Page:The Golden Ass of Apuleius.djvu/34

 those who would allegorise both mythology and romance. 'The fall of Icarus is an example to proud and arrogant persons, that weeneth to climbe up to the heavens'; and further, he holds that 'by Mydas is carped the foul sin of Avarice.' And, as if to excuse the translation of a 'meere jeast and fable,' he addresses to the reader a most solemn homily, setting forth the example of Nebuchadnezzar and upholding the efficacy of prayer. 'Verily under the wrap of this transformation is taxed the life of mortall men,' thus he writes in the proper spirit of the divine; concluding that we can never bee restored to the right figure of our selves, except we taste and eat the sweet Rose of reason and vertue, which the rather by mediation of praier we may assuredly attaine.' Nor is this the mere perversion of ingenuity. His prudery is perfectly sincere. In many places he is inclined, by a modest suppression, to mitigate the gaiety of the Apuleian narrative. But only once does he completely sacrifice his author's effect to his own scruples; and the restrained nobility of his prose more than atones for lack of scholarship and a prudish habit of mind. The lapse of three centuries has left his book as fresh and living as its original, and withal as brave a piece of narrative as the literature of his century has to show.

CHARLES WHIBLEY.