(Translated by Edward Marsh, 1941)

Think not these words of mine shall die,
That born by Aufidus’ far-echo’d stream
In unaccustomed modes of art I frame
For chords with meet response to accompany.

Though first Maeonian Homer shine
In fame, not therefore dimmed is Pindar’s fire,
Nor unesteemed the Cean’s mighty line,
Alcaeus’ clarion or Stesichorus’ lyre.

Still as of old Anacreon sings
His playful melodies no years can stale,
Still breathes and burns to-day the amorous tale
That Sappho whispered to the Aeolian strings.

Long before Helen, many a queen
Had broke her vows for an adulterer
Because he dazed her with his curling hair,
His princely train, his mantle’s golden sheen.

Many another Teucer sped
Cydonian arrows, and an older Troy
Was leaguered, and in fiery battle joy
Many an Idomeneus and Diomed

Deserved the Muses’ benisons;
Not Hector only nor Deiphobus
Gave blow for blow in combat perilous
Adventuring for wife or little ones.

Unmatched is Agamemnon’s fame,
Not so his might; but in the dark of years
Unwept and unremembered lie his peers,
Because no heaven-graced poet sang their name,

Virtue that shines not before men
Is little better than ignoble ease.
Ah, Lollius! I would not have my pen
Leave you unpraised, nor blank Oblivion seize

On your high exploits. You possess
A mind that in a true and steady light
Views men and things, and in the varied stress
Of good or doubtful fortune judges right;

A mind which scourges knave and fool,
Which keeps no traffic with the wealth that moulds
All things to its greedy will, a mind whose rule
Is no brief twelve-month consulship, but holds

Whene’er an honest magistrate
Prefers the just to the expedient way,
Scorns the rich caitiff’s bribe, and soon or late,
Routing the hosts of evil, wins the day.

Who is the happy man? not he
Who owns the earth; to him that name be given
Who knows to use aright the gifts of Heaven,
And bravely bear the stings of poverty;

Who dreads dishonour worse than death,
Confronts disaster with unflinching eye,
And when stern Duty calls upon his faith,
For friend or country has no fear to die.

Translated by Edward Marsh, 1941:

The man to his just purpose true
No ravening mob’s foul-passion’d hue and cry,
No tyrant’s frown, brow-beating, eye to eye,
Shall move, what his firm mind holds wrong, to do,

Nor yet Jove’s clenched bolt-hurling hand,
Nor Hadria by tumultuous Auster driven;
He, were the round world from its axle riven,
Calm ‘neath the ruining firmament would stand.

Translated by Hugh MacNaghten, 1926:

The righteous man who holds his purpose fast
None from the rock of his resolve shall cast,
Not mobs aflame for wrong, nor tyrant’s frown
Vindictive, nor the South, with stormy blast,

By restless Adriatic waves obeyed,
Nor hand almighty on the lightning laid,
Though on his head fall ruining the world,
Ruin will overwhelm him unafraid.

Translated by John Conington, 1863:

The man of firm and righteous will,
No rabble, clamorous for the wrong,
No tyrant’s brow, whose frown may kill,
Can shake the strength that makes him strong:
Not winds, that chafe sea they sway,
Nor Jove’s right band, with lightning red:
Should Nature’s pillar’d frame give way,
That wreck should strike one fearless head.

Translated by Lord Byron, 1806:

The man of firm, and noble soul,
No factious clamours can controul,
No threat’ning tyrant’s darkling brow,
Can swerve him from his just intent;
Gales the warring waves which plow,
By Auster on the billows spent,
To curb the Adriatic main,
Would awe his fix’d determined mind in vain.

Translated by Philip Francis, 1743:

The man, in conscious virtue bold,
Who dares his secret purpose hold,
Unshaken hears the crowd’s tumultuous cries,
And the impetuous tyrant’s angry brow defies.

Let the wild winds, that rule the seas;
Tempestuous, all their horrors raise;
Let Jove’s dread arm with thunders rend the spheres,
Beneath the crush of worlds undaunted he appears.

(Translated by E. E. Cummings, 1913)

Farewell, runaway snows! For the meadow is green, and the tree stands
Clad in her beautiful hair.
New life leavens the land! The river, once where the lea stands,
Hideth and huggeth his lair.
Beauty with shining limbs ‘mid the Graces comes forth, and in glee stands,
Ringed with the rythmical fair.

Hope not, mortal, to live forever, the year whispers lowly.
Hope not, time murmurs, and flies.
Soft is the frozen sod to the Zephyr’s sandal, as wholly
Summer drives Spring from the skies, —
Dying when earth receives the fruits of Autumn, till slowly
Forth Winter creeps, and she dies.

Yet what escapes from heaven, the fleet moons capture, retrieving;
When through Death’s dream we survey
Heroes and kings of old, in lands of infinite grieving,
What are we? Shadow and clay.
Say will rulers above us the fate tomorrow is weaving
Add to the sum of today?

Hear me: whatever thou giv’st to thine own dear soul, shall not pleasure
Hungering fingers of kin.
Once in the gloom, when the judge of Shades in pitiless measure
Dooms thee to journey within,
Birth, nor eloquent speech, nor gift of piety’s treasure
Opens the portal of sin.

Never, goddess of chasteness, from night infernal thou freest
One who for chastity fell.
Ever, hero of Athens, him who loved thee thou seest
Writhe in the chainings of Hell.

(Included in Horace’s Diffugere Nives: A Collection of Translations)

(Translated by Franklin P. Adams, 1912)

Horace

When I was your stiddy, my loveliest Lyddy,
And you my embraceable she,
In joys and diversions, the king of the Persians
Had nothing on me.

Lydia

When I was the person you penned all that verse on,
Ere Chloë had caused you to sigh,
Not she whose cognomen is Ilia the Roman
Was happier than I.

Horace

Ah, Chloë the Thracian — whose sweet modulation
Of voice as she lilts to the lyre
Is sweeter and fairer? Would but the Fates spare her
I’d love to expire.

Lydia

Tush! Calais claims me and wholly inflames me,
He pesters me never with rhymes;
If they should spare Cally, I’d perish totally
A couple of times.

Horace

Suppose my affection in Lyddy’s direction
Returned; that I gave the good-by
To Chloë the golden, and back to the olden? —
I pause for reply.

Lydia

Cheer up, mine ensnarer! Be Calais fairer
Than stars, be you blustery and base,
I’ll love you, adore you; in brief, I am for you
All over the place.

(Included in Horace’s Donec Gratus Eram: A Collection of Translations)

(Translated by Alan McNicoll, 1979)

“So long as I was dear to you, my love,
And no more favoured lad called you his own
And clasped your whiteness in his arms, I throve
More blessed than the Persian on his throne.”

“And while you burned for no one more than me,
And Chloë was than Lydia less dear,
I, Lydia, walked forth in majesty
And Ilia of Rome was not my peer.”

“‘Tis Thracian Chloë now who rules my heart,
Learned in measures sweet, and skilled to play:
And if the Fates would spare her, for my part
Gladly for hers I’d give my life away.”

“For Calaïs, Ornytus’ son, am I
Consumed by fires of love, and as I live
He loves me too. But were I twice to die,
The forfeit would be paid could he survive.”

“What if our love return, and clasp us twain
In yoke of brass; if golden Chloë spurned
Forever go from me, and once again
The door stand wide to Lydia returned?”

“Though you are light as air; wild as the sea,
And he is fairer than the stars, yet I
Forever at your side would choose to be —
And gladly would I live, and gladly die.”

(Not included in Horace’s Donec Gratus Eram: A Collection of Translations)

(Translated by Alan McNicoll, 1979)

For rest he prays the gods, who unaware
Sails the Aegean, and a black cloud hides
The moon. No longer do the stars shine fair
While the swift storm he rides.

For rest the Thracians furious in war,
The Medes adorned with teeming quivers sigh—
Of greater price than gems or purple are—
Dearer than gold can buy.

It is not treasure, nor the consul’s pride
That clears away the mind’s unhappy strife,
Nor lays the cares that haunt on every side
The fretted vaults of life.

He lives on little well, upon whose board
His father’s silver gleams: nor do the throes
Of passion, nor the fear of things untoward
Deny him his repose.

Why in a little lifetime do we aim
At many marks; live under many skies?
What exile, from whatever land he came
From himself also flies?

Care sails aboard the vessel brazen-prowed,
And never lags behind a troop of horse.
Fleet as a stag, and fleeter than a cloud
Borne on the east wind’s course.

A mind that views with joy its present state
Will hesitate to ask what may befall.
Soften with smiles the bitterness of fate—
Nothing is blest in all.

(Not included in Horace’s Otium Divos: A Collection of Translations)

(Translated by Sir Edward Marsh, 1941)

Repose! thou universal boon,
Craved of poor shipmen battling through the night
On open seas, when clouds have hid the moon
And stars their guiding ray withhold;
Craved of grim Thracian warriors mad for fight
And Medes exulting in their quivers bright,
But never yet for gems or gold
Or bales of glowing purple sold.
For neither treasuries of Eastern kings
Nor puissant consul’s bullying halberdiers
Can chase the anguish of the mind, the fears
That round the coffered ceiling brush their wings.

Ah, Grosphus! he lives well who lives content
With little; on whose frugal board
His father’s salt, sole ornament,
Shines fleckless; him the Gods afford
Calm sleep by no mean cares oppressed,
By greedy longings unpossessed.

Why waste in vaulting hopes our little span,
Why seek strange suns abroad, though well we know
Our same self cleaves to us where’er we go,
And still we end as we began?
Proud captains board their ships, brave horsemen tide,
But still, to unman them, Care is at their side —
Care that outstrips the stag, and faster flies
Than winds that drive the clouds across the skies.

Live happy in the moment, take no thought
For hidden things beyond, be firm to test
And turn the edge of troubles with a jest;
For bliss unmixed was never earthly lot.
Young, but illustrious, Achilles died:
Tithonus in immortal age decays;
And Time, who knows? may grant my lowlier days
Good gifts to yours denied.
For you, the neighing of your chariot mares
And countless lowing of Sicilian kine;
For you the precious dye the murex bears,
And jewels of the Indian mine:
With me kind Fate has kept her word;
My little farm she gives me, country peace,
A strain of music from the hills of Greece,
A mind made strong to flout the envious herd.