Passages from Victory Odes

What it costs to choose a life that might be remembered.

In the path doth a mighty peril lie;To the craven soul no welcome it gives.But, seeing a man must needs once die,Wherefore should I unto old age screenFrom peril a life that only lives,Sitting nameless and fameless in darkness unseen,In the deeds of the valiant never sharing?Nay, lies at my feet the challenge now:I will accept it for doing and daring!Good speed to mine heart’s desire grant thou!”Not fruitless the cry of his heart’s desiringWas uttered. The God heard gracious-souled,And crowned him with honour. Winged steeds untiringHe gave, and a chariot of gold.

Why the unsung hero loses half his glory.

Even so, Agesidamus, when from emprise nobly wroughtA man descendeth all unsung to mansions of the dead,Scant pleasure all his toil hath won, his breath was spent for nought.But upon thee the sweet-voiced lyre and dulcet flute have shedThe grace of all their winsomeness: like some wide-spreading treeBy those Zeus-born Pierian Maids thy fame shall fostered be.

Where aspiration ends and presumption begins.

To chant a triumph than all more sweet,Inspiration-wafted, as one that fliesIn a chariot, on paths of utterance meet,Till I win unto Kronos’ Hill sunbright.O yea, in my Muses’ quiver liesA song-arrow winged for stronger flight.By diverse paths men upward aspire:Earth’s highest summit by kings is attained.Thou therefore look to attain no higherThan earth. Be it thine on the height thou hast gainedTo pace mid splendour of royal achievingThy life through: mine be it no less longTo consort with victors, from Hellas receivingThe world o’er praise for my song.

Why envy always follows the generous.

Yet praise is by spite ever dogged, wherein never is justice abiding,But from grasping envy it springs; with its slanders it fain would be hidingIn darkness the good deeds doneBy the noble of heart. But, as no man can number the great sea’s sands,So the joys on his fellow-men showered by Theron with lavish hands,Who telleth the tale of them? None!

The future is a room we cannot see into.

But through all the years never any of men on the earth abidingHath found sure tokens from God to revealHow he shall fare in the days to come, but in darkness hidingAre the future’s warnings of woe or weal.Many chances to men have befallen, yea, past all expectation:Some plunge from joy into sorrow’s abyss;And some, who have battled with troublous surges, by sudden mutationTheir anguish have changed for the height of bliss.

A rest that only the just are promised.

But through sunlitten nights and days a life of bliss untoilingIs ordained for the righteous-souled.No more for a meagre pittance they labour the land sore moiling,Nor on stormy seas are they rolled;But with them that be honoured of Gods, who had pleasure in leal oathkeeping,They have joy of a tearless life, while the wicked are endlessly reapingSin-harvests too dread to behold.

The quiet ceremony of giving a daughter away.

As a father with wealth-laden hand uplifteth a cupWith the flashing dew of the joy-giving wine brimmed up,And pledgeth therein the youth who hath won for a brideHis daughter, and therewith giveth to him, to bearFrom the old home unto the new, that golden prideOf his treasures, and maketh the fair feast yet more fair,And his kinsman envied of all friends banqueting thereFor the marriage that joins hearts, one evermore to abide;