“For since a kiss is a knitting together both of body and soul, it is to be feared lest the sensual lover will be more inclined to the part of the body than of the soul; but the reasonable lover wotteth well that although the mouth be a parcel of the body, yet is it an issue for the words that be the interpreters of the soul, and for the inward breath, which is also called soul; and therefore hath a delight to join his mouth with the woman’s beloved with a kiss – not to stir him to any unhonest desire, but because he feeleth that that bond is the opening of an entry to the souls, which drawn with a coveting the one of the other, pour themselves by turn the one into the other’s body, and be so mingled together that each of them hath two souls, and one alone so framed of them both ruleth, in a manner, two bodies. Whereupon a kiss may be said to be rather a coupling together of the soul than of the body, because it hath such force in her that it draweth her unto it, and, as it were, separateth her from the body. For this do all chaste lovers covet a kiss as a coupling of souls together.” LoveSoulKissCourtship Book:The Book of the Courtier Source: The Book of the Courtier
“Outward beauty is a true sign of inner goodness. This loveliness, indeed, is impressed upon the body in varying degrees as a token by which the soul can be recognized for what it is, just as with trees the beauty of the blossom testifies to the goodness of the fruit.” SoulBodyTreeGoodnessDegreesFruitImpressedTokensLovelinessOutward Beauty Author:Baldassare Castiglione
“Then the soul, freed from vice, purged by studies of true philosophy, versed in spiritual life, and practised in matters of the intellect, devoted to the contemplation of her own substance, as if awakened from deepest sleep, opens those eyes which all possess but few use, and sees in herself a ray of that light which is the true image of the angelic beauty communicated to her, and of which she then communicates a faint shadow to the body.” IfsSoulMatterPhilosophyUseBodyLightEyeSpiritualSleepStudyShadowVicesCommunicateIntellectSubstanceContemplationRaysSpiritual LifeDevotedAwakenedAngelic Book:The Book of the Courtier Source: The Book of the Courtier
