The Golden Ass · Chapter
Epistle Dedicatory explained
William Adlington dedicates his English translation of Apuleius's Metamorphoses to Thomas Earl of Sussex, explaining that despite the book's light and jesting matter, it contains virtuous morals and profitable lessons, as fables have histor
What happens
William Adlington dedicates his English translation of Apuleius's Metamorphoses to Thomas Earl of Sussex, explaining that despite the book's light and jesting matter, it contains virtuous morals and profitable lessons, as fables have historically been used to allure children to deeper studies and to covertly commend virtues and discommend vices.
Themes in this chapter
Folly and Wisdom
Adlington argues that the book's light and merry matter conceals a good and virtuous moral, suggesting that wisdom can be found beneath apparent folly.
Storytelling and Narrative
The epistle discusses the purpose of fables and feigned jests to allure readers to deeper studies and to covertly teach virtues.
Deception and Appearance
The fable of Acteon is used to illustrate how the appearance of beauty can deceive and lead to a man's downfall.
Characters to notice
- William Adlington
The translator who dedicates his work to the Earl of Sussex and explains his motivations.
- Lucius
The protagonist of the translated book, whose feigned jest is said to figure man's life.
- Acteon
Mentioned in the fable illustrating how gazing on vain beauty leads to destruction.
- Diana
Referenced in the fable of Acteon as the goddess whose bathing is witnessed.
Key passages
“For so have all writers in times past employed their travel and labours, that their posterity might receive some fruitful profit by the same.”
All past writers have worked so that future generations might gain some useful benefit from their efforts.
Adlington justifies the value of translating and publishing the book.
“For by the fable of Acteon, where it is feigned that he saw Diana washing herself in a well, he was immediately turned into an hart, and so was slain of his own Dogs; may be meant, that when a man casteth his eyes on the vain and soon fading beauty of the world, consenting thereto in his mind, he seemeth to be turned into a brute beast, and so to be slain by the inordinate desire of his own affects.”
The story of Acteon, who was turned into a stag and killed by his own dogs after seeing Diana bathing, symbolizes how a man who gazes on worldly beauty and consents to it in his mind becomes like a beast and is destroyed by his own uncontrolled desires.
Adlington provides a moral interpretation of a classical myth to illustrate the book's hidden lessons.