Happy and thrice happy are those who enjoy an uninterrupted union, and whose love, unbroken by any sour complaints, shall not dissolve until the last day of their existence.
Happy he who far from business, like the primitive are of mortals, cultivates with his own oxen the fields of his fathers, free from all anxieties of gain.
And yet more bright
Shines out the Julian star,
As moon outglows each lesser light.
[Lat., Micat inter omnes
Iulium sidus, velut inter ignes
Luna minores.]
I praise her (Fortune) while she lasts; if she shakes her quick wings, I resign what she has given, and take refuge in my own virtue, and seek honest undowered Poverty.