L'Aminta, di Torquato Tasso, favola boscherecchia. Tasso's Aminta, a pastoral comedy, in Italian and English.
Tasso, Torquato, 1544-1595.
Page  73

CHORUS.

LOVE! In what School, of what Ma∣ster, is to be learnt, thy so long and doubtful Art of Loving? which teaches to express what ever the Mind intends, while on thy Wings it soars above Heaven. Not learned Athens; nor can the Licoeum teach it. Phoebus in Helicon, who speaks so much of Love, can't shew us how it is to be learnt there. He speaks too coldly, and too little, he has not that Voice of Fire which befits you. He does not exalt his Thoughts to the Height of thy Mysteries. Love! Thou only art a Master worthy of thy self, and by thy self only can'st be express'd. You instruct the most rustick Wits to read those admirable Things, which in amorous Letters you write with your own Hand in the Eyes of others. You let loose the Tongue of your Vo∣taries in beautiful and eloquent Discourses, Page  75 and oftentimes (O strange and new Elo∣quence of Love!) often by a confus'd Speech, and interrupted Words, the Heart better expresses it self, and seems more to be moved, than by a polish'd and learn'd Ha∣rangue. And sometimes even Silence itself intreats and speaks. Love! Let others read the Socratick Writings; for my part, in a Pair of fair Eyes I'll learn this Art; and the Verses of the most learned Pens shall yield to those Sylvan Lays, which my rude, artless Hand engraves on the Bark of a Tree.