ODE XXIV.
TO THE COVETOUS.[1]
Though, more wealthy than the unrifled treasures of the Arabians and rich India, you should possess yourself by your edifices[2] of the whole Tyrrhenian and Apulian seas; yet, if cruel fate fixes its adamantine grapples upon the topmost roofs, you shall not disengage your mind from dread, nor your life from the snares of death.[3] The Scythians that dwell in the plains, whose carts, according to their custom, draw their vagrant habitations, live in a better manner; and [so do] the rough Getæ, whose uncircumscribed acres produce fruits and corn free to all, nor is a longer than annual tillage agreeable, and a successor leaves him who has accomplished his labor by an equal right. There the guiltless wife spares her motherless step-children, nor does the portioned spouse govern her husband, nor put any confidence in a sleek adulterer. Their dower is the high virtue of their parents, and a chastity reserved from any other man by a steadfast security; and it, is forbidden to sin, or the reward is death. O if there be any one willing to remove our impious slaughters, and civil rage; if he be desirous to be written father of the state, on statues [erected to him], let him dare to curb insuperable licentiousness, and be eminent to posterity; since we (O injustice!) detest virtue while living, but invidiously seek for her after she is taken out of our view. To what purpose are our woeful complaints, if sin is not cut off with punishment? Of what efficacy are empty laws, without morals; if neither that part of the world which is shut in by fervent heats, nor that side which borders upon Boreas, and snows hardened upon the ground, keep off the merchant;
- ↑ It appears by the twenty-sixth verse, that this ode was written before the year 724, which ended the civil wars; at least it preceded the expedition of Arabia in 727. San.
- ↑ The term cœmenta, quasi cœdimenta, literally means "stones for filling up." Here, however, it refers to the structures reared on these artificial foundations.
- ↑ The poet here represents death armed with a net, which he throws over the heads of those whom he attacks. This image is taken from the gladiators called Retiarii, whose antagonists had the figure of a fish upon a helmet, from whence they used in their combats to sing "Non te peto, piscem peto? Quid me fugis, Galle?" Dac.
