Therefore man thy voice attends
Gladly-thou and he are friends;
Nor thy never-ceasing strains,
Phoebus or the muse disdains
As too simple or too long,
For themselves inspire the song.
Earth-born, bloodless, undecaying,
Ever singing, sporting, playing,
What has nature else to show
Godlike in its kind as thou?
ON HERMOCRATIA.
HERMOCRATIA named-save only one-
Twice fifteen births I bore, and buried none;
For neither Phoebus pierced my thriving joys,
Nor Dian-she my girls, or he my boys.
But Dian rather, when my daughters lay
In parturition, chased their pangs away.
And all my sons, by Phœbus' bounty, shared
A vigorous youth, by sickness unimpair'd.
O Niobe! far less prolific! see
Thy boast against Latona shamed by me!
FOND youth! who dream'st that hoarded gold Is needful not alone to pay
For all thy various items sold,
To serve the wants of every day;
Bread, vinegar, and oil, and meat,
For savory viands season'd high;
But somewhat more important yet—
I tell thee what it cannot buy.
No treasure hadst thou more amass'd
Than fame to Tantalus assign'd,
Would save thee from a tomb at last,
But thou must leave it all behind.
I give thee, therefore, counsel wise;
Confide not vainly in thy store,
However large-much less despise
Others comparatively poor;
But in thy more exalted state
A just and equal temper show
That all who see thee rich and great,
May deem thee worthy to be so.
ON PALLAS BATHING, FROM A HYMN
NOR oils of balmy scent produce,
Nor mirror for Minerva's use,
Ye nymphs who lave her; she, array'd
In genuine beauty, scorns their aid.
Not even when they left the skies,
To seek on Ida's head the prize
From Paris' hand, did Juno deign,
Or Pallas in the crystal plain
Of Simois' stream her locks to trace,
Or in the mirror's polished face,
Though Venus oft with anxious care
Adjusted twice a single hair.
TO DEMOSTHENES.
Ir flatters and deceives thy view,
This mirror of ill-polish'd ore;
For, were it just, and told thee true,
Thou wouldst consult it never more.
ON A SIMILAR CHARACTER.
You give your cheeks a rosy stain,
With washes dye your hair;
But paint and washes both are vain
To give a youthful air.
Those wrinkles mock your daily toil,
No labor will efface 'em,
You wear a mask of smoothest oil,
Yet still with ease we trace 'em.
An art so fruitless then forsake,
Which though you much excel in,
You never can contrive to make
Old Hecuba young Helen.
ON AN UGLY FELLOW.
BEWARE, my friend! of crystal brook,
Or fountain, lest that hideous hook,
Thy nose, thou chance to see;
Narcissus' fate would then be thine,
And self-detested thou wouldst pine,
As self-enamour'd he.
ON A BATTERED BEAUTY.
HAIR, wax, rouge, honey, teeth you buy,`
A multifarious store!
A mask at once would all supply
Nor would it cost you more.
WHEN Aulus, the nocturnal thief, made prize Of Hermes, swift-wing'd envoy of the skies,
Hermes, Arcadia's king, the thief divine,
Who when an infant stole Apollo's kine,
And whom, as arbiter and overseer
Of our gymnastic sports, we planted here;
Hermes," he cried, "you meet no new disaster; Ofttimes the pupil goes beyond the master."
My mother! if thou love me, name no more
My noble birth! Sounding at every breath
My noble birth, thou kill'st me. Thither fly,
As to their only refuge, all from whom
Nature withholds all good besides; they boast
Their noble birth, conduct us to the tombs
Of their forefathers, and, from age to age
Ascending, trumpet their illustrious race:
But whom hast thou beheld, or canst thou name,
Derived from no forefathers? Such a man
Lives not; for how could such be born at all?
And, if it chance that, native of a land
Far distant, or in infancy deprived
Of all his kindred, one, who cannot trace
His origin, exist, why deem him sprung
From baser ancestry than theirs who can?
My mother! he whom nature at his birth
Endow'd with virtuous qualities, although
An Ethiop and a slave is nobly born.
PITY, says the Theban bard,
From my wishes I discard;
Envy, let me rather be,
Rather far, a theme for thee.
Pity to distress is shown,
Envy to the great alone→
So the Theban-But to shine
Less conspicuous be mine!
I prefer the golden mean,
Pomp and penury between;
For alarm and peril wait
Ever on the loftiest state,
And the lowest to the end
Obloquy and scorn attend.
I SLEPT When Venus enter'd: to my bed
A Cupid in her beauteous hand she led,
A bashful seeming boy, and thus she said:
"Shepherd, receive my little one! I bring An untaught love, whom thou must teach to sing."
She said, and left him. I, suspecting nought,
Many a sweet strain my subtle pupil taught,
How reed to reed Pan first with osier bound,
How Pallas form'd the pipe of softest sound,
How Hermes gave the lute, and how the quire
Of Phoebus owe to Phoebus' self the lyre.
Such were my themes; my themes nought heeded
But ditties sang of amorous sort to me,
The pangs that mortals and immortals prove
From Venus' influence and the darts of love.
Thus was the teacher by the pupil taught;
His lessons I retain'd, he mine forgot.
OFT we enhance our ills by discontent,
And give them bulk beyond what nature meant.
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