The poem opens with a strange, heavy image: a well-fed ox that seems to loom like a building and smells as thick as night. It's a picture of excess, of bigness that has stopped being impressive and turned oppressive. Then the speaker steps in with a wry, slightly reluctant turn. Life is a blessing, they say, but they are "much against too much."
The last two lines are the hardest to pin down. "Now that we leave pleasure / to the rope" could suggest that pleasure has been handed over to something that binds, restrains or hangs, though the poem doesn't spell it out. One reading is that indulgence ends up tied to its own punishment, or that we have given up on moderation and left pleasure to be dragged along.
The mood is dry and cautionary, with a little humor in the clipped, almost proverb-like phrasing. The speaker sounds wary rather than preachy, wanting appetite kept within limits.