The Peaceful Heart (Prudentius, Psychomachia 779-784)

Here is a recording by Amy Hall of a lovely passage from near the end of Psychomachia (or “Battle within the Soul”), written around AD 400 by the Spanish-born Latin poet Aurelius Prudentius Clemens (whom you may now befriend on Facebook).

Psychomachia 770-784 Amy Hall

pax plenum Virtutis opus, pax summa laborum,

pax belli exacti pretium est pretiumque pericli.

sidera pace uigent, consistunt terrea pace.

nil placitum sine pace deo: non munus ad aram

cum cupias offerre probat, si turbida fratrem

mens inpacati sub pectoris oderit antro,

nec, si flammicomis Christi pro nomine martyr

ignibus insilias seruans inamabile uotum

bile sub obliqua, pretiosam proderit Iesu

inpendisse animam, meriti quia clausula pax est.

non inflata tumet, non inuidet aemula fratri,

omnia perpetitur patiens atque omnia credit,

nunquam laesa dolet, cuncta offensacula donat,

occasum lucis uenia praecurrere gestit,

anxia ne stabilem linquat sol conscius iram.