Narcissus; or Self-Love
001
Narcissus is said
to have been
a young man of
wonderful beauty,
but intolerably proud,
fastidious, and disdainful.
Pleased with himself
and despising all others,
he led a solitary life
in the woods and
hunting grounds;
with a few companions
to whom
he was all in all;
followed also
wherever he went
by a nymph called
Echo.
002
Living thus,
he came by chance
one day to
a clear fountain,
and (being in the heat of noon)
lay down by it;
when beholding in the water
his own image,
he fell into
such a study
and then into
such a
rapturous admiration of himself,
that he could not
be drawn away from
gazing at
the shadowy picture,
but remained rooted to
the spot till sense
left him;
and at last
he was changed into
the flower
that bears his name;
a flower
which appears
in the early spring;
and is sacred to
the infernal deities,
－Pluto,
Proserpine,
and the Furies.
003
In this fable
are represented
the dispositions,
and the fortunes too,
of those persons
who from consciousness
either of beauty or
some other gift with
which nature unaided
by any industry of
their own has graced them,
fall in love
as it were
with themselves.
004
For with
this state of mind
there is commonly
joined an indisposition to
appear much in public or
engaged in business;
because business would expose
them to many neglects and scorns,
by which their minds would
be dejected and troubled.
005
Therefore they
commonly live a solitary,
private, and
shadowed life;
with a small circle of
chosen companions,
all devoted admirers,
who assent like
an echo to everything
they say,
and entertain them
with mouth-homage;
till being by such habits
gradually depraved
and puffed up, and
besotted at last
with self-admiration,
they fall into
such a sloth
and listlessness
that they grow
utterly stupid, and
lose all
vigor and alacrity.
006
And it was
a beautiful thought
to choose
the flower of spring
as an emblem of characters
like this:
characters which
in the opening of
their career flourish
and are talked of,
but disappoint
in maturity
the promise of
their youth.
007
The fact
too that
this flower
is sacred to
the infernal deities
contains
an allusion to
the same thing.
008
For men of
this disposition
turn out utterly
useless and good
for nothing whatever;
and anything
that yields no fruit,
but
like the way of a ship
in the sea
passes and leaves no trace,
was by the ancients
held sacred to
the shades and infernal gods.
