Book I, Epigram 70 (Ker)

Go forth, my book, to bear my greeting for me; 'tis to the smart house of Proculus you are bidden to go, a duteous messenger. You ask the way? I'll tell you. You will pass the temple of Castor near time-honoured Vesta, and the house of the Vestals. Thence by the Sacred Slope you will make for the august Palatine, where gleams many a statue of our illustrious Commander. Let not the mass, girt with rays, of the wondrous Colossus that exults to surpass the labour of Rhodes, detain you. Bend round here where is the roof of wine-drenched Lyaeus, and Cybele's dome stands with its painted Corybants. Right before you on the left a dwelling with shining front and the hall of a lofty house invite approach. Make for this; and, that you may not fear any disdain and a proud threshold, know that 110 portal gapes so wide to show its doorposts, nor is there one whereto Phoebus and the learned Sisters draw more near in love. If he shall say, "Yet why did he not come himself?" thus you may excuse me: "Because those poems, whatever their worth, no man could have written who attends levees."