With whatsoever bane is anywhere Conceived, who gave to field of mine to bear On a good master's head shouldst fall. Against what all should shun, men nowhere are Always enough on guard. The Tyrian tar, Whom Bosphorus frightens, does not fear Blind fate's assault from otherwhere. Arrows, that fast-retreating Parthians shower, Our soldiers dread; Parthians, Italian power And fetters: but unlooked-for death Has reft and will reave nation's breath. How nearly was I then the kingdom seeing Of pale Proserpine! Aeacus decreeing Blest mansions, piety's rewards, And Sappho, on Aeolian chords Of her compatriot maidens plaining : Ocean's, and war's, and exile's woes! Of Furies, shew themselves benign? Nay e'en Prometheus and Pelop's sire Forget in the sweet sound their labours dire : Et quidquid usquam concipitur nefas, Te triste lignum, te caducum In domini caput immerentis. Quid quisque vitet nunquam homini satis Cautum est in horas. Navita Bosporum Poenus perhorrescit, neque ultra Caeca timet aliunde fata. Miles sagittas et celerem fugam Vis rapuit rapietque gentes. Sedesque discretas piorum, et Aeoliis fidibus querentem Sappho puellis de popularibus, Et te sonantem plenius aureo, Alcaee, plectro, dura navis, Dura fugae mala, dura belli! Utrumque sacro digna silentio Mirantur umbrae dicere; sed magis Pugnas et exactos tyrannos Densum humeris bibit aure volgus. Quid mirum? ubi illis carminibus stupens Demittit atras belua centiceps Aures, et intorti capillis Eumenidum recreantur angues? Quin et Prometheus et Pelopis parens Nor any more to hunt the lion Whoever Postumus was-a point upon which there is the usual disagreement among commentators-this Ode, Mr. Macleane justly observes, 'is clearly one of those to which any other name might as well have been prefixed, since it only deals with Horace's ordinary commonplace, the certainty of death for all men.' Aн, Postumus! ah, Postumus! ah me! Tityon and triply monstrous Geryon, " Nec curat Orion leones Aut timidos agitare lyncas. XIV. AD POSTUMUM. EHEU, fugaces, Postume, Postume, Labuntur anni; nec pietas moram Rugis et instanti senectae Afferet, indomitaeque morti: Non si trecenis, quotquot eunt dies, Amice, places illacrymabilem Plutona tauris; qui ter amplum Geryonen, Tityonque tristi Compescit unda, scilicet omnibus, Quicunque terrae munere vescimur, Enaviganda; sive reges, Sive inopes erimus coloni. Frustra cruento Marte carebimus, Fractisque rauci fluctibus Hadriae; Frustra per auctumnos nocentem Corporibus metuemus Austrum. Visendus ater flumine languido Cocytos errans, et Danai genus Infame, damnatusque longi Sisyphus Aeolides laboris. Your house and lands and comely wife must all A worthier heir the Caecuban shall drain Supposed to have been composed in order to recommend and promote the social reform attempted by Augustus. FEW acres for the plough will presently |