THE WISDOM OF THE ANCIENTS. 47 



compound bodies to a man rightly judging, seem to 

 be apparelled and cloathed, and nothing to be pro 

 perly naked but the first particles of things. 



Concerning his blindness, the allegory is full of 

 wisdom : for this love, or desire, whatsoever it be, 

 seems to have but little providence, as directing his 

 pace and motion by that which it perceives nearest, 

 not unlike blind men that go by feeling : more 

 admirable then must that chief divine providence be, 

 which, from things empty and destitute of provi 

 dence, and as it were blind, by a constant and fatal 

 law produceth so excellent an order and beauty of 

 things. 



The last thing which is attributed unto Love is 

 archery, by which is meant, that his virtue is such, 

 as that it works upon a distant object : because that 

 whatsoever operates afar off, seems to shoot, as it 

 were, an arrow. Wherefore whosoever holds the 

 being both of atoms and vacuity, must needs infer, 

 that the virtue of the atom reacheth to a distant 

 object; for if it were not so, there could be no 

 motion at all, by reason of the interposition of 

 vacuity, but all things would stand stone still, and 

 remain immoveable. 



Now as touching that other Cupid, or Love, he 

 may well be termed the youngest of the gods, be 

 cause he could have no being, before the constitution 

 of species. And in his description the allegory may 

 be applied and traduced to manners: nevertheless 

 he holds some kind of conformity with the elder; 

 for Venus doth generally stir up a desire of conjunc- 



