Inducitur Archytas Philofophus & Geometra naute cuidam refpondens, quod omnibus fit moriendum, petenfque à nauta ne finat corpus fuum jacere in littore infepultum.

TE maris & terræ, numeroque carentis arenæ
Menforem cohibent, Archyta,

Pulveris exigui prope littus parva Matinum
Munera; nec quicquam tibi prodest
Aërias tentaffe domos, animoque rotundum
Percurriffe polum, morituro.

Occidit & Pelopis genitor, conviva deorum :
Tithonufque remotus in auras :

Et Jovis arcanis Minos admiffus. Habentque
Tartara Panthoiden, iterum Orco
Demiffum quamvis clypeo Trojana refixo
Tempora teftatus, nihil ultra

Nervos atque cutem morti conceffèrat atræ:
Judice te non fordidus autor

PROSE INTERPRETATION.

O Archytas, the scanty gift of a little duft near the Matinian fhore, detains thee the furveyor of fea and earth, and the fand, which has no number; nor does it profit you any thing to have attempted, in your ftate of mortality, the etherial regions, and to have run through the round world in your mind. In like manner did the father of Pelops, the gueft of the Gods, die, and Thithonus removed into the air, and Minos admitted into the privy-council of Jupiter: and the Tartarian regions have the son of Panthous once more difmiffed

Archytas a philofopher and geometrician is introduced remonftrating to a certain failor, that all must die, and beseeching that he would not fuffer bis corpse to lie unburied on the fore.

ARCHYTAS, born to compass land and fea,
And of the countless fand thy charts to make,
A little boon of duft fuffices thee,

Which on Matinian fhores thy relicks take.
Nor is there profit in those airy dreams,

When you the houses of the planets try'd,
And the round world determin'd by your schemes,
Since in your death all these grand projects dy'd.
The fire of Pelops in like manner fell,

Tho' with the Gods he feafted in the sky;
Tithonus chang'd into a fauterelle,

And Minos in Jove's fecrets wont to pry.

*

Death too has got Panthoides again,

Tho' having taken from the wall his fhield,

He cou'd fo well the Trojan times explain,

Nor ought to death but fkin and nerves cou'd yield.

* Pythagoras afferted that his identical jpirt, about feven hundred years before, was the foul of Eu

phorbus the fon of Panthous, who was flain at the fiege of Troy.

PROSE INTERPRETATION,

difmiffed to hell, notwithstanding his fhield being retaken from the temple, he gave teftimony of the Trojan times, and that he had given up to dusky death nothing but his nerves and

fkin,

Naturæ verique. Sed omnes una manet nox,
Et calcanda femel via lethi.

Dant alios Furiæ torvo fpectacula Marti:

Exitio eft avidis mare nautis..

Mista fenum ac juvenum denfantur funera : nullum
Sæva caput Proferpina fugit.

Me quoque

devexi rapidus comes Orionis,

Illyricis Notus obruit undis.

At tu, nauta, vaga ne parce malignus arenæ

Offibus & capiti inhumato

Particulam dare: fic, quodcunque minabitur Eurus
Fluctibus Hefperiis, Venusinæ

Plectantur fylvæ, te fofpite: multaque merces,
Unde poteft, tibi defluat æquo

Ab Jove, Neptunoque facri cuftode Tarenti.
Negligis immeritis nocituram

Poft modo te natis fraudem committere Forfan.
Debita jura vicefquæ fuperbæ

PROSE INTERPRETATION.

fkin, one, in your judgment, of no mean authority respecting nature and truth. But one night awaits all men; the path of death muft once be trod. The furies give up some to be ipectacles of horrible Mars; the fea is the perdition of greedy failors. The mixed funerals of young and old are crouded together. Not one head has ever the cruel Proferpine paffed The fouth wind, that rapid companion of the declining Orion, has overwhelmed me alfo in the Illyrian waves. But do not thou, O failor, malignant, fpare to give a portion of loofe fand to my bones and head uninterred. So, whatfoever the east shall menace to the Hefperian feas, let the Venufinian groves pay for it, while you are in fafety; and may much profit, from whence it may, flow down upon you from

over.

Jove

This was no mean profeffor in the ways

Of truth and nature, as you did prefume-
But night, a gen'ral night, its wing displays,

And all at length must travel to the tomb.
The furies fome expose to martial rage,
The greedy failors perifh in the wave,
The funerals increase of youth and age,
None from fell Proferpine themselves can fave,
Me, e'en Archytas, the outrageous fouth,
Upon oblique Orion fure t' attend,

Where that ILLYRIC opes her gulphing mouth,
Involved at once in an unlook'd-for end.
But thou, O failor, do not check thy hand,
Nor grutch on these unburied bones to throw
A little portion of the common fand-

So may the eastern blasts, whate'er you owe,
Whate're they threaten to th' Hefperian floods,
(Thee fafe) make Venufinian forrests pay,
And Jove and Neptune, with great ftore of goods,
Thee to Tarentum's port, in peace convey.
But fhou'd you this benevolence neglect,

A fraud about to hurt your fons unborn, Perchance, a due reward you may expect, Of equal terror, and of equal fcorn.

PROSE INTERPRETATION.

Jove and Neptune guardian of facred Tarentum. But if perchance you make flight of committing a piece of injustice, which will prove detrimental to your innocent pofterity; just laws, and a contemptuous reverfe of fortune, await you in

your

Te maneant ipfum: precibus non linquar inultis:
Teque piacula nulla refolvent.

Quanquam feftinas (non eft mora longa) licebit
Injecto ter pulvere curras.

PROSE INTERPRETATION.

your turn. I will not be left with fruitless prayers, and no atonement shall abfolve you. Though you are making hafte, it is not fo long a delay: after having thrice fprinkled the duft over me, you may run your course.

C

ODE