To Fortune
O Goddess, who presidest over beautiful Antium; thou, that art ready to
exalt mortal man from the most abject state, or to convert superb
triumphs into funerals! Thee the poor countryman solicits with his
anxious vows; whosoever plows the Carpathian Sea with the Bithynian
vessel, importunes thee as mistress of the ocean. Thee the rough Dacian,
thee the wandering Scythians, and cities, and nations, and warlike
Latium also, and the mothers of barbarian kings, and tyrants clad in
purple, fear. Spurn not with destructive foot that column which now
stands firm, nor let popular tummult rouse those, who now rest quiet, to
arms--to arms--and break the empire. Necessity, thy minister, alway
marches before thee, holding in her brazen hand huge spikes and wedges,
nor is the unyielding clamp absent, nor the melted lead. Thee Hope
reverences, and rare Fidelity robed in a white garment; nor does she
refuse to bear thee company, howsoever in wrath thou change thy robe,
and abandon the houses of the powerful. But the faithless crowd [of
companions], and the perjured harlot draw back. Friends, too faithless
to bear equally the yoke of adversity, when casks are exhausted, very
dregs and all, fly off. Preserve thou Caesar, who is meditating an
expedition against the Britons, the furthest people in the world, and
also the new levy of youths to be dreaded by the Eastern regions, and
the Red Sea. Alas! I am ashamed of our scars, and our wickedness, and of
brethren. What have we, a hardened age, avoided? What have we in our
impiety left unviolated! From what have our youth restrained their
hands, out of reverence to the gods? What altars have they spared? O
mayest thou forge anew our blunted swords on a different anvil against
the Massagetae and Arabians.
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