Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 1.djvu/387

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My beloved, the king is Christ; the daughter is the soul, and Abibas is the devil, who provides various seductions to draw us from the goal of heaven.

emperor Claudius had an only daughter who was incomparably beautiful. As he lay in bed, he reflected seriously upon the best mode of disposing of her. "If," thought he, "I should marry her to a rich fool, it will occasion her death. But if I bestow her upon a wise man, although he be poor, his own wit will procure him riches ."