I come at last to that heroical love which is proper to men and women, is a frequent cause of melancholy, and deserves much rather to be called burning lust, than by such an honourable title.  There is an honest love, I confess, which is natural, laqueus occultus captivans corda hominum, ut a mulieribus non possint separari, “a secret snare to captivate the hearts of men,” as [4712]Christopher Fonseca proves, a strong allurement, of a most attractive, occult, adamantine property, and powerful virtue, and no man living can avoid it. [4713]_Et qui vim non sensit amoris, aut lapis est, aut bellua_.  He is not a man but a block, a very stone, aut [4714]Numen, aut Nebuchadnezzar, he hath a gourd for his head, a pepon for his heart, that hath not felt the power of it, and a rare creature to be found, one in an age, Qui nunquam visae flagravit amore puellae; [4715]for semel insanivimus omnes, dote we either young or old, as [4716]he said, and none are excepted but Minerva and the Muses:  so Cupid in [4717]Lucian complains to his mother Venus, that amongst all the rest his arrows could not pierce them.  But this nuptial love is a common passion, an honest, for men to love in the way of marriage; ut materia appetit formam, sic mulier virum. [4718]You know marriage is honourable, a blessed calling, appointed by God himself in Paradise; it breeds true peace, tranquillity, content, and happiness, qua nulla est aut fuit unquam sanctior conjunctio, as Daphnaeus in [4719]Plutarch could well prove, et quae generi humano immortalitatem parat, when they live without jarring, scolding, lovingly as they should do.

[4720] “Felices ter et amplius
          Quos irrupta tenet copula, nec ullis
        Divulsus querimoniis
          Suprema citius solvit amor die.”

       “Thrice happy they, and more than that,
          Whom bond of love so firmly ties,
        That without brawls till death them part,
          ’Tis undissolv’d and never dies.”

As Seneca lived with his Paulina, Abraham and Sarah, Orpheus and Eurydice, Arria and Poetus, Artemisia and Mausolus, Rubenius Celer, that would needs have it engraven on his tomb, he had led his life with Ennea, his dear wife, forty-three years eight months, and never fell out.  There is no pleasure in this world comparable to it, ’tis summum mortalitatis bonum—­ [4721]hominum divumque voluptas, Alma Venus—­latet enim in muliere aliquid majus potentiusque, omnibus aliis humanis voluptatibus, as [4722]one holds, there’s something in a woman beyond all human delight; a magnetic virtue, a charming quality, an occult and powerful motive.  The husband rules her as head, but she again commands his heart, he is her servant, she is only joy and content:  no happiness is like unto it, no love so great as this of man and wife, no such comfort as [4723]_placens uxor_, a sweet wife:  [4724]_Omnis amor magnus, sed aperto in conjuge major_.  When they love at last as fresh as they did at first, [4725]_Charaque charo consenescit conjugi_, as Homer brings Paris kissing Helen, after they had been married ten years, protesting withal that he loved her as dear as he did the first hour that he was betrothed.  And in their old age, when they make much of one another, saying, as he did to his wife in the poet,