The Anatomy of Melancholy

Once in love, therefore, he will walk, run or ride many miles to meet her, by day or night, even in pitch darkness; endure scorching heat and cold; wait in frost, snow, rain and storms until his teeth chatter. Those northern winds and showers cannot cool or quench the flames of his love. “He is not deterred by the dead of night.” Take my word for it: he will endure hunger and thirst. “He will penetrate everything, break through everything”: love will find a way. Through thick and thin he will reach her. “Mountains seem easily traversed, rivers swimmable.” He will swim an ocean, ride post-haste over the Alps, Apennines or Pyrenees,

He is ready to pass through fire, the waves of the sea, And whirlwinds—

Even if it rains daggers point-downwards, light or dark makes no difference: “Faunus came through the darkness to the dewy cave.” For her sweet sake he will undertake Hercules’s twelve labours, endure anything and risk everything: he feels none of it.

“What shall I say,” asks Haedus, “of the great dangers they face, the single combats they undertake, how they risk their lives, creep through windows and gutters, climb over walls to reach their sweethearts”—oiling doors and hinges to prevent creaking, treading softly, swimming, wading, keeping watch and so on—“and, if surprised, leap out of windows and throw themselves headlong down, bruising or breaking their legs or arms, sometimes losing life itself?” So Calisto did for his lovely Melibea.

Hear some of their own confessions, declarations, complaints, offers, protests, wishes, brutish attempts and efforts of this kind. Hercules served Omphale, put on an apron, took up a distaff and spun. The soldier Thraso was so submissive to Thais that he resolved to do whatever she commanded: “I shall surrender myself to Thais and do what she orders.” I am at her service.

Philostratus, in a letter to his mistress: “I am ready to die, sweetheart, if that is your wish. Quench the thirst of the man your star has scorched and ruined. Springs and rivers refuse drink to no one who comes. The spring does not say, ‘You shall not drink’; the apple, ‘You shall not eat’; the beautiful meadow, ‘Do not walk in me.’ Yet you alone will not let me approach or see you. Scorned and despised, I die of grief.”

In Petronius, when his mistress Circe merely frowned at him, Polyaenus drew his sword and told her to kill him, stab him or whip him to death: he would strip naked and offer no resistance. Another will journey to Japan, “disregarding the hardships of a long voyage.” A third, if she says so, will not speak a word for twelve months: her command will be kept absolutely. A fourth will take Hercules’s club from him and, like that Centurio in the Spanish Celestina, kill ten men for his mistress Areusa at a word from her. He will slice shields in two like apples and strike men down like flies: “Choose what kind of death you want me to kill him by.”