Odes by Horace

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THE ODES AND CARMEN SAECULARE OF HORACE

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DIFFUGERE NIVES.


The snow is fled
the trees their leaves put on, The fields their green:
Earth
owns the change, and rivers lessening run. Their banks between.
Naked
the Nymphs and Graces in the meads The dance essay:

"No 'scaping death" proclaims the year, that speeds

This sweet spring day.

Frosts yield to zephyrs; Summer drives out Spring,

To vanish, when

Rich Autumn sheds his fruits; round wheels the ring,--

Winter again!

Yet the swift moons repair Heaven's detriment:

We, soon as thrust

Where
good Aeneas, Tullus, Ancus went, What are we? dust.

Can Hope assure you one more day to live

From powers above?

You rescue from your heir whate'er you give

The self you love.

When life is o'er, and Minos has rehearsed

The grand last doom,

Not birth, nor eloquence, nor worth, shall burst

Torquatus' tomb.

Not Dian's self can chaste Hippolytus

To life recall,

Nor Theseus free his loved Pirithous

From Lethe's thrall.





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