Cicero's Tusculan Disputations. Marcus Cicero

      Oh that some friendly hand its aid would lend,

      My body from this rock’s vast height to send

      Into the briny deep! I’m all on fire,

      And by this fatal wound must soon expire.

      What tortures I endure no words can tell,

      Far greater these, than those which erst befell

      From the dire terror of thy consort, Jove—

      E’en stern Eurystheus’ dire command above;

      This of thy daughter, Œneus, is the fruit,

      Beguiling me with her envenom’d suit,

      Whose close embrace doth on my entrails prey,

      Consuming life; my lungs forbid to play;

      The blood forsakes my veins; my manly heart

      Forgets to beat; enervated, each part

      Neglects its office, while my fatal doom

      Proceeds ignobly from the weaver’s loom.

      The hand of foe ne’er hurt me, nor the fierce

      Giant issuing from his parent earth.

      Ne’er could the Centaur such a blow enforce,

      No barbarous foe, nor all the Grecian force;

      This arm no savage people could withstand,

      Whose realms I traversed to reform the land.

      Thus, though I ever bore a manly heart,

      I fall a victim to a woman’s art.

      Assist, my son, if thou that name dost hear,

      My groans preferring to thy mother’s tear:

      Convey her here, if, in thy pious heart,

      Thy mother shares not an unequal part:

      Proceed, be bold, thy father’s fate bemoan,

      Nations will join, you will not weep alone.

      Oh, what a sight is this same briny source,

      Unknown before, through all my labors’ course!

      That virtue, which could brave each toil but late,

      With woman’s weakness now bewails its fate.

      Approach, my son; behold thy father laid,

      A wither’d carcass that implores thy aid;

      Let all behold: and thou, imperious Jove,

      On me direct thy lightning from above:

      Now all its force the poison doth assume,

      And my burnt entrails with its flame consume.

      Crestfallen, unembraced, I now let fall

      Listless, those hands that lately conquer’d all;

      When the Nemæan lion own’d their force,

      And he indignant fell a breathless corse;

      The serpent slew, of the Lernean lake,

      As did the Hydra of its force partake:

      By this, too, fell the Erymanthian boar:

      73E’en Cerberus did his weak strength deplore.

      This sinewy arm did overcome with ease

      That dragon, guardian of the Golden Fleece.

      My many conquests let some others trace;

      It’s mine to say, I never knew disgrace.31

      Thou heav’n-born race of Titans here fast bound,

      Behold thy brother! As the sailors sound

      With care the bottom, and their ships confine

      To some safe shore, with anchor and with line;

      So, by Jove’s dread decree, the God of fire

      Confines me here the victim of Jove’s ire.

      With baneful art his dire machine he shapes;

      From such a God what mortal e’er escapes?

      When each third day shall triumph o’er the night,

      Then doth the vulture, with his talons light,

      Seize on my entrails; which, in rav’nous guise,

      He preys on! then with wing extended flies

      Aloft, and brushes with his plumes the gore:

      But when dire Jove my liver doth restore,

      Back he returns impetuous to his prey,

      Clapping his wings, he cuts th’ ethereal way.

      Thus do I nourish with my blood this pest,

      Confined my arms, unable to contest;

      Entreating only that in pity Jove

      Would take my life, and this cursed plague remove.

      But endless ages past unheard my moan,

      Sooner shall drops dissolve this very stone.32