Monday, April 26, 2021
Your Last Day
Horace, Epistles 1.4.12-16 (tr. Colin Macleod):
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Amid hopes and cares, attacks of fear and anger,Eduard Fraenkel, Horace (1957; rpt. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), p. 325:
think of each dawn as lighting your last day:
an hour not counted on will be a gift.
Visit your plump, sleek, well-groomed friend, whenever
you want a laugh, in his Epicurean sty.
inter spem curamque, timores inter et iras
omnem crede diem tibi diluxisse supremum.
grata superveniet, quae non sperabitur hora.
me pinguem et nitidum bene curata cute vises, 15
cum ridere voles, Epicuri de grege porcum.
[Lines 12-14], although they do not contain an original or unfamiliar thought, are so full of vigour and deep feeling and worded with such perfect harmony that they sink into our memory for good.
