I have ventured to treat Terrarum dominos' in the sixth line as agreeing not with 'Deos' in the same line, but with 'quos' in the third. This is not the usual construction, but it is one which the words will perfectly well bear, and which, I think, gives them additional significance. Mr. Macleane thinks it probable that the first three books of Odes were published together, with this as a preface, and, at the same time, graceful dedication to Maecenas of a work consisting of fugitive pieces the composition of which had occupied and amused the poet at intervals for some years, and which he may probably have put forth in a collected form at his patron's instigation.
MAECENAS, offspring of ancestral kings,
O thou my cherished ornament and trust! Some men there are, to whom delight it brings To gather round their car Olympian dust;
Whom, goal by hot wheel cleared, and palmy prize Uplift, as lords of earth, unto the skies.
This, if a mob of fickle burghers strive That he to tripled dignity may soar: That, if within his granary he hive Whate'er is swept from Libyan threshingfloor: Or one, whose pleasure is in furrowing His patrimonial acres, never thou
Wilt, with Attalic proffers, trembling, bring, Myrtoan sea, to cleave with Cyprian prow. The merchant, fearing when the south-west wind Buffets Icarian waves, no praise omits Of village life;-yet, ill to want resigned, He, presently, his shattered barks refits.
There are, who goblets of old Massic wine Scorn not; nor, for a while from business fled,
I. AD CILNIUM MAECENATEM.
MAECENAS atavis edite regibus,
O et praesidium, et dulce decus meum! Sunt quos curriculo pulverem Olympicum Collegisse juvat; metaque fervidis Evitata rotis, palmaque nobilis Terrarum dominos evehit ad Deos. Hunc, si mobilium turba Quiritium Certat tergeminis tollere honoribus Illum, si proprio condidit horreo Quidquid de Libycis verritur areis; Gaudentem patrios findere sarculo Agros, Attalicis conditionibus
Nunquam dimoveas, ut trabe Cypria, Myrtoum pavidus nauta secet mare. Luctantem Icariis fluctibus Africum Mercator metuens, otium et oppidi Laudat rura sui: mox reficit rates Quassas, indocilis pauperiem pati. Est qui nec veteris pocula Massici, Nec partem solido demere de die
Full length, 'neath green arbūtus, to recline, Or by some hallowed streamlet's tranquil head. Many there are, whose taste is for camp life, And wars that mothers hate, and mingled strains Of trump and horn. Forgetting his fond wife, The hunter 'neath inclement sky remains, If his staunch hounds have spied an antler, or Through tapering toils hath rushed a Marsic boar. Me, doth the ivy, wreathed for learned brow, Mix with Supernal Gods: me, forest shade And agile choirs of Nymphs and Satyrs, now, Distinguish from the crowd;-if, nor the aid Of her own reed, Euterpe, nor my claim Do Polyhymnia to her lute deny:
But if 'mid lyric bards thou place my name With head sublime, shall I then strike the sky..
Probably written on the return of Augustus to Rome after the taking of Alexandria, when the civil wars were brought to a close, and the temple of Janus shut, B.C. 28. The poet signifies his acquiescence in the then prevailing opinion that the assumption of absolute power by Augustus would be the best remedy for reforming the disorders of the state. The prodigies referred to in the opening stanzas are supposed to have been those which followed the death of Julius, B.C. 44, and which are also described by Virgil at the end of the first Georgic.
SNOW, and dire hail sufficient hath the Father Now upon earth sent down: and with a gleaming Right hand, the sacred capitol assailing,
Spernit, nunc viridi membra sub arbuto Stratus, nunc ad aquae lene caput sacrae. Multos castra juvant, et lituo tubae Permixtus sonitus, bellaque matribus Detestata. Manet sub Jove frigido Venator, tenerae conjugis immemor : Seu visa est catulis cerva fidelibus, Seu rupit teretes Marsus aper plagas. Me doctarum hederae praemia frontium Dîs miscent superis: me gelidum nemus, Nympharumque leves cum Satyris chori Secernunt populo; si neque tibias Euterpe cohibet, nec Polyhymnia Lesboum refugit tendere barbiton. Quod si me lyricis vatibus inseris, Sublimi feriam sidera vertice.
JAM satis terris nivis atque dirae Grandinis misit Pater, et rubente Dextera sacras jaculatus arces Terruit urbem:
Frighted the nations, lest of Pyrrha, plaining Prodigies new, the drear age were returning, In the which Proteus, mountain heights to visit, Did his whole herd drive.
And the fish-brood stuck on the elm-tree's summit, Perch to wood-pigeons theretofore familiar; And in the superjected flood were swimming Timorous roe-deer.
Yellow Tiber saw we, with billows backward From the Etruscan shore perforce contorted, Rush to hurl down the monument of Numa; Vesta's fane likewise.
While of his Ilia, overmuch repining, Boasts himself 'venger the uxorious river, O'er his left bank he scours erratic, spite of Jove's disapproval.
Youths, few in number through their parents' fault, shall Hear how we Romans 'gainst each other sharpened Steel by which rather Persians should have perished: Hear, ay, of battles.
Which of the Gods shall now the people call, to Aid the condition of the toppling empire?
With what entreaties holy virgins weary
Whom with the charge our guilt of expiating
Will Jove invest? Come thou, at length, we pray thee, With a cloud veiling thy resplendent shoulders,
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