New Poems And Variant Readings

AD MARTIALEM 139
AD MARTIALEM
GO(D) knows, my Martial, if we two could be To enjoy our days set wholly free; To the true life together bend our mind, And take a furlough from the falser kind. % No rich saloon, nor palace of the great, Nor suit at law should trouble our estate; On no vainglorious statues should we look, But of a walk, a talk, a little book, Baths, wells and meads, and the veranda shade, Let all our travels and our toils be made. Now neither lives unto himself, alas ! And the good suns we see, that flash and pass And perish ; and the bell that knells them cries: " Another gone ; O when will ye arise ?"
IN MAXIMUM
WOULDST thou be free ? I think it not, indeed ; But if thou wouldst, attend this simple rede:
When quite contented \ •', '
^ .,,••.,. , L thou canst dme at home Thou shall be free whenj
And drink a small wine of the march of Rome; When thou canst see unmoved thy neighbour's plate, And wear my threadbare toga in the gate;