Quid, si scripsissem mimos obscena iocantes,
qui semper uetiti crimen amoris habent,
in quibus assidue cultus procedit adulter,
uerbaque dat stulto callida nupta uiro?
Nubilis hos uirgo matronaque uirque puerque
spectat, et ex magna parte senatus adest.
Nec satis incestis temerari uocibus aures;
adsuescunt oculi multa pudenda pati.
cumque fefellit amans aliqua nouitate maritum
plauditur et magno palma fauore datur.
quoque minus prodest, scaena est lucrosa poetae,
tantaque non paruo crimina praetor emit.
Inspice ludorum sumptus, Auguste, tuorum;
empta tibi magno talia multa leges.
Haec tu spectasti spectandaque saepe dedisti
(maiestas adeo comis ubique tua est)
luminibusque tuis, totus quibus utitur orbis,
scaenica uidisti lentus adulteria.
Scribere si fas est imitantes turpia mimos,
materiae minor est debita poena meae.
An genus hoc scripti faciunt sua pulpita tutum —
quodque licet, mimis scaena licere dedit?
What if I had written mimes, that joke about indecent things,
that always have the crime of forbidden love,
in which the sophisticated adulterer constantly appears
and the clever wife cheats her stupid husband?
The marriageable maiden, the wife, the husband, and the boy
all watch these, and to a large extent the Senate is present as well.
It is not enough that your ears are disgraced by unchaste words,
but your eyes grow accustomed to experiencing many shameful sights.
When the lover has deceived the husband by some novel trick,
he is applauded and given the palm of victory with much clapping.
Even as the stage is not very useful, it is profitable for a poet,
and the praetor buys so many crimes at no small price.
Look into the expenses of your games, Augustus;
you will read many such things purchased by you at great cost.
You yourself have viewed these things and have often put these on view
(so generous is your majesty everywhere),
and with your own eyes, which the whole world employs,
you have calmly watched staged adulteries.
If it is acceptable to write mimes that imitate vices,
then the punishment for my material ought to be less.
Or does its own stage setting make this kind of writing safe —
and because it is allowed, has the stage itself given license to the mimes?