Odes 1.24

Mourning for a good man

by Horace

This ode, in a sombre asclepiadic metre, is a notably effective piece on a stock theme: loss, acceptance and consolation. Scholars speculate about just who Quintilius was, but that he was respected by Horace and a friend of Virgil seems good enough reason in itself for him to be remembered. At the end of the poem, Mercury is shown as the guide of the souls of the dead to the underworld. His most famous appearance in this aspect is in the last book of the Odyssey, when he performs this function for Penelope’s suitors after Odysseus has killed them.

See the illustrated blog post here.

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Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modus
tam cari capitis? praecipe lugubris
cantus, Melpomene, cui liquidam pater
vocem cum cithara dedit.

ergo Quintilium perpetuus sopor
urget? cui Pudor et Iustitiae soror
incorrupta Fides nudaque Veritas
quando ullum inveniet parem?

multis ille bonis flebilis occidit,
nulli flebilior quam tibi, Vergili.
tu, frustra pius, heu non ita creditum
poscis Quintilium deos.

quid si Threicio blandius Orpheo
auditam moderere arboribus fidem,
num vanae redeat sanguis imagini,
quam virga semel horrida

non lenis precibus fata recludere
nigro conpulerit Mercurius gregi?
durum: sed levius fit patientia
quidquid corrigere est nefas.

What shame or restraint should there be in our sense of loss for so dear a life? Teach us sad songs, Melpomene, to whom father Jupiter gave your clear voice to go with your lyre. So eternal sleep lies heavy on Quintilius? When will decency, and justice’s sister, perfect fidelity, and naked truth, ever find his like? He died bringing sorrow to many good men, and to none more than to you, Vergil. In vain in your piety, alas, do you ask the Gods for your Quintilius, whom you did not entrust to them on these terms. Even if you were to serenade the trees more persuasively even than Thracian Orpheus, surely the lifeblood may not return to an empty shade which Mercury, not gentle enough to reopen its fate in response to our prayers, has once herded with his dreaded crook into the dark flock? It is hard: but through endurance ills that it is forbidden to correct become easier to bear.

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More Poems by Horace

  1. An invitation to Maecenas
  2. Courage and decadence: the Regulus ode
  3. Soracte
  4. Diffugere nives
  5. The consolations of wine
  6. Pyrrha
  7. Licymnia
  8. Horace’s Chloe
  9. Iccius goes soldiering
  10. Don’t worry, be happy
  11. A Farewell to arms
  12. Fortuna
  13. Here’s to Murena!
  14. Numida’s back
  15. Horace welcomes his army comrade
  16. Give me comfort, not riches
  17. Horace’s Cleopatra ode
  18. Horace rests from his labours
  19. Luxury versus the simple life
  20. Rome: disaster and salvation
  21. Awe for the Gods
  22. The Golden Mean
  23. Gathering rosebuds: carpe diem
  24. A garland from the Muses
  25. Horace’s limitations
  26. Curse you, tree!
  27. The final ode
  28. Glycera
  29. Nereus prophesies the Trojan War
  30. Some advice for Dellius
  31. Poscimur
  32. Horace, the wolf and the upright life
  33. The fleeting years slip by
  34. Pollio’s histories of civil war
  35. Lydia’s tragedy
  36. The pleasures and dangers of wine
  37. Horace the peacemaker
  38. Stormy seas
  39. Horace’s reverence to Bacchus
  40. Horace’s prayer to a wine-jar
  41. Don’t trust Barine
  42. Love a slave-girl? Oh, Xanthias!
  43. Augustus, master of the world
  44. A prayer to Venus
  45. A plea for burial
  46. Tibur or Tarentum: a poet’s dilemma?
  47. Postumus, the years slip by
  48. Horace returns to lyric poetry
  49. Diana and Apollo: a hymn
  50. A change of mind
  51. Wealth should be used, not hoarded
  52. Unrequited love
  53. Valgius and Mystes
  54. Pindar and Augustus
  55. Horace’s wine
  56. A prayer to Mercury
  57. The tug-of-war for Nearchus
  58. Lalage is too young
  59. What Roman youth should be
  60. Horace’s first Ode
  61. The country is best
  62. A Prayer to the poetry-God
  63. Last love
  64. Celebrating Neptune’s feast day
  65. Lovely mother, lovelier daughter
  66. Carpe diem, Sestius
  67. Jealousy
  68. O Fons Bandusiae
  69. Horace’s monument
  70. Housman and Horace
    71. View Latin Poems