Page:Petrach, the first modern scholar and man of letters.djvu/255

 and destruction:

The dark caverns where Virgil represents them as being hidden away, what are they but the hollow and hidden parts of our bodies, where, according to Plato's determination, the passions dwell in abodes of their own, in the breast and entrails? The mountain mass which is placed above them is the head, where Plato thinks the reason has its home.… Venus, who meets them in the middle of the wood, is pleasure, whose pursuit by us becomes hotter and keener toward the middle of our life. Her assumption of a maidenly look and air is for the purpose of deceiving the unwary. If we saw her as she is we should flee from her in fear and trembling; for, as there is nothing more tempting than pleasure, so there is nothing more foul. Her garments are girded up because her flight is swift. For this same reason she is compared to the swiftest of creatures and things. It cannot be denied that nothing swifter exists, whether you consider her comprehensively or part by part; for pleasure as a whole passes from us very soon, and even