And it is a true thing that there are wizards’ sayings or proverbs which cause good luck—buona fortuna; and if such a proverb remains always in the memory the spirit of the proverb will aid him who knows it. And to secure his aid one should repeat this spell:
“Spirito del proverbio!
Ti prego di stampare
Questo proverbio corretamente
Per sempre nella mia mente,
Ti prego di aiutarlo,
Sempre cosi la detta sara
Cagione della felicità.”“Spirit of the proverb,
I pray thee to impress
This proverb exactly
And for ever in my mind,
So that it may ever be
A blessing and a joy to me.”
And this done, the proverb or poem will become a living spirit, which will aid you to become learned and wise. [194]
As the Jatakas of Buddha, which perhaps give the origin of the fable, were all intended to set forth the great doctrine of the immortality of the soul in transmigrations, so most stories like the preceding have for an aim or object the teaching of a spell. That which is here explained is very singular, yet the idea is one which would naturally occur to a student of magic. It is that in a deep meaning or moral there is a charm, and every charm implies a spirit. Hence a spirit may go with a proverb, which in its form is like a spell. It is simply a perception of the similarity of a saying or proverb to a charm. As the Pythagoreans and Neo-Platonists believed there were spirits in numbers and ideas, so a believer might even more rationally conceive of a soul in a wise saying.
VIRGIL AND MATTEO, OR ANOTHER PROVERB OF VIRGILIO.
“Proverbi, noti spontaneamente, e quasi inconsciamente sulle labbre del popolo, oltre contenere una profonda sapienza . . . manifestano la prontezza, il brio.”—Da Augusto Alfani: Proverbi e Modi Proverbiali (1882).
The following story is translated from the Romognola, or mountain dialect, also called Bolognesa, which is a rude, strange patois, believed to be very ancient. It was written by a native of Rocca Casciano, near Forli. The beginning of it in the original is as follows:
“Un Eter proverbi di Virgilio.—Ho iera una volta un om co des a Verzeglie che un su usen lera un ledre e vieva rube quaicosa, e é bon om ed nom Matei, e pregheva Verzeglie ed ulei de un det, ho proverbi, incontre a e le der.”
There was once a man who said to Virgil that one of his neighbours was a thief, who had stolen something from him, and the man, whose name was Matteo, begged Virgil to give him a saying or a proverb against the thief.
Virgil replied: “Truly thou hast been robbed; but be of good cheer, and thou mayst regain thine own again if thou wilt remember this saying: