The fact is, in Renaissance literature, love was very often thought to be based not on contrast but on similarity; the classical model was the romantic bond between two men. Like calls to like; birds of a feather flock together. There is an intriguing exchange in Honoré D’Urfé’s L’Astrée (1607–27), when a jealous man called Hylas asks sneeringly if “Alexis” (a man disguised as a priestess) finds shepherdesses more appealing than shepherds, and “she” answers proudly, “Have no doubt about it, and blame no one but nature, who wants everyone to love his own kind."