§4.9.1Si licet et pateris, nomen facinusque tacebo, §4.9.2et tua Lethaeis acta dabuntur aquis, §4.9.3nostraque vincetur lacrimis clementia seris, §4.9.4fac modo te pateat paenituisse tui; §4.9.5fac modo te damnes cupiasque eradere vitae §4.9.6tempora, si possis, Tisiphonea tuae. §4.9.7sin minus, et flagrant odio tua pectora nostro, §4.9.8induet infelix arma coacta dolor, §4.9.9sim licet extremum, sicut sum, missus in orbem, §4.9.10nostra suas istinc porriget ira manus, §4.9.11omnia, si nescis, Caesar mihi iura reliquit, §4.9.12et sola est patria poena carere mea. §4.9.13et patriam, modo sit sospes, speramus ab illo: §4.9.14saepe Iovis telo quercus adusta viret. §4.9.15denique vindictae si sit mihi nulla facultas, §4.9.16Pierides vires et sua tela dabunt, §4.9.17quod Scythicis habitem longe summotus in oris, §4.9.18siccaque sint oculis proxima signa meis, §4.9.19nostra per inmensas ibunt praeconia gentes, §4.9.20quodque querar notum qua patet orbis erit. §4.9.21ibit ad occasum quicquid dicemus ab ortu, §4.9.22testis et Hesperiae vocis Eous erit. §4.9.23trans ego tellurem, trans altas audiar undas, §4.9.24et gemitus vox est magna futura mei, §4.9.25nec tua te sontem tantummodo saecula norint. §4.9.26perpetuae crimen posteritatis eris. §4.9.27iam feror in pugnas et nondum cornua sumpsi, §4.9.28nec mihi sumendi causa sit ulla velim. §4.9.29Circus adhuc cessat; spargit iam torvus harenam §4.9.30taurus et infesto iam pede pulsat humum. §4.9.31hoc quoque, quam volui, plus est.
If it is allowed and you permit, I will keep silent about your name and your crime,\n and your deeds will be given to the waters of Lethe,\n and my clemency will be conquered by your late tears,\n only make it clear that you have repented of yourself;\n only make yourself condemn yourself and desire to erase from your life\n that Tisiphonean time of yours, if you can.\n But if not, and your breast burns with hatred for me,\n my unhappy grief will don forced arms,\n although I may have been sent, as indeed I am, to the edge of the world,\n my anger will stretch out its hands from here to there,\n Caesar, in case you do not know, left me all my rights,\n and my only punishment is to lack my fatherland.\n And I hope for my fatherland from him, provided he remains safe:\n often the oak scorched by Jupiter's bolt grows green again.\n Finally, even if I should have no power of vengeance,\n the Pierides will give me strength and their own weapons,\n although I dwell far removed on Scythian shores,\n and the dry constellations are closest to my eyes.\n Our proclamations will go through immense nations,\n and whatever I complain of will be known wherever the world extends.\n Whatever we say will go from the rising to the setting sun,\n and the East will be witness to the Hesperian voice.\n I shall be heard across the earth, across the deep waves,\n and the voice of my groaning will be a great thing,\n nor shall your own age alone know you to be guilty.\n You will be the crime of eternal posterity.\n Already I am carried into battles, and yet I have not taken up horns,\n and I would wish there to be no cause for me to take them up.\n The Circus still rests; yet already the fierce bull scatters the sand\n and already strikes the ground with hostile hoof.\n This too is more than I wished.
cane, Musa, receptus, §4.9.32dum licet huic nomen dissimulare suum.
Muse, sound the retreat,\n while this man is allowed to conceal his name.