Anger will face the sharpest sword They say Prometheus, making man, 'Twas wrath Thyestes overthrew, And plough where stood her wall. Then ever angry tempers rule- But now I wish for gentler moods XVII. TO TYNDARIS. Fleet-footed Faunus loves to change And guards my goats as wild they range Safe thro' the grove they careless stray, The kids, too, cross the adder's way E'en if a warlike wolf appear ; Soon as his notes resound, The strain re-echo round. The gods protect me, they who mind My piety and songs. Here, Tyndaris, all the wealth you'll find That to my farm belongs. Here in a lowly vale you'll flee The dog-star's heat, and tell us Of Circe and Penelope, Both for one lover jealous. Here cups of Lesbian wine you'll drain Beneath a shady tree : Bacchus and Mars shall rage restrain, Nor break our harmony. Nor need you wanton Cyrus fear, Nor garlands from your tresses tear, XVIII. TO QUINTILIUS VARUS. O Varus! plant the sacred vine before all other toil All things come hard to sober wights-'tis thus the gods decree And bitter cares that plague us so thro' drink alone will flee. Who in his glass of poverty or warfare dares repine? Who does not rather dwell on you, O gods of love and wine? Don't quaff too much, though, when you feast-remember and be taught, The Centaurs and the Lapithæ, how o'er their cups they fought. E'en Bacchus preaches this, and views displeased the Thracian throng, Whose drunken passions oft confuse the bounds of right and wrong. I'll never shake thy thyrsus, nor without thy will reveal, O Bacchus, to the daylight what a thousand leaves conceal. Cease, then, your Berecynthian horn and savage trump to sound, Which blind Self-love still follows, despising all around; Next Arrogance, with empty head too high erect, will pass, And Faith betraying secrets, more transparent than the glass. XIX. OF GLYCERA. I am bidden by Semele's child And the mother of Cupid the stern, And also by wantonness wild, Το my old loves again to return. To Glycera's charms am I true, And her eyes that so dazzle my own. 'Tis me Venus seeks, Cyprus leaving ; Here place the green sod, boys, and here XX. TO MÆCENAS. Dear knight, Mæcenas, when with me, The day they praised you publicly; So loud your own paternal banks Rich Cæcuban you quaff, and wine XXI. OF DIANA AND APOLLO. Ye maids, a hymn to soft Diana raise; Whom ardent Jove o'ercame. Ye maids, sing her in rivers who delights, Or sunny bowers and green. Tempe, ye youths, with equal praise adorn; And Delos, where Apollo erst was born, Armed with his quiver dire, Or else his brother's lyre. From famine, grievous war, and pestilence, |