BOETHIUS II
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hat which he prayed. And the restless wheel which Ixionthe king of the Lapithae was bound to for his guilt ; thatstood still for his harping. And Tantalus the king, who inthis world was immoderately greedy, and whom that samevice of greediness followed there ; he became quiet. Andthe vulture should cease, so that he tore not the liver ofTityus the king, which before therewith tormented him.And all the punishments of the inhabitants of hell were sus-pended, while he harped before the king. When he longand long had harped, then spoke the king of the inhabitantsof hell. He said : Let us give the man his wife, for he has earnedher by his harping. He then commanded him that heshould well observe that he never looked backward afterhe departed thence, and said, if he looked backward, thathe should lose the woman. But men can with great diffi-culty, if at all, restrain love! Well-away! what! Orpheusthen led his wife with him till he came to the boundary oflight and darkness. Then went his wife after him. Whenhe came forth into the light, then looked he behind his backtoward the woman. Then was she immediately lost to him.This fable teaches every man who desires to fly the darknessof hell, and to come to the light of the true good, that helook not about him to his old vices, so that he practise themagain as fully as he did before. For whosoever with fullwill turns his mind to the vices, which he had before for-saken, and practises them, and they then fully please him,and he never thinks of forsaking them : then loses he allhis former good, unless he again amend it ! I can relate to thee, from ancient fables, a story very liketo the subject which we have just now spoken about. Ithappened formerly in the Trojan war, that there was a kingwhose name was Ulysses, who had two countries under theCaesar. The countries were called Ithaca and Retia, andthe Caesar's name was Agamemnon. When Ulysses wentwith the Caesar to the battle, he had some hundred ships.Then were they some ten years in that war. When the kingagain returned homeward from the Caesar, and they hadconquered the land, he had not more ships than one ; butthat was a ship with three rows of oars. Then opposed him
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