Le tableau des riches inventions qui sont representees dans le songe de Poliphile

...touched my hand, as if wanting to tell me that I was welcome. He left me with the gracious Nephés the Soul-guide, who, in this state of prosperity, promised to make me more content than all the other lovers serving Olocliree Polia, the object of the quest. I cannot speak her name without total reverence. It is for those who are well-born and have the state of happiness as the guardian of their birth to rejoice. The great Phecel the Intellect or Solar Light having retired into his vault, Nephés told me many wonders of the place, the order of its practices, and what is permitted to be brought back from it. It seems to me that I still see that precious movement of the separated coral, by which beautiful airs were gathered into distinct forms. This pleasure was so natural that I am convinced I am at the same moment hearing and seeing her speak thus. Just Heaven, which gives us everything according to our labor, does not want beautiful souls to be constantly deprived of the fruits of their work. Therefore, by allowing love to imprint its forces on beautiful hearts, Heaven ensures that desirable objects feel the passions stirred by them. Our beautiful Olocliree is no less desirous of being sought after than her faithful lovers are passionate for her. If it were otherwise, she would do wrong to her beauty, which is the most beautiful object for courageous affection. She takes pleasure in being loved. All her desires incline toward the sweet concern of perfect lovers. However, she only wishes to admit the one who knows how to judge what is perfectly legitimate love. For this reason, the intellectual power animating the angel presiding over her affections has placed pure intentions of love into curious souls. Every heart of desire is reduced to these intentions for all subjects. Therefore, as is evident, all the wise have practiced the sciences under the shadow of the most beautiful folds of love. Love has been and still is the gracious brush that has traced what is rare and destined, both among the superior and inferior powers, and all that concerns them. This is why the Chaos of our order is supported on the stem of the Myrtle, which is the symbol of love. As love spreads happily everywhere, one sees the Myrtle here casting out infinite branches on all sides of this place. This expanded stem demonstrates that all our diligence aims only at love. Know, see, and hear, and you will prudently notice that all the most magnificent and good mysteries have been hidden and retraced under the beauties of love. For love is the happy soul of everything. One sees here in Old French original: "vieil François" a double meaning containing the derivation of love, written in capital letters as L'AME-HEVR a pun combining "l'âme" (the soul) and "heur" (luck or happiness) to sound like "amour". This implies that love is the fortune of the soul. Just as terms have changed—where in the past people said doulour for douleur sorrow—they once said AMEYR, and now AMOUR. For a true understanding of

what it is: the love of each person is what they hold as their most intimate and darling desires. To enjoy one’s loves is properly to abound in the enjoyment of expected excellences. These are not effects that cause sadness through their perception, or danger through their accomplishment, or sin through their meeting. Instead, it is permanent joy in finding them, complete safety in receiving them, and lasting glory through their arrival at their legitimate end. The profane have placed a veil over the eyes of love because they dared not cast their sight toward his divinities, whose rays were unbearable to them. But the wise, who live according to equity and lead themselves by the spirit of the truths that truth proposes, represent him without a blindfold, as he is in his true state. If some have left him with this bandage, it was to deprive the unworthy of him. In fact, love is the brother of light and its true guide, illuminating everything capable of being lit. It is only to those in the misery of ignorance that he is blind. It is not he who is blind, but they who think they see and yet have no eyes. The spirits who are children of light are led by love through the paths of just knowledge. If by chance there were darkness there, then by the sincerity of his magnificent operations, he removes all shadows and dissipates the difficulties that would turn away one's intentions. Truly, he is also the torch of souls and the broom that chases the dust of ignorance into the wind. Therefore, ignorance in our subject is a manifest fault and a notable sin. For this cause, so that you are not among the number of those who have revolted against the order of innocence—to which all true philosophers and perfect lovers belong—I will equip you with certain maxims. If you ponder these often in your heart, they will make you capable of your blessed loves and the enjoyment of your object. To reach this, there is only one way. Whoever finds himself on it meets all happiness, being the only one truly blessed. I am sad to hear often that many whom I would like to help despise my counsel. Although they have one of my sisters for a guide, and sometimes myself or our great universal mother, they nevertheless have a horror of this path. They disdain this road because it seems common to them, as there is much frequency near it. But take note that it is chosen only by the most harmonious souls. Those who wander from it are troubled by imaginations. These do not come from the great Phecel, but from the trouble of their own understanding which judges without knowledge. Now, my brother, believe me, I pray you, that what is easy is the most beautiful. Secrets wrapped in difficult returns, which are twisted with artifices of apparent excellences, are to tell the truth so secret that they are made eternally, in such a way that they are never discovered. The knowledge of what they suppose remains so secretly dead in such