That is, we cannot pardon their bad taste,

For so it seems to lovers swift or slow,

Who fain would have a mutual flame confessed,

And see a sentimental passion glow,

Even were St. Francis' paramour their guest,

In his monastic concubine of snow;—[336]In short, the maxim for the amorous tribe is

Horatian, "Medio tu tutissimus ibis."[337]