A 17th c. Edition of Ovid's Art of Love

The original of this treatise of how to win love provides details to many of the love-affairs in Shakespeare's plays. For example, Ovid notes how lovers rationalize defects of their beloveds into virtues (IV.1153 on) just as Petruchio does in his courtship of Katharina in The Taming of the Shrew (II.i.168-80):

I will attend her here,
And woo her with some spirit when she comes.
Say that she rail; why then I'll tell her plain
She sings as sweetly as a nightingale:
Say that she frown, I'll say she looks as clear
As morning roses newly wash'd with dew:
Say she be mute and will not speak a word;
Then I'll commend her volubility,
And say she uttereth piercing eloquence:
If she do bid me pack, I'll give her thanks,
As though she bid me stay by her a week:
If she deny to wed, I'll crave the day
When I shall ask the banns and when be married.