B_right hope it brings and vigor back_
T_o minds outworn upon the rack_,
A_nd puts such courage in the brain_
A_s makes the poor be men again_,
W_hom neither tyrants' wrath affrights_,
N_or all their bristling satellites_."
When wine is a curse, it is not so because of itself, but because of
excess in its use. The cup was made for purposes of pleasure, but to
quarrel over it,--leave that to barbarians! Take warning by the
Thracians, and the Centaurs and Lapiths, never to overstep the bounds of
moderation. Pleasure with after-taste of bitterness is not real
pleasure. Pleasure purchased with pain is an evil.
Upon women he looks with the same philosophic calm as upon wine. Love,
too, was to be regarded as one of the contributions to life's pleasure.
To dally with golden-haired Pyrrha, with Lyce, or with Glycera, the
beauty more brilliant than Parian marble, was not in his eyes to be
blamed in itself. What he felt no hesitation in committing to his poems
for friends and the Emperor to read, they on their part felt as little
hesitation in confessing to him. The fault of love lay not in itself,
but in abuse.
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