Odes 2.14 (Creech): Eheu, Fugaces

THe whirling year, Ah Friend! the whirling year Rouls on apace;
And soon shall wrinkles plough thy wither'd Face:
In vain you wast your Pious breath,
No prayers can stay, no vows defer
The swift approach of Age, and conqu'ring Death:

No, tho ten thousand Oxen stain'd his Shrines With sacred Blood,
Shouldst thou appease the inexorable God:
He opens, and he shuts the Grave;
Geryon's triple Soul confines,
And stubborn Gyges with the Stygian Wave:

That fatal Wave that must be past by all, The Rich, the Poor
Are doom'd alike to view the Stygian Shore;
The Knaves and Fools, the Wise and Just,
The Kings as well as Clowns must fall;
And undistinguisht lie with meaner dust:

In vain we all retreat from dangerous War, And live in ease;
In vain we shun the rage of angry Seas:
The burning Fevers Autumn brings
In vain we fly, and idly fear
The Plagues that South-winds bear on sickly Wings:

For all the Stygian Waves are doom'd to pass, We all must go
And view Cocytus wandring Streams below:
We all must see the lasting Chains
That hold curst Danaus his Race,
And Sisyphus condemn'd to endless pains:

Thy Children must be left, thy Lands and House, Thy pleasing Wife,
That happy Comfort and Delight of Life;
Of all the Trees thy hands restor'd
None but the Cypress hated Boughs
Shall follow their short-liv'd decaying Lord:

The Wines you keep so close thy worthier Heir shall soon possess,
And wast midst wanton Luxury and Ease;
Much nobler Wine the squandring Youth
Shall spill and costlier Feasts prepare,
Than ever pleas'd a Pamper'd Abbots Tooth.