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. Will spare their proper young, though pinch'd for food;
  2. Nor will the Libyan lionesses slay
  3. Their whelps,—but woman are more fierce than they;
  4. More barb'rous to the tender fruit they bear,
  5. Nor nature's call, tho' loud she cries, will hear.
  6. But righteous vengeance oft their crimes pursues,
  7. And they are lost themselves, who would their
  8. children lose;
  9. The pois'nous drugs with mortal juices fill
  10. Their veins, and, undesign'd, themselves they kill
  11. Themselves upon the bier are breathless borne,
  12. With hair tied up that was in ringlets worn,
  13. Thro' weeping crowds that on their course attend;
  14. Well may they weep for their unhappy end.
  15. Forbid it, heaven, that what I say may prove
  16. Presaging to the fair I blame and love;
  17. Thus let me ne'er, ye pow'rs, her death deplore,
  18. 'Twas her first fault, and she'll offend no more;
  19. No pardon she'll deserve a second time,
  20. But, without mercy, punish then her crime.