The Visions of Dom Francisco de Quevedo VillegasQuevedo, Francisco de
General
The Visions of Dom Francisco de Quevedo Villegas
Quevedo, Francisco de
Satire; Spanish literature -- Translations into English
recommend you here to other remedies of love, inseparable from the very
sex, but what I have said already, I hope, will be sufficient.”
* * * * *
THE END OF THE FIFTH VISION
THE SIXTH VISION OF HELL
BEING one autumn at a friend’s house in the country (which was indeed a
most delicious retreat) I took a walk one moonlight night into the park,
where all my past visions came fresh into my head again, and I was well
enough pleased with the meditation. At length the humour took me to
leave the path, and go further into the wood: what impulse carried me to
this, I know not. Whether I was moved by my good angel, or some higher
power, but so it was that in half a quarter of an hour, I found myself a
great way from home, and in a place where ’twas no longer night; with the
pleasantest prospect round about me that ever I saw since I was born.
The air was calm and temperate; and it was no small advantage to the
beauty of the place, that it was both innocent and silent. On the one
hand, I was entertained with the murmurs of crystal rivulets; on the
other, with the whispering of the trees; the birds singing all the while
either in emulation, or requital of the other harmonies. And now, to
show the instability of our affections and desires, I was grown weary
even of tranquillity itself, and in this most agreeable solitude began to
long for company.
When in the very instant (to my great wonder) I discovered two paths,
issuing from one and the same beginning but dividing themselves forwards,
more and more, by degrees, as if they liked not one another’s company.
That on the right hand was narrow, almost beyond imagination; and being
very little frequented, it was so overgrown with thorns and brambles, and
so stony withal, that a man had all the trouble in the world to get
into’t. One might see, however, the prints and marks of several
passengers that had rubbed through, though with exceeding difficulty; for
they had left pieces of heads, arms, legs, feet, and many of them their
whole skins behind them. Some we saw yet upon the way, pressing forward,
without ever so much as looking back; and these were all of them
pale-faced, lean, thin, and miserably mortified. There was no passing
for horsemen; and I was told that St. Paul himself left his horse, when
he went into’t. And indeed, there was not the footing of any beast to be
seen. Neither horse nor mule, nor the track of any coach or chariot.
Nor could I learn that any had passed that way in the memory of man.
While I was bethinking myself of what I had seen, I spied at length a
beggar that was resting himself a little to take breath; and I asked him
what inns or lodgings they had upon that road. His answer was that there
was no stopping there, till they came to their journey’s end. “For
this,” said he, “is the way to paradise, and what should they do with
inns or taverns, where there are so few passengers? Do not you know that
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