The Book of the Courtier
conversing with their ladies until they reached the place where the
enemy were seen, then taking leave each of his own lady, they went on in
this presence to meet the enemy with that fierce spirit which was
aroused in them by their love and by the desire to make their ladies
sensible of being served by men of valour; thus a very few Spanish
cavaliers were often found putting a host of Moors to flight and to
death, thanks to gentle and beloved women.
“So I do not see, my lord Gaspar, what perversity of judgment has led
you to cast reproach on women.
52.—“Do you not know that the origin of all the graceful exercises that
give pleasure in the world is to be ascribed to none other than to
women? Who learns to dance and caper gallantly for aught else than to
please women? Who studies the sweetness of music for other cause than
this? Who tries to compose verses, in the vernacular at least, unless to
express those feelings that are inspired by women? Think how many very
noble poems we should be deprived of, both in the Greek tongue and in
the Latin, if women had been lightly esteemed by the poets. But to pass
all the others by, would it not have been a very great loss if messer
Francesco Petrarch, who so divinely wrote his loves in this language of
ours, had turned his mind solely to things Latin, as he would have done
if the love of madonna Laura had not sometimes drawn him from them?[422]
I do not name you the bright geniuses now on earth and present here, who
every day put forth some noble fruit and yet choose their subject only
from the beauties and virtues of women.
“You see that Solomon, wishing to write mystically of things lofty and
divine, to cover them with a graceful veil composed a fervent and tender
dialogue between a lover and his sweetheart, deeming that he could not
here below find any similitude more apt and befitting things divine than
love for women; and in this way he tried to give us a little of the
savour of that divinity which he both by knowledge and by grace knew
better than the rest.[423]
“Hence there was no need, my lord Gaspar, to dispute about this, or at
least so wordily: but by gainsaying the truth you have prevented us from
hearing a thousand other fine and weighty matters concerning the
perfection of the Court Lady.”
My lord Gaspar replied:
“I believe nothing more is left to say; yet if you think that my lord
Magnifico has not adorned her with enough good qualities, the fault lay
not with him, but with the one who arranged that there are not more
virtues in the world; for the Magnifico gave her all there are.”
My lady Duchess said, laughing:
“You shall now see that my lord Magnifico will find still others.”
The Magnifico replied:
“Indeed, my Lady, methinks I have said enough, and for my part I am
content with this Lady of mine; and if these gentlemen will not have her
as she is, let them leave her to me.”
53.—Here everyone remaining silent, messer Federico said:
“My lord Magnifico, to spur you on to say something more, I should like
to put you a question concerning what you would have the chief business
of the Court Lady, and it is this: that I wish to hear how she ought to
conduct herself with respect to one detail which seems to me very
important; for although the excellent qualities wherewith you have
endowed her include genius, wisdom, good sense, ease of bearing,
modesty, and so many other virtues, whereby she ought in reason to be
able to converse with everyone and on every theme, still I think that
more than anything else she needs to know that which belongs to
discussions on love. For as every gentle cavalier uses those noble
exercises, elegances and fine manners that we have mentioned, as a means
to win the favour of women, to this end likewise he employs words; and
not only when he is moved by passion, but often also to do honour to the
lady with whom he is speaking, since he thinks that to give signs of
love for her is a proof that she is worthy of it, and that her beauty
and merits are so great that they compel every man to serve her.
“Hence I fain would know how this lady ought to converse on such a theme
discreetly, and how reply to him who loves her truly, and how to him who
makes a false pretence thereof; and whether she ought to feign not to
understand, whether to return his love or to refuse, and how conduct
herself.”
54.—Then my lord Magnifico said:
“It would be needful to teach her first to distinguish those who pretend
to love and those who love truly; then, as to returning love or not, I
think she ought not to be governed by any others’ wish but her own.”
Messer Federico said:
“Then teach her what are the surest and safest signs to discern false
love from true, and with what proof she ought to be content in order to
be sure of the love shown her.”
The Magnifico replied, laughing:
“I know not, for men to-day are so cunning that they make false
pretences without end, and sometimes weep when they have great wish to
laugh; hence it were necessary to send them to Isola Ferma under the
True Lovers’ Arch.[424]
“But to the end that this Lady of mine (of whom it behooves me to take
special care, since she is my creation) may not fall into those errours
wherein I have seen many others fall, I should tell her not to be quick
to believe herself loved, nor act like some who not only do not feign
not to understand when court is paid to them even covertly, but at the
first word accept all the praise that is given them, or decline it with
a certain air that is rather an invitation to love for those with whom
they are speaking, than a refusal.
“Therefore the course of conduct that I wish my Court Lady to pursue in
love talk, will be to refuse always to believe that whoever pays court
to her for that reason loves her: and if the gentleman shall be as pert
as many are, and speak to her with small respect, she will give him such
answer that he may clearly understand he is causing her annoyance.
Again, if he shall be discreet and use modest phrases and words of love
covertly, with that gentle manner which I think the Courtier fashioned
by these gentlemen will employ, the lady will feign not to understand
and will apply his words in another sense, always modestly trying to
change the subject with that skill and prudence which have been said
befit her. If, again, the talk is such that she cannot feign not to
understand, she will take it all as a jest, pretending to be aware that
it is said to her more out of compliment to her than because it is so,
depreciating her merits and ascribing the praises that he gives her to
the gentleman’s courtesy; and in this way she will win a name for
discretion and be safer against deceit.
“After this fashion methinks the Court Lady ought to conduct herself in
love talk.”
55.—Then messer Federico said:
“My lord Magnifico, you discourse of this matter as if everyone who pays
court to women must needs speak lies and seek to deceive them: if the
which were true, I should say that your teachings were sound; but if
this cavalier who is speaking loves truly and feels that passion which
sometimes so sorely afflicts the human heart, do you not consider in
what pain, in what calamity and mortal anguish you put him by insisting
that the lady shall never believe anything he says on this subject?
Ought his supplications, tears, and many other signs to go for naught?
Have a care, my lord Magnifico, lest it be thought that besides the
natural cruelty which many of these ladies have in them, you are
teaching them still more.”
The Magnifico replied:
“I spoke not of him who loves, but of him who entertains with amourous
talk, wherein one of the most necessary conditions is that words shall
never be lacking. But just as true lovers have glowing hearts, so they
have cold tongues, with broken speech and sudden silence; wherefore
perhaps it would not be a false assumption to say: ‘Who loves much,
speaks little.’ Yet as to this I believe no certain rule can be given,
because of the diversity of men’s habits; nor could I say anything more
than that the Lady must be very cautious, and always bear in mind that
men can declare their love with much less danger than women can.”
56.—Then my lord Gaspar said, laughing:
“Would you not, my lord Magnifico, have this admirable Lady of yours
love in return even when she knows that she is loved truly? For if the
Courtier were not loved in return, it is not conceivable that he should
go on loving her; and thus she would lose many advantages, and
especially that service and reverence with which lovers honour and
almost adore the virtue of their beloved.”
“As to that,” replied the Magnifico, “I do not wish to give advice; but
I do say that I think love, as you understand it, is proper only for
unmarried women; for when this love cannot end in marriage, the lady
must always find in it that remorse and sting which things illicit give
her, and run risk of staining that reputation for chastity which is so
important to her.”
Then messer Federico replied, laughing:
“This opinion of yours, my lord Magnifico, seems to me very austere, and
I think you have learned it from some preacher—one of those who rebuke
women for loving laymen, in order to have themselves the better part
therein. And methinks you impose too hard a rule on married women, for
many of them are to be found whose husbands bear them the greatest
hatred without cause, and affront them grievously, sometimes by loving
other women, sometimes by causing them all the annoyances possible to
devise; some against their will are married by their fathers to old men,
infirm, loathsome and disgusting, who make them live in continual
misery. If such women were allowed to be divorced and separated from
those with whom they are ill mated, perhaps it would not be fitting for
them to love any but their husbands; but when, either by enmity of the
stars or by unfitness of temperament or by other accident, it happens
that the marriage bed, which ought to be a nest of concord and of love,
is strewn by the accursed infernal fury with the seed of its venom,
which then brings forth anger, suspicion and the stinging thorns of
hatred to torment those unhappy souls cruelly bound by an unbreakable
chain until death,—why are you unwilling that the woman should be
allowed to seek some refuge from the heavy lash, and to bestow on others
that which is not only spurned but hated by her husband? I am quite of
the opinion that those who have suitable husbands and are loved by them,
ought not to do them wrong; but the others wrong themselves by not
loving those who love them.”
“Nay,” replied the Magnifico, “they wrong themselves by loving others
than their husbands. Still, since not to love is often beyond our power,
if this mischance shall happen to the Court Lady (that her husband’s
hate or another’s love brings her to love), I would have her yield her
lover nothing but her spirit; nor ever let her show him any clear sign
of love (either by words or by gestures or by any other means) by which
he may be sure of it.”
57.—Then messer Roberto da Bari said, laughing:
“I appeal from this judgment of yours, my lord Magnifico, and think I
shall have many with me; but since you will teach married women this
rusticity, so to speak, do you wish also to have the unmarried equally
cruel and discourteous?—and complaisant to their lovers in nothing
whatever?”
“If my Court Lady be unmarried,” replied my lord Magnifico, “and must
love, I wish her to love someone whom she can marry; nor shall I account
it an errour if she shows him some sign of love: as to which matter I
wish to teach her one universal rule in a few words, to the end that she
may with little pains be able to bear it in mind; and this is, let her