use of purple, more dazzling than the sun,* nor the Falernian vine, nor the Persian perfume, composes a troubled mind, why should I set about a lofty edifice, with envy-exciting columns, and in the modern taste? Why should I exchange my Sabine vale for wealth, that is attended with more trouble? ODE II. TO HIS FRIENDS. He praises military bravery, probity, and fidelity in the keeping of a secret. LET the robust youth, my friends, learn to endure pinching want in the active exercise of arms, and an expert horseman, dreadful for his spear, let him harass the fierce Parthians; let him lead a life exposed to the open air, and in familiarity with dangers. Him the consort and marriageable virgin-daughter of some warring tyrant, viewing from the hostile walls, may sigh-alas! lest the royal husband, unacquainted with the state of the battle, should provoke, by a touch, this terrible lion, whom rage hurries through the midst of slaughter! It It is presumed, that commentators upon this passage might have succeeded better, had they remembered Seneca's expression, clarum mundi sidus, speaking of the sun. The sun, in many languages, is frequently and emphatically termed the star. Clarior, here rendered dazzling, refers not at all to the colour of the purple, but only to the use of it as a badge of dignity and office. Which he spreads wherever he goes. Mors et fugacem persequitur* virum; Est et fideli tuta silentio Merces vetabo, qui Cereris sacrum 4 Sit trabibus, fragilemve mecum Solvat phaselum. Sæpe Diespiter Neglectus incesto addidit integrum : 'Raro antecedentem scelestum Deseruit pede pœna claudo. * Fugacem prosequitur virum. Consequitur virum. Bentl. † Nescia sordidæ, incontaminatis fulget. is sweet and glorious to die for one's country : death even pursues the man that flies from him; nor does he spare the trembling knees of effeminate youth, nor the coward back. Virtue, unknowing of base repulse,* shines with immaculate honours; nor does she assume or lay aside the ensigns of her dignity, at the capricious veering of popular air. Virtue, throwing open heaven to those who deserve not to die, directs her progress through paths of difficulty, and spurns, with a rapid wing, grovelling crowds, and the slabby earth. There is likewise a sure reward for faithful silence. I will prohibit that man, who shall divulge the sacred ritest of mysterious Ceres, from being under the same roof with me, or from setting sail with me in the same precarious vessel': for Jupiter, when he is slighted, often joins a good man in the same fate with a bad one. It is seldom that punishment, though lame of foot, hath failed to overtake a villain. Virtue, as independent of factions and parties, can suffer no diminution of its native honours by popular caprice. Cato's virtues are here supposed to be alluded to, and how did they Through the dark cloud of ills that covered him, Break out, and burn with more triumphant brightness! The Eleusinian mysteries, so named from Eleusis, in Attica, where they were celebrated. CARMEN III. Augustum, ne sedem imperii Trojam transferat, clam dehortátur. JUSTUM, et tenacem propositi virum, Mente quatit solidâ; neque Auster Dux inquieti turbidus Adriæ, Nec fulminantis magna Jovis manus: Impavidum ferient ruinæ. Hercules Hâc arte Pollux, et vagus Hâc te merentem, Bacche pater, tuæ Collo trahentes: hâc Quirinus Gratum elocutâ consiliantibus In pulverem, ex quo destituit Deos Innisus, arces attigit. Enisus arces. Bentl. 5 10 15 20. ODE III. He privately dissuades Augustus from any thoughts of transferring the seat of empire to Troy. NOT the rage of the people pressing to hurtful measures, not the aspect of a threatening tyrant, can shake from his settled purpose the man that is just, and determined in his resolution; nor can the south wind, that tumultuous ruler of the restless Adriatic, nor can the mighty hand of thundering Jupiter: if a crushed world should fall in upon him, the ruins would strike him undismayed. By this means Pollux, by this the wandering Hercules, arrived at the starry citadels: amongst whom Augustus hath now taken his place, and quaffs nectar with impurpled lips. Thee, O father Bacchus, meritorious for this virtue, thy tigers carried, drawing the yoke with indocile neck; by this, Romulus escaped Acheron (death) on the horses of Mars. Juno spoke what the gods in full council approved: "Troy, Troy, a fatal and lewd judge,* and a foreign woman,† have reduced to ashes, condemned, together with its inhabitants and fraudulent prince, to me and the chaste Minerva, ever since Laomedon disappointed the gods of the stipulated reward. Now neither the infamous guest of the Alluding to the judgment of Paris. † Helen. # Apollo and Neptune, for building the walls of Troy. The origin of the fable is supposed to have been, his bor rowing money out of the temples of those two gods, which he never returned. |