Line 1. non usitata, 'quia primus Romanae fidicen lyrae,' Orelli. 2. biformis, a poet and yet a swan.

liquidum, 'clear,' opposed to the damp and heavy atmosphere of earth. Cp. udam spernit humum,' 3. 2. 24.

4. invidiaque maior, above the range of envy. It is to attain this that he will leave the throng of men. For the use of 'que' after a negative clause see on 1. 27. 16, 2. 12. 9.

pauperum sanguis parentum, the very words of the 'invidi,' as Sat. 1. 6. 46 Nunc ad me redeo libertino patre natum, Quem rodunt omnes libertino patre natum.' 'Sanguis,' as ‘regius sanguis,' 3. 27. 65; 'sanguis deorum,' 4. 2. 13.

6

6. quem vocas dilecte, 'whom thou callest dear friend.' To the name given him by the envious crowd, he opposes that given him by the one whose judgment he most values. This is the interpretation of the Scholiast. Cp. (with Ritter) Maecenas' expression of affection for Horace in the epigram preserved in the Suetonian life of the poet: 'Ni te visceribus meis Horati Plus iam diligo,' &c. It must be confessed that the separation of dilecte' from Maecenas' is harsh; and such passages as Ov. Am. 1. 7. 19 'Quis mihi non "demens," quis non mihi "barbare" dixit'? hardly reach the boldness of the vocative in this place. But this seems preferable to the alternative of making 'vocas ' mean ad te vocas.' In all the passages quoted in which vocare' is really used absolutely in the sense of 'to invite,' it seems to be a colloquialism for 'to ask to dinner,' and Orelli allows that in this meaning 'sententia sane parasito quam poeta dignior foret.'

8. cohibebor, 2. 14. 9.

9. The skin roughens and shrinks to my legs, as they also shrink into the legs of a bird.' Notice the antithetical ' asperae.. leves': see on 1. 36. 16.

11. superne. Thee is short, as in Lucr. 6. 543 and 596: see Wagner's Plaut. Aulul. Introd. p. xxiii.

13. notior, so Keller edits, following the readings of B and A (though 'corrected' in the latter by a second hand to otior'). A large number have ocior.' The hiatus in that case must be defended by the same considerations as 'periret' in 3. 5. 17; the caesura separates two parts of an asynartete verse. Bentley proposed 'tutior,' and Lachmann follows him, not to avoid the hiatus, but on the ground that Horace would have felt the bare comparison of his flight to that of Icarus to be ill-omened. Cp. 4. 2. 2 foll. But it is not here as there an effort of his genius, which might be unsuccessful, of which he is speaking. He says that by his poetic fame he will be known to further regions (or that he will travel faster) than if he had the wings of Icarus.

not in question. 'Daedaleo,' not a needless ‘ope Daedalea,' 4. 2. 2, 'Icarus, who had

The fate of Icarus is
patronymic; but i. q.
Daedalus to make wings for him.'

14. gementis, 2. 13. 14, 3. 4. 30. The names seem to be selected, as Dill'. remarks, in stanza 4 as those of strange and barbarous peoples, in stanza 5 for distance-east, north, west.

15. canorus ales. The 'white' (v. 10) and 'tuneful' bird is not named, but is clearly the swan. Cp. 4. 3. 19 'O mutis quoque piscibus Donatura cycni si libeat sonum'; ib. 2. 25 ‘Dircaeum cycnum'; Virg. E. 9. 27.

17. qui dissimulat, fears, though he tries to hide his fear.

19. peritus. Orelli takes this proleptically, when he learns anything shall learn of me.' Ritter thinks there is a distinction drawn between the Spaniard and Gaul as already 'periti,' and the barbarous Colchian, &c.

20. Rhodani potor. For the form of expression see on 3. 10. 1: cp. 4. 15. 21.

21. inani funere, there must be no dirge, for there will be none to bury. See Ennius' epitaph in Introd.

24. supervacuos, 'unmeaning.' Horace; Cicero uses 'supervacaneus.'

The word is not found before

BOOK III.

ODE I.

'Hear the teaching of the Muses, ye that are fit to receive it. All human greatness is bounded. Kings are above us, but Jove is above kings; men may differ in wealth and rank, but Death makes no distinction. To one who has the sword of Damocles above his head no feasts will taste sweet, no music bring sleep; yet sleep may be had in peasants' cots or on a shady river bank. Moderate your desires. It is not the desire for what is enough for life that puts the trader's happiness at the mercy of a stormy sea, or the farmer's at the mercy of the weather. The rich proprietor, weary of the sameness of the dry land, builds houses out into the sea; but fear and conscience and care are not to be escaped; marbles and purple and costly wines cannot take away a pang. Do not ask me, then, to change my happy Sabine valley for a palace that will only bring on me envy, and wealth that only increases trouble!

The exordium suits the beginning of a Book, and also indicates that the Ode or Odes which follow have some special dignity. The sequence of six Odes in the same metre, and dealing with the same general subject, is by itself sufficiently different from the poet's usual practice to attract remark. Diomedes, in his account of Horace's metres, treats them as one continuous poem, numbering Ode 7 as 2; and both MSS. and Scholiasts are inclined to press, beyond the bounds of probability, the connection between one Ode and another (see Introd. to Ode 3, and note on 4. 1). The unity, however, of general purpose is obvious. The ends social, moral, religious, political, which a good government would set before itself in Rome are reviewed, and it is more than once promised that Caesar's régime is to compass them. The Odes fall by their subject, as well as by resemblances of detail, into the same period as Odes 15, 16, 18 of Book ii, and Ode 24 of this Book.

The chief internal evidences of date are the references in Ode 6 to

the still recent Bellum Actiacum (vv. 13-16: cp. 4. 37, 38) and to Augustus' exercise of the censorian power (B. C. 28: see Introd. to Od. 2. 15). The name of Augustus' in 3. 11, if it is held to fix that Ode after January, B. C. 27, when that title was conferred by the senate on Octavianus, will still leave it within the general period assigned to the others.

Lines 1-4. The crowd of men and women are beyond my teaching; listen to me, maidens and boys.' This idea is partly clothed in the language of a hierophant bidding the uninitiate avaunt at the commencement of mysterics. We must not, however, look for the metaphor in every word of the stanza. It is the epithet 'profanum' that seems first to suggest it. As the mysteries are those of the Muses, the vehicle of their proclamation will be 'carmina.' The audience are to be 'virgines puerique,' not because the chorus that sang hymns in honour of a god (Carm. S. 6) must be so composed, for this would be to introduce a second metaphor; but because it was to the young and simple that the poet would address his precepts of moderate living, of courage, justice and piety. We seem to have an echo, and an interpretation, of the imagery of this place in Epp. 1. 19. 32 foll. Hunc [sc. Alcaeum] ego non alio dictum prius ore Latinus Volgavi fidicen; iuvat immemorata ferentem Ingenuis oculisque legi manibusque teneri.' Verses 1, 2 contain the two proclamations customary at solemn rites, the first to warn away improper hearers, kas kas õσtis åλiτpós, Callim. H. in Apoll. 2, ✦ Procul O procul este profani,' Virg. Aen. 6. 258; the second enjoining a sacred silence on those that remained, Arist. Thesm. 39 evpnμos ñâs EσTW λews oτóμa ovyrλeíoas, Tibull. 2. 2. 1 'Dicamus bona verba .. Quisquis ades lingua vir mulierque fave,' Virg. Aen. 5. 71' Ore favete omnes.' Cp. especially Arist. Ran. 353 foll. Evonμeîv Xpǹ kåfíoraobai τοῖς ἡμετέροισι χοροῖσιν | ὅστις ἀπειρος τοιῶνδε λόγων ἢ γνώμῃ μὴ καθα ρεύει | ἢ γενναίων ὄργια Μουσῶν μήτ' εἶδεν μήτ ̓ ἐχόρευσεν κ.τ.λ.

2. non prius audita. The initiated are to receive a new revelation. The metaphor, if we are to interpret it, would seem to include the two ideas, that the Odes which follow are to be of a higher mood than their predecessors, and that the wisdom which they convey is strange to the age.

3. Musarum sacerdos, a natural description of a poet. Theoc. 16. 29 Movσáav iepoùs vñopĥτas, Virg. G. 2. 175 ‘Musae quarum sacra fero.'

5. proprios, each over his own flock; i. e. his sway is limited.

greges, because kings are ποιμένες λαῶν. For the construction 'imperium est in greges,' cp. 4. 4. 2 regnum in aves.' Orelli quotes Plaut. Men. 5. 7. 11 'Si quod imperi est in te mihi.'

7, 8. 'Of Jove, whose glory and power dwarf those of the greatest kings.' 8. supercilio, after Hom. Il. I. 528 ἢ καὶ κυανέησιν ὑπ ̓ ὀφρύσι νεῦσε Κρονίων . . μέγαν δ' ἐλέλιξεν Ολυμπον, Virg. Αen. 10. 115.

9-14. Men may differ in fortune during life. One possesses broad acres; another, if he is a candidate for office, can offer high birth; a third is a "novus homo," but has higher personal reputation; a fourth has a larger number of clients on whose votes he can reckon.'

9. est ut, it may be that,' as 'non est ut,' Epp. 1. 12. 2. It is needless with Bentley to alter to 'esto.' The concessions are balanced in the apodosis 'aequa lege,' &c.

viro vir, man than man,' but they do not thereby rise above the conditions of humanity. Cp. the same emphasis on ȧvp in Soph. Ο. Τ. 498 foll. ὁ μὲν οὖν Ζεὺς ὅ τ' Απόλλων ξυνετοὶ καὶ τὰ βροτῶν | εἰδότες· ἀνδρῶν δ' ὅτι μάντις πλέον ἢ γὼ φέρεται | κρίσις οὐκ ἔστιν ἀληθής σοφίᾳ δ ̓ ἂν σοφίαν | παραμείψειεν ἀνήρ.

latius, i. e. 'per ampliorem fundum.'

10. arbusta, the trees on which vines are to be trained. ordinet sulcis describes the usual mode of planting them. 'Pone ordine vites,' Virg. E. 1. 74, 'plantas deposuit sulcis,' G. 2. 24.

11. descendat, an habitual word with a Roman of rank for going from his own house, which would be on one of the heights, to the forum, the Campus Martius, &c. Cic. Phil. 2. 6 'Hodie non descendit Antonius.' Probably, also, with some feeling of the idiomatic use of descendere,' as KałηKEI, KATEλ0€îv, 'in aciem,' 'in dimicationem,' 'apud Actium descendenti in aciem,' Suet. Aug. 96.

14. Necessitas, 1. 35. 17, 3. 24. 6.

15. sortitur, 'casts lots about,' 'decides their fate by lot.' Virg. Aen. 3. 376 'sortitur fata deum rex.'

16. capax urna, 2. 3. 25 foll.

17. super impia cervice, see on 1. 15. 19 'adulteros crines.' The wicked man has, in his conscience, as it were a sword of Damocles hanging over his head which spoils all pleasure to him. The reference is to the acted parable by which, according to Cic. Tusc. 5. 21, Dionysius proved to his flatterer Damocles nihil esse ei beatum cui semper aliquis terror impendeat.'

18. Siculae dapes, 'a banquet such as was set before Damocles': 'conquisitissimae epulae,' Cic. Tusc. 5. 21. Sicilian banquets were famed, Plat. Rep. 3, p. 404 D Συρακοσίαν τράπεζαν καὶ Σικελικὴν ποικι λίαν ὄψου.

19. non elaborabunt, for all the labour spent on them, they will not procure him the taste of sweetness.

20. avium, of the aviaries of singing birds, a luxury of Roman houses. See Plin. N. H. 10. 72, 17. 6.