EPODE XIV. TO THE PEOPLE OF ROME.
His commiseration with the Republic on account of the civil wars.
Another age our civil wars compleat,
And Rome is ruin'd by her own strong hand;
Whom nor the neighb'ring Marsians cou'd defeat,
Nor threat'ning Porsena's Etruscan band.
Nor Spartacus, nor Capua's rival boasts,
Nor innovating Allobrox cou'd worst;
Nor rough Germania, with her blue-ey'd hosts,
Nor Hannibal by Roman parents curst.
But we destroy her, the vile race she bred,
And beasts again shall seize upon the ground;
Barbarian chiefs shall on her ashes tread,
And with their horses hoofs her streets shall sound.
And Romulus his bones (dread sight to see!)
They shall disperse now kept from wind and sun;
Perhaps you all, or a majority,
Wou'd learn which way this dire distress to shun.
No better scheme than those Phoceans chose,
And execrating did their place forsake;
And left fields, houses, temples for their foes,
And for the bears or rav'nous wolves to take.
To go where'er our feet, where'r the wind
Or south or rude south-west shall us convey;
Can any a more apt expedient find,
The voyage looks fair, why do we yet delay?
But let us first to these conditions swear,
That stones shall swim emerging from the deep;
Or Po, ere any to return shall dare,
Matinian summits in his streams shall steep.
And to the main high Apennine remove,
And join new monsters in the lustful fit;
Until the kite adulterate the dove,
And to the stags the tigresses submit.
Nor tawny lion the weak flocks elude,
And shaven goats in the salt wave delight;
This, and whate'er assertion may preclude,
Our sweet return let us, all Rome, recite.
All go,—at least the more ingenuous part,
The soft and hopeless on their couches lie;—
But cease effeminate grief each noble heart,
And fly the Tuscan shores, set sail and fly.
Circumfluent ocean waits us,—steer the fleet
To plains, the happy plains and blessed isle;
Where earth untill'd each year supplies the wheat,
And undrest vine-trees wear a lasting smile.
Her bud the never-failing olive fills,
And the black figs their native branches grace;—
From hollow oaks flows honey,—and the rills
Down lofty mountains leap with tinkling pace.
She-goats, unbidden, seek the milk-pail there,
And kindly flocks, full-udder'd, homeward speed;
Nor round the sheep-coat growls the ev'ning bear,
Nor adders lurk beneath th'unshaven mead!
And still on stronger beauties shall we gaze,
How the dank east nor lays the bearded ears;
Nor the fat glebe is burnt by torrid rays,
Earth temper'd by the sov'reign of the spheres.
This place the vessel Argo ne'er found out,
Nor impudent Medea ever knew;
Nor here Sidonian sailors tack'd about,
Nor here Laertes son's laborious crew.
No murrain hurts the cattle, nor by heat
Of starry influence are the flocks destroy'd;
Jove did these stores for pious souls secrete,
When he the golden age with brass alloy'd.
The golden age he first alloy'd with brass,
With iron next he made the times more hard;
Whence, for good Romans, there shall come to pass
A sure escape, if Horace be a bard.
