The hidden is unveiled and open stands, Therefore deny not, but admit the triumph, Incomparable end of all the pains Of field and mount, Of pools and streams and seas, Of cliffs and deeps, of thorns and snags and stones.
After each one in this way, singly, playing his instrument, had sung his sistine, they danced altogether in a circle and sang together in praise of the one Nymph with the softest accents a song which I am not sure whether I can call to memory.
GIU. I pray you, my sister, do not fail to let me hear so much of it as you can remember!
"I envy not, oh Jove, the firmament," Said Father Ocean, with the haughty brow: "For that I am content With that which my own empire gives to me."
Then answered Jove, "What arrogance is thine. What to thy riches have been added now, Oh god of the mad waves, To make thy foolish boasting rise so high?"
"Thou hast," said the sea-god, "in thy command, The flaming sky, where is the burning zone, In which the heavenly host Of stars and planets stand within thy sight.[AJ]
"Of these, the world looks most upon the sun, Which, let me tell you, shineth not so bright, As she who makes of me, The god most glorious of the mighty whole.
"And I contain within my bosom vast, With other lands, that, where the happy Thames Goes gliding gaily on, Which has of graceful nymphs a lovely throng.
"There will be found 'mongst those where all are fair, Will make thee lover more of sea than sky, Oh Jove, High Thunderer! Whose sun shines pale beside the starry night."
Then answered Jove, "God of the billowy sea! That one should ere be found more blest than I Fate nevermore permits, My treasures with thine own run parallel.
"The sun is equal to thy chiefest nymph, By virtue of the everlasting laws, And pauses alternating, Amongst my stars she's equal to the sun."
[AJ] Plato says that [Greek: Theos] is derived from the verb [Greek: Theein], to move, to run, as the first astronomers who observed the motions of the heavenly bodies called the planets [Greek: Theoi], the gods.--("The Secret Doctrine," foot note, p. 2, vol. 1.)
I believe that I have recalled it entirely.
GIU. You can see that no sentence is wanting to the perfecting of the proposition, nor rhyme to the completion of the stanzas. Now if I by the grace of heaven have received beauty, a greater favour I consider is mine, in that whatever beauty I may have had it has been in a certain way instrumental in causing that Divine and only one to be found. I thank the gods, because in that time, when I was so tender (verde), that the amorous flames could not be lighted in my breast, by reason of my intractability, such simple and innocent cruelty was used in order to yield more graces to my lovers than otherwise it would have been possible for them to obtain, through any kindness of mine however great.