Religion has pleasure, but their pleasure was religion, and Cupid and Bacchus their saints.
The fabled Greek Temple of Pleasure had a large doorway for entrance, lights, music and lovely women within, but back of it all a wicket-gate which opened into a pig-pen.
Thus, the end of vice is not satisfaction, but satiety, and the bacchanal worshiper of what appeals only to his physical senses is thrust out naked, ashamed and alone. Satan smiles, and hell is happy.
A dying king dreamed he would be met on the other shore by a beautiful woman and led to a throne. Instead, he was welcomed by a horrible hag who leered and laughed at him. When he recoiled and asked who she was, she replied, “I am your sins and have come to live with you forever.”
Leaving this bare-breasted, forbidden fruit untasted, I bought some navel oranges, and went to my hotel thankful that, if I had been led into temptation, I had been delivered from evil.
The Devil’s calling cards he gives to visitors here, have B. A. after his name, and it does not stand for “Bachelor of Arts,” although he has that degree from several European and American universities. Last impressions are first in mind. I had hoped that B. A. (Buenos Aires) would stand for “Better Afterwards,” but just before the boat pulled out I found it meant “Bad Always.”
A well dressed man sold my wife some pretty post cards, of the city, and while she was looking at them he took me to one side, whispered “dirty book” in my ear, and offered me something “nice” to read on the trip. I read the title, “The Lustful Experiences of a Physician,” and refused him, saying I was no doctor, didn’t intend to study for the profession, or do anything that would make it necessary to contract for medical services in advance. As the ship sailed out of the harbor I gazed ruefully at this roué paradise of a city, repeating the lines of the poet,
“Farewell, dear, damned, distracted town;
Ye harlots live at ease.”