1What a patient man you are, or rather a hard and almost cruel one, to keep such distinguished books back so long! 2How long will you begrudge both yourself and us, yourself the highest praise, us the pleasure? 2Let them pass through the mouths of men and travel over the same spaces as the Roman tongue. 2The expectation is great and already long, and you ought not to disappoint and defer it any longer. 3Some of your verses have become known and, against your will, have broken through their bars. 3Unless you call them back into the body of the work, some day, like runaway slaves, they will find someone whose they will be said to be.
4Keep mortality before your eyes, from which you can free yourself by this one monument; 4for all else, frail and perishable, falls and comes to an end no less than men themselves. 5You will say, as you usually do: 'My friends will see to it.' 5I do indeed wish you friends so faithful, so learned, so hard-working that they would be both able and willing to undertake so much care and attention, but consider whether it is not rather improvident to hope from others what you do not do for yourself. 6As for publication, do as you like for the moment: at least give a recitation, so that you may be more inclined to send them out, and so that at last you may feel the joy which I have long and not rashly anticipated on your behalf.
7For I imagine what throngs, what admiration await you, what applause, and even what silence; 7and silence, when I speak or recite, delights me no less than applause, provided only it is keen and intent and eager to hear what follows. 8Stop cheating your work of so great a reward, so readily available, by this endless delay of yours; 8for when it goes beyond measure, there is a danger that it may earn the name of laziness and sloth, or even of timidity. 8Farewell.