Deteriora sequor.———
Reason pulls one way, burning lust another,
She sees and knows what's good, but she doth neither,
O fraus, amorque, et mentis emotae furor,
quo me abstulistis?[5386]
The major part of lovers are carried headlong like so many brute beasts, reason counsels one way, thy friends, fortunes, shame, disgrace, danger, and an ocean of cares that will certainly follow; yet this furious lust precipitates, counterpoiseth, weighs down on the other; though it be their utter undoing, perpetual infamy, loss, yet they will do it, and become at last insensati, void of sense; degenerate into dogs, hogs, asses, brutes; as Jupiter into a bull, Apuleius an ass, Lycaon a wolf, Tereus a lapwing,[5387]Calisto a bear, Elpenor and Grillus info swine by Circe. For what else may we think those ingenious poets to have shadowed in their witty fictions and poems but that a man once given over to his lust (as [5388]Fulgentius interprets that of Apuleius, Alciat of Tereus) “is no better than a beast.”
Rex fueram, sic crista docet, sed sordida vita
Immundam e tanto culmine fecit avem.[5389]
I was a king, my crown my witness is,
But by my filthiness am come to this.