Chapter 8

[76] Reading with Wyttenbach, [Greek: hôsper daktylion ischnou, hô mê perirrhuê dediôs.]

[77] Perhaps _cur_ = coward, was originally _cur-tail_.

[78] One of the three ports at Athens. See Pausanias, i. 1.

[79] Iolaus was the nephew of Hercules, and was associated with him in many of his Labours. See Pausanias, i. 19; vii. 2; viii. 14, 45.

[80] I read [Greek: synoarizontas]. The general reading [Greek: synerôntas] will hardly do here. Wyttenbach suggests [Greek: synearizontas].

[81] What the [Greek: dibolia] was is not quite clear. I have supposed a jersey.

[82] The women of Lemnos were very masterful. On one memorable occasion they killed all their husbands in one night. Thus the line of Ovid has almost a proverbial force, "Lemniadesque viros nimium quoque vincere norunt."--_Heroides_, vi. 53. Siebelis in his Preface to Pausanias, p. xxi, gives from an old Scholia a sort of excuse for the action of the women of Lemnos.

[83] Probably the epilepsy. See Herodotus, iii. 33.

[84] Euripides, "Bacchae," 203.

[85] Euripides, Fragment of the "Melanippe."

[86] I take Wyttenbach's suggestion as to the reading here.

[87] This line is taken bodily by Aristophanes in his "Frogs," 1244.

[88] The first line is the first line of a passage from Euripides, consisting of thirteen lines, containing similar sentiments to this. See Athenæus, xiii. p. 599, F. The last two lines are from Euripides, "Hippolytus," 449, 450.

[89] Compare Lucretius, i. 1-5.

[90] Hesiod, "Theogony," 116-120.

[91] Euripides, "Danae," Frag. Compare Ovid, "Cedit amor rebus: res age, tutus eris."

[92] Sophocles, Fragm. 678, Dindorf. Compare a remark of Sophocles, recorded by Cicero, "De Senectute," ch. xiv.

[93] Sophocles, Fragm. 720. Reading [Greek: kala] with Reiske.

[94] Iliad, v. 831.

[95] Connecting [Greek: Arês] with [Greek: anairein].

[96] The _Saint Hubert_ of the Middle Ages.

[97] Æschylus, Frag. 1911. Dindorf.

[98] Odyssey, v. 69.

[99] Fragm. 146, 125.

[100] Hermes is alluded to.

[101] All these four were titles of _Zeus_. They are very difficult to put into English so as to convey any distinctive and definite idea to an English reader.

[102] Enthusiasm is the being [Greek: entheos], or inspired by some god.

[103] From Æschylus, "Supplices," 681, 682.

[104] "Iliad," vii. 121, 122.

[105] Like the character described in Lucretius, ii. 1-6.

[106] Sophocles, "Trachiniae," 497. The Cyprian Queen is, of course, Aphrodite.

[107] Hence the famous Proverb, "Non omnibus dormio." See Cic. "Ad. Fam." vii. 24.

[108] Above, in § xiii.

[109] See Sophocles, "Antigone," 783, 784. And compare Horace, "Odes," Book iv. Ode xiii. 6-8, "Ille virentis et Doctæ psallere Chiæ _Pulchris excubat in genis_."

[110] The "Niobe," which exists only in a few fragments.

[111] This was the name of Dionysius' Poem. He was a Corinthian poet.

[112] "Iliad," xiii. 131.

[113] Reading according to the conjecture of Wyttenbach, [Greek: hôs ton Erôta uonon aêttêton onta tôn stratêgôn].

[114] Something has probably dropped out here, as Dübner suspects.

[115] Fragment from the "Stheneboea" of Euripides.

[116] Anytus was one of the accusers of Socrates, and so one of the causers of his death. So Horace calls Socrates "Anyti reum," "Sat." ii. 4, 3.

[117] Homeric Epigrammata, xiii. 5. Quoted also in "On Virtue and Vice," § 1.

[118] Odyssey, xix. 40.

[119] I adopt the suggestion of Wyttenbach, [Greek: eipen, ô Daphnaie].

[120] Pinder, "Pyth." i. 8.

[121] See for example Homer, Iliad, xi. 3, 73; ix. 502.

[122] Euripides, "Pirithous," Fragm. 591. Dindorf.

[123] An allusion to Homer, "Odyssey," xii. 453.

[124] So Terence, "Andria," 555. "Amantium iræ amoris integratiost."

[125] Euripides, "Hippolytus," 194-196.

[126] The lines are from Alcæus. Thus Love was the child of the Rainbow and the West Wind. A pretty conceit.

[127] Greek _iris_.

[128] The mirrors of the ancients were of course not like our mirrors. They were only burnished bronze. Hence the view in them would be at best somewhat obscure. This explains 1 Cor. xiii. 12; 2 Cor. iii. 18; James i. 23.

[129] See Euripides, "Hippolytus," 7, 8.

[130] Here the story unfortunately ends, and for all time we shall know no more of it. Reiske somewhat forcibly says, "Vel lippus videat Gorgus historiam non esse finitam, et multa, ut et alias, periisse."

[131] Like Reiske we condense here a little.

[132] Reading with Reiske [Greek: orthês kai athruptou.]

[133] I read [Greek: ei gar].

[134] See "Iliad," xxiii. 295. Podargus was an entire horse.

[135] See Ovid, "Metamorph." iii. 206-208.

[136] Æschylus, "Toxotides," Fragm. 224.

[137] A very favourite proverb among the ancients. See Plat. "Phaedr." fin. Martial, ii. 43.

[138] Soph. Fragm. 712.

[139] On Lais, see Pausanias, ii. 2. Her Thessalian lover is there called Hippostratus. Her favours were so costly that the famous proverb is said to owe its origin to her, "Non cuivis homini contingit adire Corinthum."

[140] The Ægean and Ionian. Cf. Horace, "Odes," i. 7, 2.

[141] On Acro-Corinthus, see Pausanias, ii. 4. The words in inverted commas are from Euripides, Fragm. 921.

[142] On Lais generally, and her end, see Athenæus, xiii. 54, 55.

[143] See § I. The Festival of Love was being kept at this very time.

[144] This story is also told by Plutarch, "De Mulierum Virtutibus," § xx.

[145] Sophocles, Fragm. 741. Quoted again in "On Abundance of Friends," § iii.

[146] A Delphic word for love. Can it be connected with [Greek: arma]?

[147] Very frequent in Homer, _e.g._, "Iliad," ii. 232; vi, 165; xiii. 636: xiv. 353, etc.

[148] See Lucretius, iv. 1105-1114. I tone down the original here a little.

[149] Homer, "Odyssey," vi. 183, 184. Cf. Eurip. "Medea," 14, 15.

[150] This means when the moustache and beard and whiskers begin to grow.

[151] The whole story about Harmodius and Aristogiton and how they killed Hipparchus is told by Thucydides, vi. 54-59. Bion therefore practically called these sprouting beards _tyrant-killers_, _tyrannicides_.

[152] "Scriptus igitur hic libellus est post caedem Domitiani."--_Reiske._

[153] Vespasian certainly was not cruel generally. "Non temere quis punitus insons reperietur, nisi absente eo et ignaro aut certe invito atque decepto..... Sola est, in qua merito culpetur, pecuniæ cupiditas."--Suetonius, "Divus Vespasianus," 15, 16.

CONJUGAL PRECEPTS.

PLUTARCH SENDS GREETING TO POLLIANUS AND EURYDICE.

After the customary marriage rites, by which, the Priestess of Demeter has united you together, I think that to make an appropriate discourse, and one that will chime in with the occasion, will be useful to you and agreeable to the law. For in music one of the tunes played on the flute is called Hippothorus,[154] which is a tune that excites fierce desire in stallions to cover mares; and though in philosophy there are many goodly subjects, yet is there none more worthy of attention than that of marriage, on which subject philosophy spreads a charm over those who are to pass life together, and makes them gentle and mild to one another. I send therefore as a gift to both of you a summary of what you have often heard, as you are both well versed in philosophy, arranging my matter in a series of short observations that it may be the more easily remembered, and I pray that the Muses will assist and co-operate with Aphrodite, so that no lyre or lute could be more harmonious or in tune than your married life, as the result of philosophy and concord. And thus the ancients set up near Aphrodite statues of Hermes, to show that conversation was one of the great charms of marriage, and also statues of Peitho[155] and the Graces, to teach married people to gain their way with one another by persuasion, and not by wrangling or contention.

§ I. Solon bade the bride eat a quince the first night of marriage, intimating thereby, it seems, that the bridegroom, was to expect his first pleasure from the bride's mouth and conversation.

§ II. In Boeotia they dress up the bride with a chaplet of asparagus, for as the asparagus gives most excellent fruit from a thorny stalk, so the bride, by not being too reluctant and coy in the first approaches, will make the married state more agreeable and pleasant. But those husbands who cannot put up with the early peevishness of their brides, are not a whit wiser than those persons who pluck unripe grapes and leave the ripe grapes for others.[156] On the other hand, many brides, being at first disgusted with their husbands, are like those that stand the bee's sting but neglect the honey.

§ III. Married people should especially at the outset beware of the first quarrel and collision, observing that vessels when first fabricated are easily broken up into their component parts, but in process of time, getting compact and firmly welded together, are proof against either fire or steel.

§ IV. As fire gets kindled easily in chaff or in a wick or in the fur of hares, but is easily extinguished again, if it find no material to keep it in and feed it, so we must not consider that the love of newly-married people, that blazes out so fiercely in consequence of the attractions of youth and beauty, will be durable and lasting, unless it be fixed in the character, and occupy the mind, and make a living impression.[157]

§ V. As catching fish by drugged bait is easy, but makes the fish poor to eat and insipid, so those wives that lay traps for their husbands by philtres and charms, and become their masters by pleasure, have stupid senseless and spoiled husbands to live with. For those that were bewitched by Circe did her no good, nor could she make any use of them when they were turned into swine and asses, but she was greatly in love with the prudent Odysseus who dwelt with her sensibly.

§ VI. Those women who would rather lord it over fools than obey sensible men, resemble those people who would rather lead the blind on a road, and not people who have eyesight and know how to follow.

§ VII. Women disbelieve that Pasiphäe, a king's wife, was enamoured of a bull, although they see some of their sex despising grave and sober men, and preferring to associate with men who are the slaves of intemperance and pleasure, and like dogs and he-goats.

§ VIII. Men who through weakness or effeminacy cannot vault upon their horses' backs, teach them to kneel and so receive their riders. Similarly, some men that marry noble or rich wives, instead of making themselves better humble their wives, thinking to rule them easier by lowering them. But one ought to govern with an eye to the merit of a woman, as much as to the size of a horse.

§ IX. We see that the moon when it is far from the sun is bright and glorious, but pales and hides its light when it is near. A modest wife on the contrary ought to be seen chiefly with her husband, and to stay at home and in retirement in his absence.

§ X. It is not a true observation of Herodotus, that a woman puts off her modesty with her shift.[158] On the contrary, the modest woman puts on her modesty instead, and great modesty is a sign of great conjugal love.

§ XI. As where two voices are in unison the loudest prevails; so in a well-managed household everything is done by mutual consent, but the husband's supremacy is exhibited, and his wishes are consulted.

§ XII. The Sun beat the North Wind.[159] For when it blew a strong and terrible blast, and tried to make the man remove his cloak, he only drew it round him more closely, but when the Sun came out with its warm rays, at first warmed and afterwards scorched, he stripped himself of coat as well as cloak. Most woman act similarly: if their husbands try to curtail by force their luxury and extravagance, they are vexed and fight for their rights, but if they are convinced by reason, they quietly drop their expensive habits, and keep within bounds.

§ XIII. Cato turned out of the Senate a man who kissed his own wife in the presence of his daughter. This was perhaps too strong a step, but if it is unseemly, as indeed it is, for husband and wife in the presence of others to fondle and kiss and embrace one another, is it not far more unseemly in the presence of others to quarrel and jangle? Just as conjugal caresses and endearments ought to be private, so ought admonition and scolding and plain speaking.

§ XIV. Just as there is little use in a mirror adorned with gold or precious stones, unless it conveys a true likeness, so there is no advantage in a rich wife, unless she conforms her life and habits to her husband's position. For if when a man is joyful the mirror makes him look sad, and when he is put out and sad it makes him look gay and smiling from ear to ear, the mirror is plainly faulty. So the wife is faulty and devoid of tact, who frowns when her husband is in the vein for mirth and jollity, and who jokes and laughs when he is serious: the former conduct is disagreeable, the latter contemptuous.[160] And, just as geometricians say lines and surfaces do not move of themselves, but only in connection with bodies, so the wife ought to have no private emotions of her own, but share in her husband's gravity or mirth, anxiety or gaiety.

§ XV. As those husbands who do not like to see their wives eating and drinking in their company only teach them to take their food on the sly, so those husbands who are not gay and jolly with their wives, and never joke or smile with them, only teach them to seek their pleasures out of their company.

§ XVI. The kings of Persia have their wedded wives at their side at banquets and entertainments; but when they have a mind for a drunken debauch they send them away,[161] and call for singing-girls and concubines, rightly so doing, for so they do not mix up their wives with licentiousness and drunkenness. Similarly, if a private individual, lustful and dissolute, goes astray with a courtesan or maid-servant, the wife should not be vexed or impatient, but consider that it is out of respect to her that he bestows upon another all his wanton depravity.

§ XVII. As kings make[162] if fond of music many musicians, if lovers of learning many men of letters, and many athletes if fond of gymnastics, so the man who has an eye for female charms teaches his wife to dress well, the man of pleasure teaches his meretricious tricks and wantonness, while the true gentleman makes his virtuous and decorous.

§ XVIII. A Lacedæmonian maiden, when someone asked her if she had yet had dealings with a man, replied, "No, but he has with me." This methinks is the line of conduct a matron should pursue, neither to decline the embraces of a husband when he takes the initiative, nor to provoke them herself, for the one is forward and savours of the courtesan, the other is haughty and unnatural.

§ XIX. The wife ought not to have her own private friends, but cultivate only those of the husband. Now the gods are our first and greatest friends, so the wife ought only to worship and recognize her husband's gods, and the door ought to be shut on all superfluous worship and strange superstitions, for none of the gods are pleased with stealthy and secret sacrifices on the part of a wife.

§ XX. Plato says that is a happy and fortunate state, where the words _Meum_ and _Tuum_ are least heard,[163] because the citizens regard the common interest in all matters of importance. Far more essential is it in marriage that the words should have no place. For, as the doctors say, that blows on the left shoulders are also felt on the right,[164] so is it good[165] for husband and wife to mutually sympathize with one another, that, just as the strength of ropes comes from the twining and interlacing of fibres together, so the marriage knot may be confirmed and strengthened by the interchange of mutual affection and kindness. Nature itself teaches this by the birth of children, which are so much a joint result, that neither husband nor wife can discriminate or discern which part of the child is theirs. So, too, it is well for married persons to have one purse, and to throw all their property into one common stock, that here also there may be no _Meum_ and _Tuum_. And just as we call the mixture of water and wine by the name of wine, even though the water should preponderate,[166] so we say that the house and property belongs to the man, even though the wife contribute most of the money.

§ XXI. Helen was fond of wealth, Paris of pleasure, whereas Odysseus was prudent, Penelope chaste. So the marriage of the last two was happy and enviable, while that of the former two brought an Iliad of woe on Greeks and barbarians alike.

§ XXII. The Roman who was taken to task by his friends for repudiating a chaste wealthy and handsome wife, showed them his shoe and said, "Although this is new and handsome, none of you know where it pinches me."[167] A wife ought not therefore to put her trust in her dowry, or family, or beauty, but in matters that more vitally concern her husband, namely, in her disposition and companionableness and complaisance with him, not to make every-day life vexatious or annoying, but harmonious and cheerful and agreeable. For as doctors are more afraid of fevers that are generated from uncertain causes, and from a complication of ailments, than of those that have a clear and adequate cause, so the small and continual and daily matters of offence between husband and wife, that the world knows nothing about, set the household most at variance, and do it the greatest injury.

§ XXIII. King Philip was desperately enamoured of a Thessalian woman,[168] who was accused of bewitching him; his wife Olympias therefore wished to get this woman into her power. But when she came before her, and was evidently very handsome, and talked to her in a noble and sensible manner, Olympias said, "Farewell to calumny! Your charms lie in yourself."[169] So invincible are the charms of a lawful wife to win her husband's affection by her virtuous character, bringing to him in herself dowry, and family, and philtres, and even Aphrodite's cestus.[170]

§ XXIV. Olympias, on another occasion, when a young courtier had married a wife who was very handsome, but whose reputation was not very good, remarked, "This fellow has no sense, or he would not have married with his eyes." We ought neither to marry with our eyes, nor with our fingers, as some do, who reckon up on their fingers what dowry the wife will bring, not what sort of partner she will make.

§ XXV. It was advice of Socrates, that when young men looked at themselves in the mirror, those who were not handsome should become so through virtue, and those who were so should not by vice deform their beauty. Good also is it for the matron, when she has the mirror in her hands, if not handsome to say to herself, "What should I be, if I were not virtuous?" and if handsome to say to herself, "How good it were to add virtue to beauty!" for it is a feather in the cap of a woman not handsome to be loved for herself and not for good looks.

§ XXVI. Dionysius, the tyrant of Sicily, sent some costly dresses and necklaces to the daughters of Lysander, but he would not receive them, and said, "These presents will bring my daughters more shame than adornment." And Sophocles said still earlier than Lysander, "Your madness of mind will not appear handsome, wretch, but most unhandsome." For, as Crates says, "that is adornment which adorns," and that adorns a woman that makes her more comely; and it is not gold or diamonds or scarlet robes that make her so, but her dignity, her correct conduct, and her modesty.

§ XXVII. Those who sacrifice to Hera as goddess of marriage,[171] do not burn the gall with the other parts of the victim, but when they have drawn it throw it away beside the altar: the lawgiver thus hinting that gall and rage have no place in marriage. For the austerity of a matron should be, like that of wine, wholesome and pleasant, not bitter as aloes, or like a drug.

§ XXVIII. Plato advised Xenocrates, a man rather austere but in all other respects a fine fellow, to sacrifice to the Graces. I think also that a chaste wife needs the graces with her husband that, as Metrodorus said, "she may live agreeably with him, and not be bad-tempered because she is chaste." For neither should the frugal wife neglect neatness, nor the virtuous one neglect to make herself attractive, for peevishness makes a wife's good conduct disagreeable, as untidiness makes one disgusted with simplicity.

§ XXIX. The wife who is afraid to laugh and jest with her husband, lest she should appear bold and wanton, resembles one that will not anoint herself with oil lest she should be thought to use cosmetics, and will not wash her face lest she should be thought to paint. We see also in the case of those poets and orators, that avoid a popular illiberal and affected style, that they artificially endeavour to move and sway their audience by the facts, and by a skilful arrangement of them, and by their gestures. Consequently a matron will do well to avoid and repudiate over-preciseness meretriciousness and pomposity, and to use tact in her dealings with her husband in every-day life, accustoming him to a combination of pleasure and decorum. But if a wife be by nature austere and apathetic, and no lover of pleasure, the husband must make the best of it, for, as Phocion said, when Antipater enjoined on him an action neither honourable nor becoming, "You cannot have me as a friend and flatterer both," so he must say to himself about his strict and austere wife, "I cannot have in the same woman wife and mistress."

§ XXX. It was a custom among the Egyptian ladies not to wear shoes, that they might stay at home all day and not go abroad. But most of our women will only stay at home if you strip them of their golden shoes, and bracelets, and shoe-buckles, and purple robes, and pearls.

§ XXXI. Theano, as she was putting on her shawl, displayed her arm, and somebody observing, "What a handsome arm!" she replied, "But not common." So ought not even the speech, any more than the arm, of a chaste woman, to be common, for speech must be considered as it were the exposing of the mind, especially in the presence of strangers. For in words are seen the state of mind and character and disposition of the speaker.

§ XXXII. Phidias made a statue of Aphrodite at Elis, with one foot on a tortoise,[172] as a symbol that women should stay at home and be silent. For the wife ought only to speak either to her husband, or by her husband, not being vexed if, like a flute-player, she speaks more decorously by another mouth-piece.

§ XXXIII. When rich men and kings honour philosophers, they really pay homage to themselves as well; but when philosophers pay court to the rich, they lower themselves without advancing their patrons. The same is the case with women. If they submit themselves to their husbands they receive praise, but if they desire to rule, they get less credit even than the husbands who submit to their rule. But the husband ought to rule his wife, not as a master does a chattel, but as the soul governs the body, by sympathy and goodwill. As he ought to govern the body by not being a slave to its pleasures and desires, so he ought to rule his wife by cheerfulness and complaisance.