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PROEM

'Tis humane to have compassion on the afflicted and as it shews well in all,
so it is especially demanded of those who have had need of comfort and have
found it in others: among whom, if any had ever need thereof or found it
precious or delectable, I may be numbered; seeing that from my early youth
even to the present I was beyond measure aflame with a most aspiring and
noble love (1) more perhaps than, were I to enlarge upon it, would seem to
accord with my lowly condition. Whereby, among people of discernment to
whose knowledge it had come, I had much praise and high esteem, but
nevertheless extreme discomfort and suffering not indeed by reason of
cruelty on the part of the beloved lady, but through superabundant ardour
engendered in the soul by ill-bridled desire; the which, as it allowed me no
reasonable period of quiescence, frequently occasioned me an inordinate
distress. In which distress so much relief was afforded me by the delectable
discourse of a friend and his commendable consolations, that I entertain a
very solid conviction that to them I owe it that I am not dead. But, as it
pleased Him, who, being infinite, has assigned by immutable law an end to
all things mundane, my love, beyond all other fervent, and neither to be
broken nor bent by any force of determination, or counsel of prudence, or
fear of manifest shame or ensuing danger, did nevertheless in course of time
me abate of its own accord, in such wise that it has now left nought of
itself in my mind but that pleasure which it is wont to afford to him who
does not adventure too far out in navigating its deep seas; so that, whereas
it was used to be grievous, now, all discomfort being done away, I find that
which remains to be delightful. But the cessation of the pain has not
banished the memory of the kind offices done me by those who shared by
sympathy the burden of my griefs; nor will it ever, I believe, pass from me