That very time I saw (but thou couldst not)
Flying between the cold moon and the earth,
Cupid, all arm’d; a certain aim he took
At a fair vestal, throned by the west,
And loos’d his love-shaft smartly from his bow
As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts.
But I might see young Cupid’s fiery shaft
Quench’d in the chaste beams of the wat’ry moon,
And the imperial vot’ress passèd on,
In maiden meditation, fancy-free.
Yet mark’d I where the bolt of Cupid fell.
It fell upon a little western flower,
Before milk-white, now purple with love’s wound,
And maidens call it love-in-idleness.
– William Shakespeare
A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 2, Scene 1. Oberon explains the origins of the "Love-in-Idleness" flower with magical qualities to cause people to fall in love with the first person or beast they see. He says that Cupid’s arrow was aimed at a royal virgin when it was weakened by the beams of the moon and stuck a pansy flower instead. The virgin remained unaffected. But the white flower was turned to purple by the arrow and acquired magical powers.