"'I acquiesce, my daughter,' I replied, 'in your silence. I do not blame your reserve, and that for two reasons. In the first place, I have no need to be told that which I have before discovered by my art; and then an unwillingness to speak of a matter of this nature, becomes well the modesty of your sex. But since you have at last felt love, and are manifestly smitten by Theagenes (for this the gods have disclosed to me), know that you are not the first, or the only one, who has succumbed under this passion. It is common to you with many celebrated women, and many maidens in other respects most irreproachable; for love is a very powerful deity, and is said to subdue even the gods[10] themselves. Consider then what is best to be done in your present circumstances. If it be the greatest happiness to be free from love, the next is, when one is taken captive, to regulate it properly: this you have in your power to do; you can repel the imputation of mere sensual love, and sanctify it with the honourable and sacred name of wedlock.' "When I said this, Cnemon, she showed much agitation, and great drops of sweat stood on her forehead. It was plain that she rejoiced at what she heard, but was anxious about the success of her hopes; and ashamed and blushing at the discovery of her weakness. After a considerable pause she said, "'You talk of wedlock, and recommend that, as if it were evident that my father would agree to it, or the author of my sufferings desire it.'--'As to the young man, I have not the least doubt; he is more deeply smitten than yourself, and suffers full as much on your account as you can do on his. For, as it seems, your souls at their first encountering knew that they were worthy of each other, and felt a mutual passion; this passion, out of regard to you, I have heightened by my art in Theagenes. But he whom you suppose your father, proposes to give you another husband, Alcamenes, whom you well know.'--'He shall sooner find Alcamenes a grave, than find him a wife in me,' said she; 'either Theagenes shall be my husband, or I will yield to the fate which presses upon me. But why do you hint that Charicles is not really my father?'