Metrum 4
B.'s goal is indicated by a portrait of the truly wise man, serenely above all the hopes and fears of worldly life. Meter: Phalaecean hendecasyllable - - - u u - x - u - - (which is composed of glyconic - - - u u - u - + bacchiac u - - ). Word end often occurs after the sixth syllable, but there are exceptions. The second-to-last position of the glyconic is anceps, not short as it is in ordinary glyconics (as in M6 for example). The first two positions (Aeolic base) are always long, as is typical from the Augustan age onwards.composito aevo: "of a settled age" (ablative of description). serenus: cf. 3M9.26, where God is called serenity itself.
fatum sub pedibus egit: cf. 3M12.1-2; compare Vergil's famous lines: felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas atque metus omnis et inexorabile fatum subiecit pedibus . . . (Georgics 2.490-492) ["Happy the man who can understand the causes of things and trample under foot all his fears, and fate deaf to prayer as well."] pedibus: final syllable closed (hence long) before word end.
fortunam . . . utramque: both good fortune and bad. rectus: "upright, erect," unlike B., whose head is bowed to gaze upon the ground.
versum: "turned over" (< verto ), with the adverb funditus ("from the bottom, completely"). exagitantis: modifies ponti . The line contains 12 syllables, with two short syllables in the seventh position.
caminis: "furnaces."
Vesaevus: i.e., Mt. Vesuvius.
soliti: modifies fulminis (line 10) and takes a complementary infinitive ( ferire ).
via: subject of movebit ; via fulminis , "path of the lightning," i.e., "lightning bolt."
tantum: adverbial, "so much."
Nec speres . . . nec extimescas: subjunctive of the negative command. Stronger punctuation (a colon) would be possible at the end of this line.
exarmaveris: future perfect, "you will have disarmed." impotentis: genitive, "not master of himself."
quod: "because." sui . . . iuris: predicative genitive, "[subject to] his own law," i.e., "his own master." valeat: valeo in late Latin is almost interchangeable in meaning and syntax with possum .