5.
“For now, we have made you of marble, in accordance with the cost: but when Augustus the father returns, you shall be gold.”
Nunc te mamoreum pro sumtu fecimus: at cum
Augustus frater remeaverit, Aureus esto.
6.
“The death which the lion suffers under a blow from such a tiny reed is not inflicted by the weapon, but the one who wields it.”
Quod leo tam tenui patitur sub arundine letum
non vires ferri, sed ferientis agunt.
7.
“Today, I shall be considered a woman fortunate beyond all others, whether I give birth to a god or a man.”
Ante omnes alias felix tamen hoc ego dicar:
sive deum peperi foemina, sive virum.
This is really some terrible, terrible stuff.
Why have we so little Ennius when so much Ausonius survives. What a cruel world.
Ennius wasn’t a court poet. No accident, sir, no accident!
Remember, though, in Donatus’ Life of Virgil:
“When he had a copy of Ennius in his hand and was asked what he was doing, he responded that he was busy collecting gold from the shit-heap of Ennius.”
cum Ennium in manu haberet rogareturque, quidnam faceret, respondit se aurum colligere de stercore Ennii.
My own personal taste makes me wish that we had all of Petronius. I would easily trade any Silver Latin author for it, and perhaps even a couple Augustans!