Skilled in every trick, a worthy heir of his paternal craft, he would make black look like white, and white look black.
[Lat., Furtum ingeniosus ad omne,
Qui facere assueret, patriae non degener artis,
Candida de nigris, et de candentibus atra.]
Ere land and sea and the all-covering sky Were made, in the whole world the countenance Of nature was the same, all one, well named Chaos, a raw and undivided mass, Naught but a lifeless bulk, with warring seeds Of ill-joined elements compressed together.
With wavering steps does fickle fortune stray,
Nowhere she finds a firm and fixed abode;
But now all smiles, and now again all frowns,
She's constant only in inconstancy.
Struggling over my fickle heart, love draws it now this
way, and now hate that--but love, I think, is winning. I
will hate, if I have strength; if not, I shall love unwilling.
Let me tell you I am better acquainted with you for a long absence, as men are with themselves for a long affliction: absence does but hold off a friend, to make one see him the truer.