[6241] “Noctua ut in tumulis, super atque cadavera bubo,
        Talis apud Sophoclem nostra puella sedet.”

       “Night-crows on tombs, owl sits on carcass dead,
        So lies a wench with Sophocles in bed.”

For Sophocles, as [6242]Atheneus describes him, was a very old man, as cold as January, a bedfellow of bones, and doted yet upon Archippe, a young courtesan, than which nothing can be more odious. [6243]_Senex maritus uxori juveni ingratus est_, an old man is a most unwelcome guest to a young wench, unable, unfit: 

[6244] “Amplexus suos fugiunt puellae,
        Omnis horret amor Venusque Hymenque.”

And as in like case a good fellow that had but a peck of corn weekly to grind, yet would needs build a new mill for it, found his error eftsoons, for either he must let his mill lie waste, pull it quite down, or let others grind at it.  So these men, &c.

Seneca therefore disallows all such unseasonable matches, habent enim maledicti locum crebrae nuptiae. And as [6245]Tully farther inveighs, “’tis unfit for any, but ugly and filthy in old age.” Turpe senilis amor, one of the three things [6246]God hateth.  Plutarch, in his book contra Coleten, rails downright at such kind of marriages, which are attempted by old men, qui jam corpore impotenti, et a voluptatibus deserti, peccant animo, and makes a question whether in some cases it be tolerable at least for such a man to marry,—­qui Venerem affectat sine viribus, “that is now past those venerous exercises,” “as a gelded man lies with a virgin and sighs,” Ecclus. xxx. 20, and now complains with him in Petronius, funerata est haec pars jam, quad fuit olim Achillea, he is quite done,

[6247] “Vixit puellae nuper idoneus,
        Et militavit non sine gloria.”

But the question is whether he may delight himself as those Priapeian popes, which, in their decrepit age, lay commonly between two wenches every night, contactu formosarum, et contrectatione, num adhuc gaudeat; and as many doting sires do to their own shame, their children’s undoing, and their families’ confusion:  he abhors it, tanquam ab agresti et furioso domino fugiendum, it must be avoided as a bedlam master, and not obeyed.

[6248] “Alecto------
Ipsa faces praefert nubentibus, et malus Hymen
Triste ululat,”------

the devil himself makes such matches. [6249]Levinus Lemnius reckons up three things which generally disturb the peace of marriage:  the first is when they marry intempestive or unseasonably, “as many mortal men marry precipitately and inconsiderately, when they are effete and old:  the second when they marry unequally for fortunes and birth:  the third, when a sick impotent person weds one that is sound, novae nuptae spes frustratur:  many dislikes instantly follow.”  Many doting dizzards, it may not be denied, as Plutarch confesseth, [6250]"recreate themselves with such obsolete, unseasonable