Complete Works of Horace (Illustrated) (Delphi Ancient Classics)

by Horace Quintus Horatius Flaccus

  With all his losses, rides to Philip’s door.

  Philip perceives him squalid and unshorn,

  And cries, “Why, Mena! surely you look worn;

  You work too hard.” “Nay, call me wretch,” says he,

  “Good patron; ’tis the only name for me.

  So now, by all that’s binding among men,

  I beg you, give me my old life again.”

  He that finds out he’s changed his lot for worse,

  Let him betimes the untoward choice reverse:

  For still, when all is said, the rule stands fast,

  That each man’s shoe be made on his own last.

  VIII. TO CELSUS ALBINOVANUS.

  CELSO GAUDERE.

  Health to friend Celsus — so, good Muse, report —

  Who holds the pen in Nero’s little court!

  If asked about me, say, I plan and plan,

  Yet live a useless and unhappy man:

  Sunstrokes have spared my olives, hail my vines;

  No herd of mine in far-off pasture pines:

  Yet ne’ertheless I suffer; hourly teased

  Less by a body than a mind diseased,

  No ear have I to hear, no heart to heed

  The words of wisdom that might serve my need,

  Frown on my doctors, with the friends am wroth

  Who fain would rouse me from my fatal sloth,

  Seek what has harmed me, shun what looks of use,

  Town-bird at Tibur, and at Rome recluse.

  Then ask him how his health is, how he fares,

  How prospers with the prince and his confreres.

  If he says Well, first tell him you rejoice,

  Then add one little hint (but drop your voice),

  “As Celsus bears his fortune well or ill,

  So bear with Celsus his acquaintance will.”

  IX. TO TIBERIUS CLAUDIUS NERO.

  SEPTIMIUS, CLAUDI.

  Septimius, Nero, seems to comprehend,

  As none else does, how you esteem your friend:

  For when he begs, nay, forces me, good man,

  To move you in his favour, if I can,

  As not unfit the heart and home to share

  Of Claudius, who selects his staff with care,

  Bidding me act as though I filled the place

  Of one you honour with your special grace,

  He sees and knows what I may safely try

  By way of influence better e’en than I.

  Believe me, many were the pleas I used

  In the vain hope to get myself excused:

  But then there came a natural fear, you know,

  Lest I should seem to rate my powers too low,

  To make a snug peculium of my own,

  And keep my influence for myself alone:

  So, fearing to incur more serious blame,

  I bronze my front, step down, and play my game.

  If then you praise the sacrifice I make

  In waiving modesty for friendship’s sake,

  Admit him to your circle, when you’ve read

  These lines, and trust me for his heart and head.

  X. TO ARISTIUS FUSCUS.

  URBIS AMATOREM.

  To Fuscus, lover of the city, I

  Who love the country, wish prosperity:

  In this one thing unlike, in all beside

  We might be twins, so nearly we’re allied;

  Sharing each other’s hates, each other’s loves,

  We bill and coo, like two familiar doves.

  You keep the nest: I love the rural scene,

  Fresh runnels, moss-grown rocks, and woodland green.

  What would you more? once let me leave the things

  You praise so much, my life is like a king’s:

  Like the priest’s runaway, I cannot eat

  Your cakes, but pine for bread of wholesome wheat.

  Now say that it behoves us to adjust

  Our lives to nature (wisdom says we must):

  You want a site for building: can you find

  A place that’s like the country to your mind?

  Where have you milder winters? where are airs

  That breathe more grateful when the Dogstar glares,

  Or when the Lion feels in every vein

  The sun’s sharp thrill, and maddens with the pain?

  Is there a spot where care contrives to keep

  At further distance from the couch of sleep?

  Is springing grass less sweet to nose or eyes

  Than Libyan marble’s tesselated dyes?

  Does purer water strain your pipes of lead

  Than that which ripples down the brooklet’s bed?

  Why, ‘mid your Parian columns trees you train,

  And praise the house that fronts a wide domain.

  Drive Nature forth by force, she’ll turn and rout

  The false refinements that would keep her out.

  The luckless wight who can’t tell side by side

  A Tyrian fleece from one Aquinum-dyed,

  Is not more surely, keenly, made to smart

  Than he who knows not truth and lies apart.

  Take too much pleasure in good things, you’ll feel

  The shock of adverse fortune makes you reel.

  Regard a thing with wonder, with a wrench

  You’ll give it up when bidden to retrench.

  Keep clear of courts: a homely life transcends

  The vaunted bliss of monarchs and their friends.

  The stag was wont to quarrel with the steed,

  Nor let him graze in common on the mead:

  The steed, who got the worst in each attack,

  Asked help from man, and took him on his back:

  But when his foe was quelled, he ne’er got rid

  Of his new friend, still bridled and bestrid.

  So he who, fearing penury, loses hold

  Of independence, better far than gold,

  Will toil, a hopeless drudge, till life is spent,

  Because he’ll never, never learn content.

  Means should, like shoes, be neither large nor small;

  Too wide, they trip us up, too strait, they gall.

  Then live contented, Fuscus, nor be slow

  To give a friendly rap to one you know,

  Whene’er you find me struggling to increase

  My neat sufficiency, and ne’er at peace.

  Gold will be slave or master: ’tis more fit

  That it be led by us than we by it.

  From tumble-down Vacuna’s fane I write,

  Wanting but you to make me happy quite.

  XI. TO BULLATIUS.

  QUID TIBI VISA CHIOS?

  How like you Chios, good Bullatius? what

  Think you of Lesbos, that world-famous spot?

  What of the town of Samos, trim and neat,

  And what of Sardis, Croesus’ royal seat?

  Of Smyrna what and Colophon? are they

  Greater or less than travellers’ stories say?

  Do all look poor beside our scenes at home,

  The field of Mars, the river of old Rome?

  Say, is your fancy fixed upon some town

  Which formed a gem in Attalus’s crown?

  Or would you turn to Lebedus for ease

  In mere disgust at weary roads and seas?

  You know what Lebedus is like; so bare,

  With Gabii or Fidenae ’twould compare;

  Yet there, methinks, I would accept my lot,

  My friends forgetting, by my friends forgot,

  Stand on the cliff at distance, and survey

  The stormy sea-god’s wild Titanic play.

  Yet he that comes from Capua, dashing in

  To Rome, all splashed and wetted to the skin,

  Though in a tavern glad one night to bide,

  Would not be pleased to live there till he died:

  If he gets cold, he lets his fancy rove

  In quest of bliss beyond a bath or stove:
r />   And you, though tossed just now by a stiff breeze,

  Don’t therefore sell your vessel beyond seas.

  But what are Rhodes and Lesbos, and the rest,

  E’en let a traveller rate them at their best?

  No more the wants of healthy minds they meet

  Than does a jersey in a driving sleet,

  A cloak in summer, Tiber through the snow,

  A chafing-dish in August’s midday glow.

  So, while health lasts, and Fortune keeps her smiles,

  We’ll pay our devoir to your Grecian isles,

  Praise them on this condition — that we stay

  In our own land, a thousand miles away.

  Seize then each happy hour the gods dispense,

  Nor fix enjoyment for a twelvemonth hence.

  So may you testify with truth, where’er

  You’re quartered, ’tis a pleasure to be there:

  For if the cure of mental ills is due

  To sense and wisdom, not a fine sea-view,

  We come to this; when o’er the world we range

  ’Tis but our climate, not our mind we change.

  What active inactivity is this,

  To go in ships and cars to search for bliss!

  No; what you seek, at Ulubrae you’ll find,

  If to the quest you bring a balanced mind.

  XII. TO ICCITUS.

  FRUCTIBUS AGRIPPAE.

  If, worthy Iccius, properly you use

  What you collect, Agrippa’s revenues,

  You’re well supplied: and Jove himself could tell

  No way to make you better off than well.

  A truce to murmuring: with another’s store

  To use at pleasure, who shall call you poor?

  Sides, stomach, feet, if these are all in health,

  What more could man procure with princely wealth?

  If, with a well-spread table, when you dine,

  To plain green food your eating you confine,

  Though some fine day a rich Pactolian rill

  Should flood your house, you’d munch your pot-herbs still,

  From habit or conviction, which o’er-ride

  The power of gold, and league on virtue’s side.

  No need to marvel at the stories told

  Of simple-sage Democritus of old,

  How, while his soul was soaring in the sky,

  The sheep got in and nibbled down his rye,

  When, spite of lucre’s strong contagion, yet

  On lofty problems all your thoughts are set, —

  What checks the sea, what heats and cools the year,

  If law or impulse guides the starry sphere,

  “What power presides o’er lunar wanderings,

  What means the jarring harmony of things,

  Which after all is wise, and which the fool,

  Empedooles or the Stertinian school.

  But whether you’re for taking fishes’ life,

  Or against leeks and onions whet your knife,

  Let Grosphus be your friend, and should he plead

  For aught he wants, anticipate his need:

  He’ll never outstep reason; and you know,

  When good men lack, the price of friends is low.

  But what of Rome? Agrippa has increased

  Her power in Spain, Tiberius in the East:

  Phraates, humbly bending on his knee,

  Submits himself to Csesar’s sovereignty:

  While golden Plenty from her teeming horn

  Pours down on Italy abundant corn.

  XIII. TO VINIUS ASELLA.

  UT PROFICISCENTEM.

  As I have told you oft, deliver these,

  My sealed-up volumes, to Augustus, please,

  Friend Vinius, if he’s well and in good trim,

  And (one proviso more) if asked by him:

  Beware of over-zeal, nor discommend

  My works, by playing the impetuous friend.

  Suppose my budget, ere you get to town,

  Should gall you, better straightway throw it down

  Than, when you’ve reached the palace, fling the pack

  With animal impatience from your back,

  And so be thought in nature as in name

  Tour father’s colt, and made some joker’s game.

  Tour powers of tough endurance will avail

  With brooks and ponds to ford and hills to scale:

  But when you’ve quelled the perils of the road,

  Take special care how you adjust your load:

  Don’t tuck beneath your arm these precious gifts,

  As drunken Pyrrhia does the wool she lifts,

  As rustics do a lamb, as humble wights

  Their cap and slippers when asked out at nights.

  Don’t tell the world you’ve toiled and sweated hard

  In carrying lays which Caesar may regard:

  Push on, nor stop for questions. Now good bye;

  But pray don’t trip, and smash the poetry.

  XIV. TO HIS BAILIFF.

  VILLICE SILVARUM.

  Good bailiff of my farm, that snug domain

  Which makes its master feel himself again,

  Which, though you sniff at it, could once support

  Five hearths, and send five statesmen to the court,

  Let’s have a match in husbandry; we’ll try

  Which can do weeding better, you or I,

  And see if Horace more repays the hand

  That clears him of his thistles, or his land.

  Though here I’m kept administering relief

  To my poor Lamia’s broken-hearted grief

  For his lost brother, ne’ertheless my thought

  Flies to my woods, and counts the distance nought.

  You praise the townsman’s, I the rustic’s state:

  Admiring others’ lots, our own we hate:

  Each blames the place he lives in: but the mind

  Is most in fault, which ne’er leaves self behind.

  A town-house drudge, for farms you used to sigh;

  Now towns and shows and baths are all your cry:

  But I’m consistent with myself: you know

  I grumble, when to Rome I’m forced to go.

  Truth is, our standards differ: what your taste

  Condemns, forsooth, as so much savage waste,

  The man who thinks with Horace thinks divine,

  And hates the things which you believe so fine.

  I know your secret: ’tis the cook-shop breeds

  That lively sense of what the country needs:

  You grieve because this little nook of mine

  Would bear Arabian spice as soon as wine;

  Because no tavern happens to be nigh

  Where you can go and tipple on the sly,

  No saucy flute-girl, at whose jigging sound

  You bring your feet down lumbering to the ground.

  And yet, methinks, you’ve plenty on your hands

  In breaking up these long unharrowed lands;

  The ox, unyoked and resting from the plough,

  Wants fodder, stripped from elm or poplar bough;

  You’ve work too at the river, when there’s rain,

  As, but for a strong bank,’twould flood the plain.

  Now have a little patience, you shall see

  What makes the gulf between yourself and me:

  I, who once wore gay clothes and well-dressed hair,

  I, who, though poor, could please a greedy fair,

  I, who could sit from mid-day o’er Falern,

  Now like short meals and slumbers by the burn:

  No shame I deem it to have had my sport;

  The shame had been in frolics not cut short.

  There at my farm I fear no evil eye;

  No pickthank blights my crops as he goes by;

  My honest neighbours laugh to see me wield

  A heavy rake, or dibble my own field.

  Were wishes wings, you’d join my slaves in tow
n,

  And share the rations that they swallow down;

  While that sharp footboy envies you the use

  Of what my garden, flocks, and woods produce.

  The horse would plough, the ox would draw the car.

  No; do the work you know, and tarry where you are.

  XV. TO C. NUMONIUS VALA.

  QUAE SIT HIEMS VELIAE.

  If Velia and Salernum tell me, pray,

  The climate, and the natives, and the way:

  For Baiae now is lost on me, and I,

  Once its staunch friend, am turned its enemy,

  Through Musa’s fault, who makes me undergo

  His cold-bath treatment, spite of frost and snow.

  Good sooth, the town is filled with spleen, to see

  Its myrtle-groves attract no company;

  To find its sulphur-wells, which forced out pain

  From joint and sinew, treated with disdain

  By tender chests and heads, now grown so bold,

  They brave cold water in the depth of cold,

  And, finding down at Clusium what they want,

  Or Gabii, say, make that their winter haunt.

  Yes, I must change my quarters; my good horse

  Must pass the inns where once he stopped of course.

  “How now, you creature? I’m not bound to-day

  For Cumae or for Baiae,” I shall say,

  Pulling the left rein angrily, because

  A horse when bridled listens through his jaws.

  Which place is best supplied with corn, d’ye think?

  Have they rain-water or fresh springs to drink?

  Their wines I care not for: when at my farm

  I can drink any sort without much harm;

  But at the sea I need a generous kind

  To warm my veins and pass into my mind,

  Enrich me with new hopes, choice words supply,

  And make me comely in a lady’s eye.

  Which tract is best for game, on which sea-coast

  Urchins and other fish abound the most,

  That so, when I return, my friends may see

  A sleek Phaeacian come to life in me:

  These things you needs must tell me, Vala dear,

  And I no less must act on what I hear.

  When Maenius, after nobly gobbling down