No More Learning

O, whoe'er has heart and head
To stay our plague of blood, our civic brawls,
Would he that his name be read
"Father of Rome" on lofty pedestals,
Let him chain this lawless will,
And be our children's hero! cursed spite!
Living worth we envy still,
Then seek it with strain'd eyes, when snatch'd from sight.
What can sad laments avail
Unless sharp justice kill the taint of sin?
What can laws, that needs must fail
Shorn of the aid of manners form'd within,
If the merchant turns not back
From the fierce heats that round the tropic glow,
Turns not from the regions black
With northern winds, and hard with frozen snow;
Sailors override the wave,
While guilty poverty, more fear'd than vice,
Bids us crime and suffering brave,
And shuns the ascent of virtue's precipice?
Let the Capitolian fane,
The favour'd goal of yon vociferous crowd,
Aye, or let the nearest main
Receive our gold, our jewels rich and proud:
Slay we thus the cause of crime,
If yet we would repent and choose the good:
Ours the task to take in time
This baleful lust, and crush it in the bud.
Ours to mould our weakling sons
To nobler sentiment and manlier deed:
Now the noble's first-born shuns
The perilous chase, nor learns to sit his steed:
Set him to the unlawful dice,
Or Grecian hoop, how skilfully he plays!
While his sire, mature in vice,
A friend, a partner, or a guest betrays,
Hurrying, for an heir so base,
To gather riches. Money, root of ill,
Doubt it not, still grows apace:
Yet the scant heap has somewhat lacking still.




XXV.

QUO ME, BACCHE.


Whither, Bacchus, tear'st thou me,
Fill'd with thy strength? What dens, what forests these,
Thus in wildering race I see?
What cave shall hearken to my melodies,
Tuned to tell of Caesar's praise
And throne him high the heavenly ranks among?
Sweet and strange shall be my lays,
A tale till now by poet voice unsung.
As the Evian on the height,
Roused from her sleep, looks wonderingly abroad,
Looks on Thrace with snow-drifts white,
And Rhodope by barbarous footstep trod,
So my truant eyes admire
The banks, the desolate forests. O great King
Who the Naiads dost inspire,
And Bacchants, strong from earth huge trees to wring!
Not a lowly strain is mine,
No mere man's utterance. O, 'tis venture sweet
Thee to follow, God of wine,
Making the vine-branch round thy temples meet!




XXVI.

VIXI PUELLIS.


For ladies's love I late was fit,
And good success my warfare blest,
But now my arms, my lyre I quit,
And hang them up to rust or rest.
Here, where arising from the sea
Stands Venus, lay the load at last,
Links, crowbars, and artillery,
Threatening all doors that dared be fast.
O Goddess! Cyprus owns thy sway,
And Memphis, far from Thracian snow:
Raise high thy lash, and deal me, pray,
That haughty Chloe just one blow!




XXVII.

IMPIOS PARRAE.


When guilt goes forth, let lapwings shrill,
And dogs and foxes great with young,
And wolves from far Lanuvian hill,
Give clamorous tongue:
Across the roadway dart the snake,
Frightening, like arrow loosed from string,
The horses. I, for friendship's sake,
Watching each wing,
Ere to his haunt, the stagnant marsh,
The harbinger of tempest flies,
Will call the raven, croaking harsh,
From eastern skies.
Farewell! --and wheresoe'er you go,
My Galatea, think of me:
Let lefthand pie and roving crow
Still leave you free.