Than were their sires, hath born us yet
More wicked, destined to beget
A race more vicious still.

(III, vi, 45.)

3. PHILOSOPHICAL. "How charming is divine philosophy?" said the meek
younger brother in "Comus" to his instructive senior. Speaking as one
of the profane, I find not less charming the humanist philosophy of
Horace. Be content! be moderate! seize the present! are his maxims.

_Be content!_ A mind without anxiety is the highest good (II, xvi).
Great desires imply great wants (III, xvi, 42). 'Tis well when prayer
seeks and obtains no more than life requires.

Happy he,
Self-centred, who each night can say,
"My life is lived": the morn may see
A clouded or a sunny day:
That rests with Jove; but what is gone
He will not, can not, turn to nought,
Nor cancel as a thing undone
What once the flying hour has brought.

(III, xxix, 41.)

_Be moderate!_ He that denies himself shall gain the more (III, xvi,
21). He that ruleth his spirit is better than the lord of Carthage.
Hold fast the golden mean (II, x, 5). The poor man's supper, spare
but neat and free from care, with no state upon the board except his
heirloom silver saltcellar, is better than a stalled ox and care
therewith (II, xvi, 13). And he practised what he preached, refusing
still fresh bounties which Maecenas pressed upon him. What more want
I than I have? he says:

Truth is mine with genius mixed,
The rich man comes and knocks at my poor gate.
Favoured thus I ne'er repine,
Nor weary Heaven for more, nor to the great
For larger bounty pray,
My Sabine farm my one sufficient boon.

(II, xviii, 9.)

_Seize the Present!_ _Now_ bind the brow with late roses and with myrtle
crowns; now drown your cares in wine, counting as gain each day that
Chance may give (I, vii, 31; I, ix, 14). Pale Death will be here anon;
even while I speak time slips away: seize to-day, trust nothing to the
morrow.

Ah, my Beloved, fill the cup that clears
_To-day_ of past regrets and future fears:
_To-morrow?_ why to-morrow I may be
Myself with yesterday's seven thousand years.

What more commonplace than this saying that we all must die? but he
brings it home to us ever and again with pathetic tearful fascinating
force. Each time we read him, his sweet sad pagan music chants its ashes
to ashes, dust to dust, and we hear the earth fall upon the coffin lid
amongst the flowers.

Ah, Postumus, they