Odes 1.18 (Martin): Nullam, Vare

Let the vine, dearest Varus, the vine "be the first
Of all trees to be planted, of all to be nursed,
On thy well-shelter'd acres, round Catilus' walls,
"Where the sun on the green slopes of Tivoli falls!
For to him who ne'er moistens his lip with the grape
Life's every demand wears a terrible shape,
And wine, and wine only has magic to scare
Despondency's gloom or the torments of care.
"Who's he that, with wine's joyous fumes in his brain,
Of the travails of war, or of want will complain,
Nor rather, sire Bacchus, thy eulogies chant,
Or thine, Venus, thine, ever beautiful, vaunt?

Yet, that none may abuse the good gift, and o'erpass
The innocent mirth of a temperate glass,
A warning is set in the wine-kindled strife,
Where the Centaurs and Lapithae grappled for life;
In the madmen of Thrace, too, a warning is set,
Who, lost in then- Bacchanal frenzy, forget
The bounds that dissever the right from the wrong,
And sweep on the tide of their passions along.

Bright god of the vine, I never will share
In orgies so vile and unholy, nor tear
The clusters of various foliage away,
That keep thy blest mysteries veil'd from the day,
Then clash not the cymbals, and wind not the horn,
Dread sounds, of whose maddening accents are born
Blind Self-love, and Vanity lifting on high
Its feather-brain'd head, as't would strike at the sky,
And Frankness, transparent as crystal, that shows
In its babbling incontinence all that it knows.