ODE LXI.[1]
Youth's endearing charms are fled;
Hoary locks deform my head;
Bloomy graces, dalliance gay,
All the flowers of life decay.[2]
Withering age begins to trace
Sad memorials o'er my face;
Time has shed its sweetest bloom
All the future must be gloom.
This it is that sets me sighing;
Dreary is the thought of dying![3]
Lone and dismal is the road,
Down to Pluto's dark abode;
And, when once the journey's o'er,
Ah! we can return no more!
[1] The intrusion of this melancholy ode, among the careless levities of
our poet, reminds us of the skeletons which the Egyptians used to hang up
in the banquet-rooms, to inculcate a thought of mortality even amidst the
dissipations of mirth. If it were not for the beauty of its numbers, the
Teian Muse should disown this ode.
[2] Horace often, with feeling and elegance, deplores the fugacity of
human enjoyments.
[3] Regnier, a libertine French poet, has written some sonnets on the
approach of death, full of gloomy and trembling repentance. Chaulieu,
however, supports more consistently the spirit of the Epicurean
philosopher. See his poem, addressed to the Marquis de Lafare.
ODE LXII.[1]
Fill me, boy, as deep a draught,
As e'er was filled, as e'er was quaffed;
But let the water amply flow,
To cool the grape's intemperate glow;[2]
Let not the fiery god be single,
But with the nymphs in union mingle.
Pages:
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111