The phrase ‘damna reparant lunae’ is part of a line from Horace’s Ode 7, book 4, which contrasts the cyclical renewal of nature with the finality of human death, suggesting that while the moon and seasons regenerate, humans are gone forever once they die.

The full verse reads:

Damna tamen celeres reparant caelestia lunae:

nos ubi decidimus,

quo pius Aeneas, quo Tullus dives et Ancus,

pulvis et umbra sumus.

Which translates to:

Yet the moons are fast to make good their heavenly losses;

We, when we have fallen to,

Where good Aeneas and wealthy Tullus, and Ancus [have]

Are dust and shadow.