With terrors round, can reason hold her throne, 310
Despise the known, nor tremble at th' unknown?
Survey both worlds, intrepid and entire,

In spite of witches, devils, dreams, and fire?
Pleas'd to look forward, pleas'd to look behind,
And count each birth-day with a grateful mind? 315
Has life no sourness drawn so near its end?

Canst thou endure a foe, forgive a friend?
Has age but meited the rough parts away,
As winter-fruits grow mild ere they decay?

Or will you think, my friend! your bus'ness done,
When of a hundred thorns you pull out one?

319

Learn to live well, or fairly make your will; You've play'd, and lov'd, and ate, and drank your fill. Walk sober off, before a sprightlier age

Comes titt'ring on, and shoves you from the stage: 325

Leave such to trifle with more grace and ease

Whom folly pleases, and whose follies please.

327

Ambitione? caret mortis formidine et ira?
Somnia, terrores magicos, miracula, sagas,
Nocturnos lemures, portentaque Thessala rides ?
Natales grate numeras? ignoscis amicis?

Lenior et melior fis accedente senecta?
Quid te exempla juvat spinis de pluribus una?
Vivere si recte nescis, decede peritis.

Lusisti satis, edisti satis, atque bibisti;
Tempus abire tibi est: ne potum largius æquo
Rideat, et pulset lasciva decentius ætas.

HORACE, BOOK IV. ODE 1.

TO VENUS.

AGAIN new tumults in my breast?

Ah, spare me, Venus! let me, let me rest!

I am not now, alas! the man

As in the gentle reign of my queen Anne.
Ah! sound no more thy soft alarms,

Nor circle sober fifty with thy charms.
Mother too fierce of dear desires!

Turn, turn, to willing hearts your wanton fires;
To number five direct your doves,

5

There spread round Murray, all your blooming loves;

HOR. LIB. IV. ODE I.

AD VENEREM.

INTERMISSA Venus diu,

Rursus bella moves? parce, precor, precor.

Non sum qualis eram bonæ

Sub regno Cynaræ. desine, dulcium

Mater sæva Cupidinum,

Circa lustra decem flectere mollibus

Jam durum imperiis. abi

Quo blandæ juvenum te revocant preces.

11

Noble and young, who strikes the heart

With ev'ry sprightly, ev'ry decent part;
Equal the injur❜d to defend,

To charm the mistress, or to fix the friend:
He, with a hundred arts refin'd,

Shall stretch thy conquests over half the kind:
To him each rival shall submit,

Make but his riches equal to his wit.

15

Then shall thy form the marble grace,

(Thy Grecian form) and Chloe lend the face; His house, embosom'd in the grove,

20

Sacred to social life, and social love,
Shall glitter o'er the pendent green,

Where Thames reflects the visionary scene;

Tempestivius in domo

Pauli, purpureis ales oloribus,
Commessabere Maximi,

Si torrere jecur quæris idoneum :
Namque et nobilis, et decens,
Et pro solicitis non tacitus reis,
Et centum puer artium,

Late signa feret militiæ tuæ.

Et, quandoque potentior

Largis muneribus riserit æmuli,

Albanas prope te lacus

Ponet marmoream sub trabe citrea.

Thither the silver-sounding ly res

Shall call the smiling Loves and young Desires;

25

There ev'ry Grace and Muse shall throng,
Exalt the dance, or animate the song;

There youths and nymphs, in consort gay,

Shall hail the rising, close the parting day.

30

With me, alas! those joys are o'er;

For me the vernal garlands bloom no more.
Adieu! fond hope of mutual fire,

The still-believing, still renew'd desire!
Adieu! the heart-expanding bowl,
And all the kind deceivers of the soul!
But why? ah! tell me, ah! too dear!
Steals down my cheek th' involuntary tear?

Illic plurima naribus

Duces thura; lyræ et Berecynthiæ

Delectabere tibiæ

Mistis carminibus, non sine fistula.

Illic bis pueri die

Numen cum teneris virginibus tuum

Laudantes, pede candido

In morem Salium ter quatient humum.

Me nec fœmina, nec puer

Jam, nec spes animi credula mutui,
Nec certare juvat mero,

Nec vincire novis tempora floribus.

35

Why words so flowing, thoughts so free,

Stop, or turn nonsense, at one glance of thee?
Thee, dress'd in Fancy's airy beam,

40

Absent I follow thro' th' extended dream;

Now, now I seize, I clasp thy charms,

And now you burst (ah, cruel!) from my arms!

Sed cur, heu! Ligurine, cur

Manat rara meas lacryma per genas?

Cur facunda parum decoro

Inter verba cadit lingua silentio ?

Nocturnis te ego somniis

Jam captum teneo, jam volucrem sequor

Te per gramina Martii

Campi, te per aquas, dure, volubiles.