The diamond's virtues well might grace
The epigram, and both excel
In brilliancy in smallest space,
read more

The diamond's virtues well might grace
The epigram, and both excel
In brilliancy in smallest space,
And power to cut as well.

Lycoris has buried all the female friends she had, Fabianus:
would she were the friend of my wife!

Lycoris has buried all the female friends she had, Fabianus:
would she were the friend of my wife!

Acon his right, Leonilla her left eye
Doth want; yet each in form, the gods out-vie.
Sweet read more

Acon his right, Leonilla her left eye
Doth want; yet each in form, the gods out-vie.
Sweet boy, with thine, thy sister's sight improved:
So shall she Venus be, thou God of Love.
[Lat., Lumine Acon dextre,--capta est Leonilla sinistre,
Et potis est forma vincere uterque dees:
Blande puer, lumen quod habes concede sorori,
Sic tu caecus Amor, sic erit illa Venus.]

Never think of leaving perfumes or wine to your heir. Administer
these yourself, and let him have your money.

Never think of leaving perfumes or wine to your heir. Administer
these yourself, and let him have your money.

Report says that you, Fidentinus, recite my compositions in
public as if they were your own. If you allow read more

Report says that you, Fidentinus, recite my compositions in
public as if they were your own. If you allow them to be called
mine, I will send you my verses gratis; if you wish them to be
called yours, pray buy them, that they may be mine no longer.

Thou art so witty, profligate and thin,
At once we think thee Satan, Death and Sin.

Thou art so witty, profligate and thin,
At once we think thee Satan, Death and Sin.

You ask for lively epigrams, and propose lifeless subjects. What
can I do, Caecilianus? You expect Hyblaen or Hymethian read more

You ask for lively epigrams, and propose lifeless subjects. What
can I do, Caecilianus? You expect Hyblaen or Hymethian honey to
be produced, and yet offer the Attic bee nothing but Corsican
thyme?

If you wish, Faustinus, a bath of boiling water to be reduced in
temperature,--a bath, such as scarcely Julianus read more

If you wish, Faustinus, a bath of boiling water to be reduced in
temperature,--a bath, such as scarcely Julianus could enter,--ask
the rhetorician Sabinaeus to bathe himself in it. He would
freeze the warm baths of Nero.

See how the mountain goat hangs from the summit of the cliff; you
would expect it to fall; it read more

See how the mountain goat hangs from the summit of the cliff; you
would expect it to fall; it is merely showing its contempt for
the dogs.