Olympian

Pindar

Pindar. Arnson Svarlien, Diane, translator. Created for the Perseus Project, 1990.

Those who have persevered three times, on either side, to keep their souls free from all wrongdoing,
follow Zeus’ road to the end, to the tower of Cronus, where ocean breezes blow around the island of the blessed, and flowers of gold are blazing, some from splendid trees on land, while water nurtures others. With these wreaths and garlands of flowers they entwine their hands
according to the righteous counsels of Rhadamanthys, whom the great father, the husband of Rhea whose throne is above all others, keeps close beside him as his partner. Peleus and Cadmus are counted among them, and Achilles who was brought there by his mother, when she had
persuaded the heart of Zeus with her prayers—
Achilles, who laid low Hector, the irresistible, unswerving pillar of Troy, and who consigned to death Memnon the Ethiopian, son of the Dawn. I have many swift arrows in the quiver under my arm,
arrows that speak to the initiated. But the masses need interpreters. [*](On this line see W. H. Race, “The End of Olympian 2: Pindar and the Vulgus,” CSCA 12, 1979, 251-67, and G. W. Most, “Pindar O. 2.83-90,” CQ 36, 1986, 304-16. ) The man who knows a great deal by nature is truly skillful, while those who have only learned chatter with raucous and indiscriminate tongues in vain like crows
against the divine bird of Zeus. Now, bend your bow toward the mark; tell me, my mind, whom are we trying to hit
as we shoot arrows of fame from a gentle mind? I will aim at Acragas, and speak with true intent a word sworn by oath: no city for a hundred years has given birth to a man more beneficent in his mind or more generous with his hand
than Theron. But praise is confronted by greed, which is not accompanied by justice, but stirred up by depraved men, eager to babble and to bury the fine deeds of noble men. Since the sand of the shore is beyond all counting,
who could number all the joys that Theron has given others?