My languishing life at the hour of death.
Winter has begun to snow upon my head, A poetic metaphor for the graying of his hair due to old age and grief.
And my body, bowed low, prepares for the grave.
Happy is the death that ends our desires
As soon as Fate thwarts our pleasures.
But in truth, that death has neither grace nor charm,
Which refuses to close my eyelids to my tears.
She is without feeling, or perhaps without kindness,
Since I am now nothing more than an object of pity.
O Death, when I lived as a Friend of Fortune, Fortune: In the ancient and medieval world, Fortune was personified as a goddess who capriciously turns a wheel, raising people to power and then casting them into ruin.
The rigor of your laws seemed almost burdensome;
Now that Heaven begins to afflict me,
In letting me die, you fear to do me a favor.
Why then was my fortune believed to be prosperous?
If I had truly been happy, I would now be without misery. Boethius reflects a central theme of the book: that true happiness, if it were real, could not be taken away by external circumstances.

I. PROSE.

As I was thus speaking to myself, and tracing my complaints with my pen, I seemed to see above my head a Lady full of majesty, whose eyes were much more lively and sparkling than those of ordinary men. Her complexion was fresh, and her cheeks had a fullness original: "embon-point," meaning a healthy, robust appearance. that had in no way declined, although her age made this beauty appear to belong to another era than our own. Her stature was not always consistent; for at one moment she shrank to a just and measured height, and then suddenly one would have thought she touched the stars. In lifting her head, she directed her gaze not only above the heavens original: "les Astres," the stars or celestial bodies., but even human sight was too weak to follow her. Her garments were no less