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
wife tales old-wives-tales
He tells old wives' tales much to the point.
men wife sovereign
Sovereign money procures a wife with a large fortune, gets a man credit, creates friends, stands in place of pedigree, and even of beauty.
money men wife
A dowried wife, friends, beauty, birth, fair fame, These are the gifts of money, heavenly dame: Be but a moneyed man, persuasion tips Your tongue, and Venus settles on your lips.
men wife ignorant
I have known several persons of great fame for wisdom in public affairs and councils governed by foolish servants. I have known great ministers, distinguished for wit and learning, who preferred none but dunces. I have known men of valor cowards to their wives. I have known men of cunning perpetually cheated. I knew three ministers who would exactly compute and settle the accounts of a kingdom, wholly ignorant of their own economy.
men wife coward
I have known men of valor cowards to their wives.
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
absurd birth mountains
Mountains will be in labour, and the birth will be an absurd little mouse.