I am vexed that my Essays only serve the ladies for a common piece of furniture, and a piece for the hall; this chapter will make me part of the water-closet. I love to traffic with them a little in private; public conversation is without favour and without savour. In farewells, we oftener than not heat our affections towards the things we take leave of; I take my last leave of the pleasures of this world: these are our last embraces.
But let us come to my subject: what has the act of generation, so natural, so necessary, and so just, done to men, to be a thing not to be spoken of without blushing, and to be excluded from all serious and moderate discourse? We boldly pronounce kill, rob, betray, and that we dare only to do betwixt the teeth. Is it to say, the less we expend in words, we may pay so much the more in thinking? For it is certain that the words least in use, most seldom written, and best kept in, are the best and most generally known: no age, no manners, are ignorant of them, no more than the word bread they imprint themselves in every one without being, expressed, without voice, and without figure; and the sex that most practises it is bound to say least of it. 'Tis an act that we have placed in the franchise of silence, from which to take it is a crime even to accuse and judge it; neither dare we reprehend it but by periphrasis and picture. A great favour to a criminal to be so execrable that justice thinks it unjust to touch and see him; free, and safe by the benefit of the severity of his condemnation. Is it not here as in matter of books, that sell better and become more public for being suppressed?
For my part, I will take Aristotle at his word, who says, that "bashfulness is an ornament to youth, but a reproach to old age." These verses are preached in the ancient school, a school that I much more adhere to than the modern: its virtues appear to me to be greater, and the vices less:
"Ceux qui par trop fuyant Venus estrivent, Faillent autant que ceulx qui trop la suyvent."
["They err as much who too much forbear Venus, as they who are too frequent in her rites."--A translation by Amyot from Plutarch, A philosopher should converse with princes.]
"Tu, dea, rerum naturam sola gubernas, Nec sine to quicquam dias in luminis oras Exoritur, neque fit laetum, nec amabile quidquam."
["Goddess, still thou alone governest nature, nor without thee anything comes into light; nothing is pleasant, nothing joyful."--Lucretius, i. 22.]
I know not who could set Pallas and the Muses at variance with Venus, and make them cold towards Love; but I see no deities so well met, or that are more indebted to one another. Who will deprive the Muses of amorous imaginations, will rob them of the best entertainment they have, and of the noblest matter of their work: and who will make Love lose the communication and service of poesy, will disarm him of his best weapons: by this means they charge the god of familiarity and good will, and the protecting goddesses of humanity and justice, with the vice of ingratitude and unthankfulness. I have not been so long cashiered from the state and service of this god, that my memory is not still perfect in his force and value:
"Agnosco veteris vestigia flammae;"
["I recognise vestiges of my old flame."--AEneid., iv. 23.]
There are yet some remains of heat and emotion after the fever:
"Nec mihi deficiat calor hic, hiemantibus annis!"
["Nor let this heat of youth fail me in my winter years."]
Withered and drooping as I am, I feel yet some remains of the past ardour:
"Qual l'alto Egeo, per the Aquilone o Noto Cessi, the tutto prima il volse et scosse, Non 's accheta ei pero; ma'l suono e'l moto Ritien del l'onde anco agitate e grosse:"
["As Aegean seas, when storms be calmed again, That rolled their tumbling waves with troublous blasts, Do yet of tempests passed some show retain, And here and there their swelling billows cast."--Fairfax.] but from what I understand of it, the force and power of this god are more lively and animated in the picture of poesy than in their own essence:
"Et versus digitos habet:"
["Verse has fingers."--Altered from Juvenal, iv. 196.] it has I know not what kind of air, more amorous than love itself. Venus is not so beautiful, naked, alive, and panting, as she is here in Virgil:
"Dixerat; et niveis hinc atque hinc Diva lacertis Cunctantem amplexu molli fovet. Ille repente Accepit solitam flammam; notusque medullas Intravit calor, et labefacta per ossa cucurrit Non secus atque olim tonitru, cum rupta corusco Ignea rima micans percurrit lumine nimbos.
. . . . . . Ea verba loquutus, Optatos dedit amplexus; placidumque petivit Conjugis infusus gremio per membra soporem."
["The goddess spoke, and throwing round him her snowy arms in soft embraces, caresses him hesitating. Suddenly he caught the wonted flame, and the well-known warmth pierced his marrow, and ran thrilling through his shaken bones: just as when at times, with thunder, a stream of fire in lightning flashes shoots across the skies. Having spoken these words, he gave her the wished embrace, and in the bosom of his spouse sought placid sleep."--AEneid, viii. 387 and 392.]
All that I find fault with in considering it is, that he has represented her a little too passionate for a married Venus; in this discreet kind of coupling, the appetite is not usually so wanton, but more grave and dull.