When the festival had come to a close, and I had departed, being filled with wrath against the false shows of earth, I said:
“How blest is he who dwells in his solitary abode amid scenes of rural life, beneath the open canopy of heaven! The snares and pitfalls he prepares are only for simple birds or savage beasts. No cares ever trouble his soul, and if, perchance, exceeding fatigue disturbs his body, he flings himself incontinent on the cool grass, and there reposing, recruits his weakened strength.
Now, he reclines on the bank of some rapid stream, now, beneath the shade of some bosky grove, and listens to the warbling of the woodland songsters and to the trembling leaves which, set a-quiver by the zephyrs, adjust, as it were, their whispering notes to, the melodious sounds. Such a life thou shouldst have bestowed on me, O Fortune, a life compared to which all thy vaunted boons are full of cares and most pernicious. Of what profit to me, are lofty palaces and rich couches and princely blood, if my ever restless mind has to be constantly wandering to distant countries in search of Panfilo, and if it never allows these wearied limbs to rest?
Oh, what a sweet and charming thing it is to stretch oneself on the grassy margin of some swift-flowing stream, and there on the soft turf, fearing no peril, to close the eyes in gentle slumbers, lulled by the river’s dulcet, murmuring sounds! Such delights are freely granted to the poor rustic, and withheld from those who need them more, being spoiled by flattery or wearied by civic troubles or exhausted by the tumultuous disorder of a roystering family.
“The homely swain, when hunger haply goads him, satisfies it with apples gathered in his faithful woods; and the fresh herbs that spring spontaneous from the soil, and grow on little mounds, minister to his wants with savory food. Oh, how sweet it is for him, to quench his thirst from fount or neighboring stream, and drink the liquid from his hollowed hands! Oh, most unhappy ye, and vexed with anxious cares, who, make the world your idol! Ye know not how simple are the things that nature provides for your wholesome sustenance!
We believe the wants of the body can be satisfied only by a multitude of various dishes, and do not perceive that, because of them, the humors of the body are oftener vitiated than corrected. We behold also goblets, wrought of gold and set with jewels, made ready for artificial beverages, which are often deadly poisons, and, if they be not poisons, at least those who drink them drink Venus surely. Sometimes, too, quarrels arise therefrom, violence results, and, by words and deeds, a wretched life or a shameful death is purchased. But the rustic is content with the innocent society of the Fauns and Satyrs, the Dryads, Naiads and Nymphs.
He knows not who Venus is, and naught of her double-faced son. If haply he has become acquainted with her, the form under which she shows herself to him is rough and uncouth, not comely at all. Would it had been God’s pleasure that my acquaintance with her had been of a similar kind, and that the company that visited me had been also rough and homely! Then should I have been kept far from the incurable agony which I have to endure! Then would my soul, the guardian of my sacred reputation, care little, indeed, to behold those worldly shows, as unsubstantial as the fleeting wind, and, if I did behold them, no such pangs would follow the sight as those which now afflict me.
What recks the rustic of lofty towers, of battlemented castles, of patrician houses, of delicate couches, of splendid attire, of swift-footed coursers, or of the numberless other things that rob us of the best part of our lives and are the source of our most anxious concern? He need not dread the attacks of wicked men, and can abide in parts remote and solitary without fear. He never dreams of seeking in palatial mansions a doubtful repose; all he craves is air and light, and heaven itself is the witness of his life.
Oh, how badly known is such a life to-day, kept far away from each of us, as if it were an enemy! And yet it should be sought by all, being the most precious thing on earth! Certainly, I am quite positive that this was the manner of life in the Golden Age, which gave birth to men and gods at the same time. Oim! sure I am that never was a mode of life freer from guilt and marked by more innocence and contentment than that which the first men adopted, and which is still adopted to-day by him who flees from cities and dwells in sylvan scenes.
“Would that God had placed me in such a world whereof the folk were content with little and frightened of nought. If the sole thing left me out of all my possessions was the non-possession of this torturing love, and the absence of these heartrending sighs, should I not have been far happier in such an age as I have depicted than I am in the present, though it be full of all sorts of delights, jewels, ornaments and festivals? Oimè! that the impious, accursed thirst for gain, headlong anger, and minds inflamed with wicked desires, should have shattered the first holy compacts—compacts so easy to keep—between nature and her children!
Came the hankering for lordship over others, sin most provocative of bloodshed, and so the weak became the prey of the strong. Came Sardanapalus, the first to render Venus soft and effeminate, and to endow Ceres and Bacchus with qualities unknown to them hitherto. Came pitiless Mars, with new arts of destruction and a thousand different forms of death; and so the entire earth was stained with blood, and the sea made red with gore.
“Then did foulest crimes enter every household, and there was no sort of wickedness of which an example could not be found: brother was slain by brother, father by son, son by father. The husband lay stretched in death, smitten by his merciless spouse, and often did unnatural mothers make away with the offspring of their wombs. Of the cruelty of stepmothers to their stepchildren I do not speak—that is made manifest every day.
Then riches, pride, envy, avarice, luxury, and every other vice that can be named, except one, burst in upon the world like a flood; and after them rushed in the lord and leader of the aforesaid vices, dissolute Love, for whose sake numberless cities have fallen and been reduced to ashes; for whose sake numberless sanguinary battles have been waged; for whose sake nations are even now crushed by nations.
Speak not of all its other evil effects, monstrous though they be; speak rather of those it has caused in me, for no more wonderful example of its insatiable cruelty can be found anywhere than that which it wreaks on me, compelling me to keep my mind fixed on it alone, and refusing to allow me to divert my thoughts to anything else.”
After meditating a long time in this wise, I had sometimes an idea that haply the things done by me were very grievous in the eyes of God; and while I so considered, the chastisements inflicted on me, though distressing beyond comparison, had the effect of somewhat alleviating my anguish, especially as the trespasses wrought by others, being so much greater than mine, made me seem almost innocent, while the punishment endured by the same was nothing contrasted with that which I had to endure.
Moreover, seeing that I was not the first nor the only one to bear such things, I hoped to have more strength to sustain the burden of my miseries, whereunto I prayed God to make an end, either by sending me death, or sending me back Panfilo.
The life, then, of which I now tell you, was the life that I led, and how little consolation I have found in it ye have heard.
I was sometimes stung to the heart by the questions of these women who encompassed me in church, questions I had to satisfy, or rather pretend to satisfy. One of them, especially, goaded me with some such words as these:
“O Fiammetta! thou hast no idea of the amazement thou dost excite in me, and in the others here present! We shall never get over it, for we are entirely ignorant of the cause that has so suddenly led thee to abandon thy splendid attire, thy precious jewels, and all the other things that so beseem thy rank and youth.
Thou art not so childish as not to know that thou shouldst not be dressed in this wise on such occasions. Such very modest raiment is by no means appropriate to our festivals. As thou seest, albeit we be, each of us, much older than thee, yet do we wear our finest attire and our most valuable ornaments, as, of a truth, thou shouldst also.”
To her and to the others who were eagerly awaiting my answer, I replied, meekly and humbly, as follows:
“Ladies, we go to church either for the purpose of pleasing God or of pleasing men. If we go to please God, all that is required of us is that our souls be adorned
