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. And gave us fruitful corn, and wholesome food.
  2. Till then poor wretched man on acorns fed;
  3. Oaks gave him meat, and flow'ry fields a bed.
  4. First Ceres made our wheat and barley grow,
  5. And taught us how to plough, and how to mow;
  6. Who then can think that she designs to prove
  7. Our piety, by coldness in our love ?
  8. Or make poor lovers sigh, lament, and groan,
  9. Or charge her votaries to lie alone ?
  10. For Ceres, though she loves the fruitful fields,
  11. Yet sometimes feels the force of love, and yields:
  12. This Crete can witness, (Crete not always lies)
  13. Crete that nurs'd Jove, and heard his infant cries,
  14. There he was suckled who now rules the skies.
  15. That Jove his education there receiv'd,
  16. Will raise her fame, and make her be believ'd;
  17. Nay she herself will never strive to hide
  18. Her love, 'tis too well known to be denied:
  19. She saw young Jasius in the Cretan grove
  20. Pursue the deer, she saw, and fell in love.