Third Dialoguea

. Interlocutors : Liberio. Laodonio. Lib. Reclining in the shade of a cypress-tree, the enthusiast finding his mind free from other thoughts, it happened that the heart and the eyes spoke together as if they were animals and substances of different intellects and senses, and they made lament of that which was the beginning of his torment and which consumed his soul. Lao. Repeat, if you can recollect, the reasons and the words. Lib. The heart began the dialogue, which, making itself heard by the breast, broke into these words: 55. First proposition of the heart to the eyes . How, eyes of mine, can that so much torment, Which as an ardent fire from ye derives, And which this mortal subject so afflicts With unrelenting burning never spared? Can ocean floods suffice to mitigate The ardour of those flames? or slowest star Within the frozen circle of the north Offer umbrageous shade? Ye took me captive, and the self-same hand Doth hold me and reject me and through you I in the body am: out of it with the sun. I am the source of life, yet am I not alive. I know not what I am, for I belong Unto this soul; but this soul is not mine. Lao. Truly the hearing, the seeing, the knowing, is that which kindles desire, and therefore it is through the operation of the eyes that the heart becomes inflamed: and the more worthy the object which is present with them the stronger is the fire, and the more active are the flames. What then, must that kind be, for which the heart burns in such a way that the coldest star in the Arctic circle cannot cool it, nor can the whole body of water of the ocean stop its burning! What must be the excellence of that object that has made him an enemy to himself, a rebel to his own soul and content with such hostility and rebellion, although he be captive to one who despises and will have none of him! But let me hear whether the eyes made a response, and what they said. Lib. They, on the other hand, complained of the heart as being the origin and cause why they shed so many tears, and this was the sum of their proposition. 56. First proposition of the eyes to the heart . How, oh my heart, do waters gush from thee Like to the springs that bathe the Nereids' brows Which daily in the sun are born and die? Like to the double fountain of Amphitrite, Which pours so great a flood across the earth, That one might say, the sum of it exceeds That of the stream which Egypt inundates, Running its sevenfold course unto the sea. Nature hath given two lights To this small earth for governance; But thou, perverter of eternal law, Hast turned them into everlasting streams. But Heaven is not content to see her law Decline before unbridled violence. Lao. It is certain that the heart, grieved and stung, causes tears to spring to the eyes, and while these light the flames in this, that other dims those with moisture. But I am surprised at such exaggeration which says that the Nereids raising their wet faces to the eastern sun, is less than these waters (of the eyes).