Carpe diem is Latin for (approximately) "seize the day" or "enjoy the moment". This rule of life is found in the "Odes" (I, 11.8) of the Roman poet Horace (658 v. Chr.), where it reads:
- Carpe diem quam minimum credula postero
- ("seize this day, never trust the next")
Among the Horation themes treated by Herrick was that of carpe diem, "seize the day", the famous motto of Odes 1.11. Another of Herrick's poems, His Age [1] includes the lines:
- Ah Posthumus! Our years hence fly,
- And leave no sound; nor piety,
- Or prayers, or vow
- Can keep the wrinkle from the brow -
- A merry mind
- Looks forward, scorns what's left behind;
- Let's live, my Wickes, then, while we may
- An here enjoy our holiday.
William Shakespeare also wrote a poem called Carpe Diem: [1]
- O MISTRESS mine, where are you roaming?
- O stay and hear! your true-love's coming
- That can sing both high and low;
- Trip no further, pretty sweeting,
- Journeys end in lovers meeting -
- Every wise man's son doth know.
- Every wise man's son doth know.
- What is love? 'tis not hereafter;
- Present mirth hath present laughter;
- What's to come is still unsure:
- In delay there lies no plenty, -
- Then come kiss me, Sweet-and-twenty,
- Youth's a stuff will not endure.
- Youth's a stuff will not endure.
- But if you listen real close, you can hear them whisper their legacy to you. Go on, lean in. Listen, you hear it? - Carpe - hear it? - Carpe, carpe diem, seize the day boys, make your lives extraordinary.
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