Читать книгу Love Potions Through the Ages: A Study of Amatory Devices and Mores онлайн

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Bacchus and Nymphs delight, O mighty God!

Whom Cynthia gave to rule the blooming wood.

Lesbos and verdant Thasos thee adore,

And Lydians, in loose flowing dress implore,

And raise devoted temples to thy power.

Thou Dryad’s joy, and Bacchus’s guardian, hear

My conscious prayer, with an attentive ear.

My hands with guiltless blood I never stain’d,

Or sacrilegiously the gods prophan’d.

To feeble me, restoring blessings send,

I did not thee, with my whole self offend.

Who sins thro’ weakness is less guilty thought,

Be pacify’d, and spare a venial fault.

On me, when smiling fate shall smiling gifts bestow,

I’ll not ungrateful to thy godhead go.

A destined goat shall on thy altar lye,

And the horn’d parent of my flock shall dye.

A sucking pig appease thy injur’d shrine,

And hallow’d bowls o’re-flow with generous wine.

Then thrice thy frantick votaries shall round

Thy temple dance, with youth and garlands crown’d,

In holy drunkenness thy orgies sound.

While I was thus at prayers, an old woman, with her hair about her eyes, and disfigur’d with a mournful habit, coming in, disturb’d my devotions; when taking hold of me, she drew all fear out of the entry; and “what hag,” said she, “has devour’d your manhood? Or what ominous carcase have you stumbl’d over in your nightly walks? You have not acquitted your self above a boy; but faint, weak, and like a horse o’re-charg’d in a steep, tyr’d have lost your toyl and sweat; nor content to sin alone, but have unreveng’d against me, provokt the offended gods?”