Odes

Horace

Horace. The Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace. Conington, John, translator. London: George Bell and Sons, 1882.

Nor Theseus free his loved Pirithous

From Lethe's thrall.

Ah Censorinus! to my comrades true

Rich cups, rare bronzes, gladly would I send:

Choice tripods from Olympia on each friend

Would I confer, choicer on none than you,

Had but my fate such gems of art bestow'd

As cunning Scopas or Parrhasius wrought,

This with the brush, that with the chisel taught

To image now a mortal, now a god.

But these are not my riches: your desire

Such luxury craves not, and your means disdain:

A poet's strain you love; a poet's strain

Accept, and learn the value of the lyre.

Not public gravings on a marble base,

Whence comes a second life to men of might

E'en in the tomb: not Hannibal's swift flight,

Nor those fierce threats flung back into his face,

Not impious Carthage in its last red blaze,

In clearer light sets forth his spotless fame,