Dear Ovid, who to Caledonia's snow
And Tethys and old Ocean now must go,
Leaving Nomentum and King Numa's heights
And that warm hearth in which your age delights,
Fate cannot be differred though pleasure may,
Her threads to your account each moment pay.
So when you've shown, your comrade dear to please,
That you prefer your promise to your ease,
Then to your Sabine farm your presence lend
And count yourself your own most precious friend.

— translated by Frederick Adam Wright