly preferred to him by Glycera.

Tibullus, do not grieve too much,
Nor in soft elegies complain,
That Glycera's caprice is such,
And such her insolent disdain,
That she your junior shou'd prefer,
Who looks more amiable to her.

For Cyrus fair Lycoris burns,
So charming with her little face,
But he the fondling damsel spurns
For squeamish Pholoe's coy embrace;
But sooner shall the goats be join'd
To wolves of fierce Appulian kind,

Than Pholoe with a filthy rake
Commit adult'ry, heinous sin,
Such mischief Venus loves to make,
Who forms and tempers not akin
Pairs with her cruel brazen yoke,
And acts barbarity in joke.

O'er me too in an evil hour
Had servile Myrtale the sway,
A nymph of more tyrannic pow'r
Then Adria in Calabria's bay,
Tho' at that time a fairer maid
And gentler did my heart invade.

123

ODE XXXIV. TO HIMSELF.

He repents, that following the Epicureans, he had been wanting in his zeal to the Gods.

A sparing and unfrequent guest
In Jove's high temple at the best,
While mad philosophy my mind pursu'd,
I now must shift my sail, and have my course renew'd.
For lo! the sempiternal sire
(Who us'd to cleave with brandish'd fire
The clouds, as I conceiv'd) of late was seen,
With car and thund'ring horses in the clear serene.
Which the still earth and floods that flow,
And horrid Tænarus below,
And those Atlantic bounds compels to quake;
'Tis God, and God alone pre-eminent can make
The depths emerge, the mighty poor;
'Tis he, that brings to light th'obscure—
And fortune, at his bidding takes a crown,
Here proudly sets it up, there sternly throws it down.

125

ODE XXXV. TO FORTUNE.

He beseeches her to look to the preservation of Cæsar, then on the point of going against the Britons.

O Goddess, whose indulgence sways
Fair Antium sounding with thy praise,
Whose influence can exalt the meanest slave,
Or turn triumphant pomps to sorrow and the grave.
Thee the poor farmer's anxious pray'r
Solicits, that his fields may bear;
Thee, mistress of the main, the sailor hails,
As his Bithynian bark o'er Cretan billows sails.
Thee the vague Scythians, Dacian rude,
And cities, nations unsubdu'd,
The Latian fierce for battle far and near,
Thee the barbaric queens and purple tyrants fear.
Let not your hurtful foot displace
The pillar standing on its base,
Nor let the thronging populace rebel,
And roaring out to arms, to arms the state-compel.
Necessity precedes thy band,
With nails and wedges in her hand,

127

Her brazen hand, nor is the hook, nor, hot
With execrable death, the melted lead forgot.
Thee hope, and faith, so scarce, revere,
And cloath'd in white are ever near,
And still themselves of your own train profess,
Howe'er you bilk the great, and change your seat and dress.
The faithless mob and courtezan
Behave upon another plan;
And all your friends, when they have drank you dry,
The burthen they should share, in base desertion fly.
Yet, yet propitiate Cæsar's scheme
On Britain, and the world's extreme,
And all our new recruits, that well might brave,
The eastern continent, and Erythrean wave.
O fie upon the barb'rous times,
Fraternal wounds, and civil crimes,
What has this iron-age refus'd to do!
What have we left untouch'd, that honest hearts shou'd rue!
Our youth, where have they been restrain'd:
What altars are there left unstain'd—
Yet 'gainst the Scythian and Arabian foe
May all our new-forg'd weapons by thy guidance go!

Necessity signifies here the last extremity or death, and things mentioned to belong to her, were all instruments of torture amongst the Romans.

129

ODE XXXVI. TO POMPONIUS NUMIDA.

For whose return from Spain, he rejoices with much exultation.

With the sweet censer and the lyre,
And fatted calf upon the sacred fire,
The tutelary Gods we bless,
That we our Numida once more caress;
Who safe and sound from farthest Spain,
Dear to a thousand friends, is come again—
And yet to none such love he bears,
With none the fond embrace so warmly shares,
As with lov'd Lamia, mindful still
That they were form'd by one preceptor's skill,
And both together chang'd their gown—
Set the good day in white memorials down;
The ready cask by no means spare,
Nor let your feet the morrice-dance forbear.
Yet Damalis the tippler check,
Lest Bassus she out-drink—the table deck
With store of parsley, many a rose
And lily, that in transient sweetness blows.

131

They all will turn their putrid eyes
On Damalis, who will not quit her prize;
But her new conquest hugs in hold,
As the ambitious ivies the tall oak infold.

133

ODE XXXVII. TO HIS COMPANIONS.

Whom he invites to indulge their geniuses on occasion of the victory at Actium.

To drink and dance with all the glee
Of men that find their country free
Now, now's the time—now deck the hallow'd shrine,
Like Mars his active priests, and make the temple fine.
Before it was no lawful thing
The long-kept Cæcuban to bring,
While for th'imperial capitol the queen
Ruin and wrath prepar'd, and every deadly scene,
With her contaminated train
Of eunuchs, arrogant and vain,
In hopes to compass every point at last,
Drunk with a long success, and her good fortune past.
But now her rage is somewhat tame,
Since scarce a ship escap'd the flame,
And, tho' at large the Egyptian grape she swill'd,
With real horrors now her frantic soul is fill'd.
For as from Italy she flies,
His urgent oar Augustus plies,

135

And, as the hawk pursues the dove, he rows,
Or sportsman hunts the hare trac'd in Æmonian snows,
That he this monster of her kind
Might in coercive fetters bind—
But she, while for a nobler death she tried,
Nor fear'd the hostile sword, nor sought herself to hide.
Then to her downcast court she went,
With look serene, as in content,
And to her gen'rous veins the aspicks laid,
By pre-determin'd death more fierce and desp'rate made.
For the Liburnian fleet, she grudg'd
The fate to which she was adjudg'd,
A woman of her pow'r and pomp allow'd,
In triumph to be dragg'd before the clam'rous crowd.

137

ODE XXXVIII. TO HIS SERVANT.

He would have him bring nothing for the gracing of his banquet but myrtle.

[_]

In the original metre exactly.

Persian pomps, boy, ever I renounce them:
Scoff o' the plaited coronet's refulgence;
Seek not in fruitless vigilance the rose-tree's
Tardier offspring.
Mere honest myrtle that alone is order'd,
Me the mere myrtle decorates, as also
Thee the prompt waiter to a jolly toper
Hous'd in an arbour.

139

THE SECOND BOOK OF THE ODES OF HORACE.

ODE I. TO C. ASINIUS POLLIO.

He advises Pollio to forbear the writing of tragedy for a “season, till the state should be settled. And afterwards he praises his compositions.

The war, that rose from civil hate
In that Metellian consulate,
Our vices, measures, and the sport of chance,
The famous triple league, the Roman shield and lance,
With gore unexpiated, smear'd,
A work whose fate is to be fear'd
You treat, and on those treacherous ashes tread,
Beneath whose seeming surface glow the embers red.

141

O spare a little to repeat
Your tragic verse severely sweet;
Soon, when the public weal you shall replace,
Your grand Athenian works again the stage shall grace.
Thou who defend'st the poor with zeal,
To whom the conscript house appeal,
For whom the fertile laurels, that you wore
In that Dalmatian triumph, deathless honour bore.
E'en now you make my tingling ear
The din of martial trumpets hear,
Now clarions bray, and men in armour bright
The routed horse and horsemen with their lightning fright.
Now mighty captains I perceive,
In clouds of glorious dust atchieve
Eternal fame, and all the world their own,
Save the ferocious fire of Cato's soul alone.
Juno and every pow'r propense,
Like her, for Africa's defence,
When unreveng'd they left their darling coast,
Offer'd the victor's grandsons to Jugurtha's ghost.
Say where the blood of Romans slain,
Has not made fertile every plain

143

Whose monuments record our impious deeds,
And our great downfal heard by the remotest Medes?
What gulphs, what rivers in their flow
Do not our dire dissensions know?
What sea is not discolour'd by the gore
Of Romans basely slain, what climate, or what shore?
But leaving mirth, O do not urge
My Pollio's muse, the Cean dirge—
In some cool grotto sacred to the fair,
With me and sweet Dione touch a lighter air.

145

ODE II. TO C. SALLUSTIUS CRISPUS.

He applauds Proculeius for his generosity to his brethren. The contempt of money makes the wise-man and the monarch.

The hoarded silver is not white,
Thou foe to metal in the mine,
Unless by circulation bright
And mod'rate use it shine.
Let Proculeius live in song,
A father to his brethren known;
Fame jealous-wing'd, shall bear along
The bounty, he has shown.
A vaster realm you shall subdue,
By conq'ring of a greedy mind,
Than Lybia and the Gades too
With either Carthage join'd.
—The self-indulging dropsy grows,
Nor slacks its thirst, until the cause
From out the pallid body flows,
And watry pain withdraws.

147

The king restor'd, and repossess'd,
Not like the crowd fair virtue views,
Nor numbers him amongst the bless'd,
The language to abuse;
The laurel, diadem and reign
She more to that great man applies,
Who looks upon immod'rate gain
With unaffected eyes.

This generous Roman, having several brothers divested of their fortunes, for bearing arms against Cæsar, divided his substance amongst them.

Phraates.

149

ODE III. TO DELLIUS.

Either fortune is to be borne with moderation, since the same condition of mortality equally impends on all.

O Dellius, that art born to die,
On equanimity rely,
As well in adverse days your spirits buoy,
As keep the hour of wealth from light presumptuous joy.
Whether you lead a life of woes—
Or in your distant mead repose,
And bless the festal days in rural state,
With right Falernian wine of more interior date,
Where the tall pine, and pop'lar white,
To form a social bow'r delight
With blending boughs, and diligent to glide,
The riv'let urges haste against its winding side.
To wine and unguents here exhort,
And roses of a bliss too short,
While circumstance and age allow their leave,
And those black threads of death the fatal sisters weave.
You must from purchas'd park and seat,
Which yellow Tiber laves, retreat—

151

You must retreat, and your appointed heir
Shall soon possess the heaps you pil'd with so much care.
If rich and of Inachian race,
Or, poor and from a lineage base,
You daily in th'inclement skies remain,
It matters not, you must remorseless death sustain.
To one point we are all compell'd—
The universal urn is held,
From whence, or soon or late, the lot is cast,
And Charon's boat transports the convicts at the last.

153

ODE IV. TO XANTHIUS PHOCEUS.

There is no reason that he should blush for the love he bears to his waiting maid Phyllis, since the same thing has been the case with sundry great men.

O Phoceus, think it no disgrace
To love your maid, since Thetis heir,
Tho' proud, of old was in your case,
Briseis was so fair.
—The slave Tecmessa at her feet
Saw her lord Ajax—Atreus son
Lov'd his fair captive in the heat
Of conquest, that he won,
When beat by that Thessalian boy,
The Phrygian host was disarray'd,
And Hector's death, the fall of Troy,
An easy purchase made.
Who knows what wealth thou hast to claim,
Rich parents may thy Phyllis grace,
Surely the Gods have been to blame
To one of royal race.

155

You cannot think her meanly born,
Nor worthless cou'd her mother be,
Whose heart has such ingenuous scorn
For wealth, and love for thee.
Her face, her limbs so form'd t'engage,
I praise with a safe conscience still—
Shun to suspect a man, whose age
Is going down the hill.

157

ODE V. ON LALAGE.

The most beautiful Lalage is a maiden unripe for a husband, wherefore the inclination to possess her ought to be restrained.

As yet her tender neck's unbroke,
Nor to confine her in the yoke
Will all your skill avail;
As yet she cannot suit her mate,
Nor stand to bear the mighty weight
Of an impetuous male.
Your little heifer's fancy feeds
On verdant lawns and flow'ry meads,
Whose haunts she has preferr'd;
And by the streams, which willows shade,
She loves to have her gambols play'd
With younglings of the herd.
Forbear preposterous desire,
Nor at the eager grape aspire,
Anon shall autum speed;
And mark each bunch with blooming blue,
And vary into purple hue
The clusters ripe to bleed.
She soon shall follow thee of course,
For time goes on without remorse,
And to her days shall add
The rip'ning years, that make thee old,
And Lalage, maturely bold
Shall seek a sturdy lad—

159

Beloved!—coy Pholoe not so well
Nor Chloris celebrated belle,
With chest erect and white,
As Luna shining o'er the sea,
And smiling with celestial glee,
Or Cnidian Gyges bright;
Whom if you place amongst the fair
He'll make sagacious strangers stare,
As puzzl'd in the case;
Nor can they tell his sex with truth,
By reason of his looks and youth,
And smooth ambiguous face.

161

ODE VI. TO SEPTIMIUS.

He wishes to have Tibur and Tarentum for the retreat of his old age, whose pleasant situation he extols.

Septimius, who wou'd go with me,
To Gades, or unconquer'd Spain,
Or Syrtes, where the moorish sea
Bids endless tempests reign?
Be Tibur, by a Grecian plann'd,
A seat for Horace in his years,
Weary alike of sea and land,
And martial hopes and fears.
From whence if driv'n by cruel fate,
May I Galesus see in peace,
Where great Phalanthus rul'd in state,
And watch'd his cover'd fleece.
With me that little angle takes
Whose honey's of Hymettian zest,
And with the oil Venafrum makes
Their olives stand the test.

163

Where Jove gives winter warmth—and length
To spring,—and Aulon's heights arise,
Rich with those wines, whose luscious strength
With true Falernian vies.
These scenes to us their site commend—
Those tow'rs so pleasant to the view:
There the live ashes of thy friend,
With tears thou shalt bedew.

165

ODE VII. TO POMPEIUS VARUS.

Whose return to his native country he congratulates.

O Pompey! oft reduc'd with me
To danger's last extremity,
When Brutus led the van—what pow'r on high
Restores thy native Gods, and an Italian sky?
Thou principal and dearest friend,
With whom I've made the day suspend
Its course, infringing on the hours of care,
With bays, and precious essence on our shining hair.
With thee I saw that fatal field,
Where shamefully I left my shield
In rapid flight, when valour's heart was broke,
And threat'ning heroes fell beneath the hostile stroke.
But me Mercurius, much dismay'd,
Quick thro' the midmost foe convey'd
In a thick cloud—Thou wert ingulph'd again
In struggling tides of war upon the swelt'ring plain:
Wherefore to Jove the feast be paid,
And let your weary limbs be laid,

167

After long warfare, underneath my bay;
Nor spare the casks I destin'd for this joyful day.
Fill the bright tumblers to the brim,
And in oblivious Massic swim,
And from large shells the fragrant unguents pour.
—Who runs to parsley beds, or to the myrtle bow'r,
For cooling crowns? who throws the most
To take the chair and give the toast?
I will the Bacchanalian priests outdo—
'Tis sweet to lose one's wits at this dear interview.

At Philippi.

169

ODE VIII. TO JULIA BARINE.

There is no reason to give any credit to Barine, when she swears, since she grows the handsomer for her perjuries.

If any punishment or curse
Had made thee thy false oath bewail;
Hadst thou but been one tooth the worse,
Or lost a single nail;
I shou'd have kept my faith,—but thou
Shin'st out more tempting and more fair;
And art, by breaking of thy vow,
Our youth's peculiar care.
'Tis profit, therefore, to deceive
Thy mother's ashes in a breath,
Stars, moon, and silent heav'n to grieve,
And Gods, exempt from death.
Yes, Venus laughs, and nymphs, well known
For mock-simplicity, deride,
And love still whetting on a stone
His darts in crimson dy'd.

171

But add to this new dupes abound,
New slaves, nor will the old relent,
Tho' sworn to quit her impious pound,
Where their fond hearts are pent.
At thee the jealous mothers pine,
At thee old churls, and maids new wed,
Lest by that winning air of thine
Their spouses be misled.

173

ODE IX. TO VALGIUS.

That he would at length desist from bewailing the death of Mystes.

Not show'rs from darkness without end
Upon the shaggy fields descend,
Nor ruffling whirlwinds o'er the Caspian reign
For ever; nor prolong'd month after month remain,
Friend Valgius, on Armenia's heights
Of ice and snow, perpetual freights;
Nor to the North do the plantations groan
Of Garganus, nor ash trees their lost leaves bemoan.
But you, in one continual dirge,
Th'untimely death of Mystes urge,
Nor with the fondness of your grief have done,
When Vesper comes, or flies the bright-careering sun.
Yet he, who for three ages join'd,
Liv'd an example of mankind,
Did not, for all the remnant of his years,
Antilochus, so loved, lament with ceaseless tears.
No,—nor did Priam and his wife
For Troilus, who lost his life
In ruddy youth, with endless grief deplore,
And ev'n his tender sisters in a while forbore.

175

Cease from the softness of your grief,
And let us rather sing our chief,
The great Augustus has new trophies won,
And bade the stiff Niphates with submission run.
Euphrates too must roll his tide
In billows more remote from pride,
And those Gelonians, added to our reign,
Must in the bounds prescrib'd their cavalry restrain.

Nestor.

177

ODE X. TO LICINIUS.

A mean is to be observed in either fortune.

A better plan of life you form,
Not wholly launching out from land,
Nor over-jealous of a storm,
Too much for shore to stand.
Whoever loves the golden mean,
From sordid want himself supports,
Nor safe and sober is he seen
In envy-moving courts.
Tall pines are shaken, and the tow'r
Comes heaviest from the highest wall,
And thunderbolts, with greater pow'r,
On topmost mountains fall.
Hearts, well prepar'd, will see a dawn
Of hope in woe—in wealth will pray
'Gainst change—heav'n brings the winter on,
And drives the hag away.

179

If times are evil, by and by
They shall be better—Phœbus plays
At times upon his minstrelsy,
Not always shoots his rays.
When times are hardest, then a face
Of constancy and spirit wear;
But wise contract your sails apace,
When once the wind's too fair.

181

ODE XI. TO QUINTIUS HIRPINUS.

That waving cares we should live merrily.

Whate'er the warlike Spaniard tries,
Or what the Scythian bands devise,
By Adria's sea disjoin'd, cease to enquire,
Nor bustle for a life, whose term should check desire.
Smooth youth and beauty must give way
To wrinkles dry, and ringlets grey,
Which from gallants their wanton loves divorce,
And drive away sweet slumbers from their eyes of course.
Not always does the vernal pride
Of flow'rs remain, nor moon abide
In one gay face—Your thoughts why do you teize,
Not made for disquisitions so sublime as these?
Why do we not secure our seat
Beneath this plane-tree from the heat;
Or thrown at random underneath this pine,
Drink, while we may presume, and essenc'd roses twine

183

In wreathes about our hoary hair,
For Bacchus drives off biting care,
Who's there? This same Falernian is too strong,
The passing brook shall quench it, as it purls along.
Who shall decoy that gadding lass,
Lyde, to come and take a glass?
Bid her with iv'ry lyre mature her haste,
And hair ty'd up behind in the true Spartan taste.

185

ODE XII. TO MÆCENAS.

Weighty and tragical subjects are not proper for the Lyric stile. Horace will sing of nothing but the beauty of Lycymnia, and matters pertaining to love.

Numantia's fierce and bloody wars,
And Hannibal, your taste abhors,
Too dire a subject for a song;
Nor staining the Sicilian sea,
Can Carthaginian blood to me
And to my warbling lyre belong.
Nor can the Lapithan malign,
Nor over-charg'd with heady wine,
Hyleus suit the lyric strain,
Nor any giant son of earth,
The victim of Herculean worth,
And dread of Saturn's golden reign.
But, O Mæcenas, as for you,
You will for great Augustus do
Far better in historic prose:
With more address you'll tell than sing
The story of full many a king,
That drag'd in pomp triumphal goes.
Me the harmonious muse allures,
To chant my lady fair, and your's,
And praise Lycymnia's charming voice,
And eyes, that sparkle like the spheres,
With faithful heart, that never veers,
When she's once settled in her choice.

187

She's graceful in each bright advance,
Whether she lead the seemly dance,
Or urge the brilliant repartees,
Or with the noble damsels play,
That honour Dian's holiday,
Uniting dignity and ease.
Would you in earnest change one lock
Of sweet Lycymnia, for the stock
That rich Achemenes possess'd,
Or fertile Phrygia's wealthy fleece,
Or all Arabia's ambergreese,
And houses with all plenty bless'd.
While she declines her blooming cheek,
Where you the burning kisses seek,
With such benevolent disdain,
And what she'd rather have, than thee,
Refuses, till she makes so free
As to devour them all again.

189

ODE XIII. UPON THE TREE BY WHOSE SUDDEN FALL HE HAD LIKE TO HAVE BEEN CRUSHED.

It is never sufficiently evident what a man ought to beware of—the praises of Sappho and Alceus.

'Twas on a luckless day, O tree,
Whatever hand transplanted thee,
And impious bade thee prosper to disgrace
The village of his birth, and crush his future race.
He could, no doubt, to death devote
His fire, or cut his mother's throat,
Or sprinkle his unhospitable ground
At night with stranger's blood, or Colchian drugs compound.
Or whatsoe'er we may conceive
Of desp'rate feats he could atchieve,
O log, the man that plac'd thee in my farm,
Hurl'd on thy master's head, that did not dream of harm.
We never are enough aware
What we should seek, or what forbear—
From Bosphorus the sailor dreads his fate,
Nor heeds what doom at Carthage may his days await.

191

The soldiers fear the pointed reed,
And Parthian shooting in full speed,
The Parthian fears the Roman strength and chain,
One common lot for all remains, and will remain.
How near but now the lot was mine,
So see the gloomy Proserpine,
And Eäcus his dread judicial seat,
And those Elysian fields, where melancholy sweet
Sappho the sland'rous maids of Greece
Arraigns, and in a fuller piece
Alceus sings, upon his golden lyre
The conquest or the flight by sea and land how dire!
Each of these hands th'admiring ghost
In holy silence hears, but most
Th'attention and the thicking throng augment,
To hear of patriot fights, and kings in exile sent.
What wonder! since such strains as these
The many-headed beast can please,
Who hangs his hellish ears, and furies list,
While from their wreathed locks delighted snakes untwist.
Nay more, Prometheus, and the sire
Of Pelops to the sound respire,
Nor 'gainst the ounce or lions of the chace,
Will now Orion urge his visionary race.

193

ODE XIV. TO POSTHUMUS.

Life is short, and death inevitable.

Ah! Posthumus, the years, the years
Glide swiftly on, nor can our tears
Or piety the wrinkl'd age forefend,
Or for one hour retard th'inevitable end.
'Twould be in vain, tho' you should slay,
My friend, three hundred beeves a day
To cruel Pluto, whose dire waters roll,
Geryon's threefold bulk, and Tityus to controul.
This is a voyage we all must make,
Whoe'er the fruits of earth partake,
Whether we sit upon a royal throne,
Or live, like cottage hinds, unwealthy and unknown.
The wounds of war we scape in vain,
And the hoarse breakers of the main;
In vain with so much caution we provide
Against the southern winds upon th'autumnal tide.
The black Cocytus, that delays
His waters in a languid maze,
We must behold, and all those Danaids fell,
And Sysiphus condem'd to fruitless toil in hell.

195

Lands, house, and pleasing wife, by thee
Must be relinquish'd; nor a tree
Of all your nurseries shall in the end,
Except the baleful cypress, their brief lord attend.
Thy worthier heir the wine shall seize
You hoarded with a hundred keys,
And with libations the proud pavement dye,
And feasts of priests themselves shall equal and outvie.

197

ODE XV. UPON THE LUXURY OF THE AGE HE LIVED IN.

So great our palaces are now,
They'll leave few acres for the plough.
Wide as the Lucrine lake canals extend,
And steril planes in sum the wedded elms transcend.
Then violet beds, and myrtle bow'rs,
And all the nosegay-blending flow'rs,
Shall far and wide their spicy breath renew,
Where for their former lords the fertile olives grew.
There the thick laurel's green array
Shall ward the fervid beams of day.
Not so our founder's will, or Cato's lore,
And all our bearded sires commanded things of yore.
Their private fortunes were but small,
But great the common fund of all.
No grand piazzas did there then remain
To catch the summer breezes of the northern wane.
Nor did they, by their edicts wise,
The providential turf despise,
Those laws, which bade each public pile be grand,
And with new stone repair'd, the holy temples stand.

199

ODE XVI. TO GROSPHUS.

All men covet peace of mind, which cannot be acquired either by riches or honours, but only by restraining the appetites.

When o'er the Ægean vast he sails
The seaman sues the gods for ease,
Soon as the moon the tempest veils,
Nor sparkling guide he sees.
Ease by fierce Thracians in the end;
Ease by the quiver'd Mede is sought;
By gems, nor purple bales, my friend,
Nor bullion to be bought.
Not wealth or state, a consul's share,
Can give the troubled mind its rest,
Or fray the winged fiends of care,
That pompous roofs infest.
Well lives he, on whose little board
Th'old silver salt-cellar appears,
Left by his sires—no sordid hoard
Disturb his sleep with fears.

201

Why with such strength of thought devise,
And aim at sublunary pelf,
Seek foreign realms? Can he, who flies
His country, 'scape himself?
Ill-natur'd care will board the fleet,
Nor leave the squadron'd troops behind,
Swifter than harts, or irksome sleet
Driv'n by the eastern wind.
If good, the present hour be mirth;
If bitter, let your smiles be sweet,
Look not too forward—nought on earth
Is in all points complete.
A sudden death Achilles seiz'd,
A tedious age Tithonus wore—
If you're amerc'd, fate may be pleas'd
To give to me the more.
A hundred flocks around thee stray,
About thee low Sicilian kine,
And mares apt for thy carriage neigh,
And purple robes are thine.

203

Me, born for verse and rural peace,
A faithful prophetess foretold,
And groundlings, spirited from Greece,
In high contempt I hold.

205

ODE XVII. TO MÆCENAS, WHEN SICK.

If he was to die, Horace has no inclination to survive him.

Why do you send to break my heart
With your complaints? We must not part;
Nor can th'immortal gods consent, nor I,
My glory and my guard, that thou the first shouldst die.
Ah! if a more untimely fate
On thee, my soul's ally, should wait,
Why should I keep the wretched remnant here,
Imperfect without thee, and never half so dear?
One day shall be the last of both;
I have not made a traitor's oath—
Yes, we will go, together will we go,
If you precede, I follow to the shades below.
Me nor Chimera breathing fire,
Nor Gyas, if he could respire,
With all his hundred hands, should force from thee;
So justice, heav'nly pow'r, and so the fates decree.
If Libra rul'd my natal hour,
Or Scorpio's more unlucky pow'r,
Ey'd with the menace of an early grave,
Or Capricorn, the tyrant of the western wave.

207

Our horoscope, at all events,
Ev'n to a miracle consents—
Thee, lucid Jove, sav'd from Saturnian spite,
And clipt the wings of fate, and stopt its rapid flight,
Upon the day the crouded town
Thrice hail'd in claps thy just renown—
Me near that time a falling trunk had brain'd,
If Faunus, shield of bards, had not the stroke refrain'd,
These mercies therefore bear in mind,
And bring the victims you design'd,
And build the fane you vow'd upon the spot;
A slaughter'd lamb from me will suit my humbler lot.

209

ODE XVIII.

[Gold or iv'ry's not intended]

He asserts himself to be contented with a little fortune, where others labour for wealth, and the gratification of their desires, as if they were to live for ever.

Gold or iv'ry's not intended
For this little house of mine,
Nor Hymettian arches, bended
On rich Afric pillars, shine.
For a court I've no ambition,
As not Attalus his heir,
Nor make damsels of condition
Spin me purple for my wear.
But for truth and wit respected,
I possess a copious vein,
So that rich men have affected
To be number'd of my train.
With my Sabine field contented,
Fortune shall be dunn'd no more;
Nor my gen'rous friend tormented
To augment my little store.
One day by the next's abolish'd,
Moons increase but to decay;
You place marbles to be polish'd
Ev'n upon your dying day.

211

Death unheeding, though infirmer,
On the sea your buildings rise,
While the Baian billows murmur,
That the land will not suffice.
What tho' more and more incroaching,
On new boundaries you press,
And in avarice approaching,
Your poor neighbours dispossess;
The griev'd hind his gods displaces,
In his bosom to convey,
And with dirty ruddy faces
Boys and wife are driven away.
Yet no palace grand and spacious
Does more sure its lord receive,
Than the seat of death rapacious,
Whence the rich have no reprieve.
Earth alike to all is equal,
Whither would your views extend?
Kings and peasants in the sequel
To the destin'd grave descend.
There, tho' brib'd, the guard infernal
Would not shrewd Promotheus free;
There are held in chains eternal
Tantalus, and such as he.
There the poor have consolation
For their hard laborious lot;
Death attends each rank and station,
Whether he is call'd or not.

213

ODE XIX. ON BACCHUS.

Filled with the deity, the poet sings his praises.

Bacchus I saw the other day
(Posterity believe my lay)
Teaching the science of poetic feet,
While nymphs and satyrs listen'd in the rocks secrete.
Ha! ha! this lab'ring breast of mine
Is shock'd anew—and fraught with wine;
My heart is joy—ha! ha! my Bacchus spare,
Nor rear thine ivy wand too terrible to bear.
Now the mad Thyads I can sing,
Which struck out wine's perennial spring;
And rivers that with milky current glide,
And honey trickling down from hollow rocks beside.
Now can I sing the brilliant dame
Of heav'n, thy celebrated flame,
The tow'rs of Pentheus levell'd with the ground,
And downfal of Lycurgus to thy praise resound.

215

You turn the rivers to the main,
You those barbarian seas restrain,
You in the sacred mountains debonaire
Bind in serpentine knot unhurt your handmaid's hair.
You, when the bands of giants rose
Th'almighty father to depose,
The lion's fangs and horrid jaws assum'd,
Drove Rhœcus back to earth, and to destruction doom'd.
Tho' dance, and lively jests, and sport
For thee were fitter by report,
Nor did your military talents strike,
Yet facts have shewn thee proof for peace and war alike.
Thee with your golden horn bedight,
Saw Cerberus devoid of spite,
And when from hell you made your last retreat,
His tail he kindly wagg'd, and gently lick'd your feet.

217

ODE XX. TO MÆCENAS.

Horace supposing himself changed into a swan, will fly all the world over; from which adventure he infers, that his poetry will be immortal.

Above the vulgar and the trite
Transform'd, the poet takes his flight
Thro' heav'n, and will be held on earth no more;
But o'er th'abodes of man, of envious man, shall soar.
Not I, the poor man's offspring scorn'd;
Not I thus honour'd and adorn'd,
As by Mæcenas to be call'd his friend,
Shall know the Stygian stream, or share a common end.
Now, ev'n but now, my skin began
To roughen, and my upper man
Of a white bird the radiant form assumes,
And on my hands and neck spring forth the glossy plumes.
Now a melodious swan indeed,
Th'Icarian flight I shall exceed;
And Bosphorus his roaring rocks will know,
And Syrtes, and the plains of Hyperborean snow:

219

The Dacians who so poorly feign
To hold the Romans in disdain;
The Colchan and Gelonians far remote,
And skilful Spain and Gaul shall learn my works by rote.
No dirges, squalid grief, or moan,
At mine unreal death be shown;
Your loud lamentings at my grave restrain,
Nor care to build the tomb this verse has render'd vain.

221

THE THIRD BOOK OF THE ODES OF HORACE.

ODE I.

[I hate the mob, and drive them hence]

A happy life is effected not by wealth and honours, but by peace of mind.

I hate the mob, and drive them hence,
Lost to all sanctity and sense;
Hist to the Muse's priest! hist I implore—
I sing for maids and youths the strains unheard before.
Dread sovereigns their own people sway,
But Jove the kings themselves obey;
He which in triumph hurl'd the giants down,
And rules the universe by his commanding frown.

223

One man, perhaps, out-plants his friend,
In rows that regular extend;
Another comes more noble to the poll,
Another pleads his fame, and uncorrupted soul;
Another will th'ascendant claim
For clients—but 'tis all the same;
Necessity demands us, dross and scum,
And shakes the labell'd lots, and out they all must come.
He, o'er whose head the naked steel
Impends, will make no hearty meal
From rich Sicilian fare—his sleep no more
The chirping of the birds or harpers will restore—
Sweet sleep's the lusty lab'rer's lot:
Sleep does not scorn the lowly cot,
Nor trees that o'er the riv'let interweave,
Nor, Tempe, where the zephyrs play their pranks at eve.
He who desires but neighbour's fare,
Will for no storm or tempest care;
Him setting bear nor rising goat offends,
Nor all the wizzard-wit of diarist portends.
Not vineyards beaten by the hail;
Not flattering farm, whose symptoms fail,
The trees now laying blame upon the showers,
Now winter's pinching hand, or hot sidereal pow'rs.

225

The fishes feel the waters shrink,
Such loads into the depths they sink;
Here many a proud surveyor with his slaves,
And owner of the land, incroach upon the waves.
But fear and conscience with her cries
Aboard with the possessor flies;
Nor care will from the top-mast head recede,
And, when he lands, she mounts behind him on his steed.
What if nor stone in Phrygia hewn
Can keep the troubl'd mind in tune,
Nor purple brighter than the painted sky,
Nor rich Falernian grape, nor Persian luxury;
Why should I set about a pile,
High-pillar'd in the modern stile—
A bait for envy?—Why should I exchange
For cumbersome expence my little Sabine grange?

227

ODE II. TO HIS FRIRNDS.

Lads must be habituated from their tender years to poverty, warfare, and a laborious life.

Train'd up, my friends, in toil severe,
Let the young lad no hardship fear;
But learn against fierce Parthians to advance,
And on the gallant steed shake his tremendous lance.
And let him lead a life of care
In bustle and the open air—
Him from the wall the tyrant's consort spies,
And marriagable virgin sends her broken sighs.
“Ah me! for fear my royal spouse
“Should this ungovern'd lion rouze,
“And with inferior skill provoke his rage,
“Which breaks thro' thickest ranks the midmost war to wage.”
'Tis sweet, 'tis seemly ev'n to die
For one's dear country—should'st thou fly,
Death will pursue the youth afraid to fight,
Nor spares his timid knees, and back, when turn'd to flight.

229

Virtue which in the spirit tow'rs,
And cannot, like this clay of ours,
Sustain repulse, her fame unfully'd sees,
Nor takes, nor quits her office, as light voters please.
Virtue, to those that may not die,
Opes the strait doors of heav'n on high,
And with her wings in stretch for that sublime,
Scorns the unletter'd mob, and sordid earth, and time.
There's likewise an undoubted mead
For silence, that its faith can plead;
Him that mysterious rites has blaz'd—with me,
Nor tent, nor tilt shall cover, or by land or sea.
Oft the great regent of the day,
If thoughtless man neglect to pray,
In the same lot have vice and virtue cast,
Justice, tho' lame and blind, will take her due at last.

231

ODE III.

[A man of truth and honour prov'd]

A man of virtue is in dread of nothing. The speech of Juno concerning the destruction of Troy, of the end of the Trojan war, and of the Roman empire, which was to take its rise from the remnant of the Trojans.

A man of truth and honour prov'd,
And in his great resolves unmov'd,
No clam'rous mob his principles can stir,
Nor ev'n a tyrant's threat his manly heart deter.
No—nor the south, whose dread command
Fierce Adria's waves cannot withstand,
Nor thund'ring Jove—the universe might fall,
And not disturb his thoughts, or make him shrink at all.
It was upon no other plan
That Pollux was so great a man,
And wand'ring Hercules atchiev'd the skies—
Augustus too with them to rites divine shall rise.
'Twas by no other art than this,
O Bacchus, sire of social bliss,
Thine unbroke tygers drew thee to the stars,
And Romulus 'scap'd death upon the steeds of Mars.

233

For to the gods in council join'd
Juno thus spake her gracious mind—
“A foreign whore, and that dire umpire's lust,
“Has Troy, ev'n Troy reduc'd to downfal and the dust.
“By me and chaste Minerva doom'd,
“E'er since Laomedon presum'd
“The gods to rob of their most due reward,
“And subjects shar'd the fate of their deceitful lord.
“No more that ignominious guest
“Is of the Spartan dame possest,
“Nor Priam's perjur'd house prevails to break,
“By Hector's strength alone, the forces of the Greek.
“War by our diff'rent int'rests drawn
“To such a length, is past and gone—
“Henceforward I my wrath to Mars give o'er,
“And hatred for the son the Trojan priestess bore.
“Him will I suffer and befriend
“Heav'n's lucid mansions to ascend,
“To take his fill from our nectareous bowl,
“And in the rank of gods his titles to enroll—
“On this condition, that there be
“'Twixt Troy and Rome a raging sea
“For many a league—and let their exiles reign
“And prosper where they will—so that there still remain

325

“O'er Paris and o'er Priam's clay
“The trampling herd, the beast of prey,
“And cubs secure—The Capitol shall tow'r,
“And vanquish'd Medes confess proud Rome's imperial pow'r.
“Let her extend her fame and fear
“To every region far and near,
“Where the mid-sea from Europe Afric rives,
“And where o'erflowing Nile the fertile land revives.
“Deriving from contempt of gold
“A spirit great and uncontroul'd—
“Gold best unsought, and cover'd in the sand,
“Rather than coin'd for use with sacrilegious hand.
“Whatever pole or place be found
“To give the world his utmost bound,
“There let them pride their armies to engage,
“Both where cold mists descend, or torrid sun-beams rage.
“But this their fate my word confirms
“For Romans on these only terms—
“That they should not an ill-judg'd zeal embrace,
“Nor think their mother-town they prosper to replace.

237

“If Troy's estate should grow again,
“Again their thousands must be slain,
“Whilst I, Jove's sister and his wife, command
“Against their rising works a new victorious band.
“If thrice their walls of brass should rise,
“By Phœbus helping from the skies,
“Thrice should my Grecian champions lay it low;
“Thrice leave their dames and sons to widowhood and woe.”
But whither, Muse, do you aspire?
These subjects are not for the lyre—
Too grand and grave—cease, wanton, to rehearse
The converse of the gods in light degrading verse.

Alluding to the judgment of Paris.

239

ODE IV.

[Descend from yonder bright serene]

The poet mentions his being delivered by the assistance of the Muses from sundry perils, and that it has turned out bad for all that have attempted to act against the gods.

Descend from yonder bright serene,
And sing, Calliope, my queen,
A longer strain—or with your warbling tongue,
Or, if you choose, the lute, or lyre by Phœbus strung.
Hear ye not plain? Or is my thought
By a transporting frenzy wrought?
I seem to hear sweet sounds, and seem to rove
Where pleasant airs and streams pass thro' th'Elysian grove.
Me tir'd to sleep, and yet a child,
From kind Apulia's bounds beguil'd,
Up in mount Vultur, now so fam'd and known,
The woodland doves conceal'd with foliage newly blown;
Which was a miracle to tell
By all th'inhabitants that dwell
High-nested on the Acherontian brow,
Or Bantine chace possess, or fat Ferentum plow.

241

That I should there securely sleep,
Nor bears should rush, nor vipers creep;
That sacred bays and myrtle should combine
To hide the dauntless boy by providence divine.
Yours, O ye Muses! yours intire,
I to the Sabine heights aspire—
Me, whether cool Preneste shall invite,
Or Tibur sweetly slop'd, or Baian baths delight.
Me, fond of all your sylvan scene
Your founts and gambols on the green;
Not all our hopes Philippi render'd void,
Nor rough Sicilian wave, nor cursed tree destroy'd.
Whenever you shall be with me,
Chearful I'll sail upon the sea
Of raging Bosphorus, or go by land
Through all the length and drougth of that Assyrian sand.
Th'unhospitable Picts, the race
Of quiver'd Scythia, will I face;
And Concanum, with blood of horses fed,
And Tanais, secure from detriment and dread.
You Cæsar, of such high renown,
Soon as he quarters in each town
His wearied legions, bid his labours cease,
And in Pierian gottoes multiply his peace.

243

You kindly mod'rate measures urge,
Rejoicing to refrain the scourge—
We know him who alone the Titans quell'd,
And hurl'd in thunder down the monsters that rebell'd—
Ev'n he that rules the stormy main,
The sluggish earth, and Pluto's reign,
And all above, and all beneath the sun,
Both gods and men commands, omnipotent and one.
Depending upon strength of arm,
Those desp'rate youths with dire alarm
Insulted Jove, while all the brethren vie
With Pelion on Olympus to ascend the sky.
But Rhœcus and strong Mimas too,
Or what could huge Porphyrion do,
Or what Typhœus, or with trees up-torn
Enceladus assaulting heav'n in impious scorn,
Rushing against the sounding targe
Of Pallas?—Here a furious charge
Was made by Vulcan—there heav'n's royal dame,
And he, who never quits his golden quiver, came,
Who in the pure Castalion spring
Laves his loose locks, who is the king
Of Lycian wilds, Apollo is his name,
Who Patara and Delos holds by natal claim.

245

Force void of counsel rushes down
By its own weight—but there's a crown
Of blest event for courage mixt with care;
But rashness heav'n detests, as working for despair.
That Gyas with his hundred hands,
Whose story upon record stands,
And he th'attempter of the spotless maid,
Slain by Diana's dart, confirm what we have said.
The earth her groaning bosom heaves,
And for each bury'd monster grieves,
To dismal hell by thund'ring vengeance doom'd.
Nor by the eager flames is Ætna yet consum'd.
The bird that on the liver preys
Of Tityus, ever-vengeful stays—
Three hundred chains Perithous confine,
And gall his am'rous flames, which burn'd for Proserpine.

Orion.

247

ODE V.

[The thund'rer, as in heav'n supreme]

The applause of Augustus, the dispraise of Crassus, the constancy of Regulus, and his return to the Carthaginians.

The thund'rer, as in heav'n supreme,
We from his dreadful bolts esteem;
And Cæsar, like a god, directs our helm,
Picts and vexatious Persians added to our realm.
Have they, who under Crassus fought,
With base barbarian wives been caught,
And (O inverted manners, alter'd times!)
With step-fathers grown old in foreign slavish climes?
The Marsian and Appulian band,
Beneath an haughty Mede's command,
Forgetting Numa's shields, and name, and gown,
Jove's Capitol, and Rome subsisting in renown!
The soul of Regulus the great
Precluded such a shameful fate,
Scorning all base conditions ev'n in thought,
As exemplary bad, with future mischief fraught:

249

If not unpity'd and unspar'd,
Their doom the captive youth had shar'd—
“I've seen our standard hung up for a show,
“And troops by Punic foes disarm'd without a blow.
“I've seen our citizens confin'd,
“Ty'd with their free-born arms behind;
“The hostile gates op'd in defiance wide,
“And fields, we ravag'd, till'd in ostentatious pride.
“What! shall the soldier bought and sold
“Be braver when exchang'd for gold?
“You add but loss unto an impious stain,
“The poison'd wool its whiteness never can regain.
“Nor valour, wrought to a reverse,
“Can be repair'd by worse and worse—
“If rescu'd from the toils, the tim'rous deer
“Will turn and fight the hounds—then he shall cease to fear,
“Who once has trusted to deceit;
“And shall the Punic host defeat
“Another time—who felt a ruffian tie
“His coward hands with thongs, and was asham'd to die.

251

“Such, helpless where to fix a ground
“For hope, could peace and war confound—
“O shame! O Carthage! infamously great
“By our confirm'd disgrace, and Rome's subverted state!”
'Tis said, from his chaste wife's embrace
And little boys, he turn'd his face,
And look'd as one amerc'd upon the dust,
With aspect manly stern, determin'd to be just,
Until the conscript fathers all,
With council most original,
He did confirm—and 'midst his friends dismay
And tears, the godlike exile forc'd himself away.
And yet full clearly did he know
The torments he should undergo—
But waving all his kin with unconcern,
And crowds of Roman people grutching his return,
He cooly took his leave, as one,
The business of the forum done,
Goes for vacation to Venafran lands,
Or where Tarentum, built by that fam'd Spartan, stands.

Numa's shields—oval bucklers, used by the priests in processions, one of which being sent down from heaven, was esteemed a token of the establishment of the empire; which, that it might not be known or stolen away, Numa commanded eleven more to be made exactly like it, and to be kept in the temple of Mars.

Phalantus.

253

ODE VI. TO THE ROMANS, ON THE CORRUPT MANNERS OF HIS AGE.

Ye Romans, tho' not done by you,
Ye must your fathers vices rue,
Unless the holy temples ye repair,
And images defil'd with filth and blackness there.
You justly claim imperial sway,
As ye th'immortal gods obey;
Thence your beginning, there refer th'event;
Oft heav'n, for our neglect, has doleful vengeance sent.
Now twice Moneses and the band
Of Pacorus has made a stand
Against our luckless troops, and glad in scorn
Equestrian collars seiz'd, their trinkets to adorn.
While discord is our business grown,
Almost we have been overthrown
By Moors and Dacians, those by sea so dread,
And these expert for jav'lins whirling at our head.
Fraught with offence, at first the times
Defil'd us with domestic crimes,
Our marriage-beds, and families, and race,
Whence all these murders sprang, and national disgrace.

255

Our virgins, now no longer shy,
Are proud th'Ionic step to try,
And move by leud prescription in their bloom,
And meditate on incest from the mother's womb.
Soon, when her husband's at his wine,
To younger sinners she'll incline,
Nor care with whom the lawless bliss she prove,
In hasty stealth, when once the candles they remove.
But, not without her consort's leave,
She boldly rises to receive
Some broker, that will buy her to his arms,
Or Spanish dupe, that pays full dearly for her charms.
'Twas not a race from sires like these
That stain'd with Punic blood the seas,
Slew Pyrrhus and Antiochus the Great,
And beat Hamilcar's son at such a glorious rate;
But a rough set of manly blades,
And skilful with the Sabine spades
To turn the glebe, and carry clubs of oak,
Such as their rigid mothers from the wood bespoke.
What hour the sun the shades enlarg'd,
And from the yoke the steers discharg'd,
Fatigu'd with toil, and urg'd with rapid flight
The time for friendly sleep, or neighbourly delight.

257

What does not mould'ring time impair!
Worse than their sires our fathers were,
And we, far worse than them, about to fill
The world with baser men, and more degen'rate still.

259

ODE VII. TO ASTERIE.

He consoles her in her sorrow for her absent husband, and admonishes her to preserve the faith she had plighted to him.

Asterie, why do you bewail
Him, whom the zephyrs shall restore,
Which fill with vernal breath the sail,
Wafting Bithynian wealth on shore,
The happy Gyges, whose fair truth is known,
And constancy has made so much your own?
He, driv'n by that autumnal goat
And southern winds, is forc'd away,
His meditations to devote
On fair Asterie night and day,
And joyless, sleepless, spends the year,
With many a melancholy tear.
And yet the busy footman speeds
And many a subtle art he tries,
To urge how Chloe burns and bleeds,
And how she pines, and how she dies:
And, anxious to receive him to her bed,
Has many such like stories in her head,
“How a false woman could persuade
“King Prœtus, credulous too much,
“With false pretences that she made
“To murder him, who shunn'd the touch
“Of all impurity and shame,
“The chaste Bellerophon by name.

261

“How Paleas was condemn'd almost
“To hell, in that he had abstain'd,
“And wary 'scap'd the am'rous post
“Where fair Hippolyte remain'd.”
And mentions many a novel tale,
That teaches mortals to be frail.
In vain—for deafer than the rocks
Of Icarus he hears the lure,
And as temptation's voice he mocks,
Asterie, thou art still secure—
And yet—Enipeus—give me leave—
Do not with so much joy receive.
Tho' (to be fair) no man can ride
Upon the Martian plain so well:
A goodly sight, of gallant pride,
And skill equestrian to excel;
Nor any active man alike
Can through the yielding Tibur strike.
Soon as the day begins to close,
Shut up the doors, shut up the gate,
Nor in the street yourself expose,
Nor for the scurvy minstrels wait—
The more they call you hard and hard,
The more your doors and ears be barr'd.

When the constellation of the goat sets at the close of autumn, it generally stirs up showers and storms.

263

ODE VIII. TO MÆCENAS.

Mæcenas is not to wonder why Horace celebrates the calends of March, notwithstanding he has no wife.

Why, on the first of March, so clean,
Free from the matrimonial god,
Why flow'rs and frankincense are seen,
And what these heaps of fewel mean
Upon the living sod,
Friend, is from your discernment hid,
Tho' Greek and Latin are your own.
Know then I vow'd a feast and kid
To him, who did my death forbid,
When down the tree was blown.
This day, the chief of all by far,
A special festival denotes,
And shall remove from out the jar
The cork smok'd down with pitch and tar,
When Tullus had the votes.
Take, for the safety of thy friend,
An hundred bumpers at the least;
On high the wakeful lamps suspend,
Let wrath and clamour have an end,
Nor interrupt our feasts.

265

Cease each political conceit,
Nor Rome let all your cares engage;
The Dacian Cotison is beat,
The hostile Medes, in self-defeat,
Domestic warfare wage:
The Spanish foe now pays the tax,
Though by slow steps this wreath was won;
The Scythian troops their bows relax,
And, fearful of the Roman ax,
The field of battle shun:
The state, not as a man in pow'r,
But as a private friend, repute;
Leave things that are severe and sour
For pleasures of the present hour,
Wine, converse, harp, and lute.

The calends of March were sacred to Juno, and particularly celebrated by married men and their wives.

Bacchus.

267

ODE IX. TO LYDIA.

It is a Dialogue concerning their former loves, with a proposal for renewing them.

Ho.
Whilst my growing flame you nourish'd,
Spotless of a rival's touch,
Clasp'd within your arms I flourish'd,
Not the Persian king so much.

Ly.
Ere you languish'd for another,
And with Chloe was inflam'd,
Lydia, greater than the mother
Of the Roman race, was nam'd.

Ho.
Me indeed that Thracian beauty,
Sweet musician, holds her slave;
For whose life I deem it duty
Death, ev'n death itself to brave.

Ly.
Me my Calais with such ardour
Courts and kisses—him to spare—
Death, or was there aught still harder,
I ten thousand times would bear.

269

Ho.
What if our old flame recover,
And our hearts again subdue,
While the portal of your lover,
Shut to Chloe, opes to you?

Ly.
Tho' he be as bright as brightness,
Thou with cork, or with the sea,
Well compar'd for wrath and lightness,
I could live and die with thee.

271

ODE X. UPON LYCE.

He advises Lyce to lay aside hardheartedness, and to be mild to him in his state of submission.

Far away, where Tanais flows,
Had you been a Scythian's wife—
Yet to see a man expose,
At your cruel doors, his life,
To the northern blasts a prey,
Might have fill'd you with dismay.

Hear you not the creeking door,
How the winds, in ruffian haste,
Make the grove-trees howl and roar
Round the piles of Attic taste;
And how Jove, with purer air,
Glazes snow that settles there!

To the queen of softer mould
Cast away ungrateful pride,
Lest you chance to lose your hold,
When the knot of love's unty'd.
You're not of the Tuscan breed,
Right Penelope indeed.—

273

Tho' nor bribes nor pray'rs prevail
On that harden'd breast of thine,
Nor complexion, violet-pale,
Nor your spouse, who, 'midst his wine,
Wounded by the vocal art
Of a minstrel, yields his heart.

Spare, yet spare your suppliant swains,
Rougher than th'obdurate oak,
Or the snakes, which Moorish plains
To severer spite provoke—
Constitution cannot last,
Thus to bear the stormy blast.

275

ODE XI. TO MERCURY.

He requests Mercury to suggest to him such strains as may work upon the affections of Lyde, chusing for his subject the tale of the Danaids.

O Mercury! for thou instill'd
The notes of old Amphion sung,
Who with his voice could cities build,
And thou, O shell! compleatly fill'd,
When sev'n-times sweetly strung;
Nor vocal, nor in vogue of yore,
Now known in palaces and fanes,
In such inviting accents soar,
As may tempt Lyde to her door,
Attentive to thy strains.
The tygers, with their woodlands wild,
You to your train in pow'r compel;
You make the rapid torrents mild,
Th'enormous hell-hound heard, and smil'd,
You play'd your lute so well.
He smil'd—tho' on his Stygian head
A hundred twisted snakes are hung,
And steams of pestilential dread,
And matter still with poison fed,
Flow from his triple tongue.

277

Ixion too, and Tityos, shew'd
An irksome glimpse of ghastly joy,
While to your melody renew'd,
No more the Danaids pursu'd
Their task of vain employ.
Let Lyde hear the rueful tale,
And punishment at last injoin'd,
How they still ply the sieve-like pail,
Which ever must be fill'd to fail,
The monsters of their kind.
The destiny that must remain
For crimes beyond the grave to feel—
Impious! what could be more a stain?
Impious! their bridegrooms all were slain
By their remorseless steel.
But one of many was a bride,
Whose merit grac'd the nuptial flame,
To her false father nobly ly'd,
And left her memory the pride
Of everlasting fame.
Who bade her youthful spouse “arise—
“Arise (she said) with my reprieve—
“Lest a long sleep should seal your eyes
“Whence least you fear—my father's spies
“And sisters too deceive—

279

“Which, like so many beasts of prey,
“With younglings in their rav'nous claws,
“Ev'n now, alas! thy brethren slay—
“But I will neither strike nor stay
“Whom gentlest nature awes.
“With chains me let my father load,
“Because I chose my spouse to spare,
“And pity on distress bestow'd—
“Or make me settle my abode
“In sharp Numidian air.
“Convey'd by swiftness and the wind,
“Begone, my love, in peace begone,
“While Venus and the night are kind—
“But when my monument's design'd,
“Engrave my tale thereon.”

Hypermnestra.

281

ODE XII. TO NEOBULE.

Neobule, smitten with the love of young Hebrus, leads a life of indolence and sloth.

'Tis wretched in earnest to live like a mope,
Nor wash down chagrin with sweet wine;
To yield to an uncle all spirit and hope,
Who rails at your pleasures and mine.
The charms of young Hebrus, and love's flying boy,
Have stol'n your work-basket away,
And all that fine tap'stry that us'd to employ,
And give to Minerva the day.
This gay Liparean's a notable knight,
Bellerophon's self he may seem,
Not beat in the battle, or match'd in the flight,
When fresh from the cruse and the stream.
The same in each motion's as clean as a cat,
To hurl at the deer in the park,
Thro' bushes and shrubs the wild-boar can come at,
And his quickness ne'er misses the mark.

283

ODE XIII. TO THE FOUNTAIN BLANDUSIA.

He promises a sacrifice to the fountain, whose pleasantness he highly commends.

Hail, clear as crystal to the eyes,
Blandusia's fav'rite spring;
O worthy to receive the prize
Of wine and flow'rs we bring;
To-morrow we shall give thy flood
A kid, whose horns begin to bud,
And fight and wantonness portend:
In vain—his pranks must be no more—
For shortly with his sacred gore
He thy cool stream shall blend.
Thee scorching Sirius cannot touch—
You yield a pleasing shade,
Which for the steers, when work'd too much,
And wand'ring flock's display'd.
Thou shalt be register'd by fame,
A fountain of illustrious name,
Whilst I thy useful beauties book;
The oak so happy on the spot,
To overhang thine hollow grot,
Whence spouts thy pratling brook.

285

ODE XIV. TO THE ROMAN PEOPLE.

This ode contains the praises of Augustus, on his return from Spain, after having defeated the Cantabrians.

Cæsar (of whom but now 'twas said,
That, like Amphytrion's son,
He went, at hazard of his head,
To buy a wreath from Spain) is sped,
And has the battle won.
Let her come forth, whose faithful heart
Is center'd in her spouse,
So great in military art,
Having to heav'n perform'd her part,
In rend'ring of her vows.
And let Octavia too be there,
And, with neat fillets bound,
The mothers of the Roman fair,
And youths the gods have deign'd to spare,
In triumph to be crown'd.
O lads and lasses newly bless'd,
That have your bridegrooms known,
Let not a word be now express'd,
But in such decency is dress'd,
As modesty may own.
This day my festival indeed
Shall banish care and pain,
Nor will I fear by force to bleed,
But from all trouble shall be freed,
In Cæsar's peaceful reign.

287

Perfumes and garlands bring to-day,
And for a measure call,
Whose date preserves the Marsian fray,
If Spartacus, in quest of prey,
Has not secur'd them all.
Quick, with her hair set off with myrrh,
Let me Neæra see,
And bring her lute along with her;
If that cross porter should demur,
Come back again to me.
A hoary head dispute abates,
Though tempted to be sour,
Nor appetite for wrath creates—
I had not borne it, by the fates!
When Plancus was in pow'r.

Livia, the wife of Augustus.

Spartacus, the famous gladiator, who stirred up the servile war.

THE END OF VOL. I.