She closed with the encouraging
words which have become proverbial: "Yield not to disasters, but
press onward the more bravely." [Footnote: See Proverbial
Expressions.] Aeneas replied that he had prepared himself for
whatever might await him. He had but one request to make. Having
been directed in a dream to seek the abode of the dead in order to
confer with his father, Anchises, to receive from him a revelation
of his future fortunes and those of his race, he asked her
assistance to enable him to accomplish the task. The Sibyl
replied, "The descent to Avernus is easy: the gate of Pluto stands
open night and day; but to retrace one's steps and return to the
upper air, that is the toil, that the difficulty."[Footnote: See
Proverbial Expressions.] She instructed him to seek in the forest
a tree on which grew a golden branch. This branch was to be
plucked off and borne as a gift to Proserpine, and if fate was
propitious it would yield to the hand and quit its parent trunk,
but otherwise no force could rend it away. If torn away, another
would succeed.[Footnote: See Proverbial Expressions.]
Aeneas followed the directions of the Sibyl. His mother, Venus,
sent two of her doves to fly before him and show him the way, and
by their assistance he found the tree, plucked the branch, and
hastened back with it to the Sibyl.
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