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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;
While nobly conscious of unsullied fame,
Fair honor dreads th' imputed sense of blame.

By thee our wedded dames are pure
From foul adultery's embrace;
The conscious father views secure

His own resemblance in his race:

Thy chaste example quells the spotted deed,
And to the guilt thy punishments succeed.

Who shall the faithless Parthian dread,
The freezing armies of the north,
Or the fierce youth, to battle bred,

Whom horrid Germany brings forth?
Who shall regard the war of cruel Spain,
If Cæsar live secure, if Cæsar reign?

Safe in his vineyard toils the hind,
Weds to the widow'd elm his vine,
Till the sun sets his hill behind,

Then hastens joyful to his wine,
And in his gayer hours of mirth implores
Thy godhead to protect and bless his stores.

To thee he chants the sacred song,
To thee the rich libation pours;
Thee, plac'd his houshold gods among,
With solemn daily prayer adores;

So Castor and great Hercules of old
Were with her gods by grateful Greece enroll'd.

Gracious and good, beneath thy reign
May Rome her happy hours employ,
And grateful hail thy just domain

With pious hymns and festal joy:
Thus, with the rising sun we sober pray,

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,
Shall bid the grave its destin'd prey resign:
Nor chaste Diana from infernal night

Could bring her modest favorite back to light;
And hell-descending Theseus strove in vain
To break his amorous friend's Lethæan chain.

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,
And you nor want, nor wish for more;
'Tis yours the joys of verse to know,
Such joys as Horace can bestow,
While I can vouch my present's worth,
And call its every virtue forth.

Nor columns, which the public raise,
Engrav'd with monumental praise,
By which the breath of life returns
To heroes sleeping in their urns ;
Nor Hannibal, when swift he fled,
His threats retorted on his head,
Nor impious Carthage wrapt in flame,
From whence great Scipio gain'd a name.

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