32 THE WISDOM OF THE ANCIENTS. 



back upon her till he came to the light of the upper 

 world ; which he, impatient of, out of love and care, 

 and thinking that he was in a manner past all dan 

 ger, nevertheless violated, insomuch that the covenant 

 is broken, and she forthwith tumbles back again head- 

 longintohell. Orpheus falling into a deep melancholy, 

 became a contemner of women-kind, and bequeathed 

 himself to a solitary life in the deserts ; where, by 

 the same melody of his voice and harp, he first drew 

 all manner of wild beasts unto him, who, forgetful 

 of their savage fierceness, and casting off the preci 

 pitate provocations of lust and fury, not caring to 

 satiate their voracity by hunting after prey, as at a 

 theatre, in fawning and reconciled amity one towards 

 another, standing all at the gaze about him, and at 

 tentively lend their ears to his music. Neither is 

 this all; for so great was the power and alluring 

 force of this harmony, that he drew the woods, and 

 moved the very stones to come and place themselves 

 in an orderly and decent fashion about him. These 

 things succeeding happily, and with great admira 

 tion for a time ; at length certain Thracian women, 

 possessed with the spirit of Bacchus, made such a 

 horrid and strange noise with their cornets, that the 

 sound of Orpheus harp could no more be heard, in 

 somuch as that harmony, which was the bond of that 

 order and society being dissolved, all disorder began 

 again, and the beasts returning to their wonted na 

 ture, pursued one another unto death as before ; 

 neither did the trees or stones remain any longer in 

 their places ; and Orpheus himself was by these 



