No More Learning

In vain I cry
That thou avert my certain doom.
Breath fails ; the light is lost in gloom.
Like grass that torrid winds consume,
I droop and die.
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? 52 CATULLUS
Note. -- The last stanza usually appended to this poem
is so obviously a misfit that it has been omitted in the
translation. It is incredible that so finished and fault-
less a writer as Catullus shows himself in other poems,
should have so stupidly blundered in this. It is doubly
incredible if we accept this as a translation of the well
known Sapphic ode in the same strain. The first three
stanzas of the two poems are almost identical. It is
hardly probable, then, that Catullus would so flagrantly
have departed from the original in the fourth. There-
fore, we have taken the liberty to adapt for the last
stanza the general sense of Sappho's verses. It is far
more probable that the original fourth stanza of Catullus
was lost than that he made such a blunder in taste
and feeling.
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? CATULLUS 53
LII
Why wait for death, Catullus, why not be done
with life?
Corruption in the Curule chair, and in the Senate
strife.
Venality is honored, and bribery is rife,
Why wait for death Catullus, why not be done
with life?
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? 54 CATULLUS
LXV
Worn out with sorrow that finds no relief,
And crushed beneath a load of endless care,
Hortalus, friend, I ask thee to forbear;
I cannot woo the Muses in my grief.
And fain Fd send thee joyous songs and bright,
And fain remember happy things once more;
Thou knowest, how late, a flood from Lethe's shore
O'erwhelmed my brother in its chilling night.
My brother, best beloved, than life more dear,
Tom from my sight, entombed in foreign land.
Oh shall I never see thee, touch thy hand,
And never hear thee speak, nor feel thee near?
Yet always shall I love thee, always sing
Songs saddened by thy death, of minor note,
Such songs as Philomel pours from her throat,
Bewailing Itys dead by Daulian spring.
And so, Hortalus, unto thee I send
These sweeter strains by sweeter singer wrought.
Lest thou shouldst think Catullus loved thee not,
And with a brother I should lose a friend.
Note. -- Unable, because of the grief caused by his
brother's death, to send some promised verses to his
friend Hortensius Ortalus, Catullus sends this epistle
accompanied by some translations from Callimadius.
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? CATULLUS 55
LXVIII A
O'erwhelmed by cruel misfortune,
Oppressed by chilling fears,
From out the depths, thou sendest mc
This letter writ in tears.
The dark night brings no respite,
Since thou art left forlorn
To toss upon thy lonely couch
Until the darker morn.
The old familiar poets,
That once brought thee delight.
No longer soothe thy weary mind.
That watches out the night.
And thou dost ask of friendship
What love nor verse can give --
Hope in thy bitter loneliness,
The why and how to live.
Dear friend, how fain I'd aid thee,
And send thee sweet relief;
Yet thou must know that I, as thou,
Am plunged in blackest grief.
Could one bright ray still reach me,
'Twould be that thou didst send,
In thy dark hour, this tender plea
To me, thy heart's best friend.
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? 56 CATULLUS
Oh, seek not with the hopeless
To find sweet hope, nor ask
That joy shall spring from misery --
That were too grim a task.
Time was when youth's glad spring time
Led me with flowery feet
To drink where Song's clear fountains spring,
And taste Love's bitter-sweet.
Now all delight has perished,
Lost in the awful night
That rose from Orcus' gloom and tore
My brother from my sight.
Oh, brother so beloved.
All joy with thee has fled,
And all our house, its very heart
And soul, with thee lie dead.
All things thy fond love fostered
When we walked side by side --
The verse I loved, the joys I sought --
With thee, dear one, have died.
Dear friend, the joy thou cravest,
I cannot ofFer thee;
Thou wilt forgive -- how can I send
What grief has reft of me?
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? CATULLUS 57
And say not, at Verona,
I languish dull and cold,
What solace for my weary heart
Could all the city hold?
My books and all my treasures,
At Rome are left behind ;
That neither joy nor book I send,
Pray think me not unkind.
A book of verse I'd send thee
To speed one leaden hour,
As all thy bitter pain I'd cure,
If it were in my power.
Dost think, friend, I had waited
Until thy plea was read?
Sooth, long ago, to ease thy grief.
My love unasked had sped.
Note. -- According to the most reasonable evidence
this letter was written to Manlius, who was staying at
or near Verona, Catullus' paternal home, whither the
young poet himself had retired in grief at the death of
his brother.
Manlius has written to Catullus in deep distress, the
cause of which is not known, but conjectured to be
grief at the death of his young wife. He has asked
that Catullus send him books or poems of his own
making to beguile his grief.
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? 58 CATULLUS
LXX
My mistress says she'd wed with me
If Jove himself had sought her;
She says -- but write what woman says
In winds and running water.
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? CATULLUS 59
LXXII
Ah, Lesbfa, thou wert wont to say
Catullus' love alone held thee,
And should Jove's self thy beauty lure,
Before his favor mine should be.
I loved thee then beyond the love
Of man for maid ; I held thee fair
Not only with a lover's hope,
But with a father's tender care.
But now I know thee as thou art;
And though thy loveliness still charms.
Thy faithlessness makes thee despised,
And keeps thee from these longing arms.
And dost thou ask how this can be?
Such wrongs beget such deep distress,
That though compelled to love thee more,
I'm also forced to like thee less.
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? 6o CATULLUS
LXXIII
Then cease to strive to win esteem,
Or think another fair;
The whole world's thankless, selfish, mean.
There's none who truly care.
Good deeds but weary, nay, far more,
They even oft offend ;
No enemy so bitter quite,
As he who was a friend.
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? CATULLUS 6i
LXXVI
If man finds solace to his woe,
When fell misfortune strikes him low,
In consciousness of rectitude
And loyal, honest attitude
Toward god and man, Catullus, thou
Might ease thy anguished heart-ache now,
Might hope some joys for thee remain,
Dispite thy baffled love's cruel pain.
In kindness wast thou ever slow.
Or didst thou ever fail to show
Devotion to her least caprice?
Thy love didst mightily increase,
Till every thought that thou didst own
Was lost in her and her alone.
What was it thou didst do or say
That caused her love to turn away?
Ah, surely, all that man could do
Thou didst -- ^Ah well, if this be true,
Why suffer more this sharp regret,
The gods have willed it so -- and yet,
Ah, love, I cannot let thee go!
Thou knowest I have loved thee so,
And thou art all my life to me,
I know no life apart from thee.
Jove*s self could not forget to sigh
If he had ever loved as I.
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? 62 CATULLUS
What can't be done, I still must do --
Forget, if I would live life through.
Then, if there be a god above
Who pities unrequited love,
Thou god, if thou canst feel or care
For mortal anguish -- hear my prayer!
If ever I have done a deed
That ministered to mortal need,
Behold my utter w^retchedness,
And lift from me this black distress.
This cursed love creeps through my frame,
Consuming with its deadly flame
My heart's last joy; my soul lies dead,
And I, a shade, move in its stead.
No more I ask what once I yearned --
That my love love me in return.
Nor yet a thing that could not be --
That she be worthy now of me.
I only ask, great gods above,
Ye free me from this deadly love!
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? CATULLUS 63
LXXXVII AND LXXV
No woman, Lesbia, can say she's been so loved as
thou,
Nor can she claim so true a heart as mine has been,
I vow.
Yet, by thy perfidy, my love, my mind is brought so
low
My heart so in devor'on lost, alas, I only know
I could not like thee once again should'st thou full
spotless be;
Yet, dear, do what thou wilt, and I must still keep
loving thee.
Note. -- These verses are usually edited as two frag-
ments. However, some commentators put them togeth-
er and they read much better so.
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? 64 CATULLUS
LXXXVI
Now, Quintia is handsome to many a vulgar eye,
Tall, straight, she is, and fair and round -- but
handsome J I'll deny.
No charm has she, nor piquancy, and not a grain
of grace,
In all her large and buxom frame, nor in her stolid
face.
Let men of taste behold my love, my Lesbia, and see
What beauty is in form and face in dame of high
degree.
What grace of motion, poise of head, what glances,
piercing sweet;
From shining hair, she's perfect all, to shapely little
feet.
It puzzles me, I must confess, how others dare
appear.
Whatever beauty they may boast, when Lesbia is
near.
For such her perfect loveliness, e'en Venus must
admit
The sex can claim no single charm but she has stolen
it.
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? CATULLUS
XCII
Fair Lesbi'a, when I am not by,
Abuses me most sadly;
Whereat I smile, by this I know
The lady loves me madly.
How do I know? Ah well, perchance.
It's lover's intuition --
Don't I berate her just as hard,
Yet love her to perdition?
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? 66 CATULLUS
XCVI
If into the silent torab can steal
Some tenderness, some thought devine,
If aught from this life the dead can feel,
Then, Calvus, be this solace thine.
When we mourn old friends with longing heart;
For dear dead loves in anguish cry,
Oh, there, do they feel the hot tears start,
Touched by a love that cannot die?
If this be, Calvus, thy sweet girl wife.
There in the tomb shall less grief know
For her spring time lost, her broken life,
Than joy in thy love that loved her so.
Note. -- Licinius Calvus, a poet, was one of Catullus'
closest friends and one in whom he found the happiest
companionship. They often wrote verses together in
friendly rivalry. The sprightly little satire, XIV, was
addressed to this same Calvus in return for his present
of a badly written book that had fallen into his hands.
The tender verses above were written by Catullus m
sympathy and consolation for the untimely death of
Calvus' young wife, Quintilia.
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? CATULLUS 67
XCIX
Once while you played, my pretty miss,
I snatched from you a honeyed kiss --
Oh, nectar is not sweeter!
Yet short my bliss, and swift 1 paid;
The haughty, saucy little maid
Was wroth I so should treat her.
An hour or more on bended knee,
I prayed that she would pardon me --
For how could one resist her. ^
With angry little finger tips
She rubbed and scoured her coral lips,
Lamenting that I'd kissed her.
The while she tortured my desire
With blood red mouth and eyes afire --
What though the minx seemed artless?
She knew she had me on the rack.
What could I do? -- Alas, alack,
That girls should be so hearties? !
If stolen kisses, nectar sweet.
Be turned to gall, in sure defeat,
By torture such as this is;
Such brief bliss I would fain forego,
And swear by all the gods I know
To never more steal kisses.
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? 68 CATULLUS
CI
Across wide lands, across a wider sea,
To this sad service. Brother, am I bourn
To pay thee death's last tribute and to mourn
By thy dead dust that cannot answer me.
This, this alone is left -- ah, can it be
Thy living self blind chance from me has torn.
That cruel death has left me thus forlorn.
And thou so loved, dear Brother, lost to me?
Still, must I bring, as men have done for years,
These last despairing rites, this solemn vow.
Here offered with a love too deep to tell,
And consecrated with a brother's tears.
Accept them, Brother all is done -- and now
Forever hail, forever fare thee well.
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? CATULLUS 69
CII
If ever friend has trusted friend
Whose faith is tried and true,
Discretion proved, allegiance firm,
Cornelius, it is you.
My tongue is bound, as by an oath,
A secret to defend;
The very god of Silence I,
When once I've pledged a friend.
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? 70 CATULLUS
CVII
If ever answer came to ceaseless prayer,
When hope was dead and longing well-nigh spent,
Oh, doubly dear the gifts the gods then lent
To heal the heart consumed with anxious care.
So Lesbia have you been restored to me,
Who longed, yet dared not hope such grace as this.
You came, at your sweet will -- oh wonderous bliss!
You came, my golden love, wide-armed and free.
Ah, fair white day with happiness leplete.
Bright day that brought my dear love back again,
What greater joy can come to mortal men,
What gift life hold that could be half so sweet?
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? CATULLUS 71
CIX
Oh Lesbia, my life, vou promised me,
This love of ours should be forever true,
Forever true and happy -- can there be
Such perfect joy bestowed on mortal two?
Vet grant, great gods, she promised from her soul,
And spoke w^ith all the ardor of her heart.
That I may keep her mine while season's roll.
And all life perish, e'er we two should part!
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? LOAN DEPT.
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