Epistulae

mine. I could wish, loveliest of men, that the child who may stand in competition with you, had died in the birth. What reverence, after all this, can be due to your father's bed, which he even shuns himself, and has deserted? Nor let vain fears alarm you, that the commerce, between a son and mother-in-law, is infamous. This old-fashioned piety, which could not subsist long, suited only the rustic age of Saturn. Jupiter has made pleasure the test of piety, and has given us an example in espousing his own sister. That tie of blood is firmest, which is strengthened by the bonds of Venus. It will be an easy matter to conceal it: the name of relative will justify our freedoms. Whoever sees our mutual embraces will praise us; I shall be thought a stepmother, tender of my husband's son.