Safe by thy cares her oxen graze, And yellow Ceres clothes her fields: The sailor ploughs the peaceful seas, And earth her rich abundance yields; By thee our wedded dames are pure His own resemblance in his race: Thy chaste example quells the spotted deed, Who shall the faithless Parthian dread, Whom horrid Germany brings forth? Safe in his vineyard toils the hind, Then hastens joyful to his wine, To thee he chants the sacred song, So Castor and great Hercules of old Gracious and good, beneath thy reign With pious hymns and festal joy: Thus, in our wine beneath his setting ray. [The reader may find the sixth Ode in the Carmen Seculare.] ODE VII. TO TORQUATUS. THE snow dissolves; the field its verdure spreads, The trees high wave in air their leafy heads; Earth feels the change; the rivers calm subside, And smooth along their banks decreasing glide; The elder grace, with her fair sister-train, In naked beauty dances o'er the plain; The circling hours, that swiftly wing their way, And in their flight consume the smiling day; Those circling hours, and all the various year, Convince us, nothing is immortal here. In vernal gales cold winter melts away; Soon wastes the spring in summer's burning ray: Yet summer dies in autumn's fruitful reign, And slow-pac'd winter soon returns again. The moon renews her orb with growing light, But when we sink into the depths of night, Where all the good, the rich, the brave are laid, Our best remains are ashes and a shade. Who knows if Heaven, with ever-bounteous power, Shall add to-morrow to the present hour? But know, that wealth, bestow'd to gay delight, Far from thy ravening heir shall speed its flight; But soon as Minos, thron'd in awful state, Shall o'er thee speak the solemn words of Fate, Nor virtue, birth, nor eloquence divine, Could bring her modest favorite back to light; ODE VIII. TO CENSORINUS. WITH liberal heart to every friend A bowl or cauldron would I send; Or tripods, which the Grecians gave, As rich rewards, to heroes brave; Nor should the meanest gift be thine, If the rich works of art were mine, By Scopas, or Parrhasius wrought, With animating skill who taught The shapeless stone with life to glow, Or bade the breathing colours flow, To imitate, in every line, The form or human or divine. But I nor boast the curious store, Nor columns, which the public raise, |