Amores

Ovid

Ovid. Ovid's Art of Love (in three Books), the Remedy of Love, the Art of Beauty, the Court of Love, the History of Love, and Amours. Dryden, John, et al., translator. New York: Calvin Blanchard, 1855.

  1. Among the race of men what havock had they made.
  2. Mankind had been extinct, and lost the seed,
  3. Without a wonder to restore the breed,
  4. As when Deucalion and his Purrha hurl'd
  5. The stones that sow'd with men the delug'd world,
  6. Had Thetis, goddess of the sea, refus'd
  7. To bear the burden, and her fruit abus'd,
  8. Who would have Priam's royal seat destroy'd?
  9. Or had the vestal whom fierce Mars enjoy'd,
  10. Stifled the twins within her pergnant womb,
  11. What founder would have then been born to Rome?
  12. Had Venus, when she with Aeneas teem'd,
  13. To death, ere born, Anchises' son condemn'd,
  14. The world had of the Caesars been depriv'd;
  15. Augustus ne'er had reign'd, nor Julius liv'd.
  16. And thou, whose beauty is the boast of fame,
  17. Hadst perish'd, had thy mother done the same;
  18. Nor had I liv'd love's faithful slave to be,
  19. Had my own mother dealt as ill by me.
  20. Ah, vile invention, ah, accurs'd design,