Complete Works of Horace (Illustrated) (Delphi Ancient Classics)
Page 28
O cruel still, and potent in the endowments of beauty, when an unexpected plume shall come upon your vanity, and those locks, which now wanton on your shoulders, shall fall off, and that color, which is now preferable to the blossom of the damask rose, changed, O Ligurinus, shall turn into a wrinkled face; [then] will you say (as often as you see yourself, [quite] another person in the looking glass), Alas! why was not my present inclination the same, when I was young? Or why do not my cheeks return, unimpaired, to these my present sentiments?
ODE XI.
TO PHYLLIS.
Phyllis, I have a cask full of Abanian wine, upward of nine years old; I have parsley in my garden, for the weaving of chaplets, I have a store of ivy, with which, when you have bound your hair, you look so gay: the house shines cheerfully With plate: the altar, bound with chaste vervain, longs to be sprinkled [with the blood] of a sacrificed lamb: all hands are busy: girls mingled with boys fly about from place to place: the flames quiver, rolling on their summit the sooty smoke. But yet, that you may know to what joys you are invited, the Ides are to be celebrated by you, the day which divides April, the month of sea-born Venus; [a day,] with reason to be solemnized by me, and almost more sacred to me than that of my own birth; since from this day my dear Maecenas reckons his flowing years. A rich and buxom girl hath possessed herself of Telephus, a youth above your rank; and she holds him fast by an agreeable fetter. Consumed Phaeton strikes terror into ambitious hopes, and the winged Pegasus, not stomaching the earth-born rider Bellerophon, affords a terrible example, that you ought always to pursue things that are suitable to you, and that you should avoid a disproportioned match, by thinking it a crime to entertain a hope beyond what is allowable. Come then, thou last of my loves (for hereafter I shall burn for no other woman), learn with me such measures, as thou mayest recite with thy lovely voice: our gloomy cares shall be mitigated with an ode.
ODE XII.
TO VIRGIL.
The Thracian breezes, attendants on the spring, which moderate the deep, now fill the sails; now neither are the meadows stiff [with frost], nor roar the rivers swollen with winter’s snow. The unhappy bird, that piteotisly bemoans Itys, and is the eternal disgrace of the house of Cecrops (because she wickedly revenged the brutal lusts of kings), now builds her nest. The keepers of the sheep play tunes upon the pipe amid the tendar herbage, and delight that god, whom flocks and the shady hills of Arcadia delight. The time of year, O Virgil, has brought on a drought: but if you desire to quaff wine from the Calenian press, you, that are a constant companion of young noblemen, must earn your liquor by [bringing some] spikenard: a small box of spikenard shall draw out a cask, which now lies in the Sulpician store-house, bounteous in the indulgence of fresh hopes and efficacious in washing away the bitterness of cares. To which joys if you hasten, come instantly with your merchandize: I do not intend to dip you in my cups scot-free, like a man of wealth, in a house abounding with plenty. But lay aside delay, and the desire of gain; and, mindful of the gloomy [funeral] flames, intermix, while you may, your grave studies with a little light gayety: it is delightful to give a loose on a proper occasion.
ODE XIII.
TO LYCE.
The gods have heard my prayers, O Lyce; Lyce, the gods have heard my prayers, you are become an old woman, and yet you would fain seem a beauty; and you wanton and drink in an audacious manner; and when drunk, solicit tardy Cupid, with a quivering voice. He basks in the charming cheeks of the blooming Chia, who is a proficient on the lyre. The teasing urchin flies over blasted oaks, and starts back at the sight of you, because foul teeth, because wrinkles and snowy hair render you odious. Now neither Coan purples nor sparkling jewels restore those years, which winged time has inserted in the public annals. Whither is your beauty gone? Alas! or whither your bloom? Whither your graceful deportment? What have you [remaining] of her, of her, who breathed loves, and ravished me from myself? Happy next to Cynara, and distinguished for an aspect of graceful ways: but the fates granted a few years only to Cynara, intending to preserve for a long time Lyce, to rival in years the aged raven: that the fervid young fellows might see, not without excessive laughter, that torch, [which once so brightly scorched,] reduced to ashes.
ODE XIV.
TO AUGUSTUS.
What zeal of the senators, or what of the Roman people, by decreeing the most ample honors, can eternize your virtues, O Augustus, by monumental inscriptions and lasting records? O thou, wherever the sun illuminates the habitable regions, greatest of princes, whom the Vindelici, that never experienced the Roman sway, have lately learned how powerful thou art in war! For Drusus, by means of your soldiery, has more than once bravely overthrown the Genauni, an implacable race, and the rapid Brenci, and the citadels situated on the tremendous Alps. The elder of the Neros soon after fought a terrible battle, and, under your propitious auspices, smote the ferocious Rhoeti: how worthy of admiration in the field of battle, [to see] with what destruction he oppressed the brave, hearts devoted to voluntary death: just as the south wind harasses the untameable waves, when the dance of the Pleiades cleaves the clouds; [so is he] strenuous to annoy the troops of the enemy, and to drive his eager steed through the midst of flames. Thus the bull-formed Aufidus, who washes the dominions of the Apulian Daunus, rolls along, when he rages and meditates an horrible deluge to the cultivated lands; when Claudius overthrew with impetuous might, the iron ranks of the barbarians, and by mowing down both front and rear strewed the ground, victorious without any loss; through you supplying them with troops, you with councils, and your own guardian powers. For on that day, when the suppliant Alexandria opened her ports, and deserted court, fortune, propitious to you in the third lustrum, has put a happy period to the war, and has ascribed praise and wished-for honor to the victories already obtained. O thou dread guardian of Italy and imperial Rome, thee the Spaniard, till now unconquered, and the Mede, and the Indian, thee the vagrant Scythian admires; thee both the Nile, who conceals his fountain heads, and the Danube; thee the rapid Tigris; thee the monster-bearing ocean, that roars against the remote Britons; thee the region of Gaul fearless of death, and that of hardy Iberia obeys; thee the Sicambrians, who delight in slaughter, laying aside their arms, revere.
ODE XV.
TO AUGUSTUS, ON THE RESTORATION OF PEACE.
Phoebus chid me, when I was meditating to sing of battles And conquered cities on the lyre: that I might not set my little sails along the Tyrrhenian Sea. Your age, O Caesar, has both restored plenteous crops to the fields, and has brought back to our Jupiter the standards torn from the proud pillars of the Parthians; and has shut up [the temple] of Janus [founded by] Romulus, now free from war; and has imposed a due discipline upon headstrong licentiousness, and has extirpated crimes, and recalled the ancient arts; by which the Latin name and strength of Italy have increased, and the fame and majesty of the empire is extended from the sun’s western bed to the east. While Caesar is guardian of affairs, neither civil rage nor violence shall disturb tranquillity; nor hatred which forges swords, and sets at variance unhappy states. Not those, who drink of the deep Danube, shall now break the Julian edicts: not the Getae, not the Seres, nor the perfidious Persians, nor those born upon the river Tanais. And let us, both on common and festal days, amid the gifts of joyous Bacchus, together with our wives and families, having first duly invoked the gods, celebrate, after the manner of our ancestors, with songs accompanied with Lydian pipes, our late valiant commanders: and Troy, and Anchises, and the offspring of benign Venus.
ODES (VERSE)
Translated by John Conington
CONTENTS
BOOK I.
ODE I.
ODE II.
ODE III.
ODE IV.
ODE V.
ODE VI.
ODE VII.
ODE VIII.
ODE IX.
ODE X.
ODE XI.
ODE XII.
ODE XIII.
ODE XIV.
ODE XV.
ODE XVI.
ODE XVIII.
ODE XIX.
ODE XX.
ODE XXI.
ODE XXII.
ODE XXIII.
ODE XXIV.
ODE XXVI.
ODE XXVII.
ODE XXVIII.
ODE XXIX.
ODE XXX.
ODE XXXI.
ODE XXXII.
ODE XXXIII.
ODE XXXIV.
ODE XXXV.
ODE XXXVI.
ODE XXXVII.
ODE XXXVIII.
BOOK II.
ODE I.
ODE II.
ODE III.
ODE IV.
ODE VI.
ODE VII.
ODE VIII.
ODE IX.
ODE X.
ODE XI.
ODE XII.
ODE XIII.
ODE XIV.
ODE XV.
ODE XVI.
ODE XVII.
ODE XVIII.
ODE XIX.
ODE XX.
BOOK III.
ODE I.
ODE II.
ODE III.
ODE IV.
ODE V.
ODE VI.
ODE VII.
ODE VIII.
ODE IX.
ODE X.
ODE XI.
ODE XII.
ODE XIII.
ODE XIV.
ODE XV.
ODE XVI.
ODE XVII.
ODE XVIII.
ODE XIX.
ODE XXI.
ODE XXII.
ODE XXIII.
ODE XXIV.
ODE XXV.
ODE XXVI.
ODE XXVII.
ODE XXVIII.
ODE XXIX.
ODE XXX.
BOOK IV.
ODE I.
ODE II.
ODE III.
ODE IV.
ODE V.
ODE VI.
ODE VII.
ODE VIII.
ODE IX.
ODE XI.
ODE XII.
ODE XIII.
ODE XIV.
ODE XV.
Please note: Conington did not translate I.XXV, II.V, III.XX and IV.X. Please refer to the prose translations for these Odes.
BOOK I.
ODE I.
MAECENAS ATAVIS.
Maecenas, born of monarch ancestors,
The shield at once and glory of my life!
There are who joy them in the Olympic strife
And love the dust they gather in the course;
The goal by hot wheels shunn’d, the famous prize,
Exalt them to the gods that rule mankind;
This joys, if rabbles fickle as the wind
Through triple grade of honours bid him rise,
That, if his granary has stored away
Of Libya’s thousand floors the yield entire;
The man who digs his field as did his sire,
With honest pride, no Attalus may sway
By proffer’d wealth to tempt Myrtoan seas,
The timorous captain of a Cyprian bark.
The winds that make Icarian billows dark
The merchant fears, and hugs the rural ease
Of his own village home; but soon, ashamed
Of penury, he refits his batter’d craft.
There is, who thinks no scorn of Massic draught,
Who robs the daylight of an hour unblamed,
Now stretch’d beneath the arbute on the sward,
Now by some gentle river’s sacred spring;
Some love the camp, the clarion’s joyous ring,
And battle, by the mother’s soul abhorr’d.
See, patient waiting in the clear keen air,
The hunter, thoughtless of his delicate bride,
Whether the trusty hounds a stag have eyed,
Or the fierce Marsian boar has burst the snare.
To me the artist’s meed, the ivy wreath
Is very heaven: me the sweet cool of woods,
Where Satyrs frolic with the Nymphs, secludes
From rabble rout, so but Euterpe’s breath
Fail not the flute, nor Polyhymnia fly
Averse from stringing new the Lesbian lyre.
O, write my name among that minstrel choir,
And my proud head shall strike upon the sky!
ODE II.
JAM SATIS TERRIS.
Enough of snow and hail at last
The Sire has sent in vengeance down:
His bolts, at His own temple cast,
Appall’d the town,
Appall’d the lands, lest Pyrrha’s time
Return, with all its monstrous sights,
When Proteus led his flocks to climb
The flatten’d heights,
When fish were in the elm-tops caught,
Where once the stock-dove wont to bide,
And does were floating, all distraught,
Adown the tide.
Old Tiber, hurl’d in tumult back
From mingling with the Etruscan main,
Has threaten’d Numa’s court with wrack
And Vesta’s fane.
Roused by his Ilia’s plaintive woes,
He vows revenge for guiltless blood,
And, spite of Jove, his banks o’erflows,
Uxorious flood.
Yes, Fame shall tell of civic steel
That better Persian lives had spilt,
To youths, whose minish’d numbers feel
Their parents’ guilt.
What god shall Rome invoke to stay
Her fall? Can suppliance overbear
The ear of Vesta, turn’d away
From chant and prayer?
Who comes, commission’d to atone
For crime like ours? at length appear,
A cloud round thy bright shoulders thrown,
Apollo seer!
Or Venus, laughter-loving dame,
Round whom gay Loves and Pleasures fly;
Or thou, if slighted sons may claim
A parent’s eye,
O weary — with thy long, long game,
Who lov’st fierce shouts and helmets bright,
And Moorish warrior’s glance of flame
Or e’er he smite!
Or Maia’s son, if now awhile
In youthful guise we see thee here,
Caesar’s avenger — such the style
Thou deign’st to bear;
Late be thy journey home, and long
Thy sojourn with Rome’s family;
Nor let thy wrath at our great wrong
Lend wings to fly.
Here take our homage, Chief and Sire;
Here wreathe with bay thy conquering brow,
And bid the prancing Mede retire,
Our Caesar thou!
ODE III.
SIC TE DIVA.
Thus may Cyprus’ heavenly queen,
Thus Helen’s brethren, stars of brightest sheen,
Guide thee! May the Sire of wind
Each truant gale, save only Zephyr, bind!
So do thou, fair ship, that ow’st
Virgil, thy precious freight, to Attic coast,
Safe restore thy loan and whole,
And save from death the partner of my soul!
Oak and brass of triple fold
Encompass’d sure that heart, which first made bold
To the raging sea to trust
A fragile bark, nor fear’d the Afric gust
With its Northern mates at strife,
Nor Hyads’ frown, nor South-wind fury-rife,
Mightiest power that Hadria knows,
Wills he the waves to madden or compose.
What had Death in store to awe
Those eyes, that huge sea-beasts unmelting saw,
Saw the swelling of the surge,
And high Ceraunian cliffs, the seaman’s scourge?
Heaven’s high providence in vain
&
nbsp; Has sever’d countries with the estranging main,
If our vessels ne’ertheless
With reckless plunge that sacred bar transgress.
Daring all, their goal to win,
Men tread forbidden ground, and rush on sin:
Daring all, Prometheus play’d
His wily game, and fire to man convey’d;
Soon as fire was stolen away,
Pale Fever’s stranger host and wan Decay
Swept o’er earth’s polluted face,
And slow Fate quicken’d Death’s once halting pace.
Daedalus the void air tried
On wings, to humankind by Heaven denied;
Acheron’s bar gave way with ease
Before the arm of labouring Hercules.
Nought is there for man too high;
Our impious folly e’en would climb the sky,
Braves the dweller on the steep,
Nor lets the bolts of heavenly vengeance sleep.
ODE IV.
SOLVITUR ACRIS HIEMS.
The touch of Zephyr and of Spring has loosen’d Winter’s thrall;
The well-dried keels are wheel’d again to sea:
The ploughman cares not for his fire, nor cattle for their stall,
And frost no more is whitening all the lea.
Now Cytherea leads the dance, the bright moon overhead;
The Graces and the Nymphs, together knit,
With rhythmic feet the meadow beat, while Vulcan, fiery red,
Heats the Cyclopian forge in Aetna’s pit.
’Tis now the time to wreathe the brow with branch of myrtle green,
Or flowers, just opening to the vernal breeze;
Now Faunus claims his sacrifice among the shady treen,
Lambkin or kidling, which soe’er he please.
Pale Death, impartial, walks his round; he knocks at cottage-gate
And palace-portal. Sestius, child of bliss!
How should a mortal’s hopes be long, when short his being’s date?
Lo here! the fabulous ghosts, the dark abyss,