172. ‘O Invidia nimica di vertute,’

O Envy enemy to virtue, that willingly

opposes all our best intentions,

by what path have you entered silently

into that lovely breast, by what art the mute?

You have shattered my health at its root:

shown me as too happy a lover, whose humble

and chaste prayers she once valued,

and now seems to deny and hate.

But though with bitter and harsh actions

she weeps at my good fortune, laughs at my tears,

she cannot change a single thought of mine:

nor, though she murder me a thousand times,

make me not love her, or not hope for her:

though she make me afraid, Love gives me hope.