ALL THE ODES AND EPODES OF HORACE.

TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH VERSE: By HENRY RIDER, Master of Arts of Emanuel Colledge in CAMEBRIDGE.

HOR. lib. 3. Ode 1.
—Carmina non prius
Audita, Musarum Sacerdos
Virginibus puerisque canto.

LONDON, Printed by Iohn Haviland, for Robert Rider. Anno Dom. 1638.

Imprimatur,

Tho. Wykes, R. P. Episc. Lond. Cap. domest.
Novemb. 8. 1637.

TO THE HONOVRABLE ROBERT LORD Rich, &c.
The Author wisheth all happinesse here and hereafter.

My honoured LORD:

TO shew that your greatnesse in your selfe hath not made mee fearefull unto despaire, nor your graciousnesse toward me, bold unto presumption, in a modest confidence I now beg a long-since promised patronage: Horace, who either learned from, or taught the Spheres a per­fect musicall harmonie, and made the language of Rome truly Roman, (if we may beleeve him­selfe) [Page]was as meanly descended as my own selfe; yet did not his meannesse deprive him of a pre­sidiarie Maecenas, a Roman Knight, high in Ho­nours, and (which was the greatest) in his Prin­ces love: and it is questionable whether Horace were more helped by Maecenas hand, or Maecenas more honoured by Horace his pen: Horace lived well under Maecenas protection, Maecenas yet lives in Horace kis Poesie: Dignum laude Virum Musa vetat mori; Coelo musa beat. I now present unto your Honours hand, the same Poet, but in an English dresse; nor can it be more difficult to finde an English Maecenas, than to make an Eng­lish Horace: It is not unknowne to those that have bent their studies this way, how hard it is to be tyed to the words and matter of another, especially in verse; and yet if you please gra­ciously to accept, and powerfully to protect my weake endeavours, I was never so much bound to my Authors phrase, as I shall be to your Ho­nours favour. Vouchsafe a gracious aspect to these my labours, and I doubt not but those comfortable raies darted from your eyes, will now give mee life, as they have heretofore given me heat. The loftie riding Sunce in his diurnall course doth shine as bright on a meane cottage, as a Princes Palace; and though his beames can­not raise it to an equall height, yet they impart light and comfort to both alike. I know the [Page]Noblenesse of your disposition will accept of my Translation as well in parchment, as if it had been wrapped up in plush; in vellam as in vel­vet; considering the matter is still the same, as when that Muses darling Horace wrote it: a cu­rious Cabinet cannot make gold better, nor a canvase bag, or iron chest diminish the worth of it. I leave my worke and selfe to your gracious patronage, and wish my selfe may ever be estee­med, as I desire to be

Your Honours humble servant, HENRY RIDER.

The Translator to the Judicious Reader.

TRanslations of Authors from one lan­guage to another, are like old garments turn'd into new fashions; in which though the stuff [...] be still the same, yet the die and trimming are altered, and in the making, here something added, there something cut away: yet have I endeavoured to set forth in pub­lick the Odes and Epodes of Horace in English verse, with as little losse as may be, unlesse it be of my owne credit, who have presumed to make my gleanings more than anothers harvest, and where hee onely ga­thered some few eares, I to bind up straw and all to­gether; for you will find many Odes which have lit­tle or no matter in them, as being composed by the prime author onely to shew the excellency of the Roman phrase, and verse; others mixt of words and matter; many materially excellent. I know I cannot write without the committing of many errors, somewhereof may passe undetected to many, which I my selfe may very much mislike; and some may pick a good con­ceit in some things, where I intended none: others may utterly dislike, what may indifferently please me, [Page]and disaffect some epithetes which I did labour for: Thus tres mihi convivae prope dissentire &c. Let me give you a tasle of one or two passages, where­in haply, perhaps unhappily I may dissent from other judgements: in the fourth Ode of the first Booke: Quo simul mearis, Nec regna vini sortiere talls, which the Commentators in my opinion doe faile in, making talis vini the adjective and substantive of the genitive case; whereas Talis is a substantive in the ablative ease; for it was a custome among the Romans, at their feasts, to cast the dice who should bee the governour of their healths drinking; and this is consonant to Horace himselfe in the seventh Ode of the second Book— Quem Venus arbitrum Dic [...]t bibendi: for Venus, or jactus Venereus carried a­way all: Another thing which I would advertise the Reader of is this, when the same word, of the same ease and gender shall beare two senses, both good; and the Translator, that cannot in his verse render both, shall bee thought ignorant in the one, as in this place; Ode thirty five of the first Book: Regum (que) matres barbarorum, Et purpurei metuunt Tyranni; where the word purpurei may bee understood of the cruelty of tyrants, whose hands are dipt in blood; or the royall clothing of Kings and Emperours in purple robes: in the former sense I have translated the words thus,

And barbarous Kings mothers are afeard,
And tyrants too with purple gore besmear'd.

In the latter sense it may be thus rendred;

And barbarous kings mothers are afraid,
And Tyrants too with purple robes araid.

A third sort of mistake is in some whole clause or sen­tence, as in the fifth Ode of the third Booke, concerning Regulus his embasie to Rome, where he saith:

—Signa ego Punicis
Affixa delubris, & arma
Militibus sine caede, dixit,
Direpta vidi.

Thus farre I understand of the base cowardize of the Roman souldiers: but for that which followeth,

—Vidi ego civium
Retorta tergo brachia libero,

I wonder that all Commentators, that I have seene, should interpret it of the slaverie of the Romans, which is spoken of the fearlesse walking up and downe of the Carthaginian citicens with their hands behind them, after their conquest obtained: and this is evident by the next words.

Portasque non clausas, et arva
Marte coli populata nostro.

A fourth sort of mistake is in the different pointing of a sentence, as you may see in the same Ode:

Si pugnat extricata densis
Cerva plagis, erit ille fortis
Qui perfidis fe credidit hostibus.

Which if it be read with an interrogation, I can see us sense in it: therefore I reade it as a meere concession upon an impossibilitie, that you may as well make a Deere stay and fight valiantly, when she is escaped from the hunters toile, as a soldier once freed from his captivitie. The last sort of mistakes may be in different readings, as in the seventh Ode of the first book (to give no more in­stances) where some reade, Undique decerptam fronti praeponere olivam: I preferre that other rea­ding, Undique decerptae frondem praeponere olivae: since there the Poet speakes of preferring Athens, Pallas citie, and the Olive tree sacred to her, before all other cities and trees.

Take, gentle Reader, these my labours in good part; and if I in this shall give thee any contentment, I hope hereafter to increase it to thee in some other subject; whose studie in this hath been, to afford thee both pro­fit and delight.

Thine in the best of his endeavours, HENRY RIDER.

THE FIRST BOOKE of the Odes of HORACE.

ODE I. TO MAECENAS. HORACE describeth how severall men are delighted with severall sorts of life; but himselfe only with the Name of a Lyrick Poet, as that which will prove most for his glorie.

MAEcenas, my protection, and sweet grace,
Frō great great-grandsire Kings that hadst thy race;
There's some who love in charrets to raise high
Th'Olympick dust; and then the goale past by
By their swift heated wheeles, and noble praise
The Lords of th'earth up to the Gods doth raise.
Him, if the fickle Roman rout contend
With trebly doubled honours to commend;
That man, if he in his owne barns have heapt
What ever from the Libyan floores is swept,
Loving with's plow to cut his countrie field,
With richest profers you shall nere make yeeld;
That as a trembling sea-man he should rip
Myrtilus sea up in a Cyprus ship.
The Merchant lauds his countries ease and rest,
Fearing the South-west-wind that dos contest
With Icarus seas, straight his torn ships doth reare,
Being unskilfull povertie to beare;
This man doth love bowles of old Sack to taste,
And some part of the solid day to waste,
His corps being now beneath some green tree spread,
Now neere some sacred fountains gentle head,
Tents and confused dinne of fife and drum,
[...]nd matron-hated battels doe please some:
The hunter mindlesse of his tender bride,
Dos under the cool-freezing air abide,
Whether his trustie hound did spie a Deere,
Or Marsyan Boar his round hol'd nets did teare.
Ivie, the learn'd heads meed, ranks me above,
With the high gods; me the coole-sh [...]ded grove,
And Nymphs and Satyres nimble train divide
From the rout, if Euterpe doe not hide
Her pipe from me, nor Polyhymnia
Refuse upon her Lesbian lute to play:
But if 'mong Lyrick Poets you'l prick me down,
He touch the stars with my advanced crown.

ODE II. TO AUGUSTUS CAESAR. Hee describeth the tempest, and inundation of Tiber, and inti­mates that they were sent for the slaughter of Julius Caesar in the Capitol; complaining also of the civill wars that fol­lowed upon it; and concludes with a prayer for Augustus.

NOw hath our Father sent upon this land
Snow and dire haile enough, and, with fierce hand
Casting our sacred towres down, hath dismaid
Our Citie; he the Nations made afraid,
L [...]st Pyrrha's wofull age (who did complain
Of new-sprung monsters) should return again.
When Prote [...] drove up all his herds to see
The tops of hills, and on the high elm-tree
The fishes clung (which was the doves known seat)
And fearfull does on the tost waves did beat.
We yellow-sanded Tiber did behold
With billowes from the Tyrrhene Ocean roll'd,
Hurrie to beat down our Kings monument,
And Vesta's temple, very violent:
While he himselfe a champion did display
For his too much lamenting Ilia,
And the wife-serving floud enrag'd dos slide
(Though love gain-said it) ore his cursed side.
Our youths diminisht by their fathers fault,
Shall heare tell that our Citizens have wrought
Their swords, with which the Persians severe
Might better fall; they of these wars shall heare.
What God now shall our people invocate
Unto our ruine-fearing Empires state?
With what pray'r shall our sacred virgins call
Vesta who now heares not our prayers at all?
On whom will Iupiter the office lay
Of wiping our impieties away?
Prophet Apollo, come, we pray, at last,
Thy shoulders with a white cloud being o'rec [...]st;
Or if [...]ai [...]e Venus thou please to step out,
(Whom Mirth and Venus ever fly about)
Or whether thou our Father cast an eye
On thy neglected stock and progenie;
Thou (ah) with too long bloudie pastime fill'd,
Whom clamour pleases, and the glittering shield,
And countenance of Indian swift to goe,
Most violent against his wounded foe:
Or if that thou the winged messenger,
Thy forme being chang'd, like our young Prince appeare
Upon the earth, thou son of Maia mild,
Caesars avenger pleasing to be stil'd;
Mayst thou returne to heav'n again, but late;
And long live gracious to our Roman state;
Nor from us let ore-swift fate carry thee
Offended much at our impietie.
Here mayst thou purchase worthy conquests rather,
Here love thou to be stil'd our Prince and father;
Nor let the Medians unpunisht ride,
So long as thou, ô Caesar, art our guide.

ODE III. To the ship in which Virgil sailed to Athens. He prayeth the ship to deliver Virgil safe to Athens, then con­demneth the rashcesse of him that first went to sea.

O Ship that ow'st back Virgil trusted to thee,
Restore him safe to Athens shoares, I wooe thee,
And keep the one halfe of my soule: so, ever,
May Cyprus potent goddesse thee deliver,
So Helens brothers, two bright stars, thee guide,
So the winds Father, (all else up being tide
Except the west-wind.) Oake and three-fold brasse
Went ore his heart, who first of all did passe
The slender ship unto the floud severe,
Nor rude north struggling 'gainst the south did feare,
Nor rainy Hyades, nor south-wests mood,
Than which the ruler of the Adrian floud
Is not more potent, whether he doe please
To raise aloit, or to calme downe the seas.
What step of death fear'd he, who with eyes dry
Did gaze upon the monsters swimming by,
Who did behold the Ocean still uneven,
And the ill-famed rocks whose tops touch't heaven.
Foreseeing heaven hath parted, all in vain,
The earth from the unsociable main,
[...] for all this these impious ships doe goe
Beyond those seas should not be reacht unto.
"Mankind that dares doe any thing, hath runne
"Into those sins forbidden to be done.
Iäpetus bold son toth' earth hath throwne
Fire by pernicious craft: this fire stolne downe
From heavens court, Leannesse, and a new train'd band
Of feavers revelled in every Land.
Daedalus passed through the yeelding cloud,
With pinions unto mankind not allow'd:
Hercules labour did through Acheron saile:
Nothing's too hard for men: even heaven we seale
By folly, nor through our owne sin will let
Iove his revenging bolts aside to set.

ODE IV. TO L. SEXTIUS. A description of the Spring, an exhortation to mirth from the common condition of mans mortalitie.

BY Spring and West-winds gentle change about
Sharpe Winter's gone; the engines now lanch on
The long-dry keeles, nor doe the beasts desire
The stable, nor the husband-man the fire,
Nor doe the fields with hoary frosts looke gray:
Now Cytherean Venus leads the way,
While the moone'gins to shine, and sweet-fac'd Graces
Joyn'd with Nymphs, shake the earth with mixed paces:
While the flame-scattering Vulcan now doth fire
His Cyclops-toiling forges: now to tire
The head with myrtle green, and with the bud
Which the earth now unprison'd beares, is good.
Now fit to sacrifice in groves close hid
To Faunw, whether he crave lambe or kid.
"Pale death with the same foot knocks at the bowers
"Of the poore men, and at the Princes towers.
O happie Sextius, this our lives short scope
Forbids us to conceive a lasting hope.
Now, now will death, and ghosts held fabulous
Seize upon thee, and Platoes fai [...]ie house;
Whither being gone, you shan't at dice acquire
The rule 'oth' wine nor Lycidas smooth admire,
For whom our Youths now all on fire doe grow,
And maids ere long in their desire will glow.

ODE V. TO PYRRHA. The misery of them that do [...]e on ber.

WHat tender boy upon a rosie b [...]d,
Being with liquid odours overspred,
Within some pleasant bow'r, doth to thee sue
( [...]O Pyrrha) for thy love? for whom doe you
Bind your gold locks, plain in your ornament?
Alas, how oft shall the proud Boy repent
Thy false faith, and contemned deities,
And look with wonderment on those thy seas
Made rough with black winds, who (too credulous Boy)
[...] thee now as some golden prize enjoy?
Who hopes thou'lt still be free to him, still faire,
Ignorant of thy all-deluding aire.
Wretched are they to whom untride you shine;
The wall, by sacred tables made divine,
Shewes I have hung my ship-rackt robe on high
Unto the Oceans potent Deitie.

ODE VI. TO AGRIPPA. That his battels must be sung by Varius; Horace himselfe be­ing fit only for meaner subjects.

THou valiant man, and conquerour of thy foes,
Shalt be by Varius sung in hymnes like those
Or Homers muse, what ere thy warlike forces
Under thy conduct did by ships or horses.
(Agrippa) we nor strive these things to welld,
Nor Peleus sons stout heart, who could not yeeld,
Nor yet the wandring of Ʋlysses sly,
By sea, nor Pelops bloudie family.
We that are weake ones great things doe not use,
While shame and our weake lyre ore-swaying muse.
Forbids me worthy Caesars praise to stain,
And thine with the ill working of my brain.
Who worthily can with his pen denote
Mars armed with an Adamantine coate,
Or Merion with the Trojan dust besmear'd,
Or Tideus son by Pallas aid up-rear'd
Equall toth' gods? We sing of Banquettings,
We sing of angred Virgins bickerings
'Gainst young men with pair'd nailes, being free to muse,
Or, if in love, not lighter than we use.

ODE VII. TO MUNATIUS PLANCUS. Divers men extoll divers countries, the Poet only likes Tibur­tus grove, and exhorts to wash away cares with wine.

SOme will bright Rhodes or Mitylene extoll,
Or Ephesus, or two-sea'd Gorinths wall,
Or Thebes by- Bacchus, or else Delphos high
By Phoehus, or those fields of Thessaly.
Some there are whose sole worke it is to raise
The virgin Pallas towne with lasting layes,
And to preferre the branch o'th' olive tree
Fore any boughs that else-where gathered bee.
The most part doe for Iunoes honour pitch
On horse stor'd Argos, and Mycaene rich.
Not Lacedaenion so inur'd to toile
Did ever so affect me, nor the soile
Of fat Larissa did me so much sway,
As th'house of echoing Albunea,
And steepie Anio, and Tiburnus grove,
And orchards lav'd with streames that ever move.
As oft the cleared north the darknesse scoures
From the black heaven, nor breeds perpetuall showres;
So thou, being wise, remember to confine
Thy griefes, and lifes toile, Plancus, in milde wine;
Whether the Camps with banners glistring hold thee,
Or that thy Tibers shadie banks shall fold thee.
From Salamis and's sire when Teucer fled,
Yet it is said, that he did bind his head,
Well drencht in Bacchus, with a Poplar crowne,
Thus speaking to his friends so much cast downe:
Where-ever fortune, better than my father,
Shall beare us, mates and friends wee'll goe together.
Yee nothing need despaire, while Teucer is
Your guide and aid: for Phoebus promis'd this
(Unerring he) that in a new-found land
A Salamis as good as this should stand:
O valiant men, and that oft-times with me
Have suffered far worse calamitie,
Now doe you all your griefes with wine restrain;
Tomorrow wee'll to the vast sea again.

ODE VIII. TO LYDIA. Concerning a young man wasted with her love.

LYDIA, speake, by all the gods I pray,
Why strive you Sibaris to cast away
For love? Why doth he thus the wide field shun,
Being inured both to dust and Sun?
Why rides he not as souldier 'mongst his train,
Nor with sharp bits his Flanders steeds doth raine?
Why feares he to swim yellow Tiber o're
And shuns, more warily than vipers gore,
The Olive wreath, nor doth his shoulders shew
Now with the armes he beares made black and blew?
Oft by the Discus being made renoun'd,
Oft by the arrow shot cleane through the bound:
Why lurks he as the sea-queen Thetis boy
(They say) did, 'bout the wofull fall of Troy,
Lest that his manlike habit should command
Him to the wars, and to his Lycian band?

ODE IX. TO THALIARCHUS. The sharper the winter is, the sweeter our mirth should be.

SEe'st thou Soracte white with a deepe snow?
How the bow'd trees their weight can't undergoe?
And how the streames bound with sharpe ice, doe stand?
Dissolve the frost, laying with bounteous hand
Wood on the fire, and with a courage bold
Draw, Thaliarch, thy wine of foure yeares old,
Out of thy Sabine two-ear'd pot: the rest
Leave to the gods, who when they have supprest
The winds on the rude sea maintaining warre,
Nor Cypres, nor old Ash-trees shaken are.
"Enquire thou not what shall to morrow bee,
"And whatsoere day fortune giveth thee,
"Put it upon thy gaines; nor sweet love-glances
Doe thou abhorre, O bey, nor yet our dances,
While crabbed age forbeares thy youth a space,
Let both the ma [...]tiall field and wrestling place,
And softly-whispers when the night comes in,
At a fit season be reviv'd agin;
And the maids pleasant laugh that her betraid
Within some private corner closely laid,
Or favour being snatched from her arme
Or finger having done some trifling harme.

ODE X. An Hymne to MERCURIE. The praises of him from severall things.

ELoquent Hermes, Atlas daughters childe,
That hast reform'd rude mens behaviour wilde,
Smooth in thy speech, and in thy mannaging
Of the neat wrestling place; thee will I sing,
Great Ioves and the gods Nuntius, and the sire
Oth'crooked harp, what ere thou didst require,
Being skilfull in a jesting theft to hide:
Whilst thee, a lad, Apollo terrifi [...]de
With threatning words, unlesse thou didst re [...]
The kine that had been stolne away before
From him by thy deceitfulnesse; he smil'd
When of his quiver too he was beguil'd.
Nay Priam too (happie in leaving Troy)
Left Atreu [...] proud sons, (thou being his convoy)
The Greek flames, and Troyes weake camps: thou dispo­ses [...]
Blest soules in pleasant shades, and thou inclosest
The airy drove in with a golden rod,
Lov'd from the highest to the lowest god.

ODE XI. TO LEUCONOE. That shee should not trouble her selfe with future things.

(IT is a sin) doe not thou seek to know
What fate the gods will on my selfe bestow,
What upon thee, Leuconoe, nor trie
The Babylonian Astrologie;
The better to endure what ere may bee,
Whether more Winters Iove will grant to thee,
Or this thy last, which with opposed rocks
In thunder breakes the Tyrrhene ocean shocks.
Be wise, and rack thy wines up, and quite breake
Thy long hope off in short space: "while we speake,
"Envious time flyes: lay hold upon this day,
"Trusting the next as little as you may.

ODE XII. TO AUGUSTUS. Of Orpheus, of the gods, Heroes, and brave Commanders of Rome, lastly of Augustus.

WHat man, or Demi god wilt thou aspire
(Cl [...]o) to celebrate upon thy lyre,
Or shrill-tun'd pipe? what god? what persons name
Shall the deluding echo reproclaime
Or in the shadie banks of Helicon,
Or Pindus, or cold Haemus tops upon?
From whence the forests wildly tooke their way
After harmonious Orpheus, who could stay
The flouds rough current by his mothers skill,
And the swift winds, and to his musick shrill
The then-quick-hearing trees had art to raise:
What rather than our parents usuall praise
Shall I first sing? or him that dos command
Th'affaires of men and gods, rules sea and land,
And dos the world by various seasons guide?
Than whom no greater power dos live beside,
Nor any equall is, or next in place,
Yet Pallas hath obtain'd the nearest grace.
Nor of thee, Bacchus, will I silent bee,
Valiant in quarels; nor, O maid, of thee,
An enemie to savage beasts that art,
Nor thee, O Phoebus, fear'd for thy sure dart.
Alcides I, and Laedaes sons will sing,
The one renown'd, for horse-back conquering,
To'ther for handy-strokes; whose glorious stars,
When they appeare unto the marinars,
The forced water from the rocks doth flow,
The winds are laid, the clouds away doe goe,
And presently (because they so doe please)
The threatning waves are still upon the seas.
Whether, next these, to sing of Romulus,
Or the serene reigne of Pomp [...]lius,
Or of Tarquinius proud dominion,
Or Catoes noble fate, I stick upon;
I gratefully will in a loftie verse
Regulus and the Scauri next rehearse,
And Paulus prodigall of his brave blood,
What time the Carthaginian victor stood,
Next him Fabritius: crushing povertie
And a small field left from their ancestrie,
With a meet cell, him fit for war did square,
And Curius with his uncurious haire;
Camillus too: Marcellus fame is growne
Like to a tree, unto an age unknowne.
Among all these the Iulian star aspires
Like to the Moone among the lesser fires.
Thou father and preserver of mankind,
Begot by Saturne, unto thee assign'd
Let all the care of Caesars fortunes bee;
Doe thou reign chiefe, and Caesar next to thee,
He, whether he in a just victory
Chain the tam'd Parthians foes to Italy,
Or he subdue the Seres and the Mores
Dwelling upon the orientall shores;
Inferiour to thee, shall as partner take
The wide worlds rule; but thou alone shalt shake
Heaven with thy ponderous charret, and shalt cast
Thy vengefull thunders on the groves unchaste.

ODE XIII. TO LYDIA. A complaint that shee preferres Telephus afore him.

WHen thou the rosie neck of Telephus,
Telephus smooth armes (Lydia) praisest thus,
Ah, my scorcht heart with untam'd choler swells,
Nor sense, nor bloud in their due station dwells,
And sweat drops downe my cheekes, at it would say,
With what slow flames am I consum'd away?
I am intag'd, whether some ore-hot broile
Sprung out of wine, did thy white shoulders soile,
Or whether with his teeth the mad cap spark
Upon thy lips have set some noted mark.
You cannot hope, if you will yeeld to mee,
That he will yours for everlasting bee,
Who barb'rously dos your sweet kisses harme,
Which Venus with the Quintessence did warme
Of her owne Nectar. "O thrice blest are those,
"And more, whom an unsever'd band dos close;
"Nor their loves, by false scandals ren taway,
"Shall ere unknit untill their dying day.

ODE XIV. TO BRUTUS. A perpetuall Allegorie against his civill warre.

O Ship, new flouds againe shall carry you
Into the sea; ô, what dost meane to doe?
Steare quickly to the port: doe not you see
How destitute of oares your port-holes bee?
And the maine mast, and saile-yard too doe crack,
Being by the swift-wing'd North wind put to rack;
And ships without their tackling can't prevaile
On the rough sea; thou hast not one whole saile;
Thou hast no gods to whom thou out may'st crie,
Being againe opprest with miserie;
Though thou a Pontick pine (the noblest breed
Of all the forest) boastest of thy seed,
And fruitlesse name; the fearfull mariner
Trusts not in painted boards: then doe tho feare,
Unlesse thou'lt be a may-game for the wind;
(Thou that wast late my fearfull griefe of mind,
Now my desire and chiefe care) shun the seas
Winding among the shining Cyclades.

ODE XV. Nereus prophesie of the ruine of Troy.

WHer that false shepherd brought by sea away
In Projan ships his mistresse Helena,
Nereus with an unpleasing lazinesse
Fetter'd the winds, untill he did expresse
His wofull fate. With an ill omen thou
Dost bring her home, whom Greece, bound in a vow
To breake thy match, and Priams antient raigne,
With many an armed band shall fetch againe.
O what a sweat doth horse and man annoy,
What slaughters for the nation of Troy
Dost thou procure? Now Pallas readie hath
Her helmet, Aegis, charrets, and sterne wrath.
In vaine shalt thou combe out thy locks, being stout
On Venus aid, and warble thy songs out
Pleasing to women, on thy feeble lyre;
In vaine shalt thou fly from the javelins, dire
To beds of love; their shafts of Cretian reed,
Their clamourings, and Ajax swift of speed
To follow thee; yet thou, alas, though late,
Thy lecherous haires in dust shalt vitiate.
Dost thou not thinke upon Laertes son,
The overthrow of all thy nation,
Nor Pylian Nestor? Salaminius,
And Teucer, and the war-skill'd Sthenelus
Fearlesse pursues thee, who, if need there were,
To fight on horse, is a swift charioter.
Thou shalt know Merion too: Tydeus stern son,
Stouter than's sire, to find thee mad doth run;
Whom thou faint heart with panting breath dost flie,
As a Deere mindlesse of his prey, doth hie
From the Wolfe seen in the vales farther side;
Thou made not such a promise to your bride.
The furious navie of Achilles shall
Procure to Ilium an utter fall,
And to the Trojan dames: some winters past.
The Grecian fire the Trojan towres shall blast.

ODE XVI. A Recantation. To a maid whom he had libell'd, and transfers the cause up­on rage, which he describes.

DAughter more faire than thy fair mother was,
Upon my libelling Iambicks passe
What ever doome you will; whether you please
To cast them in the fire, or Adrian seas.
Not Cybele, nor the inhabiter
Of Pytho, dos so much his Priests minds stirre
From his hid cell, nor Bacchus his so much,
Nor Corybants their tinkling brasse so touch,
As fell wrath us: which nor the Turkish blade,
Nor the devouring sea can make afraid,
Nor cruell fire, nor love himselfe keep under,
Rushing upon us with his wrathfull thunder.
'Tis said Prometheus, being forc't to it,
Unto his curious peece of clay did knit
A portion cut from every thing, and prest
The raging Lions fury on our brest.
Rage with a sad destruction overthrew
Thyestes, and the chiefest causes grew
In greatest Cities, that they perisht all,
And the insulting foe drove on the wall
His hostile plough: stop rage; for my brest heat
Did in my flowing youth on mee too beat,
And upon sharp Iambicks sent me mad:
Now with milde songs I seeke to change what's sad,
And since my scandalls have recanted bin,
Be friends with mee, and give mee life agin.

ODE XVII. TO TYNDARIS. He inviteth her to Lucretilis, which he highly praises.

SWift Faunu [...] from Lycaeum changing is
Oft-times to the sweet aird Lucretilis,
And parching heat, and cold winds doth remove
Still from my goats unharm'd through each safe grove.
The strong-smell'd hee goats mates wandring about,
The sheltring shrubs, and beds of Tyme seek out,
Nor the kid fold the green skind serpent dreads;
Nor martiall wolves; when, Tyndaris, the meads,
And smooth-trod stones of steep Usticas ground
With the sweet-tuned pipe doe thorow sound.
The gods keepe mee; my pietie and Muse
Is gratefull to the gods: from hence accrues
Unto the full, out of the plenteous horne
A wealthy treasure of the countries corne.
In a retired vale here shalt thou flee
The Dog-stars heat, and of Penelope
And beauteous Circe both for one at suite,
Shalt thou relate upon thy Teian Lute.
Here shalt thou drinke beneath a shadie tree
Goblets of Lesbian wine nere harming thee,
Nor Bacchus upon Semele begot
Shall any quarellings with Mars complot;
Not yet suspected shalt thou Cyrus feare
So rash left he his rude hands up should reare
Gainst thee too weake, and rend thy fastned crowne
Off from thy haires, and teare thy harmlesse gowne.

ODE XVIII. TO QUINTIUS VARUS. That the moderate use of wine makes men pleasant; immode­rate, turbulent.

BOut Tiburs pleasant pasture, and the wall
Of Catilus, plant thou no tree at all,
O Vorus, sooner than the sacred vine;
For Bacchus to the sober dos assigne
All hard afflictions, nor otherwise
Can they avoid sharp-tooth'd calamities.
Who in's wine prates of tedious woe or want?
Who, father Bacchus, dos not of thee chant,
And thee, faire Venus? but lest some indeed
The liberties of moderate wine exceed,
The Centaures quarrells with the Lapythae,
Skirmished in their wine, admonish thee.
Bacchus advises thee, the Thracians foe,
When greedie of their appetite they goe
Through right and wrong with small distinction.
Thee, gentle Bacchus, He not set upon,
Without thy leave, nor bring into the light
Thy secret rites with many boughs bedight.
Thy trumpets shrill, and Trojan horne restraine,
Which blinde selfe-love succeeds, and glory vaine,
The emptie head more than is fitting swelling,
And glasse-transparent trust, hid secrets telling.

ODE XIX. OF GLYCERA: He is so tormented with love, that be cannot write of warre, but wantonnesse.

THe Cupids cruell mother, and the son
Of The bane Semele commands me on,
And wanton libertie, again to move
My mind unto my long forsaken love.
Glycera's beautie fireth me alone,
Shining more bright than Parian marble stone.
Her lovely skornfulnesse inflameth mee,
And look too dangerous for me to see
Venus upon me rushing with her might,
Left Cyprus, nor would suffer me to write
Of Scythians, and of Parthians valorous
On wrong-turn'd steeds, nor what concerns not us.
Young striplings, lay for me greene fresh turfe here,
Vervine and frankincense dispose me there,
With bowles of wine of two yeares old well fill'd:
Shee'l be more milde, the sacrifice being kill'd.

ODE XX. TO MAECENAS. He inviteth him to a meane banquet.

WEak Sabine wine in small cups shalt thou taste,
Which in a Greek Pot clos'd my selfe had cas'd
Deare Knight Maecenas) when that the applause
Was given thee in the Theater; the cause
That thy owne rivers banks, and pratling aire
Of the hill Vatican, did again declare
Thy praises unto thee. Thou shalt digest
Thy Caecube wine and grapes that have been prest
Out of the Calene fat: nor Falern wine
Nor Formian hills adorn these cups of mine.

ODE XXI. Hee exhorteth young men and maids to the praise of Apollo and Diana.

YEE tender Virgins Dian sing,
Yee young men long haird Phoebus ring,
And Latona loved deere
Of the mightie Iupiter.
Sing yee her that pleased is
With rivers and the leaves of trees.
Which in cold Algidum doe move,
Or Erimanthus shadle grove,
Or Cragus green: Yee young-men raise
Tempe with as many layes;
Doe ye also Delos hallow
Being the birth-place of Apollo,
And his shoulders dignified
With shafts and's brothers lute beside.
He wofull warre shall chase from hence,
He wretched dearth and pestilence
From people, and from Emp'rour Caesar,
For the Persians up shalt treasure,
And against the Brittish nation,
Moved with your supplication,

ODE XXII. TO ARISTIUS. The integritie of life is every where safe, which he proves by his owne example.

THe sound of life, and from corruption freed,
(Fuscus) nor Indian darts, nor how doth need,
Nor quiver full of poysoned shafts, though hee
Thorow the patching sands to travell bee,
Or the inhospitable Caucasus,
Or places which Hydaspes fabulous
Runs through; for in the Sabine grove from mee
Being unarm'd, a Wolfe away did flee,
While I did chant my Lalage, and goe
Beyond my bounds, being devoid of woe:
A monster which nor warlick Daunia feeds
In her large fields, nor Iuba's kingdome breeds,
The Lions dry nurse. Say you banish mee
Unto those frozen lands, where never tree
Is recreated by the Summer heat,
Which part 'oth' world fogs and bad mists doe beat:
Place me beneath the carre 'oth' too-neere Sun,
Even in a Land where habitation
Was never knowne; yet will I still love thee,
My sweet-fac't, and my sweet-tongu'd Lalage.

ODE XXIII. TO CHLOE. That shee should not feare him, but forsake her mother, being ripe for a husband.

LIke to a Hinde thou Chloe dost me fly
That seeks his dam upon the mountaines high,
With a fond feare of winds and trees.
For if the spring-time with mov'd leaves did rush,
Or green-skind Adder brustled through abush,
He trembles both in heart and knees.
But I not like a Tyger fell,
Or a Getulian Lion, will
Pursue to reare thee: cease at length to flit
After thy damme, being for a husband fit.

ODE XXIV. TO VIRGIL. Of the death of Quintilius.

MELPOMENE, thou unto whom thy fire
Gave a sweet voice together with thy lyre,
Sing thy sad tunes; what meane can be, or end
To the bewailing of so deare a friend?
Dos then an everlasting sleepe possesse
Quintilius? unto whom both modestnesse
And Justice sister (Faith from scandall cleare)
And naked Truth when will they finde a peere.
Bewail'd of many good men died hee,
Bewail'd of no man, Virgil, more than thee.
Thou pious man (alas) but all in vain,
Demandst Quintilius of the gods again,
Not lent them to that end: but if that you
Should tune that Lute which trees did hearken to,
Better than Thracian Orpheus, yet agin
Life to that ai [...]ie shape can nere come in,
Which Mercury (who never could be won
To reverse faces upon petition)
Hath once commanded downe to his black guard
With his most dreaded rod; the case is hard.
But "that by patience is made more light,
"Which 'tis not in our power to set aright.

ODE XXV. TO LYDIA. He insulteth over Lydia, that now being old shee is despised of youngsters.

BOld youngsters thy clos'd windowes seldome shake
With dobled blowes, nor thy sleeps from thee take,
And still the doore keepes shut, which heretofore
His oiled hinges moved ore and ore:
Now lesse and lesse th'art fam'd: whilst, Lydia,
I fall from thee, thou sleepst whole nights away.
In like sort, base old bawd, thou shalt complaine
For thy proud lechers downe in some by-lane,
Whilst neare th'eclipse the north-wind blowes more high,
When thy inflamed love, and lecherie
That's wont to make ma [...]es mad, shall rage upon
Thy diseas'd heart, with lamentation
That more in love each sprightfull youngster growes
With green leav'd svie, and fresh Myrtle boughs,
And the d [...]le wither'd leaves dos dedicate
To Hebrus streame the frosts associate.

ODE XXVI. In the praise of Lamias.

I That unto the Muses am a friend,
My griefes and feares to rough winds will commend
Into the Cretick Ocean them to fling.
Nor will I notice take, by whom the King
Of the cold clime neare the North pole's obey'd,
Nor what makes Tiridates sore affraid.
O thou harmonious Pimplaean muse,
That dost a bout the full-b imm'd fountaines use,
Compose together flowers newly blow'n,
O make thou for my Lamias a crown.
My praisings can doe nothing without you;
It doth behove thee, and thy sisters too,
Him with your new strung Lutes to raise on high,
Him with your Lesbian Harp to deifie.

ODE XXVII. To his Companions. Against quarrelling in drink: desiring M [...]gella's brother to drink his mistresse health, hearing her name, he pities him.

IT is the course of Thracians to fight
With cups made for increasing of delight:
Take that Barbarian custome hence, and stay
Your ruddie wine from any bloudy f [...]ay.
From wine and midnight revels strange it is
How much the Median Cimeter disagrees.
Allay, companions, this tumult ill,
And leane upon your rested elbowes still.
And would you have mequaffe my part up too
Of quarrell-breeding Falern wine with you?
Let Opus-bred Megellaes brother say,
With what wound he blest soule doth pine away?
By what dart? what now, slacks your disposition?
I will not drink, except on this condition.
What love so ere thee quels, it burnes thee yet
With no base fires; and with ingenuous heat
Thou still dost frie; what ere thou hast, impart,
Trust it with my safe eares: Ah wretched heart!
In what a vast Charybdis dost thou tire,
My boy more worthy of a better fire?
What witch, or what inchanter can you free
With his Thessalian drugs? what deitie?
Scarce Pegasus shall theo once bound at stake
From this three-shap't Chimaera ever take.

ODE XXVIII. An answer of Archytas, the Philosopher, to a Saylor, concer­ning the common necessitie of death.

THee the surve your both of sea and land,
And of the never to be numbred sand,
The small gifts of a little dust doe stay
Thee, Archytas, neare the Calabrian bay:
Nor dos it profit thee, (being to die)
To have searcht heav'n, and run through the round skie
In thy conceit. Why, Pelops father di'd,
Though the gods guest; Tithonus too beside
Caught up into the aire: and Minos chose
One of loves privie-councell: hell doth close
Pythagoras once more to hell resign'd,
Though he the Trojan age calling to mind,
By his erected shield, did dedicate
Nought but his nerves and skin to cruell fate,
Who (thou being judge) could no meane author bee
Of Physicks, and of true moralitie.
But there's one night for all men tarrieth,
And the once-to-be-trodden path of death.
Fiends on stern Mars doe some for sport bestow,
The sea's the greedie sailors overthrow.
Mixt funerals of old and young are heap't;
Dire Proserpine o're no mans head hath leap't:
The south-wind western Orions rude mate too
Me in th' Illyrian ocean orethrew.
But thou (though cruell-hearted) Mariner
Some of thy waste sand spare not to conferre
Upon my bones and head unburied yet;
So whatsoere the south-east wind may threat
Upon the Spanish seas, while safe thou art,
Let the Venusian forest feele the smart;
And may much traffick (whence it best may prove)
Flow in unto thee from propitious love,
And Neptunes hallowed Tarentine diety;
But if you feare not to doe an impiety
Harmfull unto thy harmlesse progenie,
My unpai'd rites and hard fate watch for thee;
And till my prayer be answer'd He not bate,
And thee no sacrifice shall expiate.
Though you make haste, (it will be no long stay)
Throw mould thrice on me, you may run your way.

ODE XXIX. TO ICCIUS. Wondring that hee should turne from a Philosopher to a soul­dier.

TH' Arabians rich store thou now envi'st,
(O Iccius) and sharp artillery bui'st
'Gainst the Sabean Kings nere conquer'd yet,
And for the horrid Mede thou chaines dost knit.
What barbarous virgin (her bettoth'd love slain.)
Shall tend on thee? what boy of courtly strain
With perfum'd locks shall stand thy cup to fill,
Who by his native archery hath skill
To shoot the Parthian darts? Who will denie
Steepe rivers may run up the mountains high,
And Tiber turne, when as thou dost assay
To change Panaetius brave works away,
Bought on all hands, and thy Socratick ware
For Spanish beles; once promising so faire?

ODE XXX. TO VENUS. Praying her to come to Glycera's Temple.

VENUS of Cnidus and of Paphos Queen,
Scorn thy forsaken Cyprus, and come in
To the neat Temple of my Glycera,
Who with much incense dos unto thee pray.
Let your most furious stripling com [...] with you,
And loose-roab'd Graces, and the Nymphs come too,
And let youths goddesse come, (that without thee
Is nothing beautifull) and Mercurie.

ODE XXXI. TO APOLLO. Requiring only health of body and minde, being he loved fru­gality.

WHat craves the Priest from Phoebus most divine?
What asks he, powring frō his bowle new wine?
Not the full eares of fat Sardinia,
Nor lovely herds of hot Calabria,
Neither the Indian gold, nor Ivorie,
Neither the fields which Lyris glideth by
(That silent river with his quiet stream)
They to whom fortune hath given vines, let them
Prune them with hookes; and out of bowles of gold
Let the rich merchant suck is wines were sold
For Syrian ware: he to the gods is deare,
Because he three or foure times in a yeare
Unharm'd th' Atlantick Ocean can see.
Olives and Succory doe nourish mee,
And loos'ning Mallowes. Grant Latona's son,
While I am strong, that I may feed upon
What next comes; and with perfect minde I pray
To passe a sweet and merry age away.

ODE XXXII. To his Lute. Praising it, from the comfort it yeelded Alcaeus.

WE are desir'd, if we (alone) have plaid
Any thing on thee underneath some shade;
Proceed my Lute, a Latine song tune ore,
Which both this yeare may live, and many more.
Thou first tun'd by that Lesbian citizen,
Who (valiant man at armes) though he had been
Amidst his troups, or else had lanched out
His navie from the washt shores tost about,
Bacchus, the Muses too, and Venus sung,
And her boy too that ever on her hung,
And Lycus beautifull with his black eyes,
And his black haire: O Lute, Apollo's prize,
And lov'd at feasts of mightie Iupiter,
O thou my labours sweetest temperer,
All happinesse be wisht to thee from me,
When in a comely sort I summon thee

ODE XXXIII. TO ALBIUS TIBULLUS. Comforting him; that loving, was not beloved againe.

DOe not thou grieve too much, bearing in mind,
(O Albius) thy Glycera unkind,
Nor tune sad lays, 'cause one more young than thou
Is more accepted, throw her cancell'd vow.
The love of Cyrus doth Lycoris burne.
Fam'd for her comely brow; Cyrus doth turne
After rough-natur'd Pholoë; but first
Kids shall among Apulian Wolves be nurst,
Ere Pholoë sin with that loth'd Sodomite;
For so to Venus it doth seeme most right,
Whom it delights in brezen yoakes to bind
With cruell sport unequall shapes and mind.
When once there su'd to me a love much better,
Myrtale held me with a pleasing fetter,
That slave that lowder than the sea could roare
Of Adria curling the Calabrian shore.

ODE XXXIV. He forsaketh the irreligious Epiturcan sect.

THe gods but scarce and seldome worshipper,
While skill'd in mad Philosophie I erre,
I now am made to turne my sailes perforce,
And fall back to my long-forsaken course.
For with bright flames the cloud dividing Iove
His thunder-shod steeds, and swift charet drove
Through the bright aire, with which the earth so great,
The winding flouds, Styx, and the horrid seat
Of hated hell, and the Atlantick border
Is thorow-shaken: Iove can quickly order
Small things instead of great, the man of worth
He makes a begger, bringing hid things forth.
The all-confounding fortune with lowd cry
Hence had her height: on this shee loves to lye.

ODE XXXV. To Fortune. Praying her to preserve Caesar in his expedition against the Britains.

GOddesse that pleasing Antium dost steare,
Being potent from the lowest step to reare
The putrifying bod [...], and to turne
The proudest triumphs [...]o the funerall urne:
The Country poore swaine with his trembling vow
Seeks thee; and who the Turkish seas doth plow
With Greek ships, as the sea's Queen honours thee:
The Dacians fierce, and Scythians apt to flee
From place to place, cities and nations too,
And warlike Italy stands in awe of you,
And barbarous Kings mothers are afeard,
And Tyrants too with purple gore besmear'd.
O doe not thou wi [...]h a destructive foot
Our firme fixt pillar from his basis root,
Nor let the gather'd rout to armes command
Our quiet troupes, to armes, and waste our land:
Severe fate ever dos before thee passe,
Carrying sharp pikes in her hand of brasse,
And wedges; nor from it is severed
The tort' [...]ing gibber, nor the molten lead.
Hope, and Faith (seldome found) being veil'd ore
With a white vestiment, dos thee adore,
Nor thee for her companion denies,
When, as a foe thou leav'st great families,
With thy chang'd robe: but the perfidious rout,
And strumpetizing perjur'd crue slinke out;
"Friends, when our hogs-heads to the lees are drie,
"Failing to beare the yoake with us, all flie.
Guard Caesar (ready now to set upon
The Britain the worlds utmost nation)
And our young souldiers fresh-waterd powers
So Terrible to all the Fasterne shoares,
And the Red-sea: Ah, ah it shameth mee
To thinke of home-bred skars and crueltie,
And brother against brother. We, hard seed,
what have we shunn'd? we, most accursed breed,
What left untri'd? when did our young-train'd band,
In reverence to the gods, restrain their hand?
What Altars did they spare? would heaven that you
Would fashion over upon an vills new
Those weapons to be hammer'd out againe
Against the Goths and the Arabian traine.

ODE XXXVI. A gratulation for Numidas safe comming home, and an ex­hortation to be merry.

I Love with frankincense and harmonie,
And heifers vowed bloud to gratifie
Numidas guarding deities, who again,
Safely return'd from farthest part of Spain,
Gives many kisses to his friends away,
But to none more than his deare Lamia;
Counting their youths spent under the same guide,
And their gownes changed both at the same tide.
Let not that glorious day want a white stone,
Nor stop page of the pierced butt be knowne;
And (as the manner of the Salis is)
Let not our feet have rest, nor Damalis,
Pow'rfull to drink much wine, Bassus controule
With the long'st breath exceeding Thracian bowle.
Let's want no roses at our banquetting,
Parsly still green, [...]ilie [...] soone withering.
And all shall cast their eyes with lust to stain'd
On Damalis, yet shall not shee he train'd
Away by any new adulterer,
Though shee more fond than clinging Ivie were.

ODE XXXVII. Exhorting his compeeres to mirth for the victory at Actium.

NOw must we drink, now freely dance, my mates,
Now it is time to deck with Saliar cates,
The table of the gods: it was a fault
Of late to fetch wine from the ancient vault;
When the Queen with a lothsome muster'd breed,
(A most infectious hospitall indeed)
Hammer'd the fancied death and funerall
Both of the Capitol and state withall;
Conceiting that shee any thing could doe,
And being drunke with her sweet fortune too:
But scarce one ship escaping from the flame
Pull'd downe her rage; and Caesar new did frame
Her soule, made drunk with her Aegyptian crowne,
To reall feares, pursuing her strait downe
By sea, when she escap'd from Italy,
(Like as the Hawke at the poore Dove doth fly,
Or huntsman swift after a hare doth goe
Through fields of Thrace quite cover'd ore with snow:)
That he in chains the fatall beast might lay;
But she, who sought to die a nobler way,
Nor woman-like afraid of swords did stand,
Nor with quicke sailes fled toth Aegyptian stand;
Who brave soule, durst her ruin'd palace see,
With countenance full of serenitie,
And handle stinging snakes, that she might draine
Into her bodie their infectious bane;
Growing by her determin'd death more stout;
Scorning as captive to be borne about
In strong Liburnian ships in vaunting show,
Being a woman of a spirit not low.

ODE XXXVIII. Hee wills his boy to provide nothing but Myrtle to the setting forth of his banquet.

BOy, I doe hate the Persian nicetie,
Their garlands bound with ribands please not mee,
And doe not thou molest thy selfe to know
In what place the late springing rose doth blow.
I chiefly doe take care you should provide
To the plain Myrtle nothing else beside;
Myrtle will not shame thee my boy, nor mee
Drinking beneath the shadowing vine-tree.
The end of the first Booke of the Odes of Horace.

THE SECOND BOOKE of the Odes of HORACE.

ODE I. TO ASINIUS POLLIO. Hee desireth him to lay aside his admirable Tragedies, con­cerning the civill warres that had beene in Rome, and the severall occurrences therein, till he have selled the affaires of the Common-wealth. Then hee commendeth him, and his rare expressions of the warre; whereunto hee adjoynes the deplorable calamitie occasioned by their civill dissen­tions.

THe civill war, wag'd when Metellus was
Our Consul, and each battels severall cause,
And our corruptions, and State-alterations,
And fortunes sport & kings firme cōbinations,
And weapons stain'd with bloud unexpiated
(A worke with dangerous hazzard operated)
Thou tak'st in hand, and thou on fires dost tread
Under deceitfull ashes buri [...]d.
Oh let the Muse of your sad Tragedie
A short time from the Theaters lie by:
When thou hast ordered State affaires a while,
On to thy brave worke in thy Atticke style.
Rare helpe to condemn'd soules opprest with woe,
And thy-aid-craving Court, O Pollio,
To whom in the Dalmatian victorie
The Laurell gave eternall dignitie.
Now with the Trumps dread noise my eares you fill,
And now againe the Fises sound very shrill;
And now the armors glistering terrifies
The praunsing horses, and the horsemens eyes.
Me thinkes I now doe mighty Captaines heare
Besmear'd with gracefull dust ore every where,
And all parts of the universe supprest,
Excepting Cato's never daunted brest.
Iuno, and what ere Deitic more stable
Unto the Affricans, yet being unable,
Fled from their unavenged land away,
Our Conquerors posterity did slay
In sacrifice to Iugurth: Oh what field,
Manur'd with Roman slaughter, does not yeeld
A testimony of our wicked warr.
Even from our graves; and the fame nois'd as fart
As to the Persians of Romes overthrow?
What Ocean or what Rivers doe not know
Our woefull battels, or what Oceans bay
Have not our slaughters in Appulia
Di'de of a crimson colour? or what shore
Has wanted any of our sluced gore.
But lest (bold Muse) leaving your sports you use
The office of Simonides his muse,
Upon a gentle r [...]string thy measures move
Alone with me under some lovely grove.

ODE II. TO C. SALUSTIUS Crispus. There is no goodnesse in the possession of wealth, without the moderate use of it. He truly is a King, and a blessed man, that can command his desires.

THere is no beauty in the silver found
While it is hid in the devouring ground,
Crispus Salustius thou foe to coyne,
Unlesse it with a moderate usage shine.
Let Proculeius live time unconfin'd,
Fam'd towards his brothers for his fathers mind,
And his surviving fame him up shall beare
With wings that dissolution doe not feare.
Thou shalt more amply reigne, if thou confine
Thy haughty spirit, than if thou Libya joyne
To furthest Cales, and unto thee alone
Both Carthaginians vow subjection.
The direselfe-glutting dropsie dos increase,
Nor slakes the thirst, till cause of the disease,
And all the waterish corruption
Out of the veines and the pale corps be gon.
Vertue that rankes not with the vulgar brest,
Dischargeth from the number of the blest
Phrahates setled in the Persian Throne,
And new instructeth every nation
On false opinions not to relie [...];
Giving him a Kingdome, and firme Royalty,
And perfect praise, who mighty heapes of gold
Can with an uncorrupted eye behold.

ODE III. TO GELLIUS. Since we must die, the minde must neither be dejected in ad­versity, nor puffed up in prosperity.

REmember Gellius, since thou must die,
To keepe a strong mind in adversitie,
And in best state from haughty glorying free,
Whether thou all thy life time pensive be,
Or whether that thou do'st thine owne selfe feast,
Being in some secret Arbour laid to rest,
With long stor'd liquor of the Falerne Vine
On every holiday, where the tall Pine,
And white leav'd Poplar with their boughes doe love
To knit in one an hospitable grove.
What's here to doe? the gliding river prides
To run with murmurs by his winding sides.
Goe bid the boyes bring wine and odours hither,
And fragrant buds of Roses that soone wither,
While our estates, and yeeres, and blacke threed-skeanes
Of the three sisters doe afford us meanes.
You purchas'd fields, and house, and farme shall lose,
By which the yellow-sanded Tiber flowes;
These you shall part from, and your heire shall reape
Your riches raised to a mighty heape.
It skils not whether you be rich in store,
Descended from old Inachus; or poore,
And of the meanest ranck ith' fields dost dwell;
Thou'rt but a feast for all-devouring hell:
Thither we all are driven, all mens fate
Is shaken in one box, that soone or late
Must have an end, and us in Charons wherrie
To everlasting banishment must ferry.

ODE IIII. TO XANTHIAS PHOCEUS. That hee should not bee ashamed to be captivated to the love of a maide.

XAnthias Phoceuss let not a maides love
Shame thee: the captive B [...]is [...]is did move
Achiues, sterne at first, with her faire looke;
The beauty of captiv'd Tecmessa tooke
The Lordly Ajax, sonne of Telamon;
And Agamemnon too was madd upon
A captive maid, amidst his victory,
After the barb'rous troopes did slaughterd lye
By the Thessalian foe, and Hector slaine
Laid open Troy now easier to be t'ane
By the ore wearied Greeks: you cannot say
Whether faire Phyllis princely parents may
Grace thee their sonne in law: for certainty,
She do's bewaile her kingly family,
And envious houshold gods: thinke not that she
From a dishonest stocke was chose for thee;
Nor one so loyall, so averse from gaine,
Sprung from a mother meriting disdaine.
I, from suspicion free, doe highly prize
Her armes, and face, and her smooth rising thighes:
Then scorne thou to suspect the man, whose date
Hastens his fortieth yeare to consummate,

ODE V. He dehorteth some one of his friends, from the love of Lala­ge, araw virgin, and not ripe for a husband.

ON her tam'd necke she yet can't undergoe
The yoke, nor office of a bedfellow
Can yet performe, nor beare the heavinesse
Of the bull that unto his lust doth presse.
Thy heifers mind is for the flowrie fields,
That now neare streames the toil some parching shields,
Now love's mong calves in osiers moist to play:
Put the desire of the sowre grape away.
Ere long the Autumne will display to you,
His blewish clusters mixt with purple hue.
Are long she'l seeke you; for strong age mak's haste,
And those yeares, which it takes from thee, shall cast
All upon her; thy Lalage anon
With fretted brow her mate shall set upon;
So amiable, as not Pholoe
So swift of foote, nor Chloris ere could be:
She being with her ivory skin as bright,
As the cleere moone shines in the sea by night,
Or Cnidian Gyges: whom if you would set
Mong troupes of girles, he wonderously would cheat
The prying guests (the difference scarce found out)
with his loose haires and lookes still moving doubt.

ODE VI. TO SEPTIMIUS. He commendeth the sweetnesse of the aire about Tibur and Tarentum; that he would willingly end his dayes with Sep­timius in one of them.

SEptimius, that must goe to Cales with me,
And to the Spaniards that unused be
To beare our yoakes, and to the barbarous shoares
Where still the Mauritanian Ocean roares:
Would Tibur, by the Argive builder laid,
Might be the mansion of my old age made;
Be that the bound to him that's wearied quite
With navigations, travellings, and fight.
Which if the envious destinies deny,
Unto Galesus pleasing streamesile hie.
Among the well fleec'd sheepe, and to the land
Rul'd by Laconian Phalantus hand.
That plat of ground above all pleases me,
Whose honies no worse than Hymertian bee,
And Olives with greene Venafran contend;
Where Jove long springs, and winters warme doth send;
And Aulon, loving to the fertile vines,
Yeelds but a litle to the Falern wines.
That portion, and those glorious buildings too,
Together with my selfe, doe wish for you;
There with true teares you the warme dust shall blend
Of me that am thy Poet and thy friend.

ODE VII. TO POMPEIUS VARUS. He congratulateth his fellow-souldier Pompeius Varus his returne from warre.

POmpey the chiefe of my associates,
That to the utmost hazzard of our fates
Hast oftentimes along with me been led,
When Brutus of our Armies was the head;
With whom in wine I oft the long day spent,
Crowning my bright haires with my Syrian scent;
Who hath restored thee a Citizen
Unto our gods and Roman air agen?
with thee I tasted of Philippi field,
And swift flight (having basely lost my shield)
Wher [...] our foil'd powers (and menacing before)
The foule earth with their bodies covere dore.
But trembling me swift Mercury did shrowd
Thorow my enemies in a thickned cloud:
But the flood, sucking thee to warre againe,
Once more committed to the raging maine.
Now then to Jove thy vowed offerings pay;
And thy corps, wearied with long warfare, lay
Under my lawrell tree, and doe not spare
My wine tubs that for thee appointed are.
With care removing wine the smooth bowls fill,
The oile from the capacious Jarres distill:
Who will take order to make up for me
Wreathes of moist prasley, or the myrtle tree?
What arbiter will the Venerean throw
Allow us for our healths? I will not now
Be lesse wilde then the Thradians: I delight
Now my friend's safe return'd, to be foxt quite.

ODE VIII. Against BARINE a whore. Tis no wonder shee feares not to forsweare, being shee is nere struck by heaven for it, but rather growes more beauti­full after it.

IF any punishment of perjurie,
Barine, any time had harmed thee,
Wert thou deform'd in one blacke tooth or naile,
I should beleeve: but thou, when thou dost baile
Thy perjur'd head with rowes, shin'st much more faire,
And walkst abroad, our young mens publicke care
Your mothers hidden ashes you may flight,
And silent constellations of the night,
With the whole heavens and gods from pale death ty'de
Venus (I say) her selfe doth this deride,
The plaine nymphes smile, and cruell Cupid, framing
On bloody hones his arrowes ever flaming.
Adde here, that all our youth to you improves,
New servitors grow up, nor former loves
The house of thee their impious mistris quit,
Although they oftentimes have threatned ir.
Thee mothers, thee old fathers very [...]eare,
In regard of their youthfull sonnes doe feare,
And wretched young girles wed awhile goe,
Lest that thy breath their husbands should forest we.

ODE IX. TO VALGIUS. Hee counsels him to give o're mourning for his young boy Mystes.

FRiend Valgius, showres doe not still abound
From forth the clouds upon the furrowed ground;
Nor rough stormes on the Caspian sea doe roare,
Nor stiffe ice stand on the Armenian shore,
Nor Gargan woods are by the North wind shaken,
Nor are the Ash-trees of their leaves forsaken
All the yeare long: yet thou dost still complaine
In mournfull layes for Mystes from thee tane,
Nor cease thy plaints when as the night doth rise,
Nor when againe it from the hot Sunne flies.
But that old man who did three ages live,
For sweet Actilochus did not all times grieve;
The parent and the Ph [...]ygian sisters thus
[...]ewayl'd not alway [...]s beardlesse Troilus.
[...]ease thy soft plaints then, and lets rather raise
Augustus Caesars newly purchas'd pra [...]se,
And strong Niphates, and the Median river
Mixt mongst the conquerd nations, that deliver
Their currents weaker; and the Scythians tide
Within their bounds, in little closes ride.

ODE X. TO LICINIUS. That mediocrity and evennesse of minde, in both fortunes, are the best things to make our lives happy.

LIcinius, thou shalt live more uprightly,
If thou nor alwayes doe the Ocean try,
Nor, while you warily the tempests feare,
Too much along the uneven shore doe steare.
Who loves the golden meane (secure) is free
From filth of a foule cell: contented he
Wants envie-moving towers: The tall pine oft
[...]s shooke with winds; and turrets reard a loft
Doe with the greater ruine downeward fall,
And thunder strikes the highest hils of all.
The wel-armd breast hopes in his adverse state,
Feares in faire weather a contrary fate:
[...]ove brings rude winters, he doth them remove:
If it be ill now, 'twill not still so prove.
Sometime Apollo raises his still Muse
Unto his Lute, nor still his Bow doth use.
Thy selfe couragious and valiant frame
In adverse matters, and being still the same,
Thou very wisely in againe shalt hale
In a too prosperous wind thy swelling saile.

ODE XI. To Q. HIRPINUS. That we should rather live merrily, then toile the mind with thought of things to come.

QVintius Hirpine cease to enquire what
The warlike Spaniard and the Scythian plot,
Parted by th'interposed Adrian waves;
Nor be thou troubled for thy life that craves
But a few things for its necessitie:
Smooth youth and comelinesse away doe flie;
While withered hoary heads away doe keepe
The wanton dallyings, and gentle sleepe.
The spring flowers beauty is not still the same,
Nor doth the bright Moone still with one shape flame.
Why dost thou weary out thy soule that is
Too weak for the eternall my steries?
Under this tall Plane, or this Pine being laid
Thus carelesly, and our white haires displaid
With roses, and being drest with Syrian nard,
Why, while we may doe't, do we not drinke hard?
Bacchus dispelleth carping cares away:
What boy will quickly now our cups allay
Of heady wine, with the by gliding spring?
Who will the by lan'd harlot Lyde bring
Out of her doores? goe and command that she
Doe with her ivory lute make hast come,
In a smooth comb'd knot having ty'd her haire,
So as the fashions of the Spartans are.

ODE XII. TO MAECENAS. Grave and tragicke matters will not agree with the wan­tonnesse of his lyricke verses: that Maecenas may better write the acts of Augustus in prose.

DOe not command that to the lutes soft strings
Cruell Numances tedi [...]us quarrellings,
Sterne Annibal, or seas of Sicilie,
Made red with Punicke blood, should fitted be;
Nor cruell Lapy thae, nor Hyleus flam'd
Too much with wine, nor the earths youngsters tam'd
By th'hand of Hercules, whence the bright sphere
Of ancient Saturne did destruction feare.
And thou, Maecenas, better shalt dispose
The wars of Caesar in thy workes of prose,
And necks of threatning Kings dragg'd through the street:
But my muse bids me praise the musicke sweet
Of my Licinia, and her eyes bright-shining,
And breast most loyall to our loves conjoyning:
Whom it nor misb: seem'd her foot to fit
In dances, nor to sport in jest, nor knit
Her armes 'mong comly virgins, being at play
On honoured Dianaes holy day.
Would you exchange for my licinias haire
The wealth that rich Achemenes did share;
Or fertile Phrygias Mygdonian prize,
Or the Arabians full treasuries?
While she doth yeeld her head to fragrant kisses,
Or with mild scorne denies; which yet she wishes,
More than the suitor, he from her would snatch,
And sometimes doth prevent him, and first catch

ODE XIII. Cursing a tree with fall wherof in his own ground he had al­most beene killed, hee thence proveth that dangers of death do compasse men every houre when they least think of them: the praises of Sappho and Alcaeus, whose songs (especially Alcaeus his) moved admiration even in the Ghosts them­selves.

TRee, he did plant thee in a day accurst,
And with a wicked hand, who set thee first
To the destruction of Posteritie,
And to our townes disgrace; I beleeve he
Broke his owne fathers necke, and did all o're
Besineare his house with his guests night shed gore:
He Colchick poisons, and what ever sin
Can any way be thought on, traded in;
Who thee sad truncke set in my field, to fall
On thy lord: head not meriting it all.
"Men never can take heed sufficiently
"Of what at all houres every one should flie:
The Ca [...]thaginian Saylour feares the Straits,
Nor farther doth he dread his hidden fates.
Our band the Parthians darts, and nimble flight,
The Parthian feares our chains and Reman might:
But yet he destinies unsearched power
Hath swallowed and all nations will devoure.
How near saw I blacke Proserpines whole stations,
And judging Aeacus, and sixt situations
Of holy soules, and Sappho who did carpe
Against her country dames on her Greeke harpe;
And thee Alcaeus, on thy golden strings,
Sounding out sea fights cruell sufferings,
The cruell suffering of banishment,
Wars cruelties with a more full conce [...]t?
The ghosts admire they both could chaunt upon
Things worth their hallowed attention;
But rather far, battels, and tyrants slaine
The crowding rout doe in their cares retaine.
What wonder? when the hundred-headed hound
Hags his blacke eares, amaz'd at such a sound,
And [...]ll the Adders woven in the haire
Of the Eumenides, refreshed are.
Nay both Proneth [...]us too, and Pelops sire
Are eas'd of torments by their pleasing quire,
Nor doth Orion care to follow hard
The Lion, or the panting Leopard.

ODE XIIII. TO POSTHUMUS. Since death waits for all, Posthumus should not spare those riches which his heire after him will waste-

Ah, Posthumus, the swift yeares glide away,
Nor can thy pietie procure a stay
For wrinckles, swift age, and sterne death; though still
You should, my friend, relentlesse Pluto fill
With full three hundred Buls, through the yeares course.
Him who three bodied Gerion doth force,
And Titvus in sad streames; the which indeed,
By all of us (who on the blessings feed
Of this earth) must be throughly passed ore,
Whether that we be kings, or pesants poore.
In vaine we shall from stern death fly away,
And the dasht waves of bellowing Ad [...]ia;
In vaine we from the Sou [...]h wind shall us arme
That every autumne doth our bodies harme:
Foggy Cocytus we must all goe see,
Which wanders with his streames thatlazie bee,
And Danaus hated stocke, and Sisiphus
The long toile-suffering sonne of Aeolus.
You land, and house, and pleasing wife must leese,
Neither shall any one of all those trees
Which you possesse, save Cypresses ab [...]orr'd,
Attend on thee their quickly perisht Lord.
A worthier heire shall drinke thy wines quite dry,
Kept with a hundred lockes, and he shall dye
His stately pavement with farre better wine,
Then that at banquets of the Priests divine.

ODE XV. He condemnes their great pride in building, and praises the frugalitie of old time.

OUr princely edifices will allow
But a few acres for the ploughshare now:
On every side our fish-ponds shall be seene
More spacious then the Lucrine fen hath beene.
The single Plane-tree shall the Elme excell:
Then violets, myrtles, and all kinds of smell
Shall odours in those olive yards afford,
That have beene fertile to their former Lord.
A set of bay trees, thicke with branches, then
The parching sun-beames out from them shall pen;
'Twas not decreed by th'act of R [...]mulus
And unshav'd Cato, and the ancients thus.
The private wealth with them was very small,
The Common wealth was then the chiefe of all:
No Galleries of ten foot measured forth,
'Mong private men, stood toward the shady North;
Nor did the lawes permit them to d [...]daine
The homely grasse; commanding them againe
To build their Townes up at the publick charge,
And the gods Temples with new stones enlarge.

ODE XVI. TO GROSPHUS. That all desire tranquillity of minde, but few obtaine it.

THe sea-man prayeth to the gods for ease,
Being tost upon the vast Aegean seas,
When a blacke cloud ha's hid the Moone, and Stars
Appeare uncertaine to the Marinars:
Furious Thrace for rest from war doth sue;
The Medes, adorned with their quivers too,
Doe beg for ease, ô Grosphus, that is sold
Neither for gemmes, nor purple robes, nor gold,
For neither can the Magazines of store,
Nor Consuls officer thrust out of dore
The consciences afflictive terrifying,
And cares about the fretted chambers flying.
He with a litle does contented dine,
On whose small board his fathers salt doth shine,
Neither despaire, nor sordid coveting
His gentle slumbers ere from him shall wring.
Why doe we proud soules in our span age plot
A many things? why unto lands made hot
With different Sunnes run we? who being banish'd
From his own soile, hath from his own selfe vanish'd?
Vicious care the brasse-keel'd ships doth scale,
Neither from troupes of horse-men doth it faile,
More nimble than t [...]e Roes, and far more swift
Then the East wind that sets the clouds adrift.
The mind that for the present time is light,
To care for what shall follow, let it slight,
And with sweet laughter temper all things tart:
Ther's nothing prosperous in every part.
A sudden death did brave Achilles slay,
Ling [...]ing age pin'd Tithonus quite a way;
And time perhaps may unto me betide
The thing which it hath unto thee de [...]ide.
An hundred flocks, and kine of Sicilie
Doe round about thee bellow; unto thee
The Mare fit for the teeme doth raise her cry;
Garments twice dipt in Affricke sca let die
Cloath thee: my never-failing fare did daigne
To me some small grounds, and a slender veine
Of Graecian poesie, and with it beside
The still-malicious vulgar to deride.

ODE XVII. TO MAECENAS being sicke. That there is such union of soules betweene him and Maece­nas, that he nor can, nor will live without him.

WHerefore with thy complaints unsoul'st thou me?
Pleasing unto the gods it cannot be
Nor me, that thou, Maecenas, first shouldst die,
My states great glory and securitie.
Ah, if a swifter fare snatch thee away
The one halfe of my soule, why doe I stay
[...]hat [...]m the other, that cannot survive
Tor deare unto my selfe, nor all alive?
The day shall worke the ruine of us both;
N [...]ave not taken a perfidious oath:
' [...]
Wee'l goe, wee'l goe, when thou the [...]ay shalt lead,
Prepar'd companions our last path to tread.
Me nor the fiery Chimera's flame,
Nor hundred handed Gyas, if he came,
Shall ever part: it pleased on this wise
All-p [...]tent Justice and the destinies.
Whether the Scales or horrid Scorpion
(My birth-houres stronger part) lookes me upon,
Or Capricorn the Westerne Oceans lord,
Yet both our stars in wondrous sort accord.
Thee Joves refulgent turelage tooke backe
From impious Saturne, and the wings did slacks
Of swift fate, when the people, gathering round,
Thrice in the Thea'tre made a joyfull sound:
A tree upon my head almost fal'ne downe
Had murdered me, if Faunus had not throwne
The force of it aside with his right hand,
(The Governour of the Mercurrial band)
Remember thou thy offerings to pay,
And thy vowd temple: woe'l a meeke lambe slay.

ODE XVII. That he liveth content with his owne lot, and meane fortune, while others toile themselves in building magnificent Pa­laces, even with the oppression of the poore; as if they had forgot that the same common necessitie of dying lies on them, that lies on others.

NOrivory, nor golden roofe doth shine
In any mansion of mine;
Nor beames, fetcht from Hymettus, stay
On pillars cut from farthest Affrica:
Nor have I ever (as an heire unknowne)
Usurped Attalus his throne;
Nor doe our lames that honest be
Spin their Laconicke purple wooll for me.
But I have musicke, and a vein of wit
Ful-flowing, and the rich submit
To me a poore man: nothing more
Then this is doe I of the gods implore;
Nor greater gifts of my great friends request,
In my one Sabine field well blest.
Day is still expell'd by day,
And new moones doe increase to wane away.
Thou marble stones to be hewen out dost hire,
Near upon thy funerall fire;
And, mindlesse of thy Sepulcher,
Buildst houses, and dost strive the shoares to weare
Of the sea neare the bathes making a sound,
Not rich enough on the firme ground.
Why? cause you your next land-marks waste,
And greedy o're your tenants fences haste:
The man and wife is thrust out, at their brest
Bearing their gods and brats undrest.
Yet no house surer doth attend
The rich lord, then devouring hels fixt end.
Why seeke you more? "the earth alike must bee
"For the poore man, as kings sonnes free.
Hels porter (nere with bribes oretane)
Cunning Promotheus hath not freed againe.
He the proud Tantalus close up doth tye,
And Tantalus his progenie.
"Call'd, or not call'd, he prepares
To ease the dying begger of his cares.

ODE XIX. TO BACCHUS. It is meet for him to sing Bacchus his prayses.

I Bacchus in remotest rocks did see
Teaching his song (beleev't posteritie)
And Nymphes a learning, and the prickt up cares
Of the Goat-footed Satyres: with fresh feares
My soule doth Evoe utter; and my brest
Fall gorg'd with Wine, doth rumblingly egest
Evoe: O Bacchus spare me, spare me thou
All dreadfull with thy fatall ivie bough,
It very fitting is for me to sing
Thy wanton Thyades, and thy wines spring,
And thy full streame of milke to chant againe,
And hony dropping from the hollow cane:
It's sit for me to descant on the Crowne
Of thy blest wife, among the stais fixt downe;
And Penibeus house thrown down with no meane blow,
And Thracian Lycurgus overthrow.
Thou rivers, thou the barb'rous sea dost still,
Thou, throughly drench't on some retired hill,
Together in a viperous knot dost charme
The Th [...]acian womens tresses without harme.
When as the Gyants impious Company
Assail'd your fathers kingdome through the sky,
You Rhoecus with his lyons pawes orethrew,
And with his horrid jawes: although that you
Being held more fit for maskes, and playes, and sport,
As one scarce fit for warre had the report;
Yet thou wast found for peace indifferent,
And war too: Cerberus, then innocent,
Saw thee adorned with the golden Crowne,
Wagging his taile full gently up and downe;
And with's three-tongu'd chaps 'bout the feet did play,
And legs of thee when thou didst part away.

ODE XX. TO MAECENAS. That he hath got himselfe immortall glory by his poems, and that he shall be famous with theremotest and most barba­rous nations.

I A two shaped poet will not flye
With cōmon and mean wings through the moist skye;
Nor to the earth will any longer cleave,
And above envie I the world will leave.
I the succession of my parents poore,
I, deare Maecenas, whom thou dost implore,
Will not quite perish, neither will I be
Stayd in the Stygian poole continually.
Now, now rough skin upon my thighes doth grow,
And I a silver Swan am turnd unto
In all my upper parts, and gentle downe
Upon my fingers and my armes is growne.
Now swifter than Daedalean Icarus
I'l see the shores of roaring Bosphorus,
(Being a sweet voic'd Cygnet) and the sands
Of Astricke, and the Hyperborean lands.
The Colchick and the Dacian me shall know,
Who at our Marsian troupes a feare doe show:
The remote Scythes, and Spaniard valiant,
And also Rhodanus inhabitant.
Far be sad tunes from my mean obsequies,
And squalid lamentations and cries;
Keepe to your selfe all clamors, and defer
The needlesse duties of my Sepulcher.
The end of the second Booke.

THE THIRD BOOKE Of the Odes of HORACE.

ODE I. Blessednesse consists not in wealth or honour, but in quietnesse and contentednesse.

I Doe abhorre the multitude prophane,
And chase them hence: do ye your tongues restraine.
I priest unto the Muses, warble ore
To maids, and young men, songs nere heard before:
"Dreadfull kings power is ore their proper drove,
"Ore kings themselves is the command of Iove,
Made famous in the gyants victorie,
And over ruling all things with his eye.
It may be one man than another, may
His trees more largely in his furrowes lay;
This a more generous suitor may descend
Into the field; another may contend
Better in his conditions and report;
More store of client may to him resort;
"Death by the same law, high and low doth take,
His spacious lotterie every name doth shake.
Over whose vile head hangs a naked sword,
Neither Sicilian dainties can afford
A pleasing relish to him, nor the straine
Of birds and lutes reduce his sleepe againe:
Sweet sleepe disdaines not countrie clownes low sheads,
And shadie bankes, and Zephyre-fanned meade [...].
Him that desireth onely whats enough,
Neither the Ocean sea, being made rough,
Nor cruell raging of the falling Beare,
Or rising Capricorne can strike with feare:
Neither his vineyards batter'd with the haile;
Nor plat of ground that dos of bearing faile,
While now the trees doe at the waters carpe,
Now at earth-parching stars, now winters sharpe.
The very fishes feele the ocean shrunke
With huge foundations in their bottome sunke
The busie purchaser, and landlord (growne
Wearie oth'land) sends hither his hew'ne stone,
With workmen; but "despaire and horror got
"That way their master dos; nor will black woe
"Depart from the brasse-armed keele, and it
"Even behind the horsemans back dos sit.
But if not Phrygian stone, nor purples shine,
More glorious than the stars, nor Falerne wine,
Nor Westerne shrubs can ease the grieved spirit,
Wherefore with pillars that may envie merit,
And in a new invented way shall I
A high exalted palace edifie?
Wherefore shall I exchange my Sabine grove
For riches that more troublesome will prove?

ODE II. An exhortation to endure hardnesse and povertie.

LEt the tough youth in bitter war-fare try
Easily to endure hard povertie,
And like a dreadfull horseman, with his speare,
Strike the ore-daring Parthians with feare,
And in the open field to lead his life,
And dangerous adventures; while the wife
Of the encounting king, and the ripe bride.
From off their hostile walls, having him spide,
She Id sigh (alas!) for feare her princely mate,
Unskilful of the wars, should initate
This same incensed lion with his blowes,
Whom bloody rage through midst of slaughters throwes.
"It is a sweet and glorious thing to die
"For our owne countrie: Death dos even flie
"After the flying man, nor dos he slack
"From saint-heart youths heeles, and the fearfull back.
"Valour, that base repulses cannot know,
"With unstain'd honours dos refulgent grow,
"And by the suffrage of the peoples breath,
"Nor receives honours, nor surrendereth.
"Valour that dos set heaven wide ope for those
"That merit not to die; its journey goes
"Through invious we yes, and with a soaring wing
"Bove vulgar troopes and the dull earth dos spring,
There's sure pay too for faithfull secrecy:
I will forbid that he, who should descry
Night ador'd Ceres sacrifice, should be
Under the same roofe, and lanch out with me
My slender bark: Iove, often, being slighted,
Hath to the full the wicked man requited.
"Tourture with limping feet seldome gives ore
"The wicked man that trips away before.

ODE III. The power of justice and constancy: Juno's prophesie of the stabilitie of the Romane empire.

THe just man, and unto his purpose standing,
Not rage of citizens had things commanding,
Not threatning tyrants frowne, from his firme mind
Can startle him, nor yet the Southern wind,
The tumbling Adria's rumbling governer.
Nor mighty hand of thundring Iupiter;
Though the world fall on him, in sunder fylle,
The ruine on't shall him undaunted hit.
Pollux, and the far-wandring Hercules
Stearing this course on the bright spheres did ceize,
Among the whom Augustus being layd,
Drinks Nectar with his lips all purple made.
Thee, father Bacchus, this way meriting,
Thy tygers, on their rude neck carrying
The yoake, did raise thee: Romul [...]s did part
From hell on Mars his horses by this art:
When Iuno pleasingly spake in this sort
To all the Gods assembled then in court:
An evill-omend Umpire, and unjust,
And a strange woman turnes Troy into dust,
Of me, and chaste Minerva too abhorr'd,
Both with the nation, and deceitfull lord,
Ere since the time in which Laomedon
Deni'd the gods their due agreed upon.
The Spartan strumpers para'mour infamous
Now triumphs not, not Priams perjar'd house
Weakens the fighting Greekes by Hectors aid;
And the war by our discords tedious made,
Is ended; from hence-forth my spleene severe
And hated kinsman whom that Nun did beare
From Troy descended, I will now bestow
Oa Mars againe: him will I grant to goe
Unto the bright spheres, Nectars juyce to taste,
And'mong the gods blest orders to be plac't:
So a vast sea 'twixt Troy and Rome may rore,
O may this exile-breed on any shore
Reigne glorious: so long as any drove
O're Priamus and Paris grave may r [...]ve,
And wilde beasts fearlesse there their whelps may hide,
Refulgent may the Capitol abide,
And s [...]o [...]ne Rome give the conquer'd Medes a law;
Dreadfull far off may shee her knowledge draw
Even unto the farthest continent,
(What way the Ocean interjacent
Furopa from the Affrican d [...]s bound,
What way the swelling Nile the fields doth drownd)
More valiant in despising unfound gold,
And so best plac't when earth doth it enfold,
Than in congesting it for humane using,
With a hand every ffollowed thing abusing.
What part o'th' world so e're stands out unknowne,
That with her armies let her land upon,
Thi [...]sting to see what way the fire, and where
The cloud, and watry dewes doe dominere.
But to the warlike Romans I present
These fates on this ground; if (too pious bent,
And too much trusting their owne strength) they ne're
Will old Troyes Palaces anew upreare.
Troyes pride renewing with an ill stari'd fate,
With sad destruction shall be ruinare,
While I the wife and sister too of Iove
Will my victorious armies onward move.
Thrice should there rise againe a brazen wall,
And Thoebus author on't; thrice should it fall,
Raz'd by my Greekes: the captive wife thrice o're
Her husband and her children should deplore.
These things agree not to my sporting Lute;
Muse, whither wilt thou? wanton thing be mute
Th'orations of the deities to relate,
And brave things with base layes t'attenuate.

ODE IV. Hee is guarded by the Muses, and takes advice from them: power without counsell perishes.

DEscend from heaven, O Queen Calliope,
And sound an everlasting harmonie
Upon thy pipe, or, if you it desire,
With your shtill voice, or harps, or Phoebus lyre.
D'ee heare? or d [...]s a pleasing lunacie
Enfatuate me? for me thinks that I
Doe heare it, and doe range through the blest grove,
'Bout which the pleasant springs and winds doe rove.
On the Apulian Vulturs hilly ground,
Beyond my fabulous nurse Apulia's bound,
Me, then a boy, with play and sleepe misse-led,
The ring-doves with fresh green leaves covered:
That might seeme strange to all those that possest
The lostie seated Acherontia's nest,
And Bantine pastures, and the fertile ground
Of low Ferentum; that, my body sound
From poisoned Snakes, and Beares, I should sleepe there,
That I with laurell boughes that sacred were,
And gather'd myrtles over-spread should bee;
(An infant hearten'd by some deitie.)
Your votary, yee Muses, only yours,
I'm drawne up to the craggie Sabine bowers;
Or whether the steepe-sited Tibur hath
Delighted me, or the serene-air'd Bath.
Me friend unto your fountains and your traine,
Our armie from Philippi chas'd amaine
O'rethrew not, nor that cursed piece of wood,
Nor Palinure in the Sicilian flood.
When you shall be with me, I willingly
The raging straights will as a sailor try,
And, as a traveller, I will passe o're
The parching sands of the Assyrian shore:
Ple see the Brittaines cruell to their guests,
And Concanus with horses bloud that [...]easts;
Ple visit the Geloni quiver-arm'd,
And river of the Scythians unharm'd.
You recreate in your Pierian grove
The Mightie Coesar, lab'ring to remove
His troubles, when he in his garrisons
Has lodged up his war-spent legions.
You, heavenly soules, gentle advice bestow,
And glory in't, being so given: we know
How he with falling lightning overthrew
The impious Titans, and their savage crew;
He who with unmov'd pow'r the unmov'd land,
And floating se [...], and cities doth command,
And sad-doom'd kingdomes, and the gods beside,
And mortall multitudes alone doth guide.
Those horrid monsters on their armes relying,
Did strike in Iove a mightie terrifying,
And all their brothers also menacing
On shadi'e Olympus Pelion to fling.
I, but what could Typhoeus then have done,
Strong Mimas, and sterne-lookt Porphyrion?
What Rhoecus, and the Archer impudent,
Enceladus, with trees by th'roots up rent,
Rushing 'gainst Pallas shining Aegis? here
Stood greedie Vulcan, Matron Iuno there,
And he who from his shoulders ne're will spare
His archery, who drenches his loose haire
In the pure fountaine of Castalia,
Who dos the champian ground of Lycia sway,
And grove fam'd for his place of birth; Apollo,
Whom Delos and whom Patara doth ballow.
"Pow'r void of poli'cie sinks with its owne waight',
"We'l-temper'd strength the gods doe propagate
"To greater force: they doe the powers detest,
"That raise up all infection in our brest.
The hundred-handed Gyas is well knowne
The witnesse of my truths, and Orion,
He who the chast Diana injured,
And by the Virgins shaft was punished.
Th' earth cast on her owne monsters, dos lament,
And grieves her children are with thunder sent
To s [...]orie hell, nor can the fires swist some
Aetna, injected on them, yet consume.
I, and the vulture never dos so beare
The heart of Tityus the ravither,
Being set the tort'rer of his lustfulnesse;
Three hundred chains lustfull Pirithous presse.

ODE V. Of Augustus his victorie over the Britains: the d [...]shonoura­ble condation of Crassus souldiers taken captive: Regu­lus speech to the Senate, exhorting them not to redeeme their captives from Carthage.

WE beleev'd thundring love reignes in the skie;
Augustus here a gracious deitie
Shall be esteem'd; now that the Britaines be,
And fatall Medes joyn'd to his empirie.
Could Crassus souldiers then with barb'rous wives,
(Being dishonour'd husbands) lead their lives?
And; ô our State and manners altered!)
Could then our Marsians, and Apulians bred,
Grow ancient men in the def [...]nce of those
Now fathers in law to them, once their foes,
Under a Persian king, for getting straight
Their divine thields, their glory, and their State,
And also Vestaes never dying fire,
love and our Citie Rome being still intire?
Regulus prudent mind this thing prevented,
Who from their base conditions dissented,
And from a president might ruine fling
Upon the after-ages following;
If that our captive-souldiers might not be
Without all pitie lost. I saw, said he,
Our ensignes in the Punick temples hung,
And swords, without blowes, from our souldiers wrung;
I also did their citizens armes behold
Behind their now-free-backs together roll'd,
And gates not shut, and fields now tilled o're
Dispoiled by our armies heretofore.
Sure our gold-ransom'd souldiers will agin
Come on more fierce; you adde unto your sia
A detriment; "wooll being dipt in grain,
"Can never after his lost hue regain?
"Nor dos true vertue, when it's once sunk down,
"Care to be lodg'd in men that worse are grown.
If the Stagge, from the thick laid nets got free,
Will stand to fight, then will he valiant bee
Who to perfidious foes himselfe did yeeld;
Then will he vanquish in a second field
The Carthaginians, who (faint-heart) did weare
Thongs on his fetter'd armes, and death did feare.
He being ignorant from whence to take
His life, in midst of war a league did make:
O shame, O mightie Carthage, made more high
By the opprobrious falls of Italy.
'Tis said, as one condemn'd to lose his life,
He put from him the kisse of his chaste wife,
And children small, and (looking sternly,) bound
His manly countenance upon the ground;
While he the faltring Senators set even,
With counsell, such as like it ne're was given;
And in the midst of all his friends agast,
This noble exile to his journey past.
Yet what the barb'rous hangman did devise
For him, he knew: yet he no otherwise
His remorating kindred did adjourne,
And all the people stopping his returne,
Then if, the terme being done, he did withdraw
From all his clients tedious suits of Law;
To the Venafran fields taking his way,
Or to Tarentum of Laconia.

ODE VI. To the Romans. The b [...]senesse of the present age, and the bravenesse of the former ages.

O Roman, thou, although thou guiltlesse bee,
For thy fore-fathers sins shalt punisht bee,
Till thou the gods shrines, and their Fanes decay'd
And statues, foul'd with black smoke, new hast made.
"That to the gods your selfe you subject make,
"Therein you reigne: henceall beginnings take,
"Hither each issue bring: the gods, neglected,
"Have many plagues on wofull Spain injected.
Moneses twice, and Pa [...]orus his powers,
Have batter'd these ill-fated troopes of ours,
And are grown proud that they have ta'neaway
Them in their little fetters, as a prey.
The Dacian and the Moore have quice erased
Our cities with sedition neere defaced:
The one being in his shipping formidable,
The other in swift-flying darts more able.
Our times, full-swolne with sin, first overthrew
Our marches, kinreds, and our houses too:
Destruction, from thi fountaine running downe,
Has o're the countrie and the people flowne.
The new ripe girle delighteth to be taught
Jonick dances, and is nimble wrought
In all her joynts, and from her tendes yeares
Her unchastelongings in her mind she beares.
Straight she more wanton paramours pursues
Amidst her husbands cups; nor dos shee chuse
One to whom shee by stealth may deale about
Her lawlesse pleasures when the lights are out;
But before folkes, being bid, she up doth git,
And not without her husband knowing it;
Whether some Clerke, or Spanish-ship-master
(Deare buyer of disgraces) [...]ummon her.
Our youngsters, from such parentage descended,
The sea with Carthaginian bloud nere blended;
Nor Pyrrhus, nor Antiochus the great
And the abhorred Annibal did beat:
But a stout crue of rustick Camerades,
Skill'd to digge up the clods with Sabine spades,
And to beare home their timber hewed downe
By their austere mothers direction;
At such time as the Sun the shades did alter
Upon the kills, and did the yokes unhalter
From the roil'd oxen, making to approach
Nights, pleasing time with his declining coach.
"What dos not wastefull time bring to worse passe?
"Our fathers age, worse than our grand-sires was,
"Bred us far wickeder, who, by and by,
"Shall shew a far more vitious progenie.

ODE VII. TO ASTERIE. Comforting her in the absence of her husband, and exhorting her to constancie.

WHy dost thou weepe for him, Astorie,
Whom the milde west-winds will restore to thee,
By the Springs comming in, with Thyne ware brest,
Thy young man Gyges of a loyall brest?
To Oricus he by the South-winds borne
After the raging stars of Capricorne,
The freezing nights, not without many teares,
Yet without any sleepe, away he weares.
And yet a much-enticing harlots squire,
Telling how Chloë dos in sighs expire,
And how poore wretch she in thy fires doth frie,
The cunning knave a thousand wayes dos trie.
He tells how a perfidious woman train'd
Credulous Praetus with suggestions fain'd,
Against the over-chaste Bellerophon,
To haste his death: then he proceedeth on,
How Peleus was nie sent to death, while he
Magnessian Hippolyte did flee,
Being abstinent: and this slie knave brings in
Histories educating men to sin.
But all in vaine: for he, as yet sincere,
More de afe than Icarus rocks his words dos heare;
Yet take thou heed lest, more than fit may bee,
[...]ripeus thy neare neighbour worke on thee.
Though not a man, equally skill'd to [...]ide
Upon a horse, in Mars his field is spi'd,
No any man, equally swift like h [...]m,
[...]horow the Tuscan channell downe dos swim.
At the nights entrance sh [...]t thy doores, nor gaze,
At his pipes sad sound, into the high wayes;
And unto him calling thee oft unkind,
Continue thou of an unshaken mind.

ODE VIII. TO MAECENAS. Exhorting him to mirth on the Calends of March.

THou being skill'd in both tongues dialect,
Admir'st what I a batchelor project
On Marches Calends; what my flowers require,
And pot with incense fill'd, and coale of fire
Laid on the fresh green turfe; pomise I did
Sweet cates to Bacchus, and a milk-white kid;
Being neare kill'd with a trees fall: This day
Sacred each New-yeares tide, shall take away
The pitch-clos'd stoppell from the kilde [...]kin
Ordain'd to keepe the headie liquor in,
When Tullus Consul was. Maecenas taste
A hundred healths of thy sav'd friend, and waste
Thy watching tapers till the break of day;
All quarelling and rage be far away.
Thy strict cares for the citie let alone:
Slain are the troopes of Dacian Cotison;
The Median, to himselfe a deadly soe,
With wofull wars dos all to peeces god.
Our ancient foe upon the shore of Spain,
The Biscaynere tam'd in our lare-forg'd chain,
Is slave to us; the Scythians doe dispose
To fly out of the field with unbent bowes.
Then, in a remisse way, desist to heed,
O're much, of what the people stands in need,
(Being retir'd) and of the present howre
Receive the pleasures, and cast off the sowre.

ODE IX. TO LYDIA. A dialogue for reconcilement.

HOR.
AS long as I was pleasing unto thee,
And not a man, better esteem'd than mee,
His armes about thy ivory neck did fling,
I flourisht braver than the Persian King.
LYD.
While with another thou wast not more fir'd,
Nor Lydia after Chloë was desir'd;
I Lydia of great fame did beare a sway,
Far brighter than the Roman Ilia.
HOR.
The Thracian Chloë dos command me now,
Skill'd in sweet songs, and well her Lute dos know,
For whom to suffer death I will not feare,
So fates will her surviving soule for beare.
LYD.
[Page 71]
[...]alais, Thurine Ornithus his son,
[...]n flames me with a like affection;
For whom I will endure ev'n twice to die,
[...]f fates will my surviving boy passe by.
HOR.
What if our ancient love returne againe,
And binds us straglers in a brazen chaine;
[...]f beauteous Chloè be cashier'd away,
And doore stands ope for cast-of Lydia?
LYD.
Although that he be brighter than a star,
Thou lighter than a corke, and fiercer far
Than the rude Adriatick sea; yet I
Would love to live with thee, would freely die.

ODE X. TO LYCE. Exhorting her not to be proud, but pitifull to him.

LYCE, didst thou at utmost Tanais live,
Wed to a savage man, yet would you grieve
To cast me to your neighb'ring northerne wind,
Being before your frozen doores reclin'd.
Heare you with what a creaking noise the doore,
And how the grove against the wind do's roare,
Being planted 'mong the pleasant roomes; and how
[...]ove with pure aire dos glaze the close laid snow?
Thy scorne ingrate to Venus, lay aside;
Lest the rope, when the wheele slips, backward slide.
A Tyrrhene father never begot thee
Harsh to thy wooers as Penelope.
O, though nor gifts, not prayers move thee yet,
Not lovers palen [...]ssest [...]in'd with violet,
Not husband d [...]ting on some singing maid,
Yet spare them which to thee are p [...]ostrate laid,
Thou harsher than the toughest oaken tree,
And bloudier-soul'd than Aff [...]ick Serp [...]nts bee;
This body' of mine for ever can't sustaine
Thepavement, and the heaven-distilling raine.

ODE XI. TO MERCURIE. Entreating him to mollifie Lyde with his sweet musick; as h [...] hath done many others: Of the punishment of the Da­naides, and the praise of Hype [...]mnestra.

MERCURIE (for thou being his schoole-master,
Learned Amphson did the stones uprea [...]e,
With making melodie,) and thou O Lute,
Skill'd with seven s [...]rings to sound (in old times mute,
And no whit pleasing; at each rich-mans board
And temples too, now us'd,) such strains afford,
Unto which Lyde her deafe cares may raise;
Who, as it were, in frisking manner playes
Like a mare three yeares old in the wide field,
And being in the marriage bed [...]nskill'd,
And for a full-veind bed-fellow unfit,
Is fearefull even to be touch'd as yet.
Thou Tygers, and their woods canst lead away
Along with them, and make swift [...]ivers stay:
Cerberus porter of the dreadfull hall,
Unto thee making musick low did fall,
Though hundred snakes did guard his furious head,
And loathsome breath and poison issued
Out of his three tongu'd chaps. Ixion too,
And Tityus with forc'd lookes did smile on you;
The urne awhile stood drie, while thou didst ease
With pleasing musick the Danaides.
Those maids fact, and known torture, and their run,
Emptie of water out at bottome run,
Let Lyde heare, and the flow-creeping fate
That ey'n in hell on wickednesse doth wait.
Accursed things: what could they doe more? they,
Accurst, with sharpe swords-could their husbands slay.
'Mongst many, one worthy a nuptiall fire,
To her false father nobly play'd the lyar,
And to all ages lives a glorious maid;
Who, Rise, rise, to her youthfull husband said,
Lest a long sleep, thou fear'st not, fall on thee,
Thy father in law, and my curs'd sisters flee.
Who (out alas) have all their husbands slaine,
Like Lionesses having heifers tane;
I, gentler sarre than they, will neither kill,
Nor in this castle will detaine thee still.
Me with strong fetters let my father guard,
'Cause I kind heart my wofull husband spas'd;
Or let him in a ship send me away
To th'utmost confines of Numidia;
Fly what way feet and winds can carry thee,
While night and Venus too propitious be;
Goe with good luck, and on my monument
An elegie, mentioning me, indent.

ODE XII. TO NEOBULE. Of her violent love of Hebrus.

NOt to give love his sportive exercise,
Nor drench in pleasing wine our miseries;
Or to be out of heart, fearing the blowes
Of Kindreds tongues, addes to poore virgins woes.
Venus wing'd son thy spindle from thee catches,
And Liparaean Hebrus beautie snatches
(O Neobule) thy tent-workes from thee,
And curious Minerva's industrie:
A better horse-man than Bellerophon,
Neither in fight, or for slow pace o're gone,
As soone as he in Tibers streames hath swill'd
His oyly shoulders; being also skill'd,
When all the herd is routed up, to wound
The Roe-bucks tripping o're the champian ground;
And swift of foot the wilde Boare to invade
Among the thick-grown bushes closely laid.

ODE XIII. The praise of the fountaine of Blandusia.

OFountaine of Blandusia, that dost shine
Clearer than glasse, deserving pleasant wine,
Nor without store of flow'rs, thou with a kid
Tomorrow morning shalt be honoured;
Whose fore-head, with his first hornes fretted out,
For lust and war (in vain tho) hunts about.
For this same young ling of the wanton traine,
Thy cooling streames with his red bloud shall staine.
Thee the hot dog stars dire ti [...]e cannot taint:
Thou gentle cooling ye [...]ldst to oxen faint
With [...]lowing, and to stray beasts: verily
Thou shalt be made a sacred spring, while I
The oakes set round thy hollow rocks will sing,
Out of the which thy murmuring waters spring.

ODE XIV. His joy for Caesars victory.

YEE people, Caesar who was lately thought
To goe for conquest, would with death be bought,
In Hercules his way; from coast of Spain
Is to our gods come conquer our again.
Each matron, with one husband being content,
Let now proceed the just gods to frequent;
And sister of our famous Generall,
And, with their braided fillets decked, all
The mothers of our virgins, and young men
Lately returned safe to us agen.
You youths, and maids that late have husbands tri'd,
Forbeare all languages unrectifi'd.
This day, being truly festivall, shall teare
My black cares from mee: I will neither feare
Commotions, or to die by violent hand,
So long as Caesar governeth the land.
Goe boy, fetch oyle and garlands, and that barrell
Which beares the true date of the Marsian quarrell,
If so be any vessell could be hid
From Spartacus having the land o're-rid.
And bid sweet-voic'd Neara to make haste
To bind her sweet haires in a knot up fast;
If by the surly porter any stay
Be made at all, come presently away.
"Haire turning to be white dos calme the mind
"To quarrellings and paltrie brawles inclin'd:
For I would ne're have suffred this, alas,
In heat of youth, when Planous Consul was.

ODE XV. TO CHLORIS. To for sake lechery, being old.

WIfe of poore Ibyous, now at length fix
A period to thy lust, and whorish tricks.
Forbeare, being nigh thy now-ripe funerall day,
Tosport'mong virgins, and a cloud di [...]play
Or'e such-bright stars: that will not become thee,
O Chloris, that may well fit Pholoe.
Thy daughter better young mens doores may threat,
Mad as the Thyades when the drums beat.
Nothus love makes her like a fond kid play;
Thee, the wooll shorne nearefam'd Luceria,
[...]ot musick fits, nor roses damask die.
[...]ing old [...])nor hogsheads to the lees drawn drie.

ODE XVI. TO MAECENAS. Of the power and trouble of riches: the benefit of conten­tation.

A Brazen towre, and strong gates, and sterne guard
Of watchfull curres, sufficiently had barr'd
Danae in it from night-lecher, lockt;
If Iupiter and Venus had not mockt
The keeper of the virgin so inclos'd,
(Fearfull Acrisius) for they suppos'd,
The entrance in would sate and open bee,
When that a god was turn'd into a fee.
"Gold uses through full guards to goe, more fierce
"Than thunder-bolts, and through stone walls to pierce [...]
The Arg [...]ve augurs palace downe is shrunk,
Being for gaine into perdition sunk.
The Macedonian victor clave in two
The gates of cities; and he overthrew
His rivall Kings with presents: "presents snare
"Those who stout Generals of navies are.
"Care waites on growing wealch, and thirst of more.
I very worthily did feare therefore
( Macenas, glory of our Cheval ie)
To raise my head up, to be seene on high.
"The more each man bars himselfe of, he shall
"Of the gods get the more: I, stript of all,]
Unto their cells that nothing covethye,
And shifting seek from rich mens gates to flye;
Be'ng of a meane estate a braver Lord,
Than if I in my barnes were fam'd to hoard
What ere the toil'd Appulian dos plow o' [...]e,
Bei'ng amids my mighty riches poore.
A spring of water pure, and a grove too
Of some few Rods, and my fields servicetrues
More blessed in possessing, is unknowne
To him that shines in fertile Affricks throne.
Though nor Calabrian Bees mee honey bring
Nor wine for me dos lye a languishing
In Formian pots, nor my fat-fleeced flock
[...] Gallick pastures dos increase my stock;
Yet urgent povertie from me dos live,
Nor, crav'd I more, would you deny to give.
My desire being pent in, I better may
Enlarge my finall meanes, than if I should lay
Croesu his wealth to the Mygdonian store:
'Much wants to them that many things implore.
'Tis well for that man to whom God has sent,
'With sparing hand, what is sufficient.

ODE XVII. TO AELIUS LAMIAS. His nobilitie; an exhortation to be merry.

O Aelius from ancient Lamus fam'd,
(Whence the first Lamiae, they say, were nam'd,
And every house of your posteritie,
Through all records yet kept in memo ie.)
Thou from that head draw'st thy originall,
Who, being a King of large bounds, first of all
Is said the walls of For [...]iae to command,
And Lyris flowing on Marica's sand.
[...]mpest sent tomorrow from the West
[...]ch many boughs s [...]all all the grove invest,
And all the shoare with uselesse flags, unlesse
The weather wise old Raven misse his guesse.
While you may, your drie wood together put;
Your corps tomorrow you with wine must glut,
And with a porkling just of two months old,
With all thy men from labour bid to hold.

ODE XVIII. A prayer and sacrifice to Faunus.

LOver of flying Nymphs, passe gently through
My bounds, O Faunus, and my faire fields too,
And part thence kind to our small nurseries;
Since each yeares end, a young kid to thee dies,
And store of wine's not wanting to the cup,
Venus compeere; th'old altar fumeth up
With many odours: on the grassie plaine
All the beasts sport, when unto thee againe
Decembers Nones returne: the solemne towne
In the fields with their idle droves sit downe.
Among the then bold lambes the wolfe dos goe,
The wood her country boughs to thee dos strow,
The country man dos with his feet delight
Three times upon the scorned ground to smite.

ODE XIX. TO TELEPHUS. Not to studie too much, but to be merry sometimes.

HOw long time Codrus liv'd from Inachus,
To die for's country no way timorous,
And Aeacus his stock you doe us tell,
And battels that at sacred Troy befell.
You tell us not at what price we may get
A Tun of Chian wine, nor who may heat
Our baths with fire; who'll make a feast for mee;
What houre I may from Peligne colds be free.
Boy, quickly fill for the new Moone; fill up
For midnight; for Muraena fill a cup,
Late Augur made: with glasses three or nine,
Easie to take, let pots be fill'd with wine.
The Poet that loves the Muses odde, will crave
Thrice three cups, being in a vein to rave.
The naked sister-Graces yoked fast,
Fearing wars, charge no more than three to taste.
Why is the Berecynthian pipes tongue mute?
Why hangs the Fife up with the silent Lute?
I hate these sparing hands: strow roses there,
Let envious Lycus our loud roaring heare,
And his young mate no way commodious
For Lycus being old: O Telephus
Thee comely-looking with thy thick grown haire,
Thee representing much the evening faire,
[...] now ripe for marriage doth require,
But me my Glyceraes slow love doth fire.

ODE XX. TO PYRRHUS. His danger in drawing Nearchus from his love.

SEE you not with what danger you doe presse
The whelpes of the Gerulian Lionesse?
O Pyrrhus, thou a fearfull theefe shalt flee
The dangerous combat, afore long time bee.
When she shall run through arm'd troopes of young men,
Fetching the faire Nearchus back agen;
A grand contention, sooth, whether the prize
Unto thy selfe or her would greater rise.
In the mean time while you doe ready get
Your flying shafts, and shee her dire teeth whet,
He that might arbitrate the war is said
The conquest under his bare feet t'have laid,
And recreate with a mild-fanning ai [...]e
His shoulders cover'd with his powder'd haire:
As beautifull as Nireus, or the Boy
Was stolne away from river-stored Troy.

ODE XXI. The praises of wine.

O Sacred tun that w [...]st bred up with mee,
When Ma [...]lius Consul was, whether in the [...],
Thou bea [...]est griefes, or jests, or quarrelling,
Or raging loves, or gentle stumbering;
By what so e're name mark'd thou clasp'st about
Thy Massick wine, worthy to be brought out
On a good day; when Corvine shall enjoyne,
Descend and yeeld us forth your gentler wine.
Though in Socratick precepts drencht he bee,
Yet will he not severely scorne at thee.
Even ancient Cat [...]'s gravitie is fam'd,
Many a time with wine to have been flam'd,
Thou dost an casie to turing procure
To dispositions usually obdure,
With merry wine; the studies of the wise
Thou dost disclose, and profound secrecies.
In desp'rate minds thou dost a hope renew,
And giv'st the poore man strength and courage too,
That, after thee once tasted, neither feares
Kings angrie lookes, nor yet the souldiers speares.
Bacchus, and Venus, if shee'll merry bee,
And Graces loath to break their unitie,
And burning lights so long with thee shall stay,
Till Phoebus rising chase the stirs away.

ODE XXII. TO DIANA. Hee consecrates a Pine-tree to her.

VIrgin, of hills and forests part onesse,
Who being thrice invoked, dost addresse
Thy selfe unto young women travelling
In child-birth, and from deaths-doore dost them bring;
O thou three-formed god desse, let the pine
Adjoyning to my mansion, be thine,
Which every yeares end gladly I will strow
With a Boares bloud that side-way aimes his blow.

ODE XXIII. TO PHYDILE. Meane sacrifices from pure hands, are most acceptable to the gods.

IF, rurall Phydile, thou raise on high
At the new-moone thy rear'd hands to the skie;
If thou with incense dost thy Lares bow,
And with this yeares fruit, and a greedy sow;
Then neither shall thy fruitfull vineyard beare
The noxious south-wind; nor thy corne ith' ea [...]e
The barren blasting, not thy younglings sweet
The dangerous season of the Autumne meet.
For the devoted sacrifice that's fed
'Mong oakes and elmes on hills with snow o're spred,
Or in the Alban fields dos fatted lye,
The high-priests axes with his neck shall dye.
Nothing at all doth it belong to thee,
Crowning thy little gods with Rosemary,
And with fraile myrtle-boughs, a stirre to keepe
With a great slaughtering of thy young sheepe.
"If a pure hand upon the altar lyes,
"You cannot with a sumptuous sacrifice
"The displeas'd houshold gods more pleased make,
"Than with your hallow'd corne, and salted cake.

ODE XXIV. Against immoderate riches.

THough richer than th' Arabians wealth unknownes
Or of rich India, you with your hewen stone
The Tyr [...]hene and the Pontick ocean stock;
If dire fare on the loftiest crownes dos knock
His Adamantine nailes, thy minde from feare,
Thy head from snares of death thou canst not cleare.
The wandring Scythians (whose carriages
Doe beare their travelling tents, as their use is)
And the sterne Getae doe far better live,
Whose unmark'd lands free herbes and come [...] give,
Nor tillage more than for a yeares food pleases,
And a supply with equall labour eases
Him that left work last: harmlesse stepdams there
Their mother-wanting sons in law for beare:
Nor dos the rich-dower'd wife her husband sway,
Nor for a comely trimm'd adult'rer stay.
"The parents vertues, and their owne chaste bearing
"In a firme league, a second suitor fearing,
"Is their great dowre; and 'tis a thing abhorr'd
"To play foule play, or death is the reward.
O, whosoever would remove from hence
Our impious broiles, and home-bred insolence,
If he doe cover registred to bee
In monuments a Pater Patriae,
Then let him dare his wilde desires to tame,
Famous to after-ages; since (O shame)
"We living vertue enviously despise,
"Admire it being once taken from our eyes.
What profit dos our mournfull lamentation,
If sin be not supprest by castigation?
What benefit can cobweb statutes doe,
Not having our obedience thereunto?
If nor this part o'th' wo [...]ld girt with hot fire,
Nor continent unto the northward nigher,
Nor the snow frozen on the ground deters
The merchant man? if skilfull mariners
Subdue the raging billowes? Povertie,
A great disgrace, commands us both to tri [...]
And suffer any thing, and from the way
Of hard-to-be-found vertue makes us stray.
Or let us send unto the Capitoll,
Whether the clients noise and train dos call;
Or let us send into the neighb'ring floud
Our gemmes, and stones, and gold for no use good,
The fomenters of our chiefe miserie,
(If for o [...] sin we truly sory bee.)
The rudiments of our unlawfull lust
Must be pull'd out, and minds too render must
Be fram'd to tougher acts: the noble youth
Cannot tell how to back a horse forsooth,
Boing raw, and feare [...] to hunt: more skill'd to sport
With the Greek top, if you give preceptfor't,
Or, if you please, at diceby law forbid,
At which his fathers faith being perjured,
His fellow gamester and his guest doth chear,
And for his worthlesse heire doth money get:
Thus ill got goods increase, yet evermore,
I know not what wants to his curtail'd store.

ODE XXV. TO BACCHUS. That being inspir'd by him bee will sing the praises of Caesar.

WHither, O Bacchus, dost thou hurry me,
Being in spired with thy deitie?
To what groves, or what caves am I confin'd,
Being astonisht in my new wrought mind?
Out of what cels shall I be heard, forecasting
Egregious Caesars glory everlasting
Among the stars, and court of Jove to set?
I'le sing a new rare song, never sung yet,
By any other voice: no otherwise
The Bacchick priest from sleepe amazed lyes,
When from the mountaines she doth Hebrus see,
And Thrace all white with Snow, and Rhodope
Climb'd ore by barbarous feete. How I desire,
The rocks, as I am wandring, to admire,
And silent groves! O King of Naiades,
And of the Bacchae that the tall ash rices,
Can pull put with their hands; No triviall thing,
Or in a low grown measure will I sing;
Nothing obnoxious to mortalitie:
A dangerous thing it is, yet sweet to me,
To follow thee god Bacchus, that dost twine
My temples with the green leaves of the vine.

ODE XXVI. TO VENUS. A farewell to love-tricks: hee prayes her to make Chloë love him.

PLeasing to maids I liv'd in former dayes,
And fought my battels too, not without praise:
Now shall the wall that is on the left hand
Of sea-bred Venus, all my armes command,
And lute weary of wars; here, here dispose
Your light, artillery, and barres, and bowes,
Which against barred doores did use to threat;
Queene goddesse that rich Cyprus mak'st thy feat,
And Memphis nere vext with Sithonian snow,
Once strike proud Chloē with a heavy blow.

ODE XXVII. TO GALATAEA. Dehorting her from going to sea by the example of Europa.

LEt the ill omen of the hooting owle,
And whelping bitch, and brown wolfe that doth prowle
Ore the Lanuvian fields, and fox with young
Keepe company the wicked crue among:
And let a snake their resolv'd journey stay,
When like an arrow it doth horses fray
From the hedge side. I, wherefore should I feare,
Being a provident Astronomer?
Before the bird presaging imminent rain,
Shall to the standing pooles return again,
I will invoke from rising of the sun
The smooth voic'd crow to my petition.
O Galatoea, happy maist thou bee,
Where thou best lik'st, and mindfull still of mee;
And let not the ill-boding pye, nor crow,
Wandring about, prohibit thee to goe.
But doe you see with what a blustring blast
Declining Orion doth stand agast?
I know what Adria's cloudy bay portends,
And wherein the cleare westarne wind offends,
Let the wives and the children of our foes,
Feele the east-rising Goats insensat blowes,
And the tempestuous oceans bellowing,
And sea-shores shaken with their battering.
Europa so herivory body threw
On a delusive bull, and pale she grew
At th' ocean with monsters cover'd ore,
And frauds ith' mids discride, though bold before;
Late in the meades for flow'rs being wholly set,
And the contriver of a coronet
Vow'd to the nymphes, in an obscure night shee
Nothing besides the stars and waves did see.
Who so soone as to potent Creet she came,
With hundred townes; O father, O that name
Disclaim'd by me thy child O pietie,
Being ore come with fury she did crie.
Whence, whither am I come? one death's too poore
For virgins faults: doe I awake deplore
My fouleoffence? or doth vaine phantasy,
(Which through an ivorie portall passing by
[...]oth usher in each dream) thus mock at mee,
Being as yet from all offences free?
Was it to travell through the vast seas rather
Fitter for me, or the fresh flowers to gather?
If any one would now unto me show
This odious bull, I being incensed so,
I'de with a sword in pieces strive to pull,
And break the hornes of that so late lov'd bull.
Impudent I my fathers court forsook,
Impudent I for hell doe waiting look;
O, whatsoever god these plaints dos heare,
Would I'mong I ons wandring naked were
Afore that ugly meagernesse shall stain
My comely checkes, or that my moisture drain
From me that will for a soft prey be put,
Faice as I am, I tygers wish to glut.
Wicked Europa, why dost ceise to dye?
Thy absent father thus dos on thee crye:
Thou with thy girdle haply com'n with thee,
May'st break thy hanging neck from this ash tree.
Or if the rocks, or stones for death sharp'd fit,
Doe please thee more: goe, goe, thy selfe commit
To a swift [...]orme, unlesse you more mind have
To card your mistris wool, and as a slave
To be confined to some barb'rous dame,
Thou being of royall blood: To her then came
False-suiling Venus (while she did lament)
And her son also, with his bow unbent:
Anon, when she sufficiently had plai'd,
For beare thy wrath and thy hot rage, she said;
Since that this heifer being by thee hated,
Shall yeeld his horns to be dilacerated.
To be the wife of unquell'd [...]upiter,
Knowst thou not how? these sobbings then for be are:
Thy selfe to bear thy great fare bravely frame;
The world divided shall retain thy name.

ODE XXVIII. TO LYDE. That she should celebrate Neptunes feast with him.

DRaw lustic Lyde, thy hid Caecube wine,
And 'gainst abstemious wisdome force combine;
What else on Neptunes holy-day shall I doe?
You see the noontide hastens on, yet you,
As if the swift day stay'd, spare to draw drie
Your barrell from your cellar, ha'ving lien by
Since Bibulus consull was: with altern share
We Neptune will extoll, and the green haire
Of the sea-nymphs: thou to thy crooked lute
Latona, and swift Cynthias darts shalt suite.
In our songs burden we will her expresse
That Cuidus rules, and the bright Cyclades,
And Paphos with her yoaked swans doth view;
The night with fit layes shall be praised too.

ODE XXIX. TO MAECENAS. He invites him to a meane feast, which hee hopes will give him content. That mortals should not trouble themselves with the times to come. His contempt of fortunes power.

MAEcenas sprung from Tyrrhene kings, for thee
There hath beene gentle wine long time with mee
In a tun nere before now turn'd about,
With rose-buds, oile too for thy hair's press'd out.
Withdraw thy selfe from all occasion,
Nor doe thou still moist Tibur gaze upon,
And fields of Aesula declivious,
And hils of particide Tellegonus.
Thy loathsome plentie at the length for beare,
And palace to the waving clouds son [...]a [...]e:
Doe thou forbeare to wonder at the fume,
And wealth, and tumult of enriched Rome.
"Enter change of-times please rich men well;
"And poore mens homely fare in a low cell,
"Have made the clouded for head smooth to lye,
"Without your Arrases, and purple dye.
Now dos Andromeda's translucent sire
Display unto us his long hidden fire;
Now Procyon raves, and the mad lions star,
While the sun brings the parching dayes from far.
The weary shepheard with his fainting drove,
Now seekes the shades, the river, and the grove
Of Sylvane rude; and from the wandring winde
The silent bank is free: Thou yet dost minde
What state may fit the citie, and dost feare
(Being carefull for thy countrie) what the Sere
And Bactrians which by Cyrus govern'd are,
And mutinizing Tanais doe prepare.
"Provident God in a black cloud doth hide
"Th'event of future things, and doth deride
"If mortall man farther than's fitting goes;
"Mind thou what's present calmly to compose:
Other things like the river on are driven,
Now ith' mid chanell gently gliding even,
To the Etrurian ocean, and anon
The eaten rocks, and rent trees driving on,
And beasts, and tents, with roating of the hils,
And neighb'ring woods, when the fierce deluge fils
The quiet streames: "O're himselfe bearing sway,
"And merry shall he live, that thus can say,
"I to this day have liv'd; let Jove o're-run
"Or with a black cloud, or a bright-raid sun
"All heaven to morrow, yet what once is past
"He never shall make void, nor ere uncast,
"Or make that thing of no validitie,
"Which once the poasting howre hath carried by.
Fortune unto her cruell work intent,
And to shew her vain glorious sportings bent,
Her flitting honours up and down doth wind,
Now to my selfe, now to another kind:
I praise her being constant; if she shake
Her swift wings, what she gave me, I forsake;
And me in my integritie doe save,
And honest povertie without dowry crave.
'Tis nought to me, when the main-mast doth crack
With northern winds, to my poore pray' [...]s to pack,
And covenant with promises, for feare
The Cyprian and Tyrian ships should beare
My wealth unto the avaritious flood:
Then with helpe of a two-oard trough of wood,
The wind and Pollux twins shall beare me hence,
Safe thorow the Aegaean insolence.

ODE XXX. That he is immortalized by his poems, better than by statues and Pyramides.

A Monument more durable than brasse,
And higher than the princely structure was
Of the Pyramides, I have set forth;
Which neither eating storme, nor raging north,
Or the unnumbred rank of many a yeare
And revolutions of times can weare.
I shall not die all, and some part of me
Shall from the funerall Goddesse power be free,
I fresh with after praise a [...]lory, shall grow,
As with the silent Nunne the Pri [...]st shall goe
Unto the Capitoll: I shall be ren [...]nd
What way the violent Aufid [...] doth sound,
And what way Daunus, being of water scant,
Is ore the countrie rout p [...]t dominant;
That I from feeble rising being strong,
Did first of a I bring downe the Grecian song
To the Italian measures: then inherit:
A statelinesse acquired by thy merit:
And thou, Melpomene, my temples tye
About with Delphick lawrell willingly.
The end of the third Booke of the Odes of Horace.

THE FOVRTH BOOK of the Odes of HORACE.

ODE I. A complaint that Venus hath made him a lover againe: he dotes upon Ligurinus, and desires Venus to forsake him, and goe to the house of Paulus Maximus.

O Venus intermitted many a day;
Dost thou againe wage wars? spare, spare, I pray.
I am not now as I before did stand
Under my lovely Cyaaraes Command.
Spare, cruell mother of all-plessing love,
A man bout fifty yeares of age to move,
Now hardned to thy soft commandments. goe,
Where young mens pleasing prayers doe thee woe,
In Paulus Maximus his palace you,
Being wing'd with Cygnets of a purple hue,
More opportunely may together feast,
If you delight to fire a fitting breast.
For he, being both noble and compleat,
And for poore souls condemn'd, nere silent yet,
And a youth of a hundred tricks beside,
Shall spread the ensignes of thy war full wide.
And when he shall triumph, being of more power
Than the lare gifts or his competitour,
Neare to the Albane springs hee'll setup thee
All marble, underue the Cition tree.
There with thy nose thou shalt draw much sweet smell,
And there thou shalt be pleased very well
With intermixed musick of the late.
And Bere cynthian pipe and with the flute.
There youths with tender virgins twice a day,
While that they doe thy deitie display,
According as is now the Satians guise,
With their cleane feet thrice on the ground shall rise.
Me neither woman now, nor boy doth move,
Nor a too credulous hope of mutuall love;
Nor doth it please me to contend with wine,
Nor with fresh flowers my temples round to twine.
But why, O Ligurinus, why alas
Doe my rare seene teares ore my cheekes thus passe?
Wherefore in silence, no way fit at all,
Amids my words dos my smooth tongue thus fall?
Now close-cling'd in my nightly dreames I wooe thee,
Now through the grasse of Mars fie field pursue thee
So swift of foote, and cruell-hearred thee
Among the streames that ever moving hee.

ODE II. TO ANTONIUS IULUS. The praise of Pindarus, with the extenuation of himselfe and therefore desires Iulus himselfe to sing of Caesan victories.

WHocuer strives to equall Pindarus,
(Julus) by the art of Daedalus,
With pinions waxed unto him, doth frame
To give the glassie ocean a by-name.
Like to a Current running downe a hill,
Which stormes above his noted banks did fill,
So rages Pindarus, and rowles along,
Unfathomed in his profoundest tongue;
Fit to be crowned with Apollos bayes,
Whether he tumbles forth his new made layes
In daring dithyrambs, and ca [...]ed bee
In numbers from authoritie set free.
Whether that he of God, or kings doth tell,
(The seed of Gods) by whom the Centaures fell
With a deserv'd destruction, and the fire
Of terrible Chimaera did expire:
Or whom th' Elean victorie home brings,
Being deifi'de, or of the champion sings,
Or of his horse, and with a gift worth
Than hundred ensignes, highly sets him forth;
Or wailes some young man from his sad wife tane,
And then his courage and his heart againe,
And golden constitutions to the skies
Raises aloft, and sootie hell envies.
Much aire doth the Dircaean swan up-raise,
When, Antonie, it to the cloudes high waies
Doth soare aloft; I in the qualitie,
And the condition of a Matine bee,
Gathering pleasant honey with much toile,
About the wood and watrie Tyburs soile,
Doe warble out, being of slender veine.
My melodies of a laborious straine.
Thou poet, on an in instrument more shrill
Shalt Caesar praise, when ore the sacred hill,
With his deserved lawrell honoured,
He shall the sterne Sicambri forward lead:
Than whom the fates and the good deities
Have given the earth no more, nor greater prize;
Nor ever shall give, though our times unfold
Themselves againe into the ancient gold.
The joviall festivals, and publick sport
Of the whose citie too thou shalt report,
And every court from causes cleared out
For the obtain'd return of Caesar stout.
Then (if [...]ought worth hearing shall begin)
A good part of my voyce too shall come in,
And, O bright Sun, O worthy praise, He straine,
Happie that Caesar is come home againe.
And all our citie while he marcheth by
Not once alone will lō triumph cry,
O lō triumph, and will sacrifice
Incense unto the gracious deities.
Ten oxen, and as many heifers, thee,
A tender calfe me of my vow shall free,
Whose dam was late forsocke, which for my vowes
In spacious meadowes, yet more sportive growes;
The horned fires, upon his forehead shewing
Of Luna her third change agen renewing,
Where he has got a marke, white to be spide,
Being yellow in all other parts beside.

ODE II TO MELPOMENE. Whosover she lookes upon with milde aspect at his nativitie be becomes a rare Poet. And that he hath gotten credi [...] by poetrie.

WHom thou Melpomene but once shalt spie
Being neare his birth, with a delighted eye;
Him neither Isthmian labour up shalt life
To be a champion; nor the horses swift
In an Achaick charet bring from farre,
Being a victor, nor affaires of warre
Bring to the Capitoll a captain drest
With Delian bayes, because he hath supprest
Kings swelling threatnings: but the streame that moves
In fertile Tybur, and thick leaves of groves,
Shall make him famous in Aeolian ditties:
[...]en so the youth of Rome the queen of citties,
Daignes me 'mong poets pleasing troopes to knit,
And now with envious teeth I lesse am bit.
O thou my muse, that of the golden lyre
Dost ever temper the harmonious quire!
O thou that on mure fishes canst bestow
The singing of the sw [...]n, if't please thee so!
It onely is thy bounteousnesse, that I
Am markt with fingers of the passers by,
The Roman lutes musician that I breath,
And please (if yet I please) thou dost bequeath.

ODE IIII. The conquests of Drusus Nero: some valiant acts of Clau­dius Nero, with the fortitude and successe of the Romans, in the battels against Annibal and Asdrubal.

LIke to the bird the thunders harbinger,
(Upon whom love, the gods king did confer
The raigne ore wandring fowles, experienced
That he was true, 'bout beauteous Ganymed)
Whose youth long since, and his fires courage prest,
Unskilfull then of labour, from his nest;
And the spring winds (tempests being now blowne o're)
Taught him (yet trembling) flights unus'd before.
His lively valian [...]nesse did by and by
'Gainst folds of sheepe send him an enemy;
Then love of food and fighting did anon
Against resisting dragone what him on.
Or like unto the lion being bear
From the milk of his yellow hair'd dams tear,
The kid intend on the sweet fields did see,
That straightway to [...] with his young teeth must bee:
The Rhoeti and the Vandals saw afar
Drusus about the Alpes maintaining war,
Whose custome how derived from all ages;
Their hands with Amazonian axes gages,
I have deferred to enquire of yet,
(Nor is it, to know all things, a thing fit.)
But their hands long [...]icto io [...]s, and f [...]ll wide,
By our young captains counsel tam'd, have tride
What wisdom, what an ingenuity,
Well foster'd in a happie family,
And what Augustus fatherly care [...]o [...].
Upon the Neroes, being youths, could doe.
"Strong things are bred of strong, and the fires forces,
"Are in the lovely heifers, are in horses;
"Nor doe strong eagles the weake dove beget,
"But learning do [...] the in bred goodnesse whet,
"And right instructions make the soul more strong;
"When manners faile, sins doe good natures wrong.
What thou, O Rome, dost to the Neroes owe,
Metaurus flood and Asdruhall cast low,
Are witnesse of, and that refulgent day
To Italie, when clouds were chac't away;
Which first in glorious victorie did pride,
When as the fatall Affrican did ride
Our Roman cities ore, as fire through wood,
Ore the West wind through the Sicilian flood.
After this time, with prosperous successe
The Roman youth did evermore increase,
Our temples had their gods anew erected,
Late by the Poem's impious bonds dejected.
Then faithlesse An [...]ibal at length did say,
We Deeres to rav'ning wolves being made a prey,
Pursue them of our selves, from whom to flee,
And scape from, is a glorious victorie.
The valiant nation which from fired Troy,
Tost on the T [...]s [...]an ocean, did convoy
Their sacred orders, and their progeny,
And aged fire, to townes of Italy,
Like to the oake with hard-edg'd axes pill'd,
In Algidum with shedy branches fill'd,
Through damages, through slaughters doth afford
Glory and courage from the very sword.
Hydra with h [...]wn corpes did not more increase
'Gainst grieving to-be-conquerd Hercules,
Colchos, nor Thebes yet by Echion builded,
A greater wonderment have ever yeelded.
In the sea drowne it, it will rise more glorious;
Wrestle, 'twill cast the conqueror victorious
With wondrous credit, and will wars maintaine,
Fit to be sung of by their wives againe.
Now unto Carthage I no more will post
My loftie messengers: all hope is lost,
And fortune of our family is dead,
Ever since Asdiubal was slaughtered.
The Claudian powers will any thing effect,
Which Jove doth with his gracious power protect,
And consultations searching very farre
Doe carry through the very brunts of warre.

ODE V. A prayer for Augustus returne home, as being the health as safety of his people.

BEst guardian of the stock of Romulus,
Sprung from blest Gods, th' art now too long fort
Return thou, having promis'd quick resort
Unto our Senatours most sacred court.
Deare governour, light to thy countrie bring;
For when thy look smiles on us, like the spring,
The day more pleasingly doth then decline,
And suns upon thy people brighter shine.
As doth a mother call for her young son
With vowes, presages, and petition,
Whom the south-wind with envious blast doth stay
Beyond the floods of the Carpathian bay,
From his deare home staying more than a years space,
Nor from the crooked shores doth turne her face:
Iust so our countrie Caesar back requires,
Being all stricken with sincere desires.
For now the oxe treads safely ore the fields,
Ceres and sweet good luck our countrie shields,
The sailor [...]ore the quiet seas doe flie,
True loye feare [...] to be vext with jealousie.
The chaste house with no lecherie's defam'd
Good life and law that spotted sin has tam'd
Young folk with children like themselves are blest,
Attending torture hath that sin supprest.
Who will the Parthian, who could Scythian dread,
Or who the brood rude Germanie hath bred,
While Caesar is intire to us? who'll way
The wars of terrible Iberia?
[...]ach man in his owne hills the day doth spend,
[...]nd to the widowed trees his vine doth bend;
[...]hence very jocund to his wine doth hye,
[...]nd at next health makes thee his deitie.
[...]hee with much prayer, thee he seekes with wine
[...]owr'd out of bowles and dos thy god head joyne
[...]o his house-gods, like Greece that mindfull is
Of Castor, and the mighty Hercules.
[...]ayst thou, O deare guide, to Hespe [...]ia bring
[...]ong festivals; thus we all day doe sing,
Dry in the morning; thus we sing being drunk,
When that the sun is in the Ocean sunk.

ODE VI. Asecular song to Apollo and Diana.

THou god whom all the Niobean kind
The scourge of her imperious tongue did find,
And lustfull Tityus, and the Phthian boy,
Achilles well-nigh victor of great Troy,
Than all the rest a greater champion,
Yet weak to thee, though marine Thetis son,
Though he victorious with his dreadfull speare,
Did the Dardanian palaces downe teare.
He like a pine with the sharpe axe cu [...] downe,
Or like a Cypresse with the West-wind blowne;
Did fall downe prostrate all along, and thrust
His very neck beneath the Trojan dust.
Th'ill-well eas'd Trojans hee'd not have destroy'd
And Priams court with dances over-joy'd,
Not being at all within that horse remaining,
A sacrifice unto Minerva faining:
But (O abhorred, O) openly dire
Unto his captives, would with Grecian fire
Children that nere knew how to speak, consume,
And those yet resting in the mothers wombe:
If the gods father, being by the pray'r
Of thee ore-ruled and of Venus faire,
Had not permitted to Aencas state
Walls reared up with a far better fare.
Luce-master Phoebus to Thalia shrill,
That dost thy hal [...]es in yellow Xanthus swill,
Smooth-fac'd Aguieus, O doe thou maintaine
The reputation of our Roman straine.
Phoebus the soule of verse, Phoebus the art,
And name of poet did to me impart.
Ye prime of virgins, and from parents rare
Ye boyes deriv'd, the Delian godesse care,
That with her bow swift pards and stags doth wound,
Keepe your Greeke measures, and my fingers sound,
Praising Latona's son in a due rite,
The fire-increasing moone that shines by night;
In a due sort, to all fruits prosperous,
And swift to snatch the hastning months from us.
And when that thou art maried, thou shalt say,
I to the gods a pleasing song did pay,
When the full age our holy-dayes had brought;
In poet Horace measures being taught.

ODE VII. Of the brevity of life, and the speedinesse of death.

THE snow is past, the grasse returned is
Unto the fields, and leaves unto the trees;
The earth doth change her courses; and the tides,
Being decreas'd run low on the bank side.
The Grace and Nymphs, and her two sisters dure
To usher in their dances, being bare.
The yeere, and howre which hence the sweet day flings,
Warnes thee thou shouldst not hope immortall things.
Frosts melt with the spring-winds; the summer then
Th [...]usts out the spring, and that must perish, when
Fruit-bearing Autumn doth her store powre out;
And then again stiffe Winter comes about.
Yet the swift moones their he venly waine [...] can mend:
When we, where good Aencas is, descend,
Where wealthy [...]llus, and where Ancus bee,
Then ashes and a very shade [...]e wee.
Who can tell whether that the high gods may
A morrow adde to this last present day?
All that on your ow [...]e dea [...]e soule you bestow,
Beyond your heires all-catching graspe shall goe.
When you're once dead, and Minos upon you
His rare determinations shall shew;
Torquatus, nor your stock, nor eloquence,
Nor pietie shall ere release you thence.
For nor Diana from infernall night
The chaste Hippolytus can ere acquite;
Neither has Theseus power to break in twaine
From dears Pirithous his Lethien chaine.

ODE VIII. That he can give his friends nothing but poems, which he esteemes the best gifts.

BOwles, and neat brasse I'de give (O censorine)
Being bountifull unto all friend, of mine,
Tripods, the valiant Greeks reward I'de give,
Neither shouldst thou my worst of gifts receive.
If I were furnisht with those rarities
Parrhasius or Scopas did devise
This skill'd in stone; in oily colours he,
To forme a god now, now a deitie:
But I have not such plen [...]ie nor indeed,
Dos your estate or mind such dainties need:
You verses love; we can give verses yet,
And on our present can the value set.
Not marble stones grav'd with the publick straine
By which the soule and life returnes againe
To brave words after death; not flights full fast
And threats of Annibal behind him cast;
Not impions Carthage fires more lowd proclaime
The praise of him who having got a name
From conquerd Aftrica, came thence away,
Than doe the poems of Calabria.
Neither if histories doe disregard
What you doe well, shall you receive reward.
What thing would Ilia's and Mars son be,
If that repining taciturnitie
Hinder'd the wouth of Romulus? the sence
Of potent Bards, their smoothnesse, eloquence
Doth consecrate unto the glorious woods
Aecus taken from the Stygian floods.
"A Muse won't let a man praise worthy die,
"A muse in heaven doth him beautifie;
So the untoiled Hercules drawes near
To the desired feasts of Iupiter.
The glorious stars, the twin- Tyndaridae
Snatch batter'd ships from forth the oreprest sea:
Bacchus his temples deck't with the green vine,
Doth bring his wishes to a good designe.

ODE IX. TO LOLLIUS. Of the immortalitie of poetrie, and how many are forgotten for want of the poets pens. He celebrates Lollius deser­vings.

DOe not beleeve those songs can ere be dead,
Which I, at lowd-nois'd Aufidus being bred,
Did warble out, by arts nere shewne before,
Upon the viols to be tune ore.
Although Maeonian Homer first place get,
Pindarus Muses doe not lye hid yet,
Simonidaean, nor Alcaicks fierce,
No nor Stesichorus his pond'rous verse.
What ere Anacreon did sport about
In former time, age hath not yet raz'd out.
The love yet breathes, and still survive the fire [...]
Inspir'd to the Aeolian virgins lyres.
The Spa [...]tan Helen was not onely fired
With an adulterers smooth locks, and admired
The gold on's robes laid ore and ore again,
And his majestick carriage, and his train;
Nor Teucer first, in a Cydonian bow
His arrowes shot; Troy more than once felt woe;
Great Idomene and Sthenelus ne're fought
Such combats (onely) worthy to be taught
By Muses; nor did Hector venterous,
Nor the most violent Deiphobus
Heavy strokes first of all men undertake
For their chaste wives, and for their childrens sake
Many brave men 'fore Agamemnon liv'd,
But all of them are pass'd away ung [...]iev'd,
And in an everlasting night unknowne,
Because a sacred poet they have none.
"Vertue conceal'd is little different
"From sluggishnesse within the grave up-pent:
O Lollius I will not suffer thee,
Ungrac'd, concealed in my lines to bee;
Nor will I let black-tooth'd oblivion
Those thy so many labours gnaw upon.
Thou hast a mind both provident in state,
And both in prosperous times and adverse straight;
Punishing griping coz'nage, and abstaining
From money all things to it selfe constraining,
And not being Consull onely for one yeare,
But while he being a judge good and sincere,
Chose goodnesse above gaining, and forsook
The bribes of guiltie men with a brave look,
And through whole troopes of them that stopt his way,
Conquerour like his ensignes did display.
"The man that is of many things possest,
"You cannot truly terme him to be blest,
"He better doth the name of blest enjoy,
"Who understands how wisely to employ
"The Gods gifts, and hard povertie to beare.
"And wickednesse far worse than death doth feare.
For his deare friends and for his countrie hee
To suffer death will never fearfull bee.

ODE X. The poet tells Ligurinus, that when the flower of his youth is past, he shall grieve to think he had not that understan­ding then which now he hath.

O Thou, yet cruell, and imperious grownei
By Venus gifts, when the unhoped downe
Shall steale upon thy pride, and thy haires shed
Which now fly ore thy shoulders, and thy red
That's choicer than the damask roses grace,
Being chang'd shall turn unto a wrinkled face
Thee Ligurinus; thou wilt cry (alas)
(When thou shalt see thee, not thee in thy glasse)
When I was young why had I not this mind?
Or to these thoughts why not sound cheeks assign'd?

ODE XI. The celebrating of Maecenas birth-day, Phyllis must n [...]t aime too high.

I Have a tun of Albane wine full-gaged,
(O Phyllis) that is more than nine yeares aged,
And I have parsely in my garden plot
To make us garlands: I have also got
I vie great store, wherewith when thou dost twine
Thy tresses up, thou wondrous bright dost shine.
With silver all my house doth glister round,
The Altar with chaste Vervine being bound
With a slain elambe to be besprinkled joyes;
Every hand now makes haste, girles mixt with boy [...]
Trudge up and downe; the flames doe blaze about
From the house-tops whirling the thick smoke our.
But what delights you are invited to,
That you may understand, these Ides by you
Must be solemnized: which every tide
Dos April sea-bred Venus moneth divide.
Solemne indeed, and almost unto me
[...]o [...]e sacred than my owne nativiri [...].
Because that my Maecenas from this light
His yeares still flowing in to him doth write
That Telephus, at whom thou dost so aime
( [...] young a man not of thy inferiour fraime)
A wench both rich and sportive hath obtain'd,
And in a pleasing fetter keepes him chain'd.
Burn'd Phoëton ambitious hopes doth fray,
And the wing'd Pegasus doth well display
A heavy president, falling upon
The earth-born horse-rider Bellerophon,
That things befitting thee thou shouldst affect,
And counting it unlawfull to expect
Farther than's meete, from thy superiours move;
Come then the Ne plus ultra of my love,
(For never after this time will I be
In love with other woman) learne with me
Songs which with thy sweet voyce thou mayst expresse;
Black cares with melodie will soone grow lesse.

ODE XII. He inviteth Virgil (conditionally) to a banquet.

THe Springs companions which the sea doe still,
The Thracian winds doe now our ship-sailes fill;
Now neither meadowes freeze, nor rivers roare,
With winter snow being forced to swell ore.
The haplesse bird, and the eternall shame
Of the Cecropian Court, her nest doth frame,
Mournfully sounding Itys, 'cause that she
Kings barb'rous lusts revenged wickedly.
The keepers of the rich-fleec'd sheepe doe raise
Unto their reeds in the soft grasse their layes,
And recreate the God to whom the herd
And shed chils of Arcade are endeard.
These times breed thirst, but if you well on't think,
Virgil, my wine trod out at Cales to drink,
Thou crafficker with all our noble youth,
Must with thy ointments buy my wine forsooth.
A little oile-gill drawes my vessell dry,
Which now dos in Sulpitian cellars lye,
Rich enough fresh hopes out for us to square,
And strong to drench the bitternesse of care.
Unto these pleasures if your course you bend,
Come quickly with thy wares: I don't intend
Like to some rich man in a full stor'd house
To drench thee free from charge with my carouse.
But put delayes of love and gaine away,
And mindfull of your funerall, while you may,
Mingle some short-breath'd folly with your reason;
'Tis pleasing to be foolish in due season.

ODE XIII. Against old Lyce, who would faine seeme young.

LYCE, the gods have hearken'd to my mone,
Lyce, the gods have heard: thou old art growne,
And yet thou beautifull wilt seeme to bee.
And thou dost sport and drinke audaciously,
And after Cupid flow to thee dost seeke
With palsied note; he in the be [...]ureous cheek
Of the now freshly colour'd Chian wench,
And throughly skill'd in prick-song dos intrench.
For hastie he over the drie okes fleeth
And runs from thee, because thy rotten teeth,
Because that those thy wrinckles, and the snow
Upon thy head doe vitiate thee so.
Nor Tyrian purples now, nor glistring stones
Gan fetch againe those times to thee, which once
The winged day hath very firmely closed
In memorable registers disposed.
Whither (alas) now is thy beautie gone,
Or where thy sweet face, where thy action?
What hast of her, of her that breathed love,
Which didst my selfe from my owne selfe remove?
A handsome face next after Cynara's,
And famous too, and full of moving wayes:
But fates gave Cyna'ra few yeeres, keeping thee
Equall with some old ravens age to bee,
That lustie youths might see with mirth enough,
Thy taper wasted to a very snuffe.

ODE XIV. Augustus his glorie, and Victories.

WHat care of Senators or Commoners,
By statues and recording registers
Can with full gifts of honour deifie
Thy worths, Augustus, to posteritie?
O thou the chiefe of Kings which way so e're
The Sun the habitable shoares doth cleare;
The Vandals, Latian rites, unused to,
Have lately felt what thou in war couldst doe.
For with thy troops brave Drusus did deface
More than at one about, an unruly race,
The Genovese, and Brenni swift of foot,
And t [...]wers upon the dreadfull Aspes tops put.
The elder of the Nero's fought of late
A dreadfull battell, and with prosp'rous fate
The savage natur'd Rhaetians out did fling,
Plain to be seene in's warlick combating,
With how great slaughters he put out of breath
Their lives design'd to revell-keeping death.
As the north (when the troope of Pleiades
Rendeth the clouds) swells up the raging seas;
[...]o swift was he his enemies troopes to tire,
And spurre his foaming horse through midst of fire.
So is the bull-form'd Aufidus rowl'd out,
Which runs Apulian Daunus Realmes about,
When it swels up, and on the field new sowne
Threatens to powre a horrid deluge downe.
As Claudius did with a destructive power
The armed troopes of the Barbarians scowre;
And as he (conquering) van and reare did mow,
Them without losse o're all the field did st [...]ow:
While thou thy aids, advice, and gods didst lend;
For what day th'Alexandrian port did bend
Humbly unto thee, and set open cleare
Her emptie court, from thence the fifteenth yeere,
Well-boding fortune did to thee present
Of the then war most prosperous event;
And did both praise and wished dignitie
Procure to thy compleated Emperie.
The Spaniard not afore then captivate,
The Mede, the Moore, Scythian runnagate
Admire thee; O thou helpe assistant come
To Italy, and its chiefe ci [...]ie, Rome.
Nile that conceales the birth-place of his spring,
And Ister too, and Tig [...]is ravening,
The monster-bearing Ocean thee adores,
That 'bout the world-divided Britains roares.
The Land of France that doth not death regard,
And of Iberia parched very hard;
Thee the Sicambri that in bloud take pride
Doe fawne upon, their armes being laid aside.

ODE XV. The praises of Augustus prudent government.

PHOEBUS rebuked mee minding to suite
Battels and conquer'd Cities to my Lute,
Lest I should spread unto the Tyrrhene main
My little sailes: Caesar, thy age againe
Did plenteous fruits unto our fields afford,
And ensignes to our Iupiter restor'd,
Pull'd from the Persians proud posts, and did bar
Romulus temple close, being freed from war,
And brought in a right-govern'd policie,
And bridles for our wandring libertie,
And our iniquities did quite subdue,
And did our ancient arts again renew;
By which agen sprung up our Roman name,
And our Italian forces, and the fame
And glory of our Emperie forth spred
To the Suns rising from his western bed.
While Caesar is the guardian of our state
Not civill rage or pow'r our rest shall bate;
Not indignation which swords doth whet,
And wretched cities doth at discord set.
Those who at deepe Danubius doe drink,
Shall not the Julian edicts e're unlink;
Not Getes, nor Seres, nor Persians infidell
Nor those who neere the river Tana is dwell.
And we on working dayes, and holy tides,
Amids blithe Bacchus bowles, with sons and brides,
First to the god in right sort having pray'd,
Of gen'ralls long since valorously decay'd,
(As our fore-fathers manner was to doe)
And of Troy also, and Anchises too,
And beauteous Venus progenie will sing
With songs to Lydian musick answering,
The end of the fourth Booke of the Odes of Horace.

THE EPODES of HORACE.

EPODE I. Horace desires to goe with Maecenas to warre.

THou, friend Maecenas, on Liburnians necks
Wilt goe unto the ships high decks;
Being prepar'd to undertake alone
All Caesars perill as thy owne.
And what then shall I doe,
To whom, so long as you
Doe still survive, my life is pleasing,
But if contrary, 'tis diseasing?
Shall we, be'ing bid, embrace securitie,
Not sweet, unlesse it be with thee?
Or undergoe this labour with that spirit,
As befits brave men to beare it?
And the Alps-hills clean through
With stout minde follow you,
And Caucasus by none possest,
And utmost confines of the West?
You'll aske how with my pains I can ease your,
Being feeble and unsure;
Being with you I shall be in feare much lesse,
That dos the absent most oppresse.
As the bird sitting o [...]
Her unfledg'd young, dos more
When they're alone, the snakes twines feare,
Not that shee could help, were shee there.
These and all enterprises, we will prove,
Freely, in hope to gain your love.
Not that my ploughs, being made fast unto
My many teemes, much work may doe;
Or that my cattell may
From Lucan pastures stray
To the Calabrians situation,
Before the firie const [...]llation.
Nor that my upland Tusculums hot bower
May reach as far as Circestower:
Sufficiently has thy benignitie,
And too much enriched me;
I will not crave that, like
Some greedy-griping tike
I in the earth may deep inhume,
Or like some riotous spark consume.

EPODE II. The prases of the courtrie life.

BLest is the man, who, free from molestation,
(As were the mortals antient nation)
With his owne oxen tills his country ground,
From all usury unbound;
Nor, souldier like, with shrill alarms is raised,
Nor at the angry sea's amazed;
And flyes the courts of law, and the proud gates
Of Citizens of great estates.
Then either with the fruitfull stems of vines,
He the tall poplar trees conjoynes,
And, with his knife cutting the waste boughs out,
Graft in better roundabout;
Or tendeth on his oxens grazing drove,
In a close retired grove,
Or his prest noney tuns in vessels cleare,
Or his swelter'd sheep doth sheare;
Or when the Autumne o're the fields doth spread
With ripen'd fruit his comely head,
How blith is he his grafted trees devesting,
And grapes with purple dye contesting.
Wherewith, Priapus, he may thee reward,
And thee, Sire Sylvane, his lands guard.
Now under some old oke he loves to lye,
Upon the long grasse by and by:
Mean while the streames along their high banks spring,
The birds doe in the forest sing;
The Springs with flowing drops a whisp'ring keep;
Which may call in gentle sleep.
But when the thund'ring Inpiters cold tide
Dos the stormes and snow provide,
With many dogs he here and there besets
The fierce Boares 'gainst the toiling nets;
Or on his smooth hook hangs his slender snares,
Gins for the devouring Stares;
Or else the fearfull Hares about pursues,
Or Crane a stranger to our noose;
(Delightfull sports! who amids these will not
Forget the sad cares love has got?)
But if the chaste wife, for her part, doth cheare
Her family and children deare;
(Like to the Sabine or the sun-burn'd bride
Of the Apulian swift to ride)
Dos with old wood a sacred fire begin
'Gainst her toil'd husbands comming in;
And in clos'd pens shutting her faire ewes by,
Milks their full-swolne udders drie,
And from her sweet pots broaching this yeares wine,
Makes him with unbought viands dine;
Nor Lucrine shel-fish'better shall me please,
Nor Rhombus, nor the Porpuses;
If that the winter swell'd with eastern waves,
Any to our Ocean laves.
No Turkey-cock shall downe my belly fleet,
Nor lonian Quaile, more sweet
Than th' Olive-betry that new-gather'd is
From the richest boughs of trees;
Or Sorrell-leafe that loves the meadow ground,
And Mallowes good for bodies bound;
Or else a lamb on Terminus feasts slaine,
Or a Kid from the Wolfe new tane.
Amid these cates how I desire to see
How the full ewes bent homeward bee;
To see the wearied oxen, as they hall'd
The o're-turn'd plough with necks all gall'd;
And, the rich houses swarme, the servants set
About the chimney trimmed near.
When as the Usurer Alphius thus had said,
Who straight a farmer would be made,
I'th'ldes he gathered all his money in,
Next month would let it out agin.

EPODE III. Against the eating of Garlick.

IF any one with hand accurst
His fathers aged neck hath burst,
Garlick more fell than Hemlock let him eat.
O the strong guts of countrie swaines!
What kind of poisons this that raignes
Within my brest? hast Vipers bloud (being h [...]
Among these herbs) from me been hid aside,
Or did [...]anidia these bad cates provide?
When as Medea did admire
'Bove all the seamen one faire Squire,
Iason with this shee charm'd, when he did tye
Yokes on the bulls to them unknowne;
With presents stain'd with this alone,
Tort'ring her rivall shee away did fly
On winged Snakes; nor ere did such a smoke
Downe from the stars the parch't Apulia choke.
Neither did that present crack
More ragingly upon the back
Of the laborious Mercules; but I pray,
O blith Maecenas, if you crave
Any such like stink to have.
At any time, that then your sweet-heart may
Her hands forth-right against your kisses spred
And lye on farthest side of all the bed.

EPODE IV. Against upstert Maenas, late a slave.

WHat hate 'twixt wolve and lambs dos use to be
So much i [...] 'twixt me and thee,
Whose sides with Spanish whips are scarr'd
And whose legs with setters hard:
Though you with wealth doe strut vaingloriously,
The fortune dos not change the qualitie.
See you, as through the sacred street you throng,
With a gown of six ells long,
How the passengers free scorne
Their faces to and fro doth turne?
He flea'd with Bride-well whips, to th'whippers toile.
Tills thousand acres now of Falern soile.
The Appian way he with his Jennets beats,
And upon the chiefest seats
He sitteth as a doughty Knight,
And dos marshall Otho slight.
What profit is't that with a heavie load
So many ships bow'd keeles are in the road
Against these pirats, and these slavish powers,
He, he being tribune of these bands of ours?

EPODE V. Canidia tortaring a boy, to make a love potion of him.

O O, what ever God in heav'n doth guide
The earth and all mandkind beside,
What dos thi [...] rore mean, and wherefore bee
All your stane looks gainst [...]nly mee?
[...]hee by thy children, if Lucina e [...]e,
To thy true l [...]ou [...]s call [...]d, was there;
By this my purples fainting die I pray,
By Iove that will these thing gain-say,
Why like a ste [...]dame dost thou on me looke,
Or like a Whale struck with the hooke?
While thus the Boy did stand, and did complaine
With trembling voice, his [...]obes being from him tane
A body very smooth, and such a one
As might the Thracians cruell brests atone;
[...]onidra having think embroydered [...]
With little snakes her locks and uncomb'd head,
Commands that fig-trees wild from graves up torne,
Commands that cypresse sprigs at funeralls worne,
And egs with bloud of a black toad made fouls,
And feathers of a nighty flying owle,
And herbs Iolcos and [...]beria
(Fertill in poisons) dos transport away,
And bones out from a hungry curs chaps sp [...]d,
[...] Magick flames should be to ashes burn'd.
[...] busie Sagana the house throughout
[...]prinkling Avernall waters round about,
[...]ke a sea Porpus, or a bristling Boare,
With her haire staring up, about doth ro [...]e.
Veia with no feare stopp' digg'd out the dust
With her hard spades, grunting at ev'ry thrust,
That the boy rammed in might pine away
At sight of meat chang'd twice or thrice each day;
While he peer'd up with's head, as bodies sunk
Toth' chin in water stand; that his pith shrunk,
And liver dri'd might be a love-drink made,
While his eyes fixt on meats forbid, did fade.
Both lazie Naples, and each Village neare
Thought Ariminian Folia was there,
(A man in lust) who pulleth from the skie,
Stars and Moon charm'd with spells of Thessaly.
Cruell Ca [...]dia here biting away
Her long nailes with black t [...]th, what did shee say,
Or what did shee not say? —
O you that to my projects bee
True helpers, Night, and Hecate,
Who the silence dost command
While our night-spells are in hand,
Now come, and on these hostile bowers,
Throw your anger and your powers.
While beasts in their sad dens doe creepe
Wearied with pleasant sleepe;
Let the Suburan dogs all snarle
At the old adulterous carle,
And (which all the towne may jeere)
Besmear'd with Spikenard every where,
"And such a one, as a more true
[...]st these my hands did never doe.
Be [...] ma [...]'s hap't? why dos my direfull charme
Than sell Medeas doe lesse harme;
Wherewith having tortur'd fore
Creat Creons daughter, that proud whore,
Away shee fled thence, when a gowne,
A present o're with potion strowne,
Carried from them all on flame
The but newly married dame.
Nor plant nor root, yet, hidden in
Sharp rocks to me unknown hath bin;
Yet he in bed of all his whores,
Besmeared with oblivion snores.
Ah, ah, he walks freed from harme,
By some more skilfull witches charme,
Thou Varus with no triviall potion
Back to me shalt make thy motion,
(Thou whose head for this shall pay)
Nor shall thy heart, though call'd away
With Marsian spells, from me e're slide;
I'le a stronger draught provide,
I'le a pow'rfuller powre out
For thee that at my love dost flout.
First heav'n beneath the earth shall lye,
The earth stretcht over both on high,
Than you not flame in my desires,
Like brimstone in the sootie fires.
At this the Boy did not, as heretofore,
These damned hags with gentle words implore,
But doubtfull how he might his silence breake,
Did Thyestaean imprecations speake;
Poisons, a great helpe and harme,
Can't humane courses counter-charme
I'le curse you all; a dire curse is
Removed with no sacrifice.
But when by you be'ing bid to die,
I shall give up the ghost, then I
A mightie terror will you meet,
And as a ghost your faces greet,
With crooked naises, (which is the pow'r)
Of the gods in feriour)
And lying on your panting brest,
With horror drive away your rest.
You, loath some Witches, all the towne
In each street shall batter downe,
Throwing stones now here now there,
Then wolves and funerall fowles shall teare
Your unburied limbs in sunder,
Nor from my parents shall this wonder
Be conceal'd, who after mee
Must (alas) survivers bee.

EPODE VI. Against Cassius Severus.

WHerefore, O Curre,
Dost thou the harmelesse stranger fright
Not daring against wolves to stirre?
Why doe not you this way
Your vain threats (if you can) display,
And seize me that again dare bite.
For Mastiffe-like,
Or like unto the brended hound,
(The shepherds loving help) Ile strike
Through she deep snow, full neare
Unto thee with my prickt up eare,
What e're game shall before me bound.
When thou hast fill'd
The forest with thy hideous cry,
Thou with one cast scrap art still'd:
O be warn'd, be warned then,
For I most fierce' gainst wicked men,
Advance my ready horns on high.
I like unto
That son in law held in disdain,
By Lycambes most untrue
Or the fierce foe of Bupalus,
If with black tooth one bite me thus,
Shall I like a weak boy complain?

EPODE VII. An execration of the civill warre.

O Whither now, O whither
Run yee (yee cursed men) together;
Or why are your long laid-by swords made fit,
For your right hands? is there yet
Too little wasted of our Latian bloud
Upon the fields and in the floud?
Not that our Romans might
Burne the stately towers downe quite
Of Carthage vile; or th'unfound Britain tread
Our sacred way, being manacled;
But that unto the Parthians wish this Land
Might perish by her owne right hand.
'Mongst Wolves and Lions ne're
Was such a use, unlesse it were
'Gainst beasts of different sort: dos hood-wink'd furie
Or stronger force, or sin allure yee?
Return an answer: they are silent still,
And palenesse wan their looks doth fill.
Their consciences pierc't through
Are all astonish't: 'tis too true,
Sad destiny, and sin of brothers slaughter,
Our Roman race still followeth after,
E're since just Remus bloud o'th'ground did lye
Fatall to its posteritie.

EPODE VIII. and XII. That obscenitis which cannot in fit words bee cove­red, is not fit in any words to bee discovered.

EPODE IX. Foretelling Caesars victory against Antonie.

O Blest Maecenas, when shall I
(So please Iove) in thy palace high
Taste the wine kept for feasts most glorious,
When Caesar shall returne victorious,
Be'ing merry with thee, while the lyre
Doth mixt songs to the pipes inspire,
Upon this a Dorick tone,
Upon them a Barb'rous one?
As of late we did when (hee
That would Neptunes bastard bee)
The Captain of the Ocean chas't
With his fir'd ships away did haste;
Threatning fetters to our citie,
Which formerly he, taking pitie,
Knock't off from slaves turn'd renegate;
A Roman Squire, now captivate
To a female creature, beares
Her trenching engin and her spears:
(Ah posteritie, you'll say
This never was) and can obey
Eunuchs with their wrinkled face;
And the Sun (O vile disgrace)
'Mongst ensignes fit for chevalrie
Dos look upon a canopie.
But the French-menturn'd together
Two thousand foaming horses hither,
Singing Caesar; and there lye
The hostile navies sterns close by
In harbour, looking a wrong way:
Iö Triumph thou hast brought
Us a generall back from war
Exceeding Jugurths victor far,
And Affricks conqueror, whose glorie
Over Carthage rais'd his storie.
Our foe by land and sea o'rethrowne
Has put on a homely gowne
For his scarlet, and now hee
With winds against him means to see
Creet for its hundred cities prais'd,
Or sailes against the quick-sands rais'd
By the South, or's tost aloft
On the Ocean varying oft.
Boy, bring larger glasses hither,
And Chian wine, or Lesbian either,
Or Cecube liquor for us fill,
That may the rising stomack still.
All care and feare for Caesars State
In sweet wine I must mitigate.

EPODE X. An execration against Maevius.

THe ship's lan [...]h'd out with fate unprosperous
Carrying in't that stinking Maevius.
R [...]ember, South-wind, that thou both sides batter
With horrid waves: let the black East-wind shatter
The racklings and the oares all burst in twain
With the toss'd sea; let the North swell again
As high, as when upon the mountains great
The trem [...]ling oakes it doth in peeces beat.
Nor let propitious Star that dark night shine,
When storme presaging Orion dos decline.
Nor calmer sea let him be born upon
Than was the Grecian Captains legion;
When Pallas had her indignation turn'd
'Gainst Ajax impious ship from Ilium burn'd.
O what a sweat dos on thy sea-men stand,
And on thy selfe a palenesse swarthy-tann'd,
And that same (not a man beseeming) crying,
And prayers unto love they suit denying!
When the lonian creek 'ginning to rore.
'Gainst the moist South-wind has your vessell tore.
But if, as a rich prey, being laid flat
On the crook'd shore, thou shalt the crowes make far,
A lustfull hee-goat and a lamb besides
Shall offer'd be to the tempestuous tides.

EPODE XI. That he is love-sick, and cannot write verses.

PEttie, it doth not me delight
Verses, as before, to write,
Quite thorow thrust
With deeply wounding lust.
With lust, the which doth me desire
'Bove all men else to set on fire
Or for young boyes,
Or for some female toyes.
This the third winter off has tore
The forests dresse, since I forbore
To pine away
For my Inachia.
Through towne O what a sport was I?
(For I'm sham'd at such foolery)
And I repent
My feasting-merriments
In which my griefe and silent tongue,
And sighs from my hearts bottom sprung,
Argued mee
Inamorate to bee.
And mourning to thee, I did cry,
A poore mans candid ingenie
Was all but vain
To stand against her gain;
When as the uncivill power
Of raging wine, had from its bower
My secret thought
With stronger liquor wrought
But in my brest if free rage boile,
That to the winds it may assoile
My sighs ingrate
Which my sore wound can't bate
Then my modestnesse cast by
Shall give over presently
To strive so long
With rivalls over strong.
When (vext) I to you had enlarg'd
These things, to hie me home being charg [...]d;
Along I went
With feet full imporent,
To those posts (ah) unkind to mee,
And doores (ah) full of crueltie
Where mightily
My loins and sides bruis'd I.
Lyciscus love me now doth presse,
Boasting that he in tendernesse
Dos far surpasse
Any young married lasse.
Whence nor the free-spent consultations,
Nor the rigid increpations
Of my friends ere
Me off againe shall teare:
But some other flame, in sooth,
Of some faire maid, or some plump youth,
Knitting up faire
His long grown head of haire.

EPODE XIII. From the present storme to take occasion to be merry.

A Horrid storme doth cloud heaven o're,
And rain and snow doe even unthrone love:
Now the sea, and now the grove
With the Thracian north-wind rore.
Friends, let's catch oportunitie
Even from this very time; and while our knees
Are lustie, and it seemly is
Let age from cloudy brow be free.
Broach the wine made when Torquat was
My Consul; cease to speak ought of the rest:
Iove perhaps with change full blest
Will these things into order passe.
Now I desire with Persian oile
To bespred o're, and with Mercuriall lyre
from all pertur bations dire
My cogltations to assoile.
As the brave Centaur sung unto
His Pupill [...]all; Morrall unconquered,
Boy by goddeste Thet is bred,
The Land of Troy doth wait for you.
Which small Scamanders coole streams lave,
And Simois smooth; whence Fates with destin'd thrid
Thy return home agen forbid
Not thy sea-mother home shall have.
Then being there doe thou suppresse
Every ill thing with wine and melodie,
The sweet-easing company
Of deform'd distractivenesse.

EPODE XIV. An excuse for not finishing his Iambicks.

WHy a feeble lazinesse
Dos so great oblivion presse
On my de [...]p senses, as if I
Had swallow'd down, with chaps parch't d [...]ie,
Drinks Lethaean slet pes in piring,
You me kill with oft enquiring,
(O Macenas deare) for why
That god, that god dos put me by
My lambicks (some part pend,
A song long promis'd) e're to end
In no other sort they say
Anacreon of Te [...]a
For Samian Bathyllus burn'd,
Who on his hollow Lute oft mourn'd
In carelesse measures his desire;
You poore heart too are all on fire:
But if that flame was not so bright
That burn'd besieged Troy down quite,
Joy in your choice: Phryne made free,
Nor with one man content, pines mee.

EPODE XV. A complaint of Neaera's perjurie.

IT was at night, and in the cleer-brow'd skie
The moone among the lesser starres did shine,
When thou, about to blast the majestie
Of the great gods, swar'st to these words of mine,
(Clinging more closely with thy armes twin'd round,
Than the tall oake is with the ivie bound)
While the wolfe to sheep a foe,
And Orion to seamen so,
Should irritate the winter swelled sea,
And the wind should every way
Apollo's uncut locks display,
This our love interchangeable should be.
Naera that much for my resolves shalt grieve,
(For if ther's ought of man in Flaccus yet)
Hee'll not endure thou all thy nights shouldst give
To a rivall; and being vext a mate hee'il get.
Nor shall his constancy ere yeeld agin,
To thy false face, if fixt griefe once step in.
And thou blest man who ere thou art,
That struttest proudly army sma [...]t
Though thou be rich in cattell and much ground,
And Pactolus to thee flow
And thou Pythagoras secrets know
(Thrice born) and Nireus dost for face confound,
Ah thou wilt weepe to see her love to steere
Another course, but I'mean time will jeere.

EPODE XVI. A deploring of the eivill wars, and an exhortation to forsake their countrie, as untuckie.

A Second age with civill wars is spent,
And Rome it selfe with her own powers is rent;
Which bord'ring Ma [...]sians could not waste away,
Nor Tuscan band or threatfull Prosena,
No [...] Capua's emulo is strength, nor Spartacus
So violent, nor French perfidious
To new affaires, nor savage Germany
Had ever wasted with her painted fry,
Nor Anni' bal by his parents cursed still,
We wicked brood of cursed seed will spill;
And now our land again shall be ore-spread
With savage beasts; the barbrous victor tread
Upon our ashes, and the horseman greet
Our citie with his horses sounding feet;
And proudly scatter (O abhorr'd to see)
Romulus bones from wind and sun set free.
Perhaps you all, or best part pitch upon
What must, to scape these wicked wars, be done:
Let no advice than this be priz'd more high;
As did the Phocians cursed citie fly,
Fields, houshold gods, and temple, too forsooke,
By boares and cruell wolves to be next tooke.
Let's goe where ere our feet can carrie us,
Where ere the south or north wind boisterous
Shall call us through the seas: what? dos this like?
Or has some else a better stroke to strike?
Wherefore doe we delay our ships to st [...]are
With prosp'rous fate? but lets to these things sweare:
When rocks, rais'd from their deep seas up, shall flow,
Then back again it be no sin to goe,
Nor be a shame our sailes towards home to set,
When Padus shall the Matine hill tops wet.
Or towring Apennine sink in the main,
And strange love with new lust shall monsters chain,
That Tygers shall to mate with Bucks delight,
And Pigeon shall adulterate with the Kite
Not credulous herds from yellow lions shall move,
And the smooth goat the brinish floods shall love:
Let's swear to these things, and what ever may,
Take all our sweet hopes of return away.
Let our curs'd citie all at once goe our,
Or some part better than th' untutor'd rout.
Let the hen-hearted and despairing wretch
Himselfe in these ill fated chambers stretch.
The girdling sea calls us; lets seek out strait
Those fields, blest fields and Ilands fortunate,
Where th'earth untill each yeare her fruit doth give,
And vineyard never prund doth everlive;
And the nere-fuling olives branch doth sprout,
And the ripe fig her native tree sets out.
From hollow oaks drops honey; from high hills
The nimble spring with ratling feet distills
There goats uncalld unto the milk pailes come,
And the faire flock their full swoln bag, brings [...];
Nor evening beare about their fields doth yell,
Nor dos the fertile land with vipers swell.
And we blest men shall more admire, as how
The wet south don't the meads with large stormes mow;
Nor the far seed is parcht in furrowes drie;
The heav'ns king both so well doth qualifie.
No ship with Argonaures doth hither steere,
Nor impudent Medea sets foot heere,
No Tyrian sailors hither their sailes bent,
Not yet Vlysses long-toil'd regiment.
Jove for a pious stock these shoares selected,
When he the golden age with brasse infected,
With brasse, then iron hardend the age; whose flight
To those blest soules by my presage stands right.

TO CANIDIA. An ironicall recantation.

NOw to thy strong art I my hands assigne,
Humbly, and crave byth' realmes of Proserpine,
And by the unmov'd power of Hecate,
And by the books of spels which able be
To call the loosned stars down from their sphaere,
Canidia, yet thy damned charms forbeare,
And wind, O wind thy nimble spindle back:
Telephus so did Nereus grand child slack.
Gainst whom proud he his Mysian troups had bent,
And against whom he had his sharpe darts sent.
The Trojan mat ons murdrous [...]ector ointed,
To ravenous birds and dogs before appointed,
When that the King, descended from the wall,
Down (ah) at proud Achilles feet did fall;
Vlysses gally-slaves, when C [...]ree pleas'd,
Their bi [...]led members of their hard skin eas'd.
Then was their mind and voyce restor'd again,
And glory in their countenance most plain.
Thou much by sailors and by factors lov'd,
Enough and too much penance I have prov'd;
My youth is vanisht, and my comely red
Has left my bones with swarthy skin o [...]espred.
My hiar's turnd white all over with thyoile,
No intermission quitteth me from toile.
The night on day, and day on night doth seize,
Yet nothing can my wind-swoln intrailes ease,
Therefore poore wretch I am captlv'd, that I
May credit what I did before denie,
That Sabine charms could doe a body wrong,
Or wit be crazed with a Marsyan song.
What would you more than this?—O earth and seas!
I flame, as neither poison'd Hercules
By Nessus foule blood, nor Sicilian fire
Raging in burning Aetna can flame higher:
Thou even a shop of Colchick witchery
Do [...]t flame so long, till I, being ashes day,
To the rude winds shall shatterd be: what end?
Or what amercement dos upon me tend?
Speak, I will truly beare my imposed task,
Prepar'd to expiate, whether you ask
A hundred buls; or on my false lute you
Will flatter'd bee; you modest dame and true,
Being a golden constellation,
Even the stars themselves shalt tread upon.
Castor, and mighty Castors brother sham'd
At the report of Helena defam'd,
Or-come with supplication, did againe
Restore the eye-sight from the poet tane.
And you (for you can doe't) free me from madnesse,
O thou nere tainted through thy fathers badnesse,
Nor old hag skill'd from poore mens sepulchers
The dust scarce nine dayes cover'd to disperse;
Thou hast a loving breast, and righteous hands,
And yet thy wombe for childbirth sitting stands.
And the nurse washes up your blood-staind clout
When thou a lustic child-bed wife leap'st out.

CANIDIA'S answer.

WHy powre you praiers into my lockt-up cares?
The winter-swelled Neptune never teares
The rocks more deafe to sea men ship wracked
On the rough sea: should you untortured
My (by you publisht) baudy rites despise,
The nor-to-be-wrong'd Cupids sacrifice?
And censor of my spels on the watch-hill,
(Unpunisht) with my name the town shouldst fill?
Wher [...] in will it availe you rich to make
The Pelign hags, or quicker poison take,
If flower destinies on you attend
Than your desires? you wretch must to this end
Spin out a loathed life, that so you may
For new found torments evermore find play.
Tantalus wanting his still furnisht feast,
( Pelops his faithlesse father) begs for rest;
Prometheus craves it, to his eagle tide;
Sisyphus begs to make his stone abide
On the hill top; but loves decrees denie:
So you may wish to leap from turrets high,
And other while with a Bavarian blade
To ri [...] entrailes up; and you may braid
Halters for your own neck, and all in vaine,
Being distracted at your tedious paine.
Then I'le in state ride on your hatefull back,
Beneath my insolence the earth-shall crack:
Shall I that can make waxen pictures goe,
(As you your selfe ore-curious foole doe know)
Can with my cha [...]s the moone from heaven constrain,
Can raise the burnt dead bodies up againe,
And make a drink of love, th'event deplore
Of all my art that hath on thee no power?

A secular Hymne for the protection of the Roman Empire.

PHOEBUS, and Dian president
Offorrests, heavens bright ornament,
Still worthy praise, and still ador'd,
Afford
Those things for which we pray
Upon our holy day.
On which the Sibylls books ordain'd,
That virgins choice, and youths unstain'd
Should to those deities rehearse
A verse,
With whom our seaven hills
Have purchased good wills.
Bright Sun that in thy charet pure
Dost cleare the day, and dost obscure,
Seem'st various, yet still in one wise
Dost rise,
O mayst thou nothing see
Greater than Rome to bee.
O Ilithuia truly milde
To bring forth the ripened child,
Protect our matrons whether thou
Allow
To be Lucina fam'd,
Or be amid wife nam'd,
Goddesse doe thou our stock increase,
And give our senates lawes successe,
'Bout marrying wives; and that, law then
For men,
That married they may breed
A new increasing seed.
That the world informed cleere
Every hundred and tenth yeere,
May make solemne hymnes and playes
Three dayes
Bright-shining, and by night
As long, with all delight.
You destinies too propagate
To our past fortunes a blest fate,
Let the firm determinings
Of things
Keep safe what once 'tis sea'd
Y'have firmly prophes'ed
Let the earth full-stor'd with corn
And cattell, Ceres then adorne
With a coroner of wheat,
And let
Sweet rain and breath of Jove
Our nurseries improve.
Apoll [...] milde and pacifi'd
(Thy artill'rie laid aside)
To our suppliant youth give ear:
And heare
Thou horn'd Queen of the skie,
(Luna) our femall fry.
If Rome be a charge of yours,
And the Troy-descended powers
Have kept the Roman shoares, some few
By you
Being bid with course secure
Their gods and land t'abjure;
For whom thorow Troy all-fired
Chaste Ae [...]eas, not expired
With's countrie, without losse did lay
Free way;
Willing to give them more
Than all they left before.
Yee gods bestow conditions sage
On our train'd youth; to sweet old age
Give rest: both wealth and issue too
Give you,
And all Majestick grace
To Romulus his race.
And he that offers' you white kine,
(The posteritie divine.
Of Venus and Anchises) let
Him get
Pow'r ore his warring foe
Mild to him when brought low.
The Mede now fears our potent band,
And Roman arms by sea and land,
The Scythians now our answers wait,
Of late
That were so full of pride,
And th' Indians beside.
Now Faith and Peace, and Honour too,
And Chastitie fam'd long agoe,
And long-scorn'd Vertue dares agin
Come in,
And blessed Plentie here
With full horn doth appeare.
And Phoebus future things divining,
Adorned with his bow bright-shining,
And belov'd of the nine Muses,
Who Iooses
With health-restoring arts
The bodies toiled parts;
If he our Palatine altars see,
Romes weale, and glorious Italie,
Being propitious, let him still
Fulfill
Them to a longer date,
And fate more fortunate.
And let Diana who doth hold
Th' Aventine hill, and Algid cold,
Our fifteene rulers prayers attend,
And bend
Her cares of milde condition
Unto our youths petition.
And I a skilfull Chorister,
Phoebus and Phoebes praise to reare,
Bring home good hope, and nere to move,
That Jove
And all the Deities
Assent unto our cries.
FINIS.

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