DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.13851#0611
OF THE MISCELLANY CUSTOMS OF GREECE.
583
Thus far concerning their arts in exciting love. It may be inquired,
in the next place, whether they had any means to allay the passion when
once raised 1 Notv it appears, that it was common to set the patient at li-
berty by the help of more powerful medicaments, or demons superior to
those that had hound him : whence we find Cani-iia, in Horace, complain-
ing that all her enchantments were rendered ineffectual by art superior
to her own : but love, inspired without the assistance of magic, scarce
yielded to any cure. Apollo himself could find no remedy against it, but
is introduced lamenting in these words (1) :
Invention medicina meum est, opiferqueper orbem,
Dicor, et herbarum est subjecta potentia nobis ;
Hei mihi ! quod nullis amor est medicabilis herbis,
JYec prosunt domino, qua prosunt omnibus, artes.
The same poet professes in another place, that no art was ever able to
set a lover at liberty (2) :
Nulla recantatas deponent pectora euros,
JVecfv.giet vivo sulphure virtus amor.
Quid te Phasiacmjuverunt gramino, terrce,
Cum cup era vatria, Colchi, maneredomo?
Quid tibi prqfnerunt, Circe, Perseides herbas,
Cum tibi Neritias abstulit aura rates.
But, notwithstanding the difficulty of this cure, there is not wanting
variety of prescriptions adapted to the several causes and occasions of the
malady ; as appears from the old nurse's words to Myrrha, desperately
in love: (3)
Seu furor est, habeo qum carmine sanet. et her bis :
Sive aliquis nocuit, r.iagico lustrabere rilu :
Ira deum sive est, sacris placabilis ira.
The antidotes may be reduced to two sorts : they were either such as
had some natural virtue to produce the desigued effect ; such are agnus
castus, and the herbs reputed enemies to generation (4) : or, secondly,
such as wrought the cure by some occult and mystical power, and the as-
sistance of demons ; such are the sprinkling of the east wherein a mule
had rolled herself (5), the tying toads in the hide of a beast lately
slain (6), witn several others mentioned by Pliny ; amongst which we
may reckon all the minerals and herbs, which were looked on as amu-
lets against other effects of magic ; for those were likewise proper on
such occasions: whence the poet>- usually mention Caucasus, Colchis,
and other places famous foi magical plants, as those which alone could
furnish remedies and antidotes against love. I shall only set down one
instance wherein the poet, enquiring what should be the cause his mis-
tress had forsaken him, puts this question among others (7) :
-an quae
Lecta Prometheis dividit herbajugis.
What! do those odious herbs, the lover's bane,
Growing on Caucasus, produce this pain ?
By Prometheus's mountain, he means Caucasus, which was remarkable
for herbs of sovereign power, that sprung out of Prometheus's blood-
(1) Ovid. Metam. i. 521. (5) Plinii. Nat. Hist. lib. xxx. cap. 16,
(2) De remedio amoris. (3) Metam. x. 397. (6) Idem. lib. xxxii. cap. 10.
<4) Vide Archselog. hujus lib. ii. cap. 3. (7) Propertii, lib. i. Eleg. 12.
583
Thus far concerning their arts in exciting love. It may be inquired,
in the next place, whether they had any means to allay the passion when
once raised 1 Notv it appears, that it was common to set the patient at li-
berty by the help of more powerful medicaments, or demons superior to
those that had hound him : whence we find Cani-iia, in Horace, complain-
ing that all her enchantments were rendered ineffectual by art superior
to her own : but love, inspired without the assistance of magic, scarce
yielded to any cure. Apollo himself could find no remedy against it, but
is introduced lamenting in these words (1) :
Invention medicina meum est, opiferqueper orbem,
Dicor, et herbarum est subjecta potentia nobis ;
Hei mihi ! quod nullis amor est medicabilis herbis,
JYec prosunt domino, qua prosunt omnibus, artes.
The same poet professes in another place, that no art was ever able to
set a lover at liberty (2) :
Nulla recantatas deponent pectora euros,
JVecfv.giet vivo sulphure virtus amor.
Quid te Phasiacmjuverunt gramino, terrce,
Cum cup era vatria, Colchi, maneredomo?
Quid tibi prqfnerunt, Circe, Perseides herbas,
Cum tibi Neritias abstulit aura rates.
But, notwithstanding the difficulty of this cure, there is not wanting
variety of prescriptions adapted to the several causes and occasions of the
malady ; as appears from the old nurse's words to Myrrha, desperately
in love: (3)
Seu furor est, habeo qum carmine sanet. et her bis :
Sive aliquis nocuit, r.iagico lustrabere rilu :
Ira deum sive est, sacris placabilis ira.
The antidotes may be reduced to two sorts : they were either such as
had some natural virtue to produce the desigued effect ; such are agnus
castus, and the herbs reputed enemies to generation (4) : or, secondly,
such as wrought the cure by some occult and mystical power, and the as-
sistance of demons ; such are the sprinkling of the east wherein a mule
had rolled herself (5), the tying toads in the hide of a beast lately
slain (6), witn several others mentioned by Pliny ; amongst which we
may reckon all the minerals and herbs, which were looked on as amu-
lets against other effects of magic ; for those were likewise proper on
such occasions: whence the poet>- usually mention Caucasus, Colchis,
and other places famous foi magical plants, as those which alone could
furnish remedies and antidotes against love. I shall only set down one
instance wherein the poet, enquiring what should be the cause his mis-
tress had forsaken him, puts this question among others (7) :
-an quae
Lecta Prometheis dividit herbajugis.
What! do those odious herbs, the lover's bane,
Growing on Caucasus, produce this pain ?
By Prometheus's mountain, he means Caucasus, which was remarkable
for herbs of sovereign power, that sprung out of Prometheus's blood-
(1) Ovid. Metam. i. 521. (5) Plinii. Nat. Hist. lib. xxx. cap. 16,
(2) De remedio amoris. (3) Metam. x. 397. (6) Idem. lib. xxxii. cap. 10.
<4) Vide Archselog. hujus lib. ii. cap. 3. (7) Propertii, lib. i. Eleg. 12.