Unus Pellæo juveni non sufficit orbis :
Estuat infelix angusto limite mundi
Ut Gyara clausus scopulis parvâque Seripho.
Quum tamen a figulis munitum intraverit urbem
Sarcophago contentus erit. Mors sola fatetur
Quantula sint hominum corpuscula.
But what ensued? Illusive Glory, say,
Subdued on Zama's memorable day,
He flies in exile to a petty state,
With headlong haste, and, at a despot's gate,
Sits, mighty suppliant! of his life in doubt,
Till the Bithynian's morning nap be out.
No swords, nor spears, nor stones from engines hurl'd,
Shall quell the man whose frown alarm'd the world:
The vengeance due to Canna's fatal field,
And floods of human gore, a ring shall yield.
Fly, madman, fly! at toil and danger mock,
Pierce the deep snow, and scale the eternal rock,
To please the rhetoricians, and become,
A declamation for the boys of Rome !
One world, the ambitious youth of Pella found
Too small; and toss'd his feverish limbs around,
And gasp'd for breath, as if immur'd the while
In Gyare, or Seripho's rocky isle:
But, entering Babylon, found ample room
Within the narrow limits of a tomb!
Death, the great teacher, Death alone proclaims
The true dimensions of our puny frames.
Da spatium vitæ, multos da, Jupiter, annos :
Hoc recto vultu, solum hoc et pallidus optas.
Sed quam continuis et quantis longa senectus
Plena malis? Deformem et tetrum ante omnia vultum,
Dissimilemque sui, deformem pro cute pellem,
Pendentesque genas, et tales adspice rugas,
Quales, umbriferos ubi pandit Tabraca saltus,
In vetulâ scalpit jam mater simia buccâ.
"Life! length of life!" For this, with earnest cries,
Or sick or well, we supplicate the skies.
Pernicious prayer! for mark what ills attend,
Still, on the old, as to the grave they bend:
A ghastly visage to themselves unknown,
For a smooth skin a hide with scurf o'ergrown,
And such a cheek as many a grandam ape
In Tabraca's thick woods is seen to scrape.
Rara est adeo concordia formæ
Atque pudicitiæ.
For rarely do we meet, in one combined,
A beauteous body and a virtuous mind.
PRAYER TO THE GODS.
Sat. x. 346.
Nil ergo optabunt homines? Si consilium vis,
Permittes ipsis expendere numinibus, quid
Conveniat nobis, rebusque sit utile nostris.
Nam pro jucundis aptissima quæque dabunt dî.
Carior est illis homo, quam sibi. Nos animorum
Impulsu, et cæcâ magnâque cupidine ducti,
Conjugium petimus, partumque uxoris: at illis
Notum, qui pueri, qualisque futura sit uxor.
Ut tamen et poscas aliquid, voveasque sacellis
Exta, et candiduli divina tomacula porci ;
Orandum est, ut sit mens sana in corpore sano:
Fortem posce animum, mortis terrore carentem,
Qui spatium vitæ extremum inter munera ponat
Naturæ, qui ferre queat quoscunque labores,
Nesciat irasci, cupiat nihil, et potiores
Herculis ærumnas credat sævosque labores
Et Venere, et cœnis, et plumâ Sardanapali.
Monstro, quod ipse tibi possis dare: semita certe
Tranquilla per virtutem patet unica vitæ.
Nullum numen habes, si sit prudentia: nos te,
Nos facimus, Fortuna, deam cœloque locamus.
Say then, shall man, deprived all power of choice,
Ne'er raise to Heaven the supplicating voice?
Not so; but to the gods his fortunes trust:
Their thoughts are wise, their dispensations just.
What best may profit or delight they know,
And real good for fancied bliss bestow :
With eyes of pity they our frailty scan;
More dear to them, than to himself, is man.
By blind desire, by headlong passion driven,
For wife and heirs we daily weary Heaven :
Yet still 'tis Heaven's prerogative to know,
If heirs, or wife, will bring us weal or woe.
But, (for 'tis good our humble hope to prove,)
That thou mayst still ask something from above,
Thy pious offerings to the temple bear,
And, while the altars blaze, be this thy prayer:
O Thou, who know'st the wants of human kind,
Vouchsafe me health of body, health of mind;
A soul prepared to meet the frowns of fate,
And look undaunted on a future state;
That reckons death a blessing, yet can bear
Existence nobly, with its weight of care;
That anger and desire alike restrains,
And count Alcides' toils, and cruel pains,
Superior far to banquets, wanton nights,
And all the Assyrian monarch's soft delights.
Here bound, at length, thy wishes. I but teach
What blessings man by his own powers may reach.
The path to peace is virtue. We should see,
If wise, O Fortune, nought divine in thee:
But we have deified a name alone,
And fixed in heaven thy visionary throne.
KNOW THYSELF.
Sat. xi. 24.
Despiciam, qui scit, quanto sublimior Atlas
Omnibus in Libyâ sit montibus; hic tamen idem
Ignoret, quantum ferratâ distet ab arcâ
Sacculus. Ε colo descendit Γνῶθι σεαυτὸν,
Figendum et memori tractandum pectore.
Whip me the fool who marks how Atlas soars
O'er every hill on Mauritania's shores,
Yet sees no difference 'twixt the coffer's hoards
And the poor pittance a small purse affords.
Heaven sent us, "Know thyself!" Be this imprest
In living characters upon thy breast,
KNOW THYSELF.
Sat, xi. 35.
Noscenda est mensura sui spectandaque rebus
In summis minimisque, etiam cum piscis emetur,
Ne mullum cupias, cum sit tibi gobio tantum
In loculis. Quis enim te, deficiente crumenâ
Et crescente gulâ, manet exitus, ære paterno
Ac rebus mersis in ventrem fœnoris atque
Argenti gravis, et pecorum, agrorumque capacem.
Yes, KNOW THYSELF: in great concerns, in small,
Be this thy care, for this, my friend, is all:
Nor when thy purse will scarce a gudgeon buy,
With fond intemperance, for turbots sigh!
Oh, think what end awaits thee, timely think,
If thy throat widens as thy pockets shrink,
Thy throat, of all thy father's thrift could save,
Flocks, herds, and fields, the insatiable grave.
Voluptates commendat rarior usus.
For still the sweetest pleasures soonest cloy,
And its best flavour temperance gives to joy.
Non propter vitam faciunt patrimonia quidam,
Sed vitio cæci propter patrimonia vivunt.
Few GAIN TO LIVE, Corvinus, few or none;
But, blind with avarice, LIVE TO GAIN alone.
Exemplo quodcunque malo committitur, ipsi
Displicet auctori.
Man, wretched man, whene'er he stoops to sin,
Feels, with the act, a strong remorse within.
CONSCIENCE.
Sat. xiii. 3.
Se judice nemo nocens absolvitur. "Tis the first vengeance: conscience tries the cause, And vindicates the violated laws.
MODERATION.
Sat. xiii. 11.
Ponamus nimios gemitus; flagrantior æquo
Non debet dolor esse viri nec vulnere major.
Then moderate thy grief; 'tis mean to show
An anguish disproportion'd to the blow.
Hos quoque felices, qui ferre incommoda vitæ,
Nec jactare jugum vitâ didicere magistrâ.
Wisdom, I know, contains a sovereign charm
To vanquish fortune, or at least disarm :
Blest they who walk in her unerring rule!—
Nor those unblest who, tutor'd in life's school,
Have learn'd of old experience to submit,
And lightly bear the yoke they cannot quit.
Rari quippe boni: numero vix sunt totidem, quot
Thebarum portæ, vel divitis ostia Nili.
THE GOOD, ALAS, ARE FEW! "The valued file,"
Less than the gates of Thebes, the mouths of Nile!
Tam facile et pronum est, superos contemnere testes,
Si mortalis idem nemo sciat!
For 'tis so common, in this age of ours,
So easy, to contemn the Immortal Powers,
That, can we but elude man's searching eyes,
We laugh to scorn the witness of the skies.
SLOWNESS OF PUNISHMENTS AND FATES OF MEN.
Sat. xiii. 100.
Ut sit magna, tamen certe lenta ira deorum est.
Si curant igitur cunctos punire nocentes,
Quando ad me venient? sed et exorabile numen
Fortasse experiar: solet his ignoscere. Multi
Committunt eadem diverso crimina fato:
Ille crucem sceleris pretium tulit, hic diadema.
"But grant the wrath of Heaven be great; 'tis slow,
And days, and months, and years, precede the blow.
If, then, to punish ALL, the gods decree,
When, in their vengeance, will they come to me?
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