Cosmetics & Cures (Ovid)

Ovid's Cosmetics for Ladies
(tr. by AD Melville. Oxford Classics)

29--42

Girls dress to please themselves; smartness can never / Be wrong; it makes no odds whom they pursue.

Hair's curled deep in the country; though they're hidden
On Athos, they'll be smart on Athos too.

There's pleasure also in self-satisfaction; / Their beauty always warms the hearts of girls. / In silent pride of beauty struts the peacock / And for the praise of men its plumes unfurls.

That's how love should arise, not by the power
Of plants some frightful sorceress prepares.
And put no trust in herbs or blended juices,
Nor try the poison-flux of lusting mares.

No snakes are burst by Marsian incantations, / Nor does a river to its source flow back, / And even though no bronze is banged and beaten, / The moon will not shaken from her track.

43--51

Your first thought, girls, should be for your behaviour; / A face will please when character is fine. / Love lasts for character: age ruins beauty / And looks that charmed are ploughed with many a line. /

The time will come when you will loathe your mirror / And grief a second cause of wrinkles sends. / Goodness suffices and endures for ever; / On this throughout its years true love depends.

* * *

Cures for Love (Melville)

445-448 (p.163)

Great rivers are reduced by many channels; / When fuel is dispersed the flame will die. / One anchor's not enough to hold a warship, / One hook is not enough when water's high.