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A certain king and queen had three daughters. The charms of the two elder were more than common, but the beauty of the youngest was so wonderful that the poverty of language is unable to express its due praise. The fame of her beauty was so great that strangers from neighbouring countries came in crowds to enjoy the sight, and looked on her with amazement, paying her that homage which is due only to Aphrodite herself. In fact Aphrodite found her altars deserted, while men turned their devotion to this young virgin. As she passed along, the people sang her praises, and strewed her way with chaplets and flowers.
This perversion of homage due only to the immortal powers to the exaltation of a mortal gave great offence to the real Aphrodite. Shaking her ambrosial locks with indignation, she exclaimed, "Am I then to be eclipsed in my honours by a mortal girl? In vain then did that royal shepherd, whose judgment was approved by Zeus himself, give me the palm of beauty over my illustrious rivals, Athena and Hera. But she shall not so quietly usurp my honours. I will give her cause to repent of so unlawful a beauty."
Thereupon she called upon her son Eros, mischievous enough in his own nature, and roused and provoked him yet more by her complaints. Pointing to the virgin, Psyche, and said, "My dear son, punish that contumacious beauty; give thy mother a revenge as sweet as her injuries are great; infuse into the bosom of that haughty girl a passion for some low, mean, unworthy being, so that she may reap a mortification as great as her present exultation and triumph."
Eros prepared to follow his mother's instructions.