Odes

Horace

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

  • Truth is mine, and Genius mine;
  • The rich man comes, and knocks at my low door:
  • Favour'd thus, I ne'er repine,
  • Nor weary out indulgent Heaven for more:
  • In my Sabine homestead blest,
  • Why should I further tax a generous friend?
  • Suns are hurrying suns a-west,
  • And newborn moons make speed to meet their end.
  • You have hands to square and hew
  • Vast marble-blocks, hard on your day of doom,
  • Ever building mansions new,
  • Nor thinking of the mansion of the tomb.
  • Now you press on ocean's bound,
  • Where waves on Baiae beat, as earth were scant;
  • Now absorb your neighbour's ground,
  • And tear his landmarks up, your own to plant.
  • Hedges set round clients' farms
  • Your avarice tramples; see, the outcasts fly,
  • Wife and husband, in their arms
  • Their fathers' gods, their squalid family.