“Great spirits and great business do keep out the weak passion of love,”
said Bacon; but long before him Ovid knew that Leisure is Cupid’s chief
ally. “If you desire to end your love, employ yourself and you will
conquer; for Amor flees business.” He advises military service,
agriculture, and hunting as excellent diversions.
Poetry and music, however, as the same poet tells us, and all other
occupations tending to stir up the tender feelings, are to be carefully
avoided. Novel-reading is particularly bad, for to imagine another’s
Love is to revive your own. “Lotte Hartmann played some melodies of
Bellini on the piano this evening,” writes Lenau; “I ought to avoid
music when I am away from you, for it arouses in me a longing and an
anguish of consuming violence. I feel how my heart sadly shrinks within
itself, and unwillingly continues to beat.”