Part 66 (1/2)
”Candida Leucothoe placet, et placet atra Melaene, Sed Galatea placet longe magis omnibus una.”
”Fair Leucothe, black Melene please me well, But Galatea doth by odds the rest excel.”
All the gracious elogies, metaphors, hyperbolical comparisons of the best things in the world, the most glorious names; whatsoever, I say, is pleasant, amiable, sweet, grateful, and delicious, are too little for her.
”Phoebo pulchrior et sorore Phoebi.”
”His Phoebe is so fair, she is so bright, She dims the sun's l.u.s.tre, and the moon's light.”
Stars, sun, moons, metals, sweet-smelling flowers, odours, perfumes, colours, gold, silver, ivory, pearls, precious stones, snow, painted birds, doves, honey, sugar, spice, cannot express her, [5401]so soft, so tender, so radiant, sweet, so fair is she.--_Mollior cuniculi capillo_, &c.
[5402] ”Lydia bella, puelia candida, Quae bene superas lac, et lilium, Albamque simul rosam et rubicundam, Et expolitum ebur Indic.u.m.”
”Fine Lydia, my mistress, white and fair, The milk, the lily do not thee come near; The rose so white, the rose so red to see, And Indian ivory comes short of thee.”
Such a description our English Homer makes of a fair lady
[5403] _That Emilia that was fairer to seen, Then is lily upon the stalk green: And fresher then May with flowers new, For with the rose colour strove her hue, I no't which was the fairer of the two_.
In this very phrase [5404]Polyphemus courts Galatea:
”Candidior folio nivei Galatea ligustri, Floridior prato, longa procerior alno, Splendidior vitro, tenero lascivior haedo, &c.
Mollior et cygni plumis, et lacte coacto.”
”Whiter Galet than the white withie-wind, Fresher than a field, higher than a tree, Brighter than gla.s.s, more wanton than a kid, Softer than swan's down, or ought that may be.”
So she admires him again, in that conceited dialogue of Lucian, which John Secundus, an elegant Dutch modern poet, hath translated into verse. When Doris and those other sea nymphs upbraided her with her ugly misshapen lover, Polyphemus; she replies, they speak out of envy and malice,
[5405] ”Et plane invidia huc mera vos stimulare videtur.
Quod non vos itidem ut me Polyphemus amet;”
Say what they could, he was a proper man. And as Heloise writ to her sweetheart Peter Abelard, _Si me Augustus...o...b..s imperator uxorem expeteret, mallem tua esse meretrix quam orbis imperatrix_; she had rather be his va.s.sal, his quean, than the world's empress or queen.--_non si me Jupiter ipse forte velit_,--she would not change her love for Jupiter himself.
To thy thinking she is a most loathsome creature; and as when a country fellow discommended once that exquisite picture of Helen, made by Zeuxis, [5406]for he saw no such beauty in it; Nichomachus a lovesick spectator replied, _Sume tibi meos oculos et deam existimabis_, take mine eyes, and thou wilt think she is a G.o.ddess, dote on her forthwith, count all her vices virtues; her imperfections infirmities, absolute and perfect: if she be flat-nosed, she is lovely; if hook-nosed, kingly; if dwarfish and little, pretty; if tall, proper and man-like, our brave British Boadicea; if crooked, wise; if monstrous, comely; her defects are no defects at all, she hath no deformities. _Immo nec ipsum amicae stercus foetet_, though she be nasty, fulsome, as Sostratus' b.i.t.c.h, or Parmeno's sow; thou hadst as live have a snake in thy bosom, a toad in thy dish, and callest her witch, devil, hag, with all the filthy names thou canst invent; he admires her on the other side, she is his idol, lady, mistress, [5407]venerilla, queen, the quintessence of beauty, an angel, a star, a G.o.ddess.
”Thou art my Vesta, thou my G.o.ddess art, Thy hallowed temple only is my heart.”
The fragrancy of a thousand courtesans is in her face: [5408]_Nec pulchrae effigies, haec Cypridis aut Stratonices_; 'tis not Venus' picture that, nor the Spanish infanta's, as you suppose (good sir), no princess, or king's daughter: no, no, but his divine mistress, forsooth, his dainty Dulcinia, his dear Antiphila, to whose service he is wholly consecrate, whom he alone adores.
[5409] ”Cui comparatus indecens erit pavo, Inamabilis sciurus, et frequens Phoenix.”
”To whom conferr'd a peac.o.c.k's indecent, A squirrel's harsh, a phoenix too frequent.”
All the graces, veneries, elegancies, pleasures, attend her. He prefers her before a myriad of court ladies.
[5410] ”He that commends Phillis or Neraea, Or Amaryllis, or Galatea, t.i.tyrus or Melibea, by your leave, Let him be mute, his love the praises have.”
Nay, before all the G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses themselves. So [5411]Quintus Catullus admired his squint-eyed friend Roscius.
”Pace mihi liceat (Coelestes) dicere vestra, Mortalis visus pulchrior esse Deo.”
”By your leave gentle G.o.ds, this I'll say true, There's none of you that have so fair a hue.”