Page:The Book of the Courtier.djvu/475

 THE FOURTH BOOK OF THE COURTIER nience and pleasures to his own, and love in her not less the beauty of mind than that of body. Therefore let him take care not to leave her to fall into any kind of errour, but by admonition and good advice let him always seek to lead her on to modesty, to temperance, to true chastity, and see to it that no thoughts find place in her except those that are pure and free from every stain of vice; and by thus sowing virtue in the garden of her fair mind, he will gather fruits of fairest behaviour too, and will taste them with wonderful delight. And this will be the true engen- dering and manifesting of beauty in beauty, which by some is said to be the end of love, " In such fashion will our Courtier be most acceptable to his lady, and she will always show herself obedient, sweet and affable to him, and as desirous of pleasing him as of being loved by him; and the wishes of both will be most virtuous and harmonious, and they themselves will thus be very happy." 63 — Here my lord Morello said: " To engender beauty in beauty, forsooth, would be to beget a beautiful child in a beautiful woman; and pleasing him in this would seem to me a much clearer token that she loved her lover than treating him with the affability of which you speak." Bembo laughed, and said: " You must not go beyond bounds, my lord Morello; nor does a woman give small token of her love when she gives her lover her beauty, which is so precious a thing, and by the ways that are the avenues to her soul (that is, sight and hearing) sends the glances of her eyes, the image of her face, her voice, her words, which strike home to the lover's heart and give him proof of her love." My lord Morello said: " Glances and words may be, and often are, false proofs; there- fore he who has no better pledge of love is, in my judgment, far from sure; and truly I quite expected you to make this lady of yours a little more courteous and generous to the Courtier than my lord Magnifico made his; but methinks that both of you are in like case with those judges who pronounce sentence against their friends for the sake of appearing wise." 64 — Bembo said: 299