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Link to an image of this page  Link to an image of this page  [G1v p50]

ERRER NE PEUT QUI PRUDENCE
a pour guide.

IL est bien malaisé d’errer en ces bas lieux,
Sans que du chemin droit ignorant on desvoye:
Veu que le moins aveugle aysément se fourvoye,
S’il n’est en son voyage illuminé des Cieux.

AEnée ardent de voir les Manes stygieux,[1]
S’ayde du rameau d’or, qui cogneu le convoye
Par les obliques tours de l’infernale voye,
Et le tire content du royaume odieux.

Ainsi l’homme qui veut secouër l’ignorance,
Et par l’obscurité passer en asseurance
L’horreur de ceste vie, ayt en main ce rameau.

Ce rameau de Prudence au sainct livre enseignée
Mieux par l’Esprit divin, qui ne l’apprit AEnée
Du discours Sibyllin, ny du vol de l’oyseau.

Link to an image of this page  Link to an image of this page  [G2r p51]

Ad Georgium Averlium.[2]

Securo del error con un’ picciol’ ramo.[3]

Safe from going astray with a little branch.

Man and woman walking in woodland. Plinth with greek inscription. Bird outlined in the sun.
[Click on image to enlarge]

EUboicae monitis Aenaeas Phoebados aureum
Ramum aufert,[4] Erebi cognita signa Deo.
Illa est quae menti errorem prudentia demit,
Obscuras animi discutiens tenebras.

Aeneas, with the advice of the Euboean priestess of Apollo, takes the golden bough, a sign recognised by the god of the Underworld. It is prudence which drives away error from the soul, scattering the gloomy darkness of the mind.

Notes:

1.  Manes stygieux: the souls of the Styx, the river of the Underworld seen by Aeneas.

2.  Georgius Averlius: thus far unidentified, but possibly a relative of François d’Averli, a noble from Champagne, and friend of Clément de Treles.

3.  Not a quotation, but a reference to the golden bough given by the Cumaean Sibyl to assist Aeneas in the Underworld where he went to find his father (Vergil, Aeneid, 6; Ovid, Metamorphoses, 14). On the Golden Bough, see also Sambucus, Tolerantia ([FSAb104]).

4.  The Euboean priestess of Apollo, i.e., the Cumaean Sibyl, so-called because the Oracle of Apollo at Cumae in Italy was founded by Greek colonists from Euboea. For the Golden Bough, see note 3, above.

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