Aeneid
- 1.223.301
the seas all winged with sails, lands widely spread,
- 1.223.302
and nations populous from shore to shore,
- 1.223.303
paused on the peak of heaven, and fixed his gaze
- 1.223.304
on Libya. But while he anxious mused,
- 1.223.305
near him, her radiant eyes all dim with tears,
- 1.223.306
nor smiling any more, Venus approached,
- 1.223.307
and thus complained: “O thou who dost control
- 1.223.308
things human and divine by changeless laws,
- 1.223.309
enthroned in awful thunder! What huge wrong
- 1.223.310
could my Aeneas and his Trojans few
- 1.223.311
achieve against thy power? For they have borne
- 1.223.312
unnumbered deaths, and, failing Italy,
- 1.223.313
the gates of all the world against them close.
- 1.223.314
Hast thou not given us thy covenant
- 1.223.315
that hence the Romans when the rolling years
- 1.223.316
have come full cycle, shall arise to power
- 1.223.317
from Troy's regenerate seed, and rule supreme
- 1.223.318
the unresisted lords of land and sea?
- 1.223.319
O Sire, what swerves thy will? How oft have I
- 1.223.320
in Troy's most lamentable wreck and woe
- 1.223.321
consoled my heart with this, and balanced oft
- 1.223.322
our destined good against our destined ill!
- 1.223.323
But the same stormful fortune still pursues
- 1.223.324
my band of heroes on their perilous way.
- 1.223.325
When shall these labors cease, O glorious King?
- 1.223.326
Antenor, though th' Achaeans pressed him sore,
- 1.223.327
found his way forth, and entered unassailed
- 1.223.328
Illyria's haven, and the guarded land
- 1.223.329
of the Liburni. Straight up stream he sailed
- 1.223.330
where like a swollen sea Timavus pours
- 1.223.331
a nine-fold flood from roaring mountain gorge,
- 1.223.332
and whelms with voiceful wave the fields below.
- 1.223.333
He built Patavium there, and fixed abodes
- 1.223.334
for Troy's far-exiled sons; he gave a name
- 1.223.335
to a new land and race; the Trojan arms
- 1.223.336
were hung on temple walls; and, to this day,
- 1.223.337
lying in perfect peace, the hero sleeps.
- 1.223.338
But we of thine own seed, to whom thou dost
- 1.223.339
a station in the arch of heaven assign,
- 1.223.340
behold our navy vilely wrecked, because
- 1.223.341
a single god is angry; we endure
- 1.223.342
this treachery and violence, whereby
- 1.223.343
wide seas divide us from th' Hesperian shore.
- 1.223.344
Is this what piety receives? Or thus
- 1.223.345
doth Heaven's decree restore our fallen thrones?”
- 1.254.346
Smiling reply, the Sire of gods and men,
- 1.254.347
with such a look as clears the skies of storm
- 1.254.348
chastely his daughter kissed, and thus spake on:
- 1.254.349
“Let Cytherea cast her fears away!
- 1.254.350
Irrevocably blest the fortunes be
- 1.254.351
of thee and thine. Nor shalt thou fail to see
- 1.254.352
that City, and the proud predestined wall
- 1.254.353
encompassing Lavinium. Thyself
- 1.254.354
shall starward to the heights of heaven bear
- 1.254.355
Aeneas the great-hearted. Nothing swerves
- 1.254.356
my will once uttered. Since such carking cares
- 1.254.357
consume thee, I this hour speak freely forth,
- 1.254.358
and leaf by leaf the book of fate unfold.
- 1.254.359
Thy son in Italy shall wage vast war
- 1.254.360
and, quell its nations wild; his city-wall
- 1.254.361
and sacred laws shall be a mighty bond
- 1.254.362
about his gathered people. Summers three
- 1.254.363
shall Latium call him king; and three times pass
- 1.254.364
the winter o'er Rutulia's vanquished hills.
- 1.254.365
His heir, Ascanius, now Iulus called
- 1.254.366
(Ilus it was while Ilium's kingdom stood),
- 1.254.367
full thirty months shall reign, then move the throne
- 1.254.368
from the Lavinian citadel, and build
- 1.254.369
for Alba Longa its well-bastioned wall.
- 1.272.370
Here three full centuries shall Hector's race
- 1.272.371
have kingly power; till a priestess queen,
- 1.272.372
by Mars conceiving, her twin offspring bear;
- 1.272.373
then Romulus, wolf-nursed and proudly clad
- 1.272.374
in tawny wolf-skin mantle, shall receive
- 1.272.375
the sceptre of his race. He shall uprear
- 1.272.376
and on his Romans his own name bestow.
- 1.272.377
To these I give no bounded times or power,
- 1.272.378
but empire without end. Yea, even my Queen,
- 1.272.379
Juno, who now chastiseth land and sea
- 1.272.380
with her dread frown, will find a wiser way,
- 1.272.381
and at my sovereign side protect and bless
- 1.272.382
the Romans, masters of the whole round world,
- 1.272.383
who, clad in peaceful toga, judge mankind.
- 1.272.384
Such my decree! In lapse of seasons due,
- 1.272.385
the heirs of Ilium's kings shall bind in chains
- 1.272.386
Mycenae's glory and Achilles' towers,
- 1.272.387
and over prostrate Argos sit supreme.
- 1.272.388
Of Trojan stock illustriously sprung,
- 1.272.389
lo, Caesar comes! whose power the ocean bounds,
- 1.272.390
whose fame, the skies. He shall receive the name
- 1.272.391
Iulus nobly bore, great Julius, he.
- 1.272.392
Him to the skies, in Orient trophies dress,
- 1.272.393
thou shalt with smiles receive; and he, like us,
- 1.272.394
shall hear at his own shrines the suppliant vow.
- 1.272.395
Then will the world grow mild; the battle-sound
- 1.272.396
will be forgot; for olden Honor then,
- 1.272.397
with spotless Vesta, and the brothers twain,
- 1.272.398
Remus and Romulus, at strife no more,
- 1.272.399
will publish sacred laws. The dreadful gates
- 1.272.400
whence issueth war, shall with close-jointed steel
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