XXXIII. AD ALBIUM TIBULLUM.
ALBI, ne doleas plus nimio, memor
Immitis Glycerae, neu miserabiles
Decantes elegos, cur tibi junior
Laesa praeniteat fide.
Insignem tenui fronte Lycorida
Cyri torret amor, Cyrus in asperam
Declinat Pholoën: sed prius Apulis
Jungentur capreae lupis,
Quam turpi Pholoë peccet adultero.
Sic visum Veneri, cui placet impares
Formas atque animos sub juga aënea
Saevo mittere cum joco.
Ipsum me, melior cum peteret Venus,
Grata detinuit compede Myrtale
Libertina, fretis acrior Hadriae
Curvantis Calabros sinus.
A SPARING and infrequent worshipper
While, steeped in an insane philosophy,
I went astray-now back again am I
Compelled to set my sail, and to recur
To my old courses: for the Sire of Heaven,
Who the cloud-masses with his fiery sheen
Cleaves mostly, has athwart the clear serene
His thundering steeds and flying chariot driven,
Whereat the stolid earth and truant streams,
Dark dens of odious Taenarus and Styx,
And Atlantean limitary peaks,
Shuddered. That deity can all extremes
Of high and low reverse: the mean uprear
And the proud humble. With shrill dissonance,
Rude fortune snatches off the plume from hence
And joys in having placed it otherwhere.
Augustus was meditating one expedition against the Britons and another against the East, and Horace here commends him to the care of Fortune the preserver.
GODDESS, who reign'st o'er pleasant Antium,
Potent to raise the mortal body from
Abjectest state, or triumphs proud
To cover with funereal shroud!
PARCUS deorum cultor et infrequens,
Insanientis dum sapientiae
Consultus erro; nunc retrorsum
Vela dare, atque iterare cursus
Cogor relictos: namque Diespiter,
Igni corusco nubila dividens
Plerumque, per purum tonantes
Egit equos volucremque currum, Quo bruta tellus, et vaga flumina Quo Styx, et invisi horrida Taenari Sedes, Atlanteüsque finis
Concutitur. Valet ima summis Mutare, et insignem attenuat deus, Obscura promens. Hinc apicem rapax
Fortuna cum stridore acuto
Sustulit; hic posuisse gaudet.
O DIVA, gratum quae regis Antium, Praesens vel imo tollere de gradu Mortale corpus, vel superbos
Vertere funeribus triumphos;
The needy husbandman besieges thee
With anxious prayers: as mistress of the sea,
So do whoe'er with Thynian prow
The plain of the Carpathian plough.
Thee Dacian rude, and Scythian wanderer,
Cities and nations, and fierce Latium fear;
Tyrants in purple dizenings,
And mothers of barbarian kings.
Do not with harmful foot the stable pile
O'erthrow, and let not popular turmoil
To arms, to arms, the weary wake
And our imperial fabric break.
Thee, aye precedes Necessity austere,
Whose brazen hands huge spikes and wedges bear:
Neither is absent thence the dread
Hook'd iron clamp or molten lead.
On thee wait Hope and rare Fidelity,
White robed, and shunning not thy company,
E'en though, with vestment changed, in ire,
From wealthy mansions thou retire.
But faithless sycophant and perjured wench
Draw back, and crafty boon-companions wrench
Aside their pledges' yoke, and fly
When to the lees the cask is dry.
Preserve thou Caesar, for Britannia's coast-
Earth's farthest-starting, and the youthful host
Newly enrolled to carry dread
To Eastern parts and Ocean Red.
Ah! for my brethren's guilty scars I blush.
Whither forbears this hardened age to rush?
Te pauper ambit sollicita prece
Ruris colonus; te dominam aequoris,
Quicunque Bithyna lacessit
Carpathium pelagus carina.
Te Dacus asper, te profugi Scythae
Urbesque gentesque et Latium ferox,
Regumque matres barbarorum, et
Purpurei metuunt tyranni,
Injurioso ne pede proruas
Stantem columnam, neu populus frequens
Ad arma cessantes, ad arma
Concitet, imperiumque frangat. Te semper anteit saeva Necessitas Clavos trabales et cuneos manu Gestans aëna nec severus
Uncus abest, liquidumque plumbum. Te Spes et albo rara Fides colit Velata panno, nec comitem abnegat, Utcunque mutata potentes
Veste domos inimica linquis. At volgus infidum et meretrix retro Perjura cedit; diffugiunt cadis, Cum faece siccatis amici
Ferre jugum pariter dolosi.
Serves iturum Caesarem in ultimos
Orbis Britannos, et juvenum recens
Examen Eois timendum
Partibus, Oceanoque rubro.
Eheu cicatricum et sceleris pudet
Fratrumque. Quid nos dura refugimus
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