Lovely and honourable it is to die for one’s country.
‘Odes’ bk. 3, no. 2, l. 13.
Iustum et tenacem propositi virum Non civium ardor prava iubentium, Non vultus instantis tyranni Mente quatit solida.
For a just man and one with a firm grasp of his intentions, neither the heated passions of his fellow men ordaining something awful, nor a tyrant staring him in the face, will shake him in his
convictions.
‘Odes’ bk. 3, no. 3, l. 1
Si fractus illabatur orbis, Impavidum ferient ruinae.
If the world should break and fall on him, its ruins would strike him unafraid.
Force, unaided by judgement, collapses through its own weight.
‘Odes’ bk. 3, no. 4, l. 65
Damnosa quid non imminuit dies? Aetas parentum peior avis tulit Nos nequiores, mox daturos Progeniem vitiosiorem.
What do the ravages of time not injure? Our parents’ age (worse than our grandparents’) has
produced us, more worthless still, who will soon give rise to a yet more vicious generation.
‘Odes’ bk. 3, no. 6, l. 45
Splendide mendax et in omne virgo Nobilis aevum.
Gloriously deceitful and a virgin renowned for ever.
‘Odes’ bk. 3, no. 11, l. 35 (referring to the Danaid Hypermestra)
Magnas inter opes inops.
A beggar amidst great riches.
‘Odes’ bk. 3, no. 16, l. 28
Fumum et opes strepitumque Romae.
The smoke and wealth and din of Rome.
‘Odes’ bk. 3, no. 29, l. 12
Exegi monumentum aere perennius.
I have erected a monument more lasting than bronze.
‘Odes’ bk. 3, no. 30, l. 1
Non omnis moriar.
I shall not altogether die.
‘Odes’ bk. 3, no. 30, l. 6
Non sum qualis eram bonae Sub regno Cinarae.
I am not as I was when dear Cinara was my queen.
‘Odes’ bk. 4, no. 1, l. 3
Quod spiro et placeo, si placeo, tuum est.
That I make poetry and give pleasure (if I give pleasure) are because of you.
‘Odes’ bk. 4, no. 3, l. 24
Merses profundo: pulchrior evenit.
Plunge it in deep water: it comes up more beautiful.
‘Odes’ bk. 4, no. 4, l. 65
Occidit, occidit
Spes omnis et fortuna nostri Nominis Hasdrubale interempto.
All our hope is fallen, fallen, and the luck of our name lost with Hasdrubal.
‘Odes’ bk. 4, no. 4, l. 70
Diffugere nives, redeunt iam gramina campis Arboribusque comae.
The snows have dispersed, now grass returns to the fields and leaves to the trees.
‘Odes’ bk. 4, no. 7, l. 1
Immortalia ne speres, monet annus et almum Quae rapit hora diem.
The year and the hour which robs us of the fair day warn us not to hope for things to last for
ever.
‘Odes’ bk. 4, no. 7, l. 7
Dignum laude virum Musa vetat mori.
The man worthy of praise the Muse forbids to die.
‘Odes’ bk. 4, no. 8, l. 28
Vixere fortes ante Agamemnona Multi; sed omnes illacrimabiles Urgentur ignotique longa Nocte, carent quia vate sacro.
Many brave men lived before Agamemnon’s time; but they are all, unmourned and unknown,
covered by the long night, because they lack their sacred poet.
‘Odes’ bk. 4, no. 9, l. 25
Non possidentem multa vocaveris Recte beatum: rectius occupat Nomen beati, qui deorum Muneribus sapienter uti Duramque callet pauperiem pati Peiusque leto flagitium timet.
It is not he who has many possessions that you should call happy: he more rightly deserves that name who knows how to use the gods’ gifts wisely and to endure harsh poverty, and who fears
dishonour more than death.
‘Odes’ bk. 4, no. 9, l. 45
Misce stultitiam consiliis brevem: Dulce est desipere in loco.
Mix a little foolishness with your prudence: it’s good to be silly at the right moment.
‘Odes’ bk. 4, no. 12, l. 27
Qui fit, Maecenas, ut nemo, quam sibi sortem Seu ratio dederit seu fors obiecerit, illa Contentus vivat, laudet diversa sequentis?
How is it, Maecenas, that no one lives contented with his lot, whether he has planned it for
himself or fate has flung him into it, but yet he praises those who follow different paths?
‘Satires’ bk. 1, no. 1, l. 1
Mutato nomine de te Fabula narratur.
Change the name and it’s about you, that story.
‘Satires’ bk. 1, no. 1, l. 69
Est modus in rebus.
There is measure in everything.
‘Satires’ bk. 1, no. 1, l. 106
Hoc genus omne.
All that tribe.
‘Satires’ bk. 1, no. 2, l. 2
Ab ovo Usque ad mala.
From the egg right through to the apples.
‘Satires’ bk. 1, no. 3, l. 6 (meaning from the start to the finish of a meal)
Etiam disiecti membra poetae.
Even though broken up, the limbs of a poet.
‘Satires’ bk. 1, no. 4, l. 62 (referring to Ennius)
Ad unguem Factus homo.
An accomplished man to his finger-tips.
‘Satires’ bk. 1, no. 5, l. 32
Credat Iudaeus Apella, Non ego.
Let Apella the Jew believe it; I shan’t.
‘Satires’ bk. 1, no. 5, l. 100
In silvam...ligna feras insanius.
It’s crazy to carry timber to the forest.
‘Satires’ bk. 1, no. 10, l. 34
Solventur risu tabulae, tu missus abibis.
The case will be dismissed with a laugh. You will get off scot-free.
‘Satires’ bk. 2, no. 1, l. 86 (H. R. Fairclough’s translation)
Par nobile fratrum.
A noble pair of brothers.
‘Satires’ bk. 2, no. 3, l. 243 (referring to notorious villains)
Hoc erat in votis: modus agri non ita magnus, Hortus ubi et tecto vicinus iugis aquae fons Et paulum silvae super his foret.
This was one of my prayers: for a piece of land not so very large, with a garden and a spring of
ever-flowing water near the house, and a bit of woodland as well as these.
‘Satires’ bk. 2, no. 6, l. 1
O noctes cenaeque deum!
O nights and feasts divine!
‘Satires’ bk. 2, no. 6, l. 65
Responsare cupidinibus, contemnere honores Fortis, et in se ipso totus, teres, atque rotundus.
Strong enough to answer back to desires, to despise distinctions, and a whole man in himself,
polished and well-rounded.
‘Satires’ bk. 2, no. 7, l. 85
8.140 Samuel Horsley 1733-1806
In this country, my Lords...the individual subject ... ‘has nothing to do with the laws but to obey them.’
House of Lords, 13 November 1795 (defending a maxim he had earlier used in committee)
8.141 A. E. Housman 1859-1936
Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrists? And what has he been after that they groan and shake their fists? And wherefore is he wearing such a conscience-stricken air? Oh they’re taking him to prison for the colour of his hair.
‘Fragment of a Greek Tragedy’ (‘Bromsgrovian’ vol. 2, no. 5, 1883) in ‘Alfred Edward Housman’, the Housman Memorial Supplement of the Bromsgrovian (1936)
The Grizzly Bear is huge and wild; He has devoured the infant child. The infant child is not aware
He has been eaten by the bear.
‘Infant Innocence’ (1938)
Pass me the can, lad; there’s an end of May.
‘Last Poems’ (1922) no. 9
May will be fine next year as like as not: Oh, ay, but then we shall be twenty-four.
‘Last Poems’ (1922) no. 9
The troubles of our proud and angry dust Are from eternity, and shall not fail.
Bear them we can, and if we can we must. Shoulder the sky, my lad, and drink your ale.
‘Last Poems’ (1922) no. 9
But men at whiles are sober And think by fits and starts, And if they think, they fasten Their hands upon their hearts.
‘Last Poems’ (1922) no. 10
And how am I to face the odds Of man’s bedevilment and God’s? I, a stranger and afraid
In a world I never made.
‘Last Poems’ (1922) no. 12
The candles burn their sockets, The blinds let through the day, The young man feels his pockets And wonders what’s to pay.
‘Last Poems’ (1922) no. 21
These, in the day when heaven was falling,
The hour when earth’s foundations fled,
Followed their mercenary calling
And took their wages and are dead.
Their shoulders held the sky suspended; They stood, and earth’s foundations stay; What God abandoned, these defended,
And saved the sum of things for pay.
‘Last Poems’ (1922) no. 37 ‘Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries’
For nature, heartless, witless nature, Will neither care nor know
What stranger’s feet may find the meadow And trespass there and go,
Nor ask amid the dews of morning If they are mine or no.
‘Last Poems’ (1922) no. 40
The rainy Pleiads wester, Orion plunges prone,
The stroke of midnight ceases, And I lie down alone.
‘More Poems’ (1936) no. 11
Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose;
But young men think it is, and we were young.
‘More Poems’ (1936) no. 36
Good-night. Ensured release Imperishable peace,
Have these for yours,
While earth’s foundations stand And sky and sea and land
And heaven endures.
‘More Poems’ (1936) no. 48 ‘Alta Quies’
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough, And stands about the woodland ride Wearing white for Eastertide.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 2
And since to look at things in bloom Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go To see the cherry hung with snow.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 2
Clay lies still, but blood’s a rover; Breath’s a ware that will not keep. Up, lad: when the journey’s over There’ll be time enough to sleep.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 4
And naked to the hangman’s noose The morning clocks will ring
A neck God made for other use Than strangling in a string.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 9
When I was one-and-twenty I heard a wise man say,
‘Give crowns and pounds and guineas But not your heart away;
Give pearls away and rubies, But keep your fancy free.’ But I was one-and-twenty, No use to talk to me.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 13
In summertime on Bredon The bells they sound so clear;
Round both the shires they ring them In steeples far and near,
A happy noise to hear.
Here of a Sunday morning My love and I would lie,
And see the coloured counties, And hear the larks so high
About us in the sky.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 21
The lads in their hundreds to Ludlow come in for the fair, There’s men from the barn and the forge and the mill and the fold, The lads for the girls and the lads for the liquor are there,
And there with the rest are the lads that will never be old.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 23
On Wenlock Edge the wood’s in trouble; His forest fleece the Wrekin heaves; The wind it plies the saplings double, And thick on Severn snow the leaves.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 31
The gale, it plies the saplings double, It blows so hard, ’twill soon be gone: To-day the Roman and his trouble Are ashes under Uricon.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 31
From far, from eve and morning And yon twelve-winded sky, The stuff of life to knit me Blew hither: here am I.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 32
Into my heart an air that kills From yon far country blows:
What are those blue remembered hills, What spires, what farms are those?
That is the land of lost content, I see it shining plain,
The happy highways where I went
And cannot come again.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 40
And bound for the same bourn as I, On every road I wandered by, Trod beside me, close and dear,
The beautiful and death-struck year.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 41
Clunton and Clunbury,
Clungunford and Clun, Are the quietest places Under the sun.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 50, epigraph
By brooks too broad for leaping The lightfoot boys are laid; The rose-lipt girls are sleeping In fields where roses fade.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 54
Say, for what were hop-yards meant, Or why was Burton built on Trent? Oh many a peer of England brews Livelier liquor than the Muse,
And malt does more than Milton can To justify God’s ways to man.
Ale, man, ale’s the stuff to drink For fellows whom it hurts to think.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 62.
I tell the tale that I heard told. Mithridates, he died old.
‘A Shropshire Lad’ (1896) no. 62
This great College, of this ancient University, has seen some strange sights. It has seen Wordsworth drunk and Porson sober. And here am I, a better poet than Porson, and a better scholar than Wordsworth, betwixt and between.
Speech at Trinity College, Cambridge, in G. K. Chesterton ‘Autobiography’ (1936) ch. 12
8.142 Julia Ward Howe 1819-1910
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord:
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored.
‘Battle Hymn of the Republic’ (1862)
8.143 James Howell c.1593-1666
Some hold translations not unlike to be The wrong side of a Turkey tapestry.
‘Familiar Letters’ (1645-55) bk. 1, letter 6
One hair of a woman can draw more than a hundred pair of oxen.
‘Familiar Letters’ (1645-55) bk. 2, letter 4
8.144 Mary Howitt 1799-1888
Buttercups and daisies, Oh, the pretty flowers; Coming ere the springtime, To tell of sunny hours.
‘Buttercups and Daisies’ (1838)
‘Will you walk into my parlour?’ said a spider to a fly: ‘’Tis the prettiest little parlour that ever you did spy.’
‘The Spider and the Fly’ (1834)
8.145 Edmond Hoyle 1672-1769
When in doubt, win the trick.
‘Hoyle’s Games’ (c.1756) ‘Whist, Twenty-four Short Rules for Learners’ rule 12
8.146 Elbert Hubbard 1859-1915
Never explain—your friends do not need it and your enemies will not believe you anyway.
‘The Motto Book’ (1907) p. 31.
Life is just one damned thing after another.
‘Philistine’ December 1909, p. 32 (often attributed to Frank Ward O’Malley)
Editor: a person employed by a newspaper, whose business it is to separate the wheat from the chaff, and to see that the chaff is printed.
‘The Roycroft Dictionary’ (1914) p. 46
8.147 Frank McKinney (‘Kin’) Hubbard 1868-1930
Classic music is th’kind that we keep thinkin’ll turn into a tune.
‘Comments of Abe Martin and His Neighbors’ (1923)
It’s no disgrace t’be poor, but it might as well be.
‘Short Furrows’ (1911) p. 42
8.148 L. Ron Hubbard 1911-86
If you really want to make a million...the quickest way is to start your own religion.
Speaking to the Eastern Science Fiction Association at Newark, New Jersey, in 1947, in B. Corydon and L. Ron Hubbard Jr. ‘L. Ron Hubbard’ (1987) ch. 3
8.149 Howard Hughes Jr. 1905-76
That man’s ears make him look like a taxi-cab with both doors open.
Describing Clark Gable, in Charles Higham and Joel Greenberg ‘Celluloid Muse’ (1969) p. 156
8.150 Jimmy Hughes and Frank Lake
Bless ’em all! Bless ’em all!
The long and the short and the tall.
‘Bless ‘Em All’ (1940 song)
8.151 Langston Hughes 1902-67
I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes.
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.
Tomorrow
I’ll sit at the table When company comes Nobody’ll dare
