but this is far preferable to retaining the words in a diluted form,
and so losing what gives them their character, I cannot doubt, then,
that it is necessary in translating an Ode of Horace to choose some
analogous metre; as little can I doubt that a translator of the Odes
should appropriate to each Ode some particular metre as its own. It may
be true that Horace himself does not invariably suit his metre to his
subject; the solemn Alcaic is used for a poem in dispraise of serious
thought and praise of wine; the Asclepiad stanza in which Quintilius is
lamented is employed to describe the loves of Maecenas and Licymnia.
But though this consideration may influence us in our choice of an
English metre, it is no reason for not adhering to the one which we may
have chosen. If we translate an Alcaic and a Sapphic Ode into the same
English measure, because the feeling in both appears to be the same, we
are sure to sacrifice some important characteristic of the original in
the case of one or the other, perhaps of both. It is better to try to
make an English metre more flexible than to use two different English
metres to represent two different aspects of one measure in Latin. I am
sorry to say that I have myself deviated from this rule occasionally,
under circumstances which I shall soon have to explain; but though I
may perhaps succeed in showing that my offences have not been serious,
I believe the rule itself to be one of universal application, always
honoured in the observance, if not always equally dishonoured in the
breach.

The question, what metres should be selected, is of course one of very
great difficulty. I can only explain what my own practice has been,
with some of the reasons which have influenced me in particular cases.
Perhaps we may take Milton's celebrated translation of the Ode to
Pyrrha as a starting point. There can be no doubt that to an English
reader the metre chosen does give much of the effect of the original;