"The thirst for beauty, to which you all succumb, would not have much satisfaction to expect from this work." "No, no, no!" Daphne interrupted in a louder tone than usual, and with the earnest desire to convince him.

"Precisely because I transported myself into your tendency, your aspirations, I recognised the danger.

O Hermon! what produced so sinister an effect by the wavering light of the lamps and torches, while the thunderstorm was rising--the strands of hair, the outspread fingers, the bewildered, staring blue eyes--do you not feel yourself how artificial, how unnatural it all was?
This transformation was only a clever trick of acting, nothing more.

Before a quiet spectator, in the pure, truthful light of Apollo, the foe of all deception, what would this Arachne probably become?
Even now--I have already said so--when I imagine her executed in marble or in gold and ivory! Beauty?
Who would expect to find in the active, constantly toiling weaver, the mortal daughter of an industrious dyer in purple, the calm, refreshing charm of divine women?
I at least am neither foolish nor unjust enough to do so.

The degree of beauty Althea possesses would entirely satisfy me for the Arachne.