"In peace, Love tunes the shepherd's reed.
In war, he mounts the warrior's steed;
In halls, in gay attire is seen;
In hamlets, dances on the green.
Love rules the court, the camp, the grove,
And men below, and saints above;
For love is heaven, and heaven is love." [11]
Even when, as among some Eastern races, Religion and Philosophy have combined to depress Love, truth reasserts itself in popular sayings, as for instance in the Turkish proverb, "All women are perfection, especially she who loves you."
A French lady having once quoted to Abd-el-Kader the Polish proverb, "A woman draws more with a hair of her head than a pair of oxen well harnessed;" he answered with a smile, "The hair is unnecessary, woman is powerful as fate."
But we like to think of Love rather as the Angel of Happiness than as a ruling force: of the joy of home when "hearts are of each other sure."
"It is the secret sympathy,
The silver link, the silken tie,
Which heart to heart, and mind to mind
In body and in soul can bind." [12]
What Bacon says of a friend is even truer of a wife; there is "no man that imparteth his joys to his friend, but he joyeth the more; and no man that imparteth his griefs to his friend, but he grieveth the less."
Let some one we love come near us and
"At once it seems that something new or strange
Has passed upon the flowers, the trees, the ground;
Some slight but unintelligible change
On everything around." [13]
We might, I think, apply to love what Homer says of Fate:
"Her feet are tender, for she sets her steps
Not on the ground, but on the heads of men."