Book 13
72
Now it appears to me, my friends, that I have displayed some diligence in getting up this amorous catalogue for you, as I myself am not a person so mad about love as Cynulcus, with his calumnious spirit, has represented me. I confess, indeed, that I am amorous, but I do deny that I am frantic on the subject. And why should I dilate upon my sorrows, When I may hide them all in night and silence? as Aeschylus the Alexandrian has said in his Amphitryon. And this is the same Aeschylus who composed the Messenian poems—a man entirely without any education.
73
Therefore I, considering that Love is a mighty and most powerful deity, and that the Golden Venus is so too, recollect the verses of Euripides on the subject, and say— Dost thou not see how great a deity Resistless Venus is? No tongue can tell, No calculation can arrive at all Her power, or her dominions' vast extent; She nourishes you and me and all mankind, And I can prove this, not in words alone, But facts will show the might of this fair goddess. The earth loves rain when the parch'd plains are dry, And lose their glad fertility of yield From want of moisture. Then the ample heaven, When fill'd with rain, and moved by Venus' power, Loves to descend to anxious earth's embrace; Then when these two are join'd in tender love They are the parents of all fruits to us, They bring them forth, they cherish them; and so The race of man both lives and flourishes.
