Georgics Book 2, lines 490 - 502 and 513 - 532

More from Virgil’s farming Utopia

by Virgil

More from Virgil’s charming, but not very realistic, paradise of a farming life. The comparison that he makes in the first three lines between the peace of mind that comes from happy life in the country, and that of the Epicurean sage who has acquired it by mastering philosophy, would have seemed a very bold one. The contrast he then draws with the ills and burdens of public life and the great city is in fact a back-handed compliment to his patron Maecenas, right-hand-man of the Emperor Augustus, whose life and work are set in just this arena.

The English is from John Dryden’s Georgics of the 1690s, and illustrates well how far even elegant and entertaining literary translations can be from the style and feel of the original.

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490 – 502

Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas

atque metus omnis et inexorabile fatum

subiecit pedibus strepitumque Acherontis avari:

fortunatus et ille deos qui novit agrestis

Panaque Silvanumque senem Nymphasque sorores.

illum non populi fasces, non purpura regum

flexit et infidos agitans discordia fratres,

aut coniurato descendens Dacus ab Histro,

non res Romanae perituraque regna; neque ille

aut doluit miserans inopem aut inuidit habenti.

quos rami fructus, quos ipsa uolentia rura

sponte tulere sua, carpsit, nec ferrea iura

insanumque forum aut populi tabularia vidit.

513 – 532

hic anni labor, hinc patriam parvosque nepotes

sustinet, hinc armenta boum meritosque iuvencos.

nec requies, quin aut pomis exuberet annus

aut fetu pecorum aut Cerealis mergite culmi,

prouentuque oneret sulcos atque horrea vincat.

venit hiems: teritur Sicyonia baca trapetis,

glande sues laeti redeunt, dant arbuta siluae;

et uarios ponit fetus autumnus, et alte

mitis in apricis coquitur uindemia saxis.

interea dulces pendent circum oscula nati,

casta pudicitiam seruat domus, ubera vaccae

lactea demittunt, pinguesque in gramine laeto

inter se adversis luctantur cornibus haedi.

ipse dies agitat festos fususque per herbam,

ignis ubi in medio et socii cratera coronant,

te libans, Lenaee, uocat pecorisque magistris

uelocis iaculi certamina ponit in ulmo,

corporaque agresti nudant praedura palaestra.

490 – 502

Happy the Man, who, studying Nature’s Laws,
Thro’ known Effects can trace the secret Cause.
His Mind possessing, in a quiet state,
Fearless of Fortune, and resign’d to Fate.
And happy too is he, who decks the Bow’rs
Of Sylvans, and adores the Rural Pow’rs:
Whose Mind, unmov’d, the Bribes of Courts can see;
Their glitt’ring Baits, and Purple Slavery.
Nor hopes the People’s Praise, nor fears their Frown,
Nor, when contending Kindred tear the Crown,
Will set up one, or pull another down.
⁠Without Concern he hears, but hears from far,
Of Tumults and Descents, and distant War:
Nor with a Superstitious Fear is aw’d,
For what befals at home, or what abroad.
Nor envies he the Rich their heapy Store,
Nor with a helpless Hand condoles the Poor.
He feeds on Fruits, which, of their own accord,
The willing Ground, and laden Trees afford.
From his lov’d Home no Lucre him can draw;
The Senates mad Decrees he never saw;
Nor heard, at bawling Bars, corrupted Law.

513 – 532

The Peasant, innocent of all these Ills,
With crooked Ploughs the fertile Fallows tills;
And the round Year with daily Labour fills.
From hence the Country Markets are supply’d:
Enough remains for houshold Charge beside;
His Wife, and tender Children to sustain,
And gratefully to feed his dumb deserving Train.
Nor cease his Labours, till the Yellow Field
A full return of bearded Harvest yield:
A Crop so plenteous, as the Land to load,
O’ercome the crowded Barns, and lodge on Ricks abroad.
Thus ev’ry sev’ral Season is employ’d:
Some spent in Toyl, and some in Ease enjoy’d. ⁠
The yeaning Ewes prevent the springing Year;
The laded Boughs their Fruits in Autumn bear,
Tis then the Vine her liquid Harvest yields,
Bak’d in the Sun-shine of ascending Fields.
The Winter comes, and then the falling Mast,
For greedy Swine, provides a full repast.
Then Olives, ground in Mills, their fatness boast,
And Winter Fruits are mellow’d by the Frost.
His Cares are eas’d with Intervals of bliss,
His little Children climbing for a Kiss,⁠
Welcome their Father’s late return at Night;
His faithful Bed is crown’d with chast delight.
His Kine with swelling Udders ready stand,
And, lowing for the Pail, invite the Milker’s hand.
His wanton Kids, with budding Horns prepar’d,⁠
Fight harmless Battels in his homely Yard:
Himself in Rustick Pomp, on Holy-days,
To Rural Pow’rs a just Oblation pays;
And on the Green his careless Limbs displays.
The Hearth is in the midst; the Herdsmen round⁠
The chearful Fire, provoke his health in Goblets crown’d.
He calls on Bacchus, and propounds the Prize;
The Groom his Fellow Groom at Buts defies;
And bends his Bow, and levels with his Eyes,
Or stript for Wrestling, smears his Limbs with Oyl,
And watches with a trip his Foe to foil.

`

More Poems by Virgil

  1. Aeneas tours the site of Rome
  2. The Fury Allecto blows the alarm
  3. Aeneas comes to the Hell of Tartarus
  4. Jupiter’s prophecy
  5. Aeneas reaches the Elysian Fields
  6. Aeneas’s oath
  7. The farmer’s happy lot
  8. King Mezentius meets his match
  9. Rumour
  10. Vulcan’s forge
  11. Virgil’s perils on the sea
  12. Aeneas joins the fray
  13. The natural history of bees
  14. Mourning for Pallas
  15. Anchises’s ghost invites Aeneas to visit the underworld
  16. Dido falls in love
  17. Laocoon and the snakes
  18. Aeneas prepares for a hopeless fight
  19. The infant Camilla
  20. A Fury rouses Turnus to war
  21. Mercury’s journey to Carthage
  22. Omens for Princess Lavinia
  23. Into battle
  24. Turnus at bay
  25. Aeneas’s ships are transformed
  26. Aeneas prepares to tell Dido his story
  27. Dido and Aeneas: royal hunt and royal affair
  28. Aeneas learns the way to the underworld
  29. Rites for the allies’ dead
  30. Help for Father Aeneas from Father Tiber
  31. Fire strikes Aeneas’s fleet
  32. Aeneas saves his son and father, but at a cost
  33. The portals of sleep
  34. Virgil begins the Georgics
  35. Dido’s release
  36. Dido and Aeneas: Hell hath no fury …
  37. The farmer’s starry calendar
  38. New allies for Aeneas
  39. In King Latinus’s hall
  40. How Aeneas will know the site of his city
  41. Aeneas and Dido meet
  42. King Latinus grants the Trojans’ request
  43. The death of Pallas
  44. The Trojans prepare to set sail from Carthage
  45. The Trojan horse opens
  46. Souls awaiting punishment in Tartarus, and the crimes that brought them there.
  47. The Harpy’s prophecy
  48. The Trojans reach Carthage
  49. Aeneas is wounded
  50. Aeneas’s vision of Augustus
  51. Virgil predicts a forthcoming birth and a new golden age
  52. Love is the same for all
  53. Virgil’s poetic temple to Caesar
  54. The death of Dido.
  55. Juno’s anger
  56. Catastrophe for Rome?
  57. The death of Euryalus and Nisus
  58. Palinurus the helmsman is lost
  59. Juno throws open the gates of war
  60. Turnus is lured away from battle
  61. The death of Priam
  62. The Aeneid begins
  63. Juno is reconciled
  64. The journey to Hades begins
  65. The Syrian hostess
  66. Cassandra is taken
  67. What is this wooden horse?
  68. Sea-nymphs
  69. Charon, the ferryman
  70. Dido’s story
  71. The Trojan Horse enters the city
  72. Hector visits Aeneas in a dream
  73. Storm at sea!
  74. Aristaeus’s bees
  75. Aeneas sees Marcellus, Augustus’s tragic heir
  76. Aeneas finds Dido among the shades
  77. Turnus the wolf
  78. Aeneas arrives in Italy
  79. Laocoon warns against the Trojan horse
  80. Aeneas rescues his Father Anchises
  81. Signs of bad weather
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