Horace
Horace
Quintus Horatius Flaccus, known in the English-speaking world as Horace, was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus. The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his Odes as just about the only Latin lyrics worth reading: "He can be lofty sometimes, yet he is also full of charm and grace, versatile in his figures, and felicitously daring in his choice of words."...
NationalityRoman
ProfessionPoet
absurd birth mountains
Mountains will be in labour, and the birth will be an absurd little mouse.
luck birth
Luck cannot change birth.
fall joy birth
Joys do not fall to the rich alone; nor has he lived ill of whose birth and death no one took note.
world birth unnoticed
He has not lived badly whose birth and death has been unnoticed by the world.
mountain littles birth
The mountains are in labour, the birth will be an absurd little mouse.
money proud birth
Though you strut proud of your money, yet fortune has not changed your birth. [Lat., Licet superbus ambules pecuniae, Fortuna non mutat genus.]
guilty pale secrets turn wall
Be this your wall of brass, to have no guilty secrets, no wrong-doing that makes you turn pale
labor mountains mouse ridiculous
The mountains will be in labor, and a ridiculous mouse will be born.
crazy fools-and-foolishness
As crazy as hauling timber into the woods.
avoid cottage favourites greatness happiness kings
Avoid greatness; in a cottage there may be more real happiness than kings or their favourites enjoy.
bowl soul troubles within
Bacchus drowns within the bowl - Troubles that corrode the soul
fond illusion mock
Do you hear, or does some fond illusion mock me?
fools-and-foolishness good mix silly
Mix a little foolishness with your prudence: it's good to be silly at the right moment. (Odes, bk. 4, no. 12, l. 27)
fools-and-foolishness lovely mix moment serious silly
Mix a little foolishness with your serious plans; it's lovely to be silly at the right moment