A rectangular decorative woodcut frieze at the top of the page features a symmetrical design. Ornate urns are positioned at the far left and right. In the center, scrolling acanthus leaves and floral vines surround two seated lions or mythical beasts flanking a central decorative mask.

PROLOGUE.

An ornamental woodcut initial "C" contains a stylized human face surrounded by decorative line work.

Who would believe that beneath human form, and beneath these pastoral garments, a God was hidden? Not just any God, nor a savage one, or one from the common rabble of the Gods, but the most powerful among the great and celestial ones, who often makes Mars drop his bloody sword from his hand, and Neptune, the shaker of the earth, his great Trident, and causes the eternal thunderbolts to fall from the hand of the highest Jupiter. In this appearance, surely, and in these clothes, my mother Venus will not easily recognize me, her son Love. I am forced to flee from her, and hide myself from her, because she wants me to act according to her will, both regarding myself and my arrows; and, like a woman, and like a vain and ambitious one, she depicts me