Marco Girolamo Vida quotes
When first to man the privilege was given
To hold by verse an intercourse with Heaven,
Unwilling that the immortal art should lie
Cheap, and exposed to every vulgar eye,
Great Jove, to drive away the groveling crowd,
To narrow bounds confined the glorious road,
For more exalted spirits to pursue,
And left it open to the sacred few.
Marco Girolamo Vida
But ne'er the subject of your work proclaim
In its own colors and its genuine name;
Let it by distant tokens be conveyed,
And wrapped in other words, and covered in their shade.
At last the subject from the friendly shroud
Bursts out, and shines the brighter from the cloud;
Then the dissolving darkness breaks away,
And every object glares in open day.
Thus great Ulysses' toils were I to choose
For the main theme that should employ my Muse,
By his long labors of immortal fame
Should shine my hero, but conceal his name;
As one who, lost at sea, had nations seen,
And marked their towns, their manners, and their men,
Since Troy was leveled to the dust by Greece-
Till a few lines epitomized the piece.
Marco Girolamo Vida
