Page:Plutarch - Moralia, translator Holland, 1911.djvu/28

6 Kept in his tears: for why His eyes within the lids were set As stiff as iron and sturdy horn, One drop would they not shed.

In such obedience to the judgment of reason he had his breath, spirits, his blood and his tears. An evident proof hereof is to be seen in those whose flesh doth rise upon the first sight of fair and beautiful persons: for no sooner doth reason or law forbid to come near and touch them, but presently the same falleth, lieth down, and is quiet again without any stirring or panting at all. A thing very ordinary and most commonly perceived in those who be enamoured upon fair women, not knowing at first who they were: For so soon as they perceive afterwards that they be their own sisters or daughters, their lust presently cooleth, by means of reason that toucheth it and interposeth itself between: so that the body keepeth all the members thereof decently in order, and obedient to the judgment of the said reason. Moreover, it falleth out oftentimes that we eat with a good stomach and great pleasure certain meats and viands before we know what they are; but after we understand and perceive once that we have taken either that which was unclean or unlawful and forbidden: not only in our judgment and understanding we find trouble and offence thereby; but also our bodily faculties agreeing to our opinion are dismayed thereat: so that anon there ensue vomits, sick qualms, and overturnings of the stomach, which disquiet all the whole frame.

And were it not that I greatly feared to be thought of purpose to gather and insert in my discourse such pleasant and youthful inducements, I could infer in this place psalteries, lutes, harps, pipes, flutes, and other like musical instruments, how they are devised by Art for to accord and frame with human passions: for notwithstanding they be altogether without life, yet they cease not to apply themselves unto us, and the judgment of our minds, lamenting, singing, and wantonly disporting together with us, resembling both the turbulent passions, and also the mild affections and dispositions of those that play upon them. And yet verily it is reported also of Zeno himself, that he went one day to the theatre for to hear the musician Amæbeus, who sung unto the harp: saying unto his scholars, Let us go, sirs, and learn what harmony and music the entrails of beasts, their sinews and bones: Let us see (I say) what resonance and melody bare wood may yield, being disposed by numbers, proportions, and order.