Classic Poem

With mind composed resolve to bear the strain
Of evil times, nor less with balance just
From insolent elation to refrain
In fortune's hour; for, Dellius, die thou must,

If all thy life in sorrow have gone by,
Or if on every holiday apart
In grassy nook thou have been wont to lie
With old Falernian comforting thy heart.

For what doth you tall pine its boughs enlace
With the white poplar, welcome shade to spread?
Why toils the brook so eagerly to race
Down through the winding channel of its bed?

Bid hither bring wine, oil, and fragrant bloom
Of rose too quick to fade, while wealth to thee
And youth remain, and the black thread of doom
Runs yet unsevered by the sisters three.

The acres broad that thou hast bought, thy hall
In Rome, and villa washed by Tiber's wave
Thou to thine heir shalt yield, nor canst of all
Thy treasure piled on high a tittle save.

If riches and high lineage be thine,
Or if a beggar and without a name
Heaven's air thou breathe, the inevitable shrine
Of pitiless Orcus will its victim claim.

We all to one sure goal are driven. The fate
To each allotted lies within the urn,
And leaping forth will bear him soon or late
To Charon's ferry, never to return.