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Dixerat. Ille Iovis monitis immota tenebat

lumina, et obnixus curam sub corde premebat.

Tandem pauca refert: "Ego te, quae plurima fando

enumerare vales, numquam, regina, negabo

promeritam; nec me meminisse pigebit Elissae,        335

dum memor ipse mei, dum spiritus hos regit artus.

Pro re pauca loquar. Neque ego hanc abscondere furto

speravi—ne finge—fugam, nec coniugis umquam

praetendi taedas, aut haec in foedera veni.

Me si fata meis paterentur ducere vitam                     340

auspiciis et sponte mea componere curas,

urbem Troianam primum dulcisque meorum

reliquias colerem, Priami tecta alta manerent,

et recidiva manu posuissem Pergama victis.

Sed nunc Italiam magnam Gryneus Apollo,                345

Italiam Lyciae iussere capessere sortes:

hic amor, haec patria est. Si te Karthaginis arces,

Phoenissam, Libycaeque aspectus detinet urbis,

quae tandem, Ausonia Teucros considere terra,

invidia est? Et nos fas extera quaerere regna.            350

Me patris Anchisae, quotiens umentibus umbris

nox operit terras, quotiens astra ignea surgunt,

admonet in somnis et turbida terret imago;

me puer Ascanius capitisque iniuria cari,

quem regno Hesperiae fraudo et fatalibus arvis.        355

Nunc etiam interpres divom, Iove missus ab ipso—

testor utrumque caput—celeris mandata per auras

detulit; ipse deum manifesto in lumine vidi

intrantem muros, vocemque his auribus hausi.

Desine meque tuis incendere teque querelis:              360

Italiam non sponte sequor."

Summary by Thomas Jenkins

Aeneas' (in)famous farewell speech to Dido, an embarrassment to those who prefer an Aeneas unsullied by aspersions on his character. Some have faulted the excessively rhetorical and almost analytical character of the speech; unlike the speeches of Dido, there are no ringing declamations of passion, no outbursts, no agitation. It is a cool and quiet speech, with some canny rhetorical moves. Some readers might gasp at Aeneas' assertion: "I wasn't going to flee in secret—don't even pretend that I was" [Neque ego hanc abscondere furto speravi—ne finge—fugam]. Such protestations of innocence ring rather hollow given Aeneas' preparations for exactly such a hasty departure. He realizes that his stated motive for leaving—a message from Hermes—might well fall on disbelieving ears, and therefore works strenuously to persuade Dido that a supernatural being did appear in an epiphany. Even if one views the preceding lines askance, one must note the real longing and wistfulness in the [incomplete?] last line of the speech, "I do not follow Italy of my own accord," a line that neatly juxtaposes the issue of destiny—Rome at all costs—and the individual desires of men.

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Virgil, Aeneid 4.331–361 (Dryden's translation) read by Kathleen M. Coleman