Odes

Horace

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

  • 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,
  • Who from crush'd Afric took away—a name,
  • Than rude Calabria's tributary lays.