Alba's hill, Home of our gods, no human foot shall tread, Save of some Senator at the ancient feast By Numa's orders founded -- he compelled Serves his high office.

(16) Void and desolate Are Veii, Cora and Laurentum's hold; Yet not the tooth of envious time destroyed These storied monuments -- 'twas civil war That rased their citadels.

Where now hath fled The teeming life that once Italia knew?
Not all the earth can furnish her with men: Untenanted her dwellings and her fields: Slaves till her soil: one city holds us all: Crumbling to ruin, the ancestral roof Finds none on whom to fall; and Rome herself, Void of her citizens, draws within her gates The dregs of all the world.

That none might wage A civil war again, thus deeply drank Pharsalia's fight the life-blood of her sons.
Dark in the calendar of Rome for aye, The days when Allia and Cannae fell: And shall Pharsalus' morn, darkest of all, Stand on the page unmarked?
Alas, the fates! Not plague nor pestilence nor famine's rage, Not cities given to the flames, nor towns Trembling at shock of earthquake shall weigh down Such heroes lost, when Fortune's ruthless hand Lops at one blow the gift of centuries, Leaders and men embattled.

How great art thou, Rome, in thy fall! Stretched to the widest bounds War upon war laid nations at thy feet Till flaming Titan nigh to either pole Beheld thine empire; and the furthest east Was almost thine, till day and night and sky For thee revolved, and all the stars could see Throughout their course was Roman.