optical character recognition
-The modern bride will undoubtedly turn up her nose and shake her independent - head in disapproval of Plutarch's suggestions about subordinating herself to - her husband, and nobody will attempt to deny that the status of women has - changed materially since Plutarch's time ; but, apart from this, she will - find in Plutarch's short essay many suggestions regarding whole-souled - co-operation and cheerful intellectual companionship with her husband, which - mutatis mutandis hold as good to-day as they did when they were written, - nearly two thousand years ago. Nor is the husband neglected ; he can find - much sound advice regarding his attitude towards his wife and the respect - and consideration that is always due to her.
-Plutarch was no mere theorist in these matters. He himself was happily - married, and anyone who doubts this should read his letter to his wife - (Moralia, 608 a).
-The essay is included in the catalogue of Lamprias (see Vol. I. Introd. p. - xviii) and is not infrequently quoted or referred to by later writers, - Stobaeus, for example, in his Florilegium, especially lxxiv., and Hieronymus - (St. Jerome), Adversus Iovinianum, i. ad fin. It is well worth while, in - this connexion, to read Jeremy Taylor's sermon, The Marriage Ring, to see - how a famous preacher served up many of the ideas of a heathen philosopher - to a Christian congregation.
-
- From Plutarch to Pollianus and Eurydice, health and
- prosperity.
-
Following close upon the time-honoured rites which the priestess of Demeter Cf. O. Gruppe, Griechische Mythologie und Religionsgeschichte, p. 1176. A few references are given regarding marriage rites and customs which are here touched upon, but anyone interested in these matters will consult some book like Westermarck, The History of Human Marriage (5th ed. 1922).
In music they used to call one of the conventional themes for the flute the
- Horse Rampant,
- Cf. Plutarch, Moralia, 704 F.cf., for example, the familiar instance in Acts xiv. 12.
Solon Moralia, 279 F, and in his Life of Solon, chap. xx. (p. 89 C).
In Boeotia, after veiling the bride, they put on her head a chaplet of
- asparagus ; for this plant yields the finest flavoured fruit from the
- roughest thorns, and so the bride will provide for him who does not run away
- or feel annoyed at her first display of peevishness and unpleasantness a
- docile and sweet life together. Those who do not patiently put up with the
- early girlish disagreements are on a par with those who on account of the
- sourness of green grapes abandon the ripe clusters to others. Again, many of
- the newly married women because of their first experiences get annoyed at
- their husbands, and find
-
In the beginning, especially, married people ought to be on their guard - against disagreements and clashes, for they see that such household vessels - as are made of sections joined together are at the outset easily pulled - apart by any fortuitous cause, but after a time, when their joints have - become set, they can hardly be separated by fire and steel.
-Just as fire catches readily in chaff, fibre, and hares' fur, but goes out - rather quickly, unless it gets hold of some other thing that can retain it - and feed it, so the keen love between newly married people that blazes up - fiercely as the result of physical attractiveness must not be regarded as - enduring or constant, unless, by being centred about character and by - gaining a hold upon the rational faculties, it attains a state of vitality. -
-Fishing with poison is a quick way to catch fish and an easy method of taking - them, but it makes the fish inedible and bad. In the same way women who - artfully employ love-potions and magic spells upon their husbands, and gain - the mastery over them through pleasure, find themselves consorts of - dull-witted, degenerate fools. The men bewitched by Circe were of no service - to her, nor did she make the least use of them after they had been changed - into swine and asses, while for Odysseus, who had sense and showed - discretion in her company, she had an exceeding great love.
-Women who prefer to have power over fools rather than to hearken to sensible
- men, are like persons who prefer to guide the blind on the road
Women will not believe that Pasiphaë, the consort of a king, fell in - love with a bull, in spite of the fact that they see some of their sex who - feel bored by uncompromising and virtuous men, and take more pleasure in - consorting with those who, like dogs and he-goats, are a combination of - licentiousness and sensuality.
-Men who through weakness or effeminacy are unable to vault upon their horses - teach the horses to kneel of themselves and crouch down. In like manner, - some who have won wives of noble birth or wealth, instead of making - themselves better, try to humble their wives, with the idea that they shall - have more authority over their wives if these are reduced to a state of - humility. But, as one pays heed to the size of his horse in using the rein, - so in using the rein on his wife he ought to pay heed to her position.
-Whenever the moon is at a distance from the sun we see her conspicuous and - brilliant, but she disappears and hides herself when she comes near him. - Contrariwise a virtuous woman ought to be most visible in her husband's - company, and to stay in the house and hide herself when he is away.
-Herodotus was not right in saying Cf. Plutarch, Moralia, 37 C, and Hieronymus, Adversus Iovinianum, chap. xlviii. (vol. ii. p. 292 of Migne's edition).
Whenever two notes are sounded in accord the tune is carried by the bass ;
- and in like manner every activity in a virtuous household is carried on
The Sun won a victory over the North Wind.Cf. also Athenaeus, 604 f.
Cato expelled from the Senate Life of Cato Major, chap. xvii. (p. 346 c).
Just as a mirror, although embellished with gold and precious stones, is good
- for nothing unless it shows a true likeness, so there is no advantage in a
- rich wife unless she makes her life true to her husband's and her character
- in accord with his. If the mirror gives back a gloomy image of a glad man,
-
- Cf. Moralia, 63 B.
Men who do not like to see their wives eat in their company are thus teaching - them to stuff themselves when alone. So those who are not cheerful in the - company of their wives, nor join with them in sportiveness and laughter, are - thus teaching them to seek their own pleasures apart from their husbands. -
-The lawful wives of the Persian kings sit beside them at dinner, and eat with
- them. But when the kings wish to be merry and get drunk, they send their
- wives away, and send for their music-girls and concubines.Cf. Moralia, 613 A.
Kings fond of the arts make many persons incline to be artists, those fond of - letters make many want to be scholars, and those fond of sport make many - take up athletics. In like manner a man fond of his personal appearance - makes a wife all paint and powder ; one fond of pleasure makes her - meretricious and licentious, while a husband who loves what is good and - honourable makes a wife discreet and well-behaved.
-A young Spartan woman, in answer to an inquiry as to whether she had already
- made advances to her husband, said, No, but he has made them to
- me.
- Cf. Moralia, 242 B.
A wife ought not to make friends of her own, but to enjoy her husband's - friends in common with him. The gods are the first and most important - friends. Wherefore it is becoming for a wife to worship and to know only the - gods that her husband believes in, and to shut the front door tight upon all - queer rituals and outlandish superstitions. For with no god do stealthy and - secret rites performed by a woman find any favour.
-Plato Republic, p. 462 C. Cf. also Plutarch, Moralia, 484 B and 767 D.mine
and not mine
most rarely uttered,
- the reason being that the citizens, so far as in them lies, treat all things
- of real importance as common property. Much more should such expressions be
- eliminated from the wine,
although the larger of the component parts is
- water, so the property and the estate ought to be said to belong to the
- husband even though the wife contribute the larger share.
Helen was fond of wealth and Paris of pleasure; Odysseus was sensible and
- Penelope virtuous. Therefore the marriage of the latter pair was happy and
- enviable, while that of the former created an Iliad of woes
- for Greeks and barbarians.
The Roman,Cf. Plutarch's Life of Aemilius Paulus, chap. v. (p. 257 B), and Hieronymus, Adversus Iovinianum, i. chap. xlviii. (vol. ii. p. 292 of Migne's edition).Yes, this is beautiful to look at, and new, but nobody knows
- where it pinches me.
A wife, then, ought not to rely on her
- dowry or birth or beauty, but on things in which she gains the greatest hold
- on her husband, namely conversation, character, and comradeship, which she
- must render not perverse or vexatious day by day, but accommodating,
- inoffensive, and agreeable. For, as physicians have more fear of fevers that
- originate from obscure causes and gradual accretion than of those which may
- be accounted for by manifest and weighty reasons, so it is the petty,
- continual, daily clashes between man and wife, unnoticed by the great
- majority, that disrupt and mar married life.
King Philip was enamoured of a Thessalian woman who was accused of using
- magic charms upon him. Olympias accordingly made haste to get the woman into
- her power. But when the latter had come into the queen's presence and was
- seen to be beautiful in appearance, and her conversation with the queen was
- not lacking in good-breeding or cleverness, Olympias exclaimed, Away
- with these slanders! You have your magic charms in yourself.
- Oxyrhynchus Papyri, ix. p. 157).Il. xiv. 214.
On another occasion, when a young man of the court had married a beautiful
- woman That fellow has no brains;
- else he would not have married on sight.
Marriages ought not to
- be made by trusting the eyes only, or the fingers either, as is the case
- with some who take a wife after counting up how much she brings with her,
- but without deciding what kind of a helpmate she will be.
Socrates Florilegium, iii. 79 Sayings of the Seven Wise Men. Other authors (e.g. Diogenes Laertius, ii. 33) assign it to Socrates.What
- if I am not virtuous ?
and the beautiful one, What if I
- am virtuous as well ?
For if the ill-favoured woman is loved
- for her character, that is something of which she can be very proud, far
- more than if she were loved for her beauty.
The Sicilian despot Moralia, 190 E, 229 A, and Life of Lysander, chap. ii. (p. 439 D). The same story is told of Archidamus in Moralia, 218 E.
- These adornments will disgrace my daughters far more than they will
- adorn them.
But Sophocles,cf. Nauck, Trag. Graec. Frag. p. 310, Sophocles, No. 762.
- adornment is that which adorns,
and that adorns or decorates a
- woman which makes her more decorous. It is not gold or precious stones or
- scarlet that makes her such, but
-
Those who offer sacrifice to Hera, the Protectress of Wedlock,Cf. O. Gruppe, Griechische Mythologie und Religionsgeschicte, p. 1134; also Plutarch, Frag. 2 of De Daedalis Plataeensibus (in Bernardakis's edition, vol. vii. p. 44).
Plato Moralia 769 D, in Plutarch's Life of C. Marius, chap. ii. (p. 407 A), and a slightly different inference in Moralia, 753 C.Cf. Moralia, 753 C.she
- may live pleasantly with him and not be cross all the time because she
- is virtuous.
The thrifty woman must not neglect cleanliness, nor
- the loving wife cheerfulness ; for asperity makes a wife's correct behaviour
- disagreeable, just as untidiness has a similar effect upon plain living.
-
The woman who is afraid to laugh and jest a bit with her husband, lest
- possibly she appear bold and wanton, is no different from one who will not
- use oil on her head lest she be thought to use perfume, or from one who will
- not even wash her face lest she be thought to use rouge. But we observe both
- poets and public speakers, such as try to avoid vulgarity, narrowness, and
- affectation in their diction, employing all artistry to move and stir the
-
- You cannot use me as a friend and flatterer
- both,
- Cf. Moralia, 64 C, 188 F, 533 D; Plutarch's Life of Phocion, chap. xxx. (p. 755 B); Life of Agis, chap. ii. (p. 795 E).I cannot have the society of the same woman
- both as wife and as paramour.
-
The women of Egypt, by inherited custom, were not allowed to wear shoes,Oedipus Coloneus 339), which errs just as badly in the other direction.
Theano,Stromata, iv. p. 522 c. A lovely arm.
- But not for the public,
said she. Not only the arm of the
- virtuous woman, but her speech as well, ought to be not for the public, and
- she ought to be modest and guarded about saying anything
-
Pheidias made the Aphrodite of the Eleans with one foot on a tortoise,cf. also Plutarch, Moralia, 381 E. Roscher, Lexikon d. gr. u. rom. Mythologie, i. p. 412, mentions two ancient bronzes, one Greek and one Etruscan, in which Aphrodite is represented with one foot on a tortoise.
Rich men and princes by conferring honours on philosophers adorn both - themselves and the philosophers ; but, on the other hand, philosophers by - paying court to the rich do not enhance the repute of the rich but lower - their own. So is it with women also ; if they subordinate themselves to - their husbands, they are commended, but if they want to have control, they - cut a sorrier figure than the subjects of their control. And control ought - to be exercised by the man over the woman, not as the owner has control of a - piece of property, but, as the soul controls the body, by entering into her - feelings and being knit to her through goodwill. As, therefore, it is - possible to exercise care over the body without being a slave to its - pleasures and desires, so it is possible to govern a wife, and at the same - time to delight and gratify her.
-Philosophers cf. Moralia, 426 A.fragmenta incerta of the Moralia, in vol. vii. of Bernardakis's edition, p. 151, and Musonius, pp. 67-68 of O. Hense's edition - Stobaeus, Florilegium, lxix. 23.Cf. Moralia, 265 E.
In Leptis, a city of Africa, it is an inherited custom Adversus Iovinianum, i. chap. xlviii. (vol. ii. p. 292 of Migne's edition), amplifies this by a reference to Terence, Hecyra, ii. l. 4: All mothers-in-law hate their daughters-in-law.
-
Mothers appear to have a greater love for their sons because of a feeling - that their sons are able to help them, and fathers for their daughters - because of a feeling that the daughters have need of their help. Perhaps, - also, because of the honour accorded by man and wife to each other, the one - wishes openly to show that he feels greater esteem and affection for the - attributes which are more characteristic of the other. And herein there may - perhaps be a divergence, but, on the other hand, it is a nice thing if the - wife, in the deference she shows, is observed to incline rather toward her - husband's parents than her own, and, if she is distressed over anything, to - refer it to them without the knowledge of her own parents. For seeming - confidence begets confidence, and love, love.
-The generals issued orders to the Greeks in Cyrus's army,Anabasis, i. 7. 4, and i. 8. 11.
Euripides Medea, 190. Cf. also Plutarch, Moralia, 710 E.Il. xiv. 205, 209.I will settle their uncomposed quarrels,
- Sending them back to their bed to a union of loving enjoyment.
-
At all times and in all places a wife ought to try to avoid any clash with
- her husband, and a husband with his wife, but they ought to be especially on
- their guard against doing this in the privacy of their bedchamber. The woman
- in travail and pain kept saying to those who were trying to make her go to
- bed, How can the bed cure this ailment which I contracted in bed ?
-
But the disagreements, recriminations, and angry passions which the
- bed generates are not easily settled in another place and at another time.
-
Hermione seems to speak the truth when she says,Andromache, 930; cf. also Hieronymus, Adversus Iovinianum, i. chap. xlviii. (vol. ii. p. 292 of Migne's edition).Bad women's visits brought
- about my fall.
This, however, does not come about so simply, but only when
- marital disagreements and jealousies open not only a wife's doors but also
- her hearing to such women. So, at such a time especially, a woman who has
- sense ought to stop her ears, and be on her guard against whispered
- insinuations, so that fire may not be added to fire,Cf. the note on 123 F supra.
- Cf. Moralia, 179 A and 457 F. A similar remark of Pausanias is quoted in Moralia, 230 D.What would happen, then, if we were to treat them ill ?
-
So when these back-biters say, Your husband treats
- grievously his loving and virtuous wife.
- Yes, what would happen, then, if I were to begin to hate him and
- wrong him ?
-
A man whose slave had run away, on catching sight of the fugitive some time
- later, ran after him ; but when the slave got ahead of him by taking refuge
- in a treadmill, the master said, Where else could I have wished to
- find you rather than here?
- Moralia, 188 A, and Life of Phocion, chap. x. (p. 746 E).Where else would my rival like better to
- see me, what would she rather have me do, than feel aggrieved with my
- husband and quarrel with him and abandon my very home and chamber ?
-
-
The Athenians observe three sacred ploughings : the first at Scirum Lexikon der griech. und. rom. Mythologie, s.v. Buzyges, and Narrison and Verrall, Mythology and Monuments of Ancient Athens, pp. 166-8.Lexikon der griech. und. rom. Mythologie, s.v. Buzyges, and Narrison and Verrall, Mythology and Monuments of Ancient Athens, pp. 166-8.Lexikon der griech. und. rom. Mythologie, s.v. Buzyges, and Narrison and Verrall, Mythology and Monuments of Ancient Athens, pp. 166-8.bountiful-bearing Cytherea.
- Trag. Graec. Frag., p. 310, Sophocles, No. 763.Cf. Plato, Laws, p. 839 A.
When the orator Gorgias read to the Greeks at Olympia a speech about
- concord,Cf. Diels, Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, ii. pp. 248-9 (Gorgias, B 7-8).This fellow is giving us advice about
- concord, and yet in his own household he has not prevailed upon himself,
- his wife, and maidservant, three persons only, to live in
- concord.
For there was, apparently, some love on Gorgias's part
- and jealousy on the wife's part towards the girl. A man therefore ought to
- have his household well harmonized who is going to harmonize State, Forum,
- and friends. For it is much more likely that the sins of women rather than
- sins against women will go unnoticed by most people.
They say that the cat is excited to frenzy by the odour of perfumes. Now if
- it happened that women were similarly made furious and frantic by perfumes,
- it would be a dreadful thing for their husbands not to abstain from perfume,
- but for the sake of their own brief pleasure to permit their wives to suffer
- in this way. Now inasmuch as women are affected in this way, not by their
- husbands' using perfume, but by their having connexion with other women, it
- is unfair to pain and disturb them so much for the sake of a trivial
- pleasure, and not to follow with wives the practice observed in approaching
- bees
- Die Bienenzucht des Altertums, Sondershausen, 1851.
Those who have to go near elephants do not put on bright clothes, nor do
- those who go near bulls put on redCf. Moralia, 330 B.Cf. Moralia, 167 C.
A woman once said to Philip, who was trying to force her to come to him
- against her will, Let me go. All women are the same when the lights
- are out.
This is well said as an answer to adulterous and
- licentious men, but the wedded wife ought especially when the light is out
- not to be the same as ordinary women, but, when her body is invisible, her
- virtue, her exclusive devotion to her husband, her constancy, and her
- affection, ought to be most in evidence.
Plato Laws, p. 729 C. Also cited or referred to by Plutarch, Moralia, 14 B, 71 B, and 272 C.
In regard to love of finery, I beg, Eurydice, that you will read and try to
- remember what was written to Aristylla by Timoxena
Besides, Pollianus, you already possess sufficient maturity to study
- philosophy, and I beg that you will beautify your character with the aid of
- discourses which are attended by logical demonstration and mature
- deliberation, seeking the company and instruction of teachers who will help
- you. And for your wife you must collect from every source what is useful, as
- do the bees, and carrying it within your own self impart it to her, and then
- discuss it with her, and make the best of these doctrines her favourite and
- familiar themes. For to her Thou art a father and precious-loved mother,
- Yea, and a brother as well.
- Il. vi. 429.My dear husband,
Studies of this sort, in the first place, divert women
- from all untoward conduct; for a woman studying geometry will be ashamed to
- be a dancer, and she will not swallow any beliefs in magic charms while she
- is under the charm of Plato's or Xenophon's words. And if anybody professes
- power to pull down the moon from the sky, she will laugh at the ignorance
- and stupidity of women who believe these things, inasmuch as she herself is
- not unschooled in astronomy, and has read in the books about Aglaonice, Nay, but thou art
- to me
guide, philosopher, and teacher in all that is most lovely and
- divine.Il. vi. 429.Cf. Moralia, 416 F. The belief that Thessalian women had the power to draw down the moon was wide-spread in antiquity. It may suffice here to refer to Aristophanes, Clouds, 749, and for Aglaonice to Plutarch, Moralia 417 A.
It is said that no woman ever produced a child without the co-operation of a
- man, yet there are misshapen, fleshlike, uterine growths originating in some
- infection, which develop of themselves and acquire firmness and solidity,
- and are commonly called moles.
- Cf. Aristotle, De generatione animalium, iv. 7.
And as for you, Eurydice, I beg that you will try to be conversant with the
- sayings of the wise and good, and always have at your tongue's end those
- sentiments which you used to cull in your girlhood's days when you were with
- us, so that you may give joy to your husband, and may be admired by other
- women, adorned, as you will be, without price, with rare and precious
- jewels. For you cannot acquire and put upon you this rich woman's pearls or
- that foreign woman's silks without buying them at a high price, but the
- ornaments of Theano,cf. 142 C, supra.
- cf. 148 C-E, 150 E, and 154 A-C, infra.cf. Herodotus, vii. 239.Moralia, 259 C, and Life of Alexander, chap. xii. (p. 671 A).These aremy jewels.
-
If Sappho thought that her beautiful compositions in verse justified her in
- writing Poet. Lyr. Gr. iii. p. 111, Sappho, No. 68; J.M. Edmonds, Lyra Graeca
- Dead in the tomb shalt thou lie, Nor shall
- there be thought of thee there, For in the roses of Pierian fields Thou hast
- no share,
-
Now that the nuptial ceremonies are over, and that the
- priestess of Ceres has joined you both together in the bands
- of matrimony according to the custom of the country, I
- thought a short discourse of this nature might not be either
- unacceptable or unseasonable, but rather serve as a kind
- epithalamium to congratulate your happy conjunction;
- more especially, since there can be nothing more useful in
- conjugal society than the observance of wise and wholesome
- precepts, suitable to the harmony of matrimonial converse.
- For among the variety of musical moods and measures
- there is one which is called Hippothoros, a sort of composition to the flute and hautboy, made use of to encourage
- and provoke stallions to cover mares. But philosophy
- being furnished with many noble and profitable discourses,
- there is not any one subject that deserves a more serious
- study than that of wedlock, whereby they who are engaged
- in a long community of bed and board are more steadfastly
- united in affection, and made more pliable one to another
- in humor and condition. To this purpose, having reduced
- under several short heads and similes some certain instructions and admonitions which you, as tutored up in philosophy, have frequently already heard, I send you the collection
- as a present, beseeching the Muses so with their presence
- to assist the Goddess Venus, that the harmony of your
- mutual society and complacency in domestic diligences may
-
-
Solon advised that the bride should eat a quince before she entered the nuptial sheets; intimating thereby, in - my opinion, that the man was to expect his first pleasures - from the breath and speech of his new-married bed-fellow.
-In Boeotia it is the custom, when they veil the virgin - bride, to set upon her head a chaplet of wild asparagus, - which from a thorny stalk affords a most delicious fruit, - to let us understand that a new-married woman, discreetly - brooking at the beginning the first distastes of marriage - restraints, grows yieldingly complaisant at length, and - makes conforming wedlock a happiness to each. And indeed such husbands who cannot bear with the little disdains - and first froppishness of imprudent youth are like to those - that choose the sour grapes and leave to others the ripe - delicious clusters. On the other side, those young ladies - that take a disdain to their husbands by reason of their - first debates and encounters may be well compared to those - that patiently endure the sting but fling away the honey.
-It especially behooves those people who are newly - married to avoid the first occasions of discord and dissension; considering that vessels newly formed are subject to - be bruised and put out of shape by many slight accidents, - but when the materials come once to be settled and hardened by time, nor fire nor sword will hardly prejudice the - solid substance.
-Fire takes speedy hold of straw or hare's fur, but
-
-
They who bait their hooks with intoxicated drugs - with little pains surprise the hungry fish, but then they - prove unsavory to the taste and dangerous to eat. Thus - women that by the force of charms and philters endeavor - to subdue their husbands to the satisfaction of their pleasure become at length the wives of madmen, sots, and - fools. For they whom the sorceress Circe had enchanted, - being then no better than swine and asses, were no longer - able to please or do her service. But she loved Ulysses - entirely, whose prudence avoided her venomous intoxications and rendered his conversation highly grateful.
-They who rather choose to be the mistresses of senseless fools than the obedient wives of wise and sober husbands are like those people that prefer misguidance of the - blind before the conduct of them that can see and know - the way.
-They will not believe that Pasiphae, the consort of - a prince, could ever be enamored of a bull, and yet - themselves are so extravagant as to abandon the society - of their husbands,—men of wisdom, temperance, and - gravity,—and betake themselves to the bestial embraces - of those who are given wholly to riot and debauchery as - if they were dogs or goats.
-Some men, either unable or unwilling to mount
- themselves into their saddles through infirmity or laziness,
- teach their horses to fall upon their knees, and in that
- posture to receive their riders. In like manner there are
-
-
We behold the moon then shining with a full and - glorious orb, when farthest distant from the sun; but, as - she warps back again to meet her illustrious mate, the - nearer she makes her approach, the more she is eclipsed - until no longer seen. Quite otherwise, a woman ought to - display the charms of her virtue and the sweetness of her - disposition in her husband's presence, but in his absence - to retire to silence and reservedness at home.
-Nor can we approve the saying of Herodotus, that - a woman lays aside her modesty with her shift. For - surely then it is that a chaste woman chiefly vails herself - with bashfulness, when, in the privacies of matrimonial - duties, excess of love and maiden reverence become the - secret signals and testimonies of mutual affection.
-As in musical concords, when the upper strings are - so tuned as exactly to accord, the base always gives the - tone; so in well-regulated and well-ordered families, all - things are carried on with the harmonious consent and - agreement of both parties, but the conduct and contrivance - chiefly redounds to the reputation and management of the - husband.
-It is a common proverb, that the sun is too strong
- for the north wind; for the more the wind ruffles and
- strives to force a man's upper garment from his back, the
- faster he holds it, and the closer he wraps it about his
- shoulders. But he who so briskly defended himself from
-
-
Cato ejected a certain Roman out of the senate for - kissing his wife in the presence of his daughter. It is - true, the punishment was somewhat too severe; but if - kissing and colling and hugging in the sight of others be - so unseemly, as indeed it is, how much more indecent is it - to chide and brawl and maunder one at another while - strangers are in company? If lawful familiarity and - caresses between man and wife are not to be allowed - but in their private retirements, shall the bitter interchanges and loud discoveries of invective and inconsiderate passion be thought an entertainment pleasingly proper - for unconcerned and public ears ?
-As there is little or no use to be made of a mirror,
- though in a frame of gold enchased with all the sparkling
- variety of the richest gems, unless it render back the true
- similitude of the image it receives; so is there nothing of
- profit in a wealthy dowry, unless the conditions, the temper, the humor of the wife be conformable to the natural
- disposition and inclination of the husband, and he sees
- the virtues of his own mind exactly represented in hers.
- Or, if a fair and beautiful mirror that makes a sad and
- pensive visage look jocund and gay, or a wanton or smiling countenance show pensive and mournful, is therefore
- presently rejected as of no value; thus may not she be
- thought an angry, peevish, and importunate woman, that
-
-
As they who are offended to see their wives eat and - drink freely in their company do but whet their appetites - to glut and gormandize in corners by themselves; so they - who refuse to frolic in retirement with their wives, or to - let them participate of their private pastimes and dalliances, do but instruct them to cater for their own pleasures and delights.
-The Persian kings, when they contain themselves - within the limits of their usual banquets, suffer their married wives to sit down at their tables; but when they once - design to indulge the provocations of amorous heats and - wine, then they send away their wives, and call for their - concubines, their gypsies, and their songstresses, with their - lascivious tunes and wanton galliards. Wherein they do - well, not thinking it proper to debauch their wives with - the tipsy frolics and dissolute extravagances of their intemperance.
-If therefore any private person, swayed by the unruly
- motions of his incontinency, happen at any time to make
- a trip with a kind she-friend or his wife's chambermaid, it
- becomes not the wife presently to lower and take pepper
- in the nose, but rather to believe that it was his respect to
-
-
Princes that be addicted to music increase the number of excellent musicians; if they be lovers of learning, - all men strive to excel in reading and in eloquence; if - given to martial exercises, a military ardor rouses straight - the drowsy sloth of all their subjects. Thus husbands - effeminately finical only teach their wives to paint and polish themselves with borrowed lustre. The studious of - pleasure render them immodest and whorish. On the other - side, men of serious, honest, and virtuous conversations - make sober, chaste, and prudent wives.
-A young Lacedaemonian lass, being asked by an - acquaintance of hers whether she had yet embraced her - husband, made answer, No; but that he had embraced her. - And after this manner, in my opinion, it behooves an honest - woman to behave herself toward her husband, never to - shun nor to disdain the caresses and dalliances of his - amorous inclinations, when he himself begins; but never - herself to offer the first occasion of provocation. For the - one savors of impudent harlotry, the other displays a female pride and imperiousness void of conjugal affection.
-It behooves a woman not to make peculiar and private friendships of her own, but to esteem only her husband's acquaintance and familiars as hers. Now as the - Gods are our chiefest and most beneficial friends, it behooves her to worship and adore only those Deities which - her husband reputes and reverences for such. But as for - quaint opinions and superstitious innovations, let them be - exterminated from her outermost threshold. For no sacrifices or services can be acceptable to the Gods, performed - by women, as it were, by stealth and in secret, without the - knowledge of the husband.
-Plato asserts those cities to be the most happy and
- best regulated where these expressions, This is mine,
-
- This is not mine,
are seldomest made use of. For that
- then the citizens enjoy in common, so far as is convenient,
- those things that are of greatest importance. But in wedlock those expressions are utterly to be abolished. For
- as the physicians say that the right side being bruised or
- beaten communicates its pain to the left; so indeed the
- husband ought to sympathize in the sorrows and afflictions
- of the woman, and much more does it become the wife to
- be sensible of the miseries and calamities of the husband;
- to the intent that, as knots are made fast by knitting the
- bows of a thread one within another, so the ligaments of
- conjugal society may be strengthened by the mutual interchange of kindness and affection. This Nature herself
- instructs us, by mixing us in our bodies; while she takes
- a part from each, and then blending the whole together
- produces a being common to both, to the end that neither
- may be able to discern or distinguish what was belonging
- to another, or lay claim to assured propriety. Therefore
- is community of estate and purses chiefly requisite among
- married couples, whose principal aim it ought to be to mix
- and incorporate their purchases and disbursements into one
- substance, neither pretending to call this hers or that his,
- but accounting all inseparable peculiar to both. However,
- as in a goblet where the proportion of water exceeds the
- juice of the grape, yet still we call the mixture wine; in
- like manner the house and estate must be reputed the
- possession of the husband, although the woman brought
- the chiefest part.
Helen was covetous, Paris luxurious. On the other - side, Ulysses was prudent, Penelope chaste. Happy therefore was the match between the latter; but the nuptials - of the former brought an Iliad of miseries as well upon - the Greeks as barbarians.
-The question being put by some of his friends to a
- certain Roman, why he had put away his wife, both sober,
-
-
King Philip so far doted on a fair Thessalian lady, - that she was suspected to have used some private arts of - fascination towards him. Wherefore Olympias labored to - get the supposed sorceress into her power. But when the - queen had viewed her well, and duly examined her beauty, - beheld the graces of her deportment, and considered her - discourse bespake her no less than a person of noble descent and education; Hence, fond suspicions, hence vainer - calumnies! said she, for I plainly find the charms which - thou makest use of are in thyself. Certainly therefore a - lawful wife surpasses the common acceptation of happiness when, without enhancing the advantages of her - wealth, nobility, and form, or vaunting the possession of - Venus's cestus itself, she makes it her business to win her - husband's affection by her virtue and sweetness of disposition.
-Another time the same Olympias, understanding that - a young courtier had married a lady, beautiful indeed, but - of no good report, said: Sure, the Hotspur had little brains, - otherwise he would never have married with his eyes. For - they are fools who in the choice of a wife believe the report of their sight or fingers; like those who telling out - the portion in their thoughts take the woman upon content, never examining what her conditions are, or whether - she is proper to make him a fit wife or no ?
-Socrates was wont to give this advice to young men - that accustomed themselves to their mirrors :—if ill-favored, to correct their deformity by the practice of virtue; - if handsome, not to blemish their outward form with inward vice. In like manner, it would not be amiss for - a mistress of a family, when she holds her mirror in her - hands, to discourse her own thoughts:—if deformed, thus, - Should I prove lewd and wicked too ?—on the other side, - thus the fair one, What if chaste beside ? For it adds a - kind of veneration to a woman not so handsome, that she - is more beloved for the perfections of her mind than the - outside graces of her body.
-Dionysius, the tyrant of Sicily, sent several costly
- presents of rich apparel, necklaces, and bracelets to the
- daughters of Lysander, which however the father would
- never permit the virgins to accept, saying: These gaudy
- presents will procure more infamy than honor to my
- daughters. And indeed, before Lysander, Sophocles in
- one of his tragedies had uttered the following sentence to
- the same effect:
-
-
-
For, as Crates said, that is ornament which adorns; and
- that adorns a woman which renders her more comely and
- decent. This is an honor conferred upon her, not by the
-
-
They who offer to Juno as the Goddess of Wedlock - never consecrate the gall with the other parts of the sacrifice, but having drawn it forth, they cast it behind the - altar. Which constitution of the lawgiver fairly implies - that all manner of passionate anger and bitterness of reproach should be exterminated from the thresholds of - nuptial cohabitation. Not but that a certain kind of - austerity becomes the mistress of a family; which however should be like that of wine, profitable and delightful, - not like aloes, biting and medicinally ungrateful to the - palate.
-Plato observing the morose and sour humor of - Xenocrates, otherwise a person of great virtue and worth, - admonished him to sacrifice to the Graces. In like manner, I am of opinion that it behooves a woman of moderation to crave the assistance of the Graces in her behavior - towards her husband, thereby (according to the saying of - Metrodorus) to render their society mutually harmonious - to each other, and to preserve her from being waspishly - proud, out of a conceit of her fidelity and virtue. For it - becomes not a frugal woman to be neglectful of decent - neatness, nor one who has great respect to her husband to - refrain complacency in her conversation; seeing that, as - the over-rigid humor of a wife renders her honesty irksome, so sluttery begets a hatred of her sparing and pinching housewifery.
-She who is afraid to laugh or to appear merry and
- gay before her husband, for fear of waking his jealousy,
- may be said to resemble one that forbears to anoint herself at all, lest she should be thought to use unnecessary
- or harlotry perfumes, or that neglects to wash her face, to
- avoid the suspicion of painting. Thus we find that poets
-
-
The Egyptian women were anciently never wont to - wear shoes, to the end they might accustom themselves to - stay at home. But altogether different is the humor of - our women; for they, unless allowed their jewels, their - bracelets, and necklaces, their gaudy vestments, gowns, and - petticoats, all bespangled with gold, and their embroidered - buskins, will never stir abroad.
-Theano, as she was dressing herself one morning in
- her chamber, by chance discovered some part of her naked
- arm. Upon which, one of the company crying out, Oh,
- what a lovely arm is there !—'Tis very true, said she, but
- yet not common. Thus ought a chaste and virtuous woman not only to keep her naked arms from open view, but
-
-
Phidias made the statue of Venus at Elis with one - foot upon the shell of a tortoise, to signify two great duties - of a virtuous woman, which are to keep at home and be - silent. For she is only to speak to her husband, or by - her husband. Nor is she to take amiss the uttering - her mind in that manner, through another more proper - organ.
-Princes and kings honor themselves in giving honor - to philosophers and learned men. On the other side, - great personages admired and courted by philosophers are - no way honored by their flatteries, which are rather a prejudice and stain to the reputation of those that use them. - Thus it is with women, who in honoring and submitting to - their husbands win for themselves honor and respect, but - when they strive to get the mastery, they become a greater - reproach to themselves than to those that are so ignominiously henpecked. But then again, it behooves a husband to control his wife, not as a master does his vassal, - but as the soul governs the body, with the gentle hand - of mutual friendship and reciprocal affection. For as - the soul commands the body, without being subject to - its pleasures and inordinate desires, in like manner should - a man so exercise his authority over his wife, as to soften it - with complaisance and kind requital of her loving submission.
-Philosophers assert that, of bodies which consist of
- several parts, some are composed of parts distinct and
- separate, as a navy or army royal; others of contiguous
- parts, as a house or a ship; and others of parts united at
- the first conception, equally partaking of life and motion
- and growing together, as are the bodies of all living creatures.
-
-
In Leptis, a city of Libya, it was an ancient custom - for the bride, the next day after the nuptial solemnity, to - send home to the mother of the bridegroom to borrow a - boiler, which she not only refused to lend, but sent back - word that she had none to spare; to the end that the new - married woman, having by that means tried the disposition - of her mother-in-law, if afterwards she found her humor - peevish and perverse, might with more patience brook her - unkindness, as being no more than what she expected. - Rather it becomes the daughter to avoid all occasions of - distaste. For it is natural to some mothers to be jealous - that the wife deprives her of that filial tenderness which - she expects from her son. For which there is no better - cure than for a wife so to contrive the gaining of her husband's love as not to lessen or withdraw his affection from - his mother.
-It is generally observed that mothers are fondest of
- their sons, as expecting from them their future assistance
-
-
The commanders of the Grecian auxiliaries that - marched in aid of Cyrus gave these instructions to their - soldiers, that, if their enemies advanced whooping and hallowing to the combat, they should receive the charge, - observing an exact silence; but on the other side, if they - came on silently, then to rend the air with their martial - shouts. Thus prudent wives, when their husbands in the - heat of their passion rant and tear the house down, should - make no returns, but quietly hold their peace; but if they - only frown out their discontents in moody anger, then, with - soft language and gently reasoning the case, they may endeavor to appease and qualify their fury.
-Rightly therefore are they reprehended by Euripides,
- who introduce the harp and other instruments of music at
- their compotations. For music ought rather to be made
- use of for the mitigation of wrath and to allay the sorrows
- of mourning, not to heighten the voluptuousness of those
- that are already drowned in jollity and delight. Believe
- yourselves then to be in an error that sleep together for
- pleasure, but when angry and at variance make two
- beds, and that never at that time call to your assistance
- the Goddess Venus, who better than any other knows
-
-
-
-
Though it becomes a man and his wife at all times - to avoid all occasions of quarrelling one with another, yet - is there no time so unseasonable for contention as when - they are between the same sheets. As the woman in difficult labor said to those that were about to lay her upon her - bed; How, said she, can this bed cure these pains, since it - was in this very bed that my pleasures were the cause of - all my throes? And still less will those reproaches and - contests which the bed produces be reconciled at any other - time or place.
-Hermione seems to be in the right, speaking to this
- effect in one of the tragedies of Euripides:
-
-
-
-
However, these mischiefs rarely happen but where women
- at variance and jealous of their husbands open not only
- their door but their ears to whole swarms of twattling gossips, that widen the difference. For then it behooves a
- prudent woman to shut her ears and beware of listening to
- such enchanting tattlers, calling to mind the answer of
- Philip, when he was exasperated by his friends against the
- Greeks for cursing and reviling him, notwithstanding all
- the benefits they had received at his hands: What would
- they have done, said he, had we used them with unkindness
- and severity. The same should be the reply of a prudent
- woman to those she-devils, when they bewail her condition,
- and cry, A woman so loving, so chaste and modest, and yet
- abused by her husband! For then should she make answer,
-
-
A certain master, whose slave had been run away - from him for several months together, after a long search - at length found him suddenly in a workhouse, and said, - Where could I have desired to meet with thee more to my - wish than in such a place as this? Thus, when a woman - is grown jealous of her husband and meditates nothing but - present divorce, before she be too hasty, let her reason - with herself in this manner: In what condition would - my rival choose to see me with greater satisfaction than as - I am, all in a fret and fume, enraged against my husband, - and ready to abandon both my house and marriage-bed - together?
-The Athenians yearly solemnized three sacred seedtimes: the first in Scirus, in memory of the first invention
- by their ancestors of ploughing and sowing; the second at
- a place called Rharia; and the third under Pelis, which
- they call
The orator Gorgias, in a full assembly of the Grecians, resorting from all parts to the Olympic games, making an oration to the people, wherein he exhorted them to
- live in peace, unity, and concord among one another, Melanthus cried out aloud: This man pretends to give us advice,
- and preaches here in public nothing but love and union,
-
-
It is reported that the scent of sweet perfumes will - make a cat grow mad. Now, supposing those strong perfumes which are used by many men should prove offensive - to their wives, would it not be a great piece of unnatural - unkindness to discompose a woman with continual fits - rather than deny himself a pleasure so trivial? But when - it is not their husbands' perfuming themselves, but their - lascivious wandering after lewd and extravagant women, - that disturbs and disorders their wives, it is a great piece - of injustice, for the tickling pleasure of a few minutes, to - afflict and disquiet a virtuous woman. For since they who - are conversant with bees will often abstain from women, - to prevent the persecution of those little but implacable - enemies of unclean dalliance, much rather ought a man to' - be pure from the pollutions of harlotry, when he approaches his chaste and lawful wife.
-They whose business it is to manage elephants
- never put on white frocks, nor dare they that govern wild
- bulls appear in red, those creatures being scared and exasperated by those colors. And some report that tigers, when
- they hear a drum beat afar off, grow mad and exercise
- their savage fury upon themselves. If then there are
- some men that are offended at the gay and sumptuous
- habit of their wives, and others that brook as ill their gadding
-
-
What said a woman to King Philip, that pulled - and hauled her to him by violence against her will? Let - me go, said she, for when the candles are out, all women - are alike. This is aptly applied to men addicted to adultery and lust. But a virtuous wife, when the candle is - taken away, ought then chiefly to differ from all other - women. For when her body is not to be seen, her chastity, her modesty, and her peculiar affection to her husband ought then to shine with their brightest lustre.
-Plato admonishes old men to carry themselves with - most gravity in the presence of young people, to the end - the awe of their example may imprint in youth the greater - respect and reverence of age. For the loose and vain - behavior of men stricken in years breeds a contempt of - gray hairs, and never can expect veneration from juvenility. Which sober admonition should instruct the husband to bear a greater respect to his wife than to all other - women in the world, seeing that the nuptial chamber must - be to her either the school of honor and chastity or that - of incontinency and wantonness. For he that allows himself those pleasures that he forbids his wife, acts like a - man that would enjoin his wife to oppose those enemies to - which he has himself already surrendered.
-As to what remains, in reference to superfluity of - habit and decent household furniture, remember, dear - Eurydice, what Timoxenas has written to Aristylla.
-And do you, Pollianus, never believe that women will
- be weaned from those toys and curiosities wherein they
- take a kind of pride, and which serve for an alleviation
- of their domestic solitude, while you yourself admire the
- same things in other women, and are taken with the gayety
-
-
Since then thou art arrived at those years which are
- proper for the study of such sciences as are attained
- by reason and demonstration, endeavor to complete this
- knowledge by conversing with persons that may be serviceable to thee in such a generous design. And as for
- thy wife, like the industrious bee, gather everywhere from
- the fragrant flowers of good instruction, replenish thyself
- with whatever may be of advantage to her, and impart
- the same to her again in loving and familiar discourse,
- both for thy own and her improvement.
-
-
-
-
Nor is it less to thy commendation to hear what she
- returns:
-
-
-
-
For such studies as these fix the contemplations of
- women upon what is laudable and serious, and prevent
- their wasting time upon impertinent and pernicious vanity.
- For that lady that is studious in geometry will never affect
- the dissolute motions of dancing. And she that is taken
- with the sublime notions of Plato and Xenophon will look
- with disdain upon the charms and enchantments of witches
- and sorcerers; and if any ridiculous astrologer promises to
- pull the moon down from the sky, she will laugh at the
- ignorance and folly of the women who believe in him,
- being herself well grounded in astronomy, and having
-
-
True it is, that never any woman brought forth a perfect
- child without the assistance and society of man, but there
- are many whose imaginations are so strongly wrought upon
- by the sight or bare relation of monstrous spectacles, that
- they bring into the world several sorts of immature and
- shapeless productions. Thus, unless great care be taken
- by men to manure and cultivate the inclinations of their
- wives with wholesome and virtuous precepts, they often
- breed among themselves the false conceptions of extravagant and loose desires. But do thou, Eurydice, make it
- thy business to be familiar with the learned proverbs of
- wise and learned men, and always to embellish thy discourse with their profitable sentences, to the end thou
- mayst be the admiration of other women, that shall behold
- thee so richly adorned without the expense or assistance
- of jewels or embroideries. For pearls and diamonds are
- not the purchase of an ordinary purse; but the ornaments
- of Theano, Cleobuline, Gorgo the wife of King Leonidas,
- Timoclea the sister of Theagenes, the ancient Roman
- Claudia, or Cornelia the daughter of Scipio,—already
- so celebrated and renowned for their virtues,—will cost,
- but little, yet nothing will set thee out more glorious or
- illustrious to the world, or render thy life more comfortable
- and happy. For if Sappho, only because she could compose an elegant verse, had the confidence to write to a
- haughty and wealthy dame in her time:
-
-
-
-
why may it not be much more lawful for thee to boast - those great perfections that give thee a greater privilege, - not only to gather the flowers, but to reap the fruits themselves, which the Muses bestow upon the lovers and real - owners of learning and philosophy?
-- The modern bride will undoubtedly turn up her nose and shake her independent - head in disapproval of Plutarch's suggestions about subordinating herself to - her husband, and nobody will attempt to deny that the status of women has - changed materially since Plutarch's time; but, apart from this, she will - find in Plutarch's short essay many suggestions regarding whole-souled - co-operation and cheerful intellectual companionship with her husband, which - mutatis mutandis hold as good to-day as they did when they were written, - nearly two thousand years ago. Nor is the husband neglected; he can find - much sound advice regarding his attitude towards his wife and the respect - and consideration that is always due to her.
-Plutarch was no mere theorist in these matters. He himself was happily - married, and anyone who doubts this should read his letter to his wife - (Moralia, 608 a).
-The essay is included in the catalogue of Lamprias (see Vol. I. Introd. p. - xviii) and is not infrequently quoted or referred to by later writers, - Stobaeus, for example, in his Florilegium, especially lxxiv., and Hieronymus - (St. Jerome), Adversus Iovinianum, i. ad fin. It is well worth while, in - this connexion, to read Jeremy Taylor's sermon, The Marriage Ring, to see - how a famous preacher served up many of the ideas of a heathen philosopher - to a Christian congregation.
-
-
Following close upon the time-honoured rites which the priestess of Demeter
In music they used to call one of the conventional themes for the flute the
- Horse Rampant,
-
Solon
In Boeotia, after veiling the bride, they put on her head a chaplet of
- asparagus; for this plant yields the finest flavoured fruit from the
- roughest thorns, and so the bride will provide for him who does not run away
- or feel annoyed at her first display of peevishness and unpleasantness a
- docile and sweet life together. Those who do not patiently put up with the
- early girlish disagreements are on a par with those who on account of the
- sourness of green grapes abandon the ripe clusters to others. Again, many of
- the newly married women because of their first experiences get annoyed at
- their husbands, and find
-
In the beginning, especially, married people ought to be on their guard - against disagreements and clashes, for they see that such household vessels - as are made of sections joined together are at the outset easily pulled - apart by any fortuitous cause, but after a time, when their joints have - become set, they can hardly be separated by fire and steel.
-Just as fire catches readily in chaff, fibre, and hares' fur, but goes out - rather quickly, unless it gets hold of some other thing that can retain it - and feed it, so the keen love between newly married people that blazes up - fiercely as the result of physical attractiveness must not be regarded as - enduring or constant, unless, by being centred about character and by - gaining a hold upon the rational faculties, it attains a state of vitality. -
-Fishing with poison is a quick way to catch fish and an easy method of taking - them, but it makes the fish inedible and bad. In the same way women who - artfully employ love-potions and magic spells upon their husbands, and gain - the mastery over them through pleasure, find themselves consorts of - dull-witted, degenerate fools. The men bewitched by Circe were of no service - to her, nor did she make the least use of them after they had been changed - into swine and asses, while for Odysseus, who had sense and showed - discretion in her company, she had an exceeding great love.
-Women who prefer to have power over fools rather than to hearken to sensible
- men, are like persons who prefer to guide the blind on the road
Women will not believe that Pasiphaë, the consort of a king, fell in - love with a bull, in spite of the fact that they see some of their sex who - feel bored by uncompromising and virtuous men, and take more pleasure in - consorting with those who, like dogs and he-goats, are a combination of - licentiousness and sensuality.
-Men who through weakness or effeminacy are unable to vault upon their horses - teach the horses to kneel of themselves and crouch down. In like manner, - some who have won wives of noble birth or wealth, instead of making - themselves better, try to humble their wives, with the idea that they shall - have more authority over their wives if these are reduced to a state of - humility. But, as one pays heed to the size of his horse in using the rein, - so in using the rein on his wife he ought to pay heed to her position.
-Whenever the moon is at a distance from the sun we see her conspicuous and - brilliant, but she disappears and hides herself when she comes near him. - Contrariwise a virtuous woman ought to be most visible in her husband's - company, and to stay in the house and hide herself when he is away.
-Herodotus was not right in saying
Whenever two notes are sounded in accord the tune is carried by the bass;
- and in like manner every activity in a virtuous household is carried on
The Sun won a victory over the North Wind.
Cato expelled from the Senate
Just as a mirror, although embellished with gold and precious stones, is good
- for nothing unless it shows a true likeness, so there is no advantage in a
- rich wife unless she makes her life true to her husband's and her character
- in accord with his. If the mirror gives back a gloomy image of a glad man,
-
-
Men who do not like to see their wives eat in their company are thus teaching - them to stuff themselves when alone. So those who are not cheerful in the - company of their wives, nor join with them in sportiveness and laughter, are - thus teaching them to seek their own pleasures apart from their husbands. -
-The lawful wives of the Persian kings sit beside them at dinner, and eat with
- them. But when the kings wish to be merry and get drunk, they send their
- wives away, and send for their music-girls and concubines.
Kings fond of the arts make many persons incline to be artists, those fond of - letters make many want to be scholars, and those fond of sport make many - take up athletics. In like manner a man fond of his personal appearance - makes a wife all paint and powder; one fond of pleasure makes her - meretricious and licentious, while a husband who loves what is good and - honourable makes a wife discreet and well-behaved.
-A young Spartan woman, in answer to an inquiry as to whether she had already
- made advances to her husband, said, No, but he has made them to
- me.
-
A wife ought not to make friends of her own, but to enjoy her husband's - friends in common with him. The gods are the first and most important - friends. Wherefore it is becoming for a wife to worship and to know only the - gods that her husband believes in, and to shut the front door tight upon all - queer rituals and outlandish superstitions. For with no god do stealthy and - secret rites performed by a woman find any favour.
-Plato mine
and not mine
most rarely uttered,
- the reason being that the citizens, so far as in them lies, treat all things
- of real importance as common property. Much more should such expressions be
- eliminated from the wine,
although the larger of the component parts is
- water, so the property and the estate ought to be said to belong to the
- husband even though the wife contribute the larger share.
Helen was fond of wealth and Paris of pleasure; Odysseus was sensible and
- Penelope virtuous. Therefore the marriage of the latter pair was happy and
- enviable, while that of the former created an Iliad of woes
- for Greeks and barbarians.
The Roman,Yes, this is beautiful to look at, and new, but nobody knows
- where it pinches me.
A wife, then, ought not to rely on her
- dowry or birth or beauty, but on things in which she gains the greatest hold
- on her husband, namely conversation, character, and comradeship, which she
- must render not perverse or vexatious day by day, but accommodating,
- inoffensive, and agreeable. For, as physicians have more fear of fevers that
- originate from obscure causes and gradual accretion than of those which may
- be accounted for by manifest and weighty reasons, so it is the petty,
- continual, daily clashes between man and wife, unnoticed by the great
- majority, that disrupt and mar married life.
King Philip was enamoured of a Thessalian woman who was accused of using
- magic charms upon him. Olympias accordingly made haste to get the woman into
- her power. But when the latter had come into the queen's presence and was
- seen to be beautiful in appearance, and her conversation with the queen was
- not lacking in good-breeding or cleverness, Olympias exclaimed, Away
- with these slanders! You have your magic charms in yourself.
-
On another occasion, when a young man of the court had married a beautiful
- woman That fellow has no brains;
- else he would not have married on sight.
Marriages ought not to
- be made by trusting the eyes only, or the fingers either, as is the case
- with some who take a wife after counting up how much she brings with her,
- but without deciding what kind of a helpmate she will be.
Socrates What
- if I am not virtuous?
and the beautiful one, What if I
- am virtuous as well?
For if the ill-favoured woman is loved
- for her character, that is something of which she can be very proud, far
- more than if she were loved for her beauty.
The Sicilian despot
- These adornments will disgrace my daughters far more than they will
- adorn them.
But Sophocles,
- adornment is that which adorns,
and that adorns or decorates a
- woman which makes her more decorous. It is not gold or precious stones or
- scarlet that makes her such, but
-
Those who offer sacrifice to Hera, the Protectress of Wedlock,
Plato she
- may live pleasantly with him and not be cross all the time because she
- is virtuous.
The thrifty woman must not neglect cleanliness, nor
- the loving wife cheerfulness; for asperity makes a wife's correct behaviour
- disagreeable, just as untidiness has a similar effect upon plain living.
-
The woman who is afraid to laugh and jest a bit with her husband, lest
- possibly she appear bold and wanton, is no different from one who will not
- use oil on her head lest she be thought to use perfume, or from one who will
- not even wash her face lest she be thought to use rouge. But we observe both
- poets and public speakers, such as try to avoid vulgarity, narrowness, and
- affectation in their diction, employing all artistry to move and stir the
-
- You cannot use me as a friend and flatterer
- both,
- I cannot have the society of the same woman
- both as wife and as paramour.
-
The women of Egypt, by inherited custom, were not allowed to wear shoes,
Theano,A lovely arm.
- But not for the public,
said she. Not only the arm of the
- virtuous woman, but her speech as well, ought to be not for the public, and
- she ought to be modest and guarded about saying anything
-
Pheidias made the Aphrodite of the Eleans with one foot on a tortoise,
Rich men and princes by conferring honours on philosophers adorn both - themselves and the philosophers; but, on the other hand, philosophers by - paying court to the rich do not enhance the repute of the rich but lower - their own. So is it with women also; if they subordinate themselves to - their husbands, they are commended, but if they want to have control, they - cut a sorrier figure than the subjects of their control. And control ought - to be exercised by the man over the woman, not as the owner has control of a - piece of property, but, as the soul controls the body, by entering into her - feelings and being knit to her through goodwill. As, therefore, it is - possible to exercise care over the body without being a slave to its - pleasures and desires, so it is possible to govern a wife, and at the same - time to delight and gratify her.
-Philosophers
In Leptis, a city of Africa, it is an inherited custom All mothers-in-law hate their daughters-in-law.
-
Mothers appear to have a greater love for their sons because of a feeling - that their sons are able to help them, and fathers for their daughters - because of a feeling that the daughters have need of their help. Perhaps, - also, because of the honour accorded by man and wife to each other, the one - wishes openly to show that he feels greater esteem and affection for the - attributes which are more characteristic of the other. And herein there may - perhaps be a divergence, but, on the other hand, it is a nice thing if the - wife, in the deference she shows, is observed to incline rather toward her - husband's parents than her own, and, if she is distressed over anything, to - refer it to them without the knowledge of her own parents. For seeming - confidence begets confidence, and love, love.
-The generals issued orders to the Greeks in Cyrus's army,
Euripides I will settle their uncomposed quarrels,
- Sending them back to their bed to a union of loving enjoyment.
-
At all times and in all places a wife ought to try to avoid any clash with
- her husband, and a husband with his wife, but they ought to be especially on
- their guard against doing this in the privacy of their bedchamber. The woman
- in travail and pain kept saying to those who were trying to make her go to
- bed, How can the bed cure this ailment which I contracted in bed?
-
But the disagreements, recriminations, and angry passions which the
- bed generates are not easily settled in another place and at another time.
-
Hermione seems to speak the truth when she says,Bad women's visits brought
- about my fall.
This, however, does not come about so simply, but only when
- marital disagreements and jealousies open not only a wife's doors but also
- her hearing to such women. So, at such a time especially, a woman who has
- sense ought to stop her ears, and be on her guard against whispered
- insinuations, so that fire may not be added to fire,What would happen, then, if we were to treat them ill?
-
So when these back-biters say, Your husband treats
- grievously his loving and virtuous wife.
- Yes, what would happen, then, if I were to begin to hate him and
- wrong him?
-
A man whose slave had run away, on catching sight of the fugitive some time
- later, ran after him; but when the slave got ahead of him by taking refuge
- in a treadmill, the master said, Where else could I have wished to
- find you rather than here?
- Where else would my rival like better to
- see me, what would she rather have me do, than feel aggrieved with my
- husband and quarrel with him and abandon my very home and chamber?
-
-
The Athenians observe three sacred ploughings: the first at Scirum bountiful-bearing Cytherea.
-
When the orator Gorgias read to the Greeks at Olympia a speech about
- concord,This fellow is giving us advice about
- concord, and yet in his own household he has not prevailed upon himself,
- his wife, and maidservant, three persons only, to live in
- concord.
For there was, apparently, some love on Gorgias's part
- and jealousy on the wife's part towards the girl. A man therefore ought to
- have his household well harmonized who is going to harmonize State, Forum,
- and friends. For it is much more likely that the sins of women rather than
- sins against women will go unnoticed by most people.
They say that the cat is excited to frenzy by the odour of perfumes. Now if
- it happened that women were similarly made furious and frantic by perfumes,
- it would be a dreadful thing for their husbands not to abstain from perfume,
- but for the sake of their own brief pleasure to permit their wives to suffer
- in this way. Now inasmuch as women are affected in this way, not by their
- husbands' using perfume, but by their having connexion with other women, it
- is unfair to pain and disturb them so much for the sake of a trivial
- pleasure, and not to follow with wives the practice observed in approaching
- bees
-
Those who have to go near elephants do not put on bright clothes, nor do
- those who go near bulls put on red
A woman once said to Philip, who was trying to force her to come to him
- against her will, Let me go. All women are the same when the lights
- are out.
This is well said as an answer to adulterous and
- licentious men, but the wedded wife ought especially when the light is out
- not to be the same as ordinary women, but, when her body is invisible, her
- virtue, her exclusive devotion to her husband, her constancy, and her
- affection, ought to be most in evidence.
Plato
In regard to love of finery, I beg, Eurydice, that you will read and try to
- remember what was written to Aristylla by Timoxena
Besides, Pollianus, you already possess sufficient maturity to study
- philosophy, and I beg that you will beautify your character with the aid of
- discourses which are attended by logical demonstration and mature
- deliberation, seeking the company and instruction of teachers who will help
- you. And for your wife you must collect from every source what is useful, as
- do the bees, and carrying it within your own self impart it to her, and then
- discuss it with her, and make the best of these doctrines her favourite and
- familiar themes. For to her Thou art a father and precious-loved mother,
- Yea, and a brother as well.
- My dear husband,
Studies of this sort, in the first place, divert women
- from all untoward conduct; for a woman studying geometry will be ashamed to
- be a dancer, and she will not swallow any beliefs in magic charms while she
- is under the charm of Plato's or Xenophon's words. And if anybody professes
- power to pull down the moon from the sky, she will laugh at the ignorance
- and stupidity of women who believe these things, inasmuch as she herself is
- not unschooled in astronomy, and has read in the books about Aglaonice, Nay, but thou art
- to me
guide, philosopher, and teacher in all that is most lovely and
- divine.
It is said that no woman ever produced a child without the co-operation of a
- man, yet there are misshapen, fleshlike, uterine growths originating in some
- infection, which develop of themselves and acquire firmness and solidity,
- and are commonly called moles.
-
And as for you, Eurydice, I beg that you will try to be conversant with the
- sayings of the wise and good, and always have at your tongue's end those
- sentiments which you used to cull in your girlhood's days when you were with
- us, so that you may give joy to your husband, and may be admired by other
- women, adorned, as you will be, without price, with rare and precious
- jewels. For you cannot acquire and put upon you this rich woman's pearls or
- that foreign woman's silks without buying them at a high price, but the
- ornaments of Theano,These aremy jewels.
-
If Sappho thought that her beautiful compositions in verse justified her in
- writing Dead in the tomb shalt thou lie, Nor shall
- there be thought of thee there, For in the roses of Pierian fields Thou hast
- no share,
-
The modern bride will undoubtedly turn up her nose and shake her independent head in disapproval of Plutarch’s suggestions about subordinating herself to her husband, and nobody will attempt to deny that the status of women has changed materially since Plutarch’s time; but, apart from this, she will find in Plutarch’s short essay many suggestions regarding whole-souled co-operation and cheerful intellectual companionship with her husband, which mutatis mutandis hold as good to-day as they did when they were written, nearly two thousand years ago. Nor is the husband neglected; he can find much sound advice regarding his attitude towards his wife and the respect and consideration that is always due to her.
Plutarch was no mere theorist in these matters. He himself was happily married, and anyone who doubts this should read his letter to his wife (Moralia, 608 a).
The essay is included in the catalogue of Lamprias (see Vol. I. Introd. p. xviii) and is not infrequently quoted or referred to by later writers, Stobaeus, for example, in his Florilegium, especially lxxiv., and Hieronymus (St. Jerome), Adversus Iovinianum, i. ad fin. It is well worth while, in this connexion, to read Jeremy Taylor’s sermon, The Marriage Ring, to see how a famous preacher served up many of the ideas of a heathen philosopher to a Christian congregation.
Following close upon the time-honoured rites which the priestess of Demeter
In music they used to call one of the conventional themes for the flute the Horse Rampant,
Solon
In Boeotia, after veiling the bride, they put on her head a chaplet of asparagus; for this plant yields the finest flavoured fruit from the roughest thorns, and so the bride will provide for him who does not run away or feel annoyed at her first display of peevishness and unpleasantness a docile and sweet life together. Those who do not patiently put up with the early girlish disagreements are on a par with those who on account of the sourness of green grapes abandon the ripe clusters to others. Again, many of the newly married women because of their first experiences get annoyed at their husbands, and find
In the beginning, especially, married people ought to be on their guard against disagreements and clashes, for they see that such household vessels as are made of sections joined together are at the outset easily pulled apart by any fortuitous cause, but after a time, when their joints have become set, they can hardly be separated by fire and steel.
Just as fire catches readily in chaff, fibre, and hares’ fur, but goes out rather quickly, unless it gets hold of some other thing that can retain it and feed it, so the keen love between newly married people that blazes up fiercely as the result of physical attractiveness must not be regarded as enduring or constant, unless, by being centred about character and by gaining a hold upon the rational faculties, it attains a state of vitality.
Fishing with poison is a quick way to catch fish and an easy method of taking them, but it makes the fish inedible and bad. In the same way women who artfully employ love-potions and magic spells upon their husbands, and gain the mastery over them through pleasure, find themselves consorts of dull-witted, degenerate fools. The men bewitched by Circe were of no service to her, nor did she make the least use of them after they had been changed into swine and asses, while for Odysseus, who had sense and showed discretion in her company, she had an exceeding great love.
Women who prefer to have power over fools rather than to hearken to sensible men, are like persons who prefer to guide the blind on the road
Women will not believe that Pasiphaë, the consort of a king, fell in love with a bull, in spite of the fact that they see some of their sex who feel bored by uncompromising and virtuous men, and take more pleasure in consorting with those who, like dogs and he-goats, are a combination of licentiousness and sensuality.
Men who through weakness or effeminacy are unable to vault upon their horses teach the horses to kneel of themselves and crouch down. In like manner, some who have won wives of noble birth or wealth, instead of making themselves better, try to humble their wives, with the idea that they shall have more authority over their wives if these are reduced to a state of humility. But, as one pays heed to the size of his horse in using the rein, so in using the rein on his wife he ought to pay heed to her position.
Whenever the moon is at a distance from the sun we see her conspicuous and brilliant, but she disappears and hides herself when she comes near him. Contrariwise a virtuous woman ought to be most visible in her husband’s company, and to stay in the house and hide herself when he is away.
Herodotus was not right in saying
Whenever two notes are sounded in accord the tune is carried by the bass; and in like manner every activity in a virtuous household is carried on
The Sun won a victory over the North Wind.
Cato expelled from the Senate
Just as a mirror, although embellished with gold and precious stones, is good for nothing unless it shows a true likeness, so there is no advantage in a rich wife unless she makes her life true to her husband’s and her character in accord with his. If the mirror gives back a gloomy image of a glad man,
Men who do not like to see their wives eat in their company are thus teaching them to stuff themselves when alone. So those who are not cheerful in the company of their wives, nor join with them in sportiveness and laughter, are thus teaching them to seek their own pleasures apart from their husbands.
The lawful wives of the Persian kings sit beside them at dinner, and eat with them. But when the kings wish to be merry and get drunk, they send their wives away, and send for their music-girls and concubines.
Kings fond of the arts make many persons incline to be artists, those fond of letters make many want to be scholars, and those fond of sport make many take up athletics. In like manner a man fond of his personal appearance makes a wife all paint and powder; one fond of pleasure makes her meretricious and licentious, while a husband who loves what is good and honourable makes a wife discreet and well-behaved.
A young Spartan woman, in answer to an inquiry as to whether she had already made advances to her husband, said, No, but he has made them to me.
A wife ought not to make friends of her own, but to enjoy her husband’s friends in common with him. The gods are the first and most important friends. Wherefore it is becoming for a wife to worship and to know only the gods that her husband believes in, and to shut the front door tight upon all queer rituals and outlandish superstitions. For with no god do stealthy and secret rites performed by a woman find any favour.
Plato mine
and not mine
most rarely uttered, the reason being that the citizens, so far as in them lies, treat all things of real importance as common property. Much more should such expressions be eliminated from the wine,
although the larger of the component parts is water, so the property and the estate ought to be said to belong to the husband even though the wife contribute the larger share.
Helen was fond of wealth and Paris of pleasure; Odysseus was sensible and Penelope virtuous. Therefore the marriage of the latter pair was happy and enviable, while that of the former created an Iliad of woes
for Greeks and barbarians.
The Roman,Yes, this is beautiful to look at, and new, but nobody knows where it pinches me.
A wife, then, ought not to rely on her dowry or birth or beauty, but on things in which she gains the greatest hold on her husband, namely conversation, character, and comradeship, which she must render not perverse or vexatious day by day, but accommodating, inoffensive, and agreeable. For, as physicians have more fear of fevers that originate from obscure causes and gradual accretion than of those which may be accounted for by manifest and weighty reasons, so it is the petty, continual, daily clashes between man and wife, unnoticed by the great majority, that disrupt and mar married life.
King Philip was enamoured of a Thessalian woman who was accused of using magic charms upon him. Olympias accordingly made haste to get the woman into her power. But when the latter had come into the queen’s presence and was seen to be beautiful in appearance, and her conversation with the queen was not lacking in good-breeding or cleverness, Olympias exclaimed, Away with these slanders! You have your magic charms in yourself.
On another occasion, when a young man of the court had married a beautiful woman That fellow has no brains; else he would not have married on sight.
Marriages ought not to be made by trusting the eyes only, or the fingers either, as is the case with some who take a wife after counting up how much she brings with her, but without deciding what kind of a helpmate she will be.
Socrates What if I am not virtuous?
and the beautiful one, What if I am virtuous as well?
For if the ill-favoured woman is loved for her character, that is something of which she can be very proud, far more than if she were loved for her beauty.
The Sicilian despot These adornments will disgrace my daughters far more than they will adorn them.
But Sophocles, adornment is that which adorns,
and that adorns or decorates a woman which makes her more decorous. It is not gold or precious stones or scarlet that makes her such, but
Those who offer sacrifice to Hera, the Protectress of Wedlock,
Plato she may live pleasantly with him and not be cross all the time because she is virtuous.
The thrifty woman must not neglect cleanliness, nor the loving wife cheerfulness; for asperity makes a wife’s correct behaviour disagreeable, just as untidiness has a similar effect upon plain living.
The woman who is afraid to laugh and jest a bit with her husband, lest possibly she appear bold and wanton, is no different from one who will not use oil on her head lest she be thought to use perfume, or from one who will not even wash her face lest she be thought to use rouge. But we observe both poets and public speakers, such as try to avoid vulgarity, narrowness, and affectation in their diction, employing all artistry to move and stir the You cannot use me as a friend and flatterer both,
I cannot have the society of the same woman both as wife and as paramour.
The women of Egypt, by inherited custom, were not allowed to wear shoes,
Theano,A lovely arm.
But not for the public,
said she. Not only the arm of the virtuous woman, but her speech as well, ought to be not for the public, and she ought to be modest and guarded about saying anything
Pheidias made the Aphrodite of the Eleans with one foot on a tortoise,
Rich men and princes by conferring honours on philosophers adorn both themselves and the philosophers; but, on the other hand, philosophers by paying court to the rich do not enhance the repute of the rich but lower their own. So is it with women also; if they subordinate themselves to their husbands, they are commended, but if they want to have control, they cut a sorrier figure than the subjects of their control. And control ought to be exercised by the man over the woman, not as the owner has control of a piece of property, but, as the soul controls the body, by entering into her feelings and being knit to her through goodwill. As, therefore, it is possible to exercise care over the body without being a slave to its pleasures and desires, so it is possible to govern a wife, and at the same time to delight and gratify her.
Philosophers
In Leptis, a city of Africa, it is an inherited custom All mothers-in-law hate their daughters-in-law.
Mothers appear to have a greater love for their sons because of a feeling that their sons are able to help them, and fathers for their daughters because of a feeling that the daughters have need of their help. Perhaps, also, because of the honour accorded by man and wife to each other, the one wishes openly to show that he feels greater esteem and affection for the attributes which are more characteristic of the other. And herein there may perhaps be a divergence, but, on the other hand, it is a nice thing if the wife, in the deference she shows, is observed to incline rather toward her husband’s parents than her own, and, if she is distressed over anything, to refer it to them without the knowledge of her own parents. For seeming confidence begets confidence, and love, love.
The generals issued orders to the Greeks in Cyrus’s army,
Euripides I will settle their uncomposed quarrels, Sending them back to their bed to a union of loving enjoyment.
At all times and in all places a wife ought to try to avoid any clash with her husband, and a husband with his wife, but they ought to be especially on their guard against doing this in the privacy of their bedchamber. The woman in travail and pain kept saying to those who were trying to make her go to bed, How can the bed cure this ailment which I contracted in bed?
But the disagreements, recriminations, and angry passions which the bed generates are not easily settled in another place and at another time.
Hermione seems to speak the truth when she says,Bad women’s visits brought about my fall.
This, however, does not come about so simply, but only when marital disagreements and jealousies open not only a wife’s doors but also her hearing to such women. So, at such a time especially, a woman who has sense ought to stop her ears, and be on her guard against whispered insinuations, so that fire may not be added to fire,What would happen, then, if we were to treat them ill?
So when these back-biters say, Your husband treats grievously his loving and virtuous wife.
Yes, what would happen, then, if I were to begin to hate him and wrong him?
A man whose slave had run away, on catching sight of the fugitive some time later, ran after him; but when the slave got ahead of him by taking refuge in a treadmill, the master said, Where else could I have wished to find you rather than here?
Where else would my rival like better to see me, what would she rather have me do, than feel aggrieved with my husband and quarrel with him and abandon my very home and chamber?
The Athenians observe three sacred ploughings: the first at Scirum bountiful-bearing Cytherea.
When the orator Gorgias read to the Greeks at Olympia a speech about concord,This fellow is giving us advice about concord, and yet in his own household he has not prevailed upon himself, his wife, and maidservant, three persons only, to live in concord.
For there was, apparently, some love on Gorgias’s part and jealousy on the wife’s part towards the girl. A man therefore ought to have his household well harmonized who is going to harmonize State, Forum, and friends. For it is much more likely that the sins of women rather than sins against women will go unnoticed by most people.
They say that the cat is excited to frenzy by the odour of perfumes. Now if it happened that women were similarly made furious and frantic by perfumes, it would be a dreadful thing for their husbands not to abstain from perfume, but for the sake of their own brief pleasure to permit their wives to suffer in this way. Now inasmuch as women are affected in this way, not by their husbands’ using perfume, but by their having connexion with other women, it is unfair to pain and disturb them so much for the sake of a trivial pleasure, and not to follow with wives the practice observed in approaching bees
Those who have to go near elephants do not put on bright clothes, nor do those who go near bulls put on red
A woman once said to Philip, who was trying to force her to come to him against her will, Let me go. All women are the same when the lights are out.
This is well said as an answer to adulterous and licentious men, but the wedded wife ought especially when the light is out not to be the same as ordinary women, but, when her body is invisible, her virtue, her exclusive devotion to her husband, her constancy, and her affection, ought to be most in evidence.
Plato
In regard to love of finery, I beg, Eurydice, that you will read and try to remember what was written to Aristylla by Timoxena
Besides, Pollianus, you already possess sufficient maturity to study philosophy, and I beg that you will beautify your character with the aid of discourses which are attended by logical demonstration and mature deliberation, seeking the company and instruction of teachers who will help you. And for your wife you must collect from every source what is useful, as do the bees, and carrying it within your own self impart it to her, and then discuss it with her, and make the best of these doctrines her favourite and familiar themes. For to her Thou art a father and precious-loved mother, Yea, and a brother as well.
My dear husband,
Studies of this sort, in the first place, divert women from all untoward conduct; for a woman studying geometry will be ashamed to be a dancer, and she will not swallow any beliefs in magic charms while she is under the charm of Plato’s or Xenophon’s words. And if anybody professes power to pull down the moon from the sky, she will laugh at the ignorance and stupidity of women who believe these things, inasmuch as she herself is not unschooled in astronomy, and has read in the books about Aglaonice, Nay, but thou art to me
guide, philosopher, and teacher in all that is most lovely and divine.
It is said that no woman ever produced a child without the co-operation of a man, yet there are misshapen, fleshlike, uterine growths originating in some infection, which develop of themselves and acquire firmness and solidity, and are commonly called moles.
And as for you, Eurydice, I beg that you will try to be conversant with the sayings of the wise and good, and always have at your tongue’s end those sentiments which you used to cull in your girlhood’s days when you were with us, so that you may give joy to your husband, and may be admired by other women, adorned, as you will be, without price, with rare and precious jewels. For you cannot acquire and put upon you this rich woman’s pearls or that foreign woman’s silks without buying them at a high price, but the ornaments of Theano,These aremy jewels.
If Sappho thought that her beautiful compositions in verse justified her in writing Dead in the tomb shalt thou lie, Nor shall there be thought of thee there, For in the roses of Pierian fields Thou hast no share,
Now that the nuptial ceremonies are over, and that the
- priestess of Ceres has joined you both together in the bands
- of matrimony according to the custom of the country, I
- thought a short discourse of this nature might not be either
- unacceptable or unseasonable, but rather serve as a kind
- epithalamium to congratulate your happy conjunction;
- more especially, since there can be nothing more useful in
- conjugal society than the observance of wise and wholesome
- precepts, suitable to the harmony of matrimonial converse.
- For among the variety of musical moods and measures
- there is one which is called Hippothoros, a sort of composition to the flute and hautboy, made use of to encourage
- and provoke stallions to cover mares. But philosophy
- being furnished with many noble and profitable discourses,
- there is not any one subject that deserves a more serious
- study than that of wedlock, whereby they who are engaged
- in a long community of bed and board are more steadfastly
- united in affection, and made more pliable one to another
- in humor and condition. To this purpose, having reduced
- under several short heads and similes some certain instructions and admonitions which you, as tutored up in philosophy, have frequently already heard, I send you the collection
- as a present, beseeching the Muses so with their presence
- to assist the Goddess Venus, that the harmony of your
- mutual society and complacency in domestic diligences may
-
-
Solon advised that the bride should eat a quince before she entered the nuptial sheets; intimating thereby, in - my opinion, that the man was to expect his first pleasures - from the breath and speech of his new-married bed-fellow.
-In Boeotia it is the custom, when they veil the virgin - bride, to set upon her head a chaplet of wild asparagus, - which from a thorny stalk affords a most delicious fruit, - to let us understand that a new-married woman, discreetly - brooking at the beginning the first distastes of marriage - restraints, grows yieldingly complaisant at length, and - makes conforming wedlock a happiness to each. And indeed such husbands who cannot bear with the little disdains - and first froppishness of imprudent youth are like to those - that choose the sour grapes and leave to others the ripe - delicious clusters. On the other side, those young ladies - that take a disdain to their husbands by reason of their - first debates and encounters may be well compared to those - that patiently endure the sting but fling away the honey.
-It especially behooves those people who are newly - married to avoid the first occasions of discord and dissension; considering that vessels newly formed are subject to - be bruised and put out of shape by many slight accidents, - but when the materials come once to be settled and hardened by time, nor fire nor sword will hardly prejudice the - solid substance.
-Fire takes speedy hold of straw or hare's fur, but
-
-
They who bait their hooks with intoxicated drugs - with little pains surprise the hungry fish, but then they - prove unsavory to the taste and dangerous to eat. Thus - women that by the force of charms and philters endeavor - to subdue their husbands to the satisfaction of their pleasure become at length the wives of madmen, sots, and - fools. For they whom the sorceress Circe had enchanted, - being then no better than swine and asses, were no longer - able to please or do her service. But she loved Ulysses - entirely, whose prudence avoided her venomous intoxications and rendered his conversation highly grateful.
-They who rather choose to be the mistresses of senseless fools than the obedient wives of wise and sober husbands are like those people that prefer misguidance of the - blind before the conduct of them that can see and know - the way.
-They will not believe that Pasiphae, the consort of - a prince, could ever be enamored of a bull, and yet - themselves are so extravagant as to abandon the society - of their husbands,—men of wisdom, temperance, and - gravity,—and betake themselves to the bestial embraces - of those who are given wholly to riot and debauchery as - if they were dogs or goats.
-Some men, either unable or unwilling to mount
- themselves into their saddles through infirmity or laziness,
- teach their horses to fall upon their knees, and in that
- posture to receive their riders. In like manner there are
-
-
We behold the moon then shining with a full and - glorious orb, when farthest distant from the sun; but, as - she warps back again to meet her illustrious mate, the - nearer she makes her approach, the more she is eclipsed - until no longer seen. Quite otherwise, a woman ought to - display the charms of her virtue and the sweetness of her - disposition in her husband's presence, but in his absence - to retire to silence and reservedness at home.
-Nor can we approve the saying of Herodotus, that - a woman lays aside her modesty with her shift. For - surely then it is that a chaste woman chiefly vails herself - with bashfulness, when, in the privacies of matrimonial - duties, excess of love and maiden reverence become the - secret signals and testimonies of mutual affection.
-As in musical concords, when the upper strings are - so tuned as exactly to accord, the base always gives the - tone; so in well-regulated and well-ordered families, all - things are carried on with the harmonious consent and - agreement of both parties, but the conduct and contrivance - chiefly redounds to the reputation and management of the - husband.
-It is a common proverb, that the sun is too strong
- for the north wind; for the more the wind ruffles and
- strives to force a man's upper garment from his back, the
- faster he holds it, and the closer he wraps it about his
- shoulders. But he who so briskly defended himself from
-
-
Cato ejected a certain Roman out of the senate for - kissing his wife in the presence of his daughter. It is - true, the punishment was somewhat too severe; but if - kissing and colling and hugging in the sight of others be - so unseemly, as indeed it is, how much more indecent is it - to chide and brawl and maunder one at another while - strangers are in company? If lawful familiarity and - caresses between man and wife are not to be allowed - but in their private retirements, shall the bitter interchanges and loud discoveries of invective and inconsiderate passion be thought an entertainment pleasingly proper - for unconcerned and public ears?
-As there is little or no use to be made of a mirror,
- though in a frame of gold enchased with all the sparkling
- variety of the richest gems, unless it render back the true
- similitude of the image it receives; so is there nothing of
- profit in a wealthy dowry, unless the conditions, the temper, the humor of the wife be conformable to the natural
- disposition and inclination of the husband, and he sees
- the virtues of his own mind exactly represented in hers.
- Or, if a fair and beautiful mirror that makes a sad and
- pensive visage look jocund and gay, or a wanton or smiling countenance show pensive and mournful, is therefore
- presently rejected as of no value; thus may not she be
- thought an angry, peevish, and importunate woman, that
-
-
As they who are offended to see their wives eat and - drink freely in their company do but whet their appetites - to glut and gormandize in corners by themselves; so they - who refuse to frolic in retirement with their wives, or to - let them participate of their private pastimes and dalliances, do but instruct them to cater for their own pleasures and delights.
-The Persian kings, when they contain themselves - within the limits of their usual banquets, suffer their married wives to sit down at their tables; but when they once - design to indulge the provocations of amorous heats and - wine, then they send away their wives, and call for their - concubines, their gypsies, and their songstresses, with their - lascivious tunes and wanton galliards. Wherein they do - well, not thinking it proper to debauch their wives with - the tipsy frolics and dissolute extravagances of their intemperance.
-If therefore any private person, swayed by the unruly
- motions of his incontinency, happen at any time to make
- a trip with a kind she-friend or his wife's chambermaid, it
- becomes not the wife presently to lower and take pepper
- in the nose, but rather to believe that it was his respect to
-
-
Princes that be addicted to music increase the number of excellent musicians; if they be lovers of learning, - all men strive to excel in reading and in eloquence; if - given to martial exercises, a military ardor rouses straight - the drowsy sloth of all their subjects. Thus husbands - effeminately finical only teach their wives to paint and polish themselves with borrowed lustre. The studious of - pleasure render them immodest and whorish. On the other - side, men of serious, honest, and virtuous conversations - make sober, chaste, and prudent wives.
-A young Lacedaemonian lass, being asked by an - acquaintance of hers whether she had yet embraced her - husband, made answer, No; but that he had embraced her. - And after this manner, in my opinion, it behooves an honest - woman to behave herself toward her husband, never to - shun nor to disdain the caresses and dalliances of his - amorous inclinations, when he himself begins; but never - herself to offer the first occasion of provocation. For the - one savors of impudent harlotry, the other displays a female pride and imperiousness void of conjugal affection.
-It behooves a woman not to make peculiar and private friendships of her own, but to esteem only her husband's acquaintance and familiars as hers. Now as the - Gods are our chiefest and most beneficial friends, it behooves her to worship and adore only those Deities which - her husband reputes and reverences for such. But as for - quaint opinions and superstitious innovations, let them be - exterminated from her outermost threshold. For no sacrifices or services can be acceptable to the Gods, performed - by women, as it were, by stealth and in secret, without the - knowledge of the husband.
-Plato asserts those cities to be the most happy and
- best regulated where these expressions, This is mine,
-
- This is not mine,
are seldomest made use of. For that
- then the citizens enjoy in common, so far as is convenient,
- those things that are of greatest importance. But in wedlock those expressions are utterly to be abolished. For
- as the physicians say that the right side being bruised or
- beaten communicates its pain to the left; so indeed the
- husband ought to sympathize in the sorrows and afflictions
- of the woman, and much more does it become the wife to
- be sensible of the miseries and calamities of the husband;
- to the intent that, as knots are made fast by knitting the
- bows of a thread one within another, so the ligaments of
- conjugal society may be strengthened by the mutual interchange of kindness and affection. This Nature herself
- instructs us, by mixing us in our bodies; while she takes
- a part from each, and then blending the whole together
- produces a being common to both, to the end that neither
- may be able to discern or distinguish what was belonging
- to another, or lay claim to assured propriety. Therefore
- is community of estate and purses chiefly requisite among
- married couples, whose principal aim it ought to be to mix
- and incorporate their purchases and disbursements into one
- substance, neither pretending to call this hers or that his,
- but accounting all inseparable peculiar to both. However,
- as in a goblet where the proportion of water exceeds the
- juice of the grape, yet still we call the mixture wine; in
- like manner the house and estate must be reputed the
- possession of the husband, although the woman brought
- the chiefest part.
Helen was covetous, Paris luxurious. On the other - side, Ulysses was prudent, Penelope chaste. Happy therefore was the match between the latter; but the nuptials - of the former brought an Iliad of miseries as well upon - the Greeks as barbarians.
-The question being put by some of his friends to a
- certain Roman, why he had put away his wife, both sober,
-
-
King Philip so far doted on a fair Thessalian lady, - that she was suspected to have used some private arts of - fascination towards him. Wherefore Olympias labored to - get the supposed sorceress into her power. But when the - queen had viewed her well, and duly examined her beauty, - beheld the graces of her deportment, and considered her - discourse bespake her no less than a person of noble descent and education; Hence, fond suspicions, hence vainer - calumnies! said she, for I plainly find the charms which - thou makest use of are in thyself. Certainly therefore a - lawful wife surpasses the common acceptation of happiness when, without enhancing the advantages of her - wealth, nobility, and form, or vaunting the possession of - Venus's cestus itself, she makes it her business to win her - husband's affection by her virtue and sweetness of disposition.
-Another time the same Olympias, understanding that - a young courtier had married a lady, beautiful indeed, but - of no good report, said: Sure, the Hotspur had little brains, - otherwise he would never have married with his eyes. For - they are fools who in the choice of a wife believe the report of their sight or fingers; like those who telling out - the portion in their thoughts take the woman upon content, never examining what her conditions are, or whether - she is proper to make him a fit wife or no?
-Socrates was wont to give this advice to young men - that accustomed themselves to their mirrors:—if ill-favored, to correct their deformity by the practice of virtue; - if handsome, not to blemish their outward form with inward vice. In like manner, it would not be amiss for - a mistress of a family, when she holds her mirror in her - hands, to discourse her own thoughts:—if deformed, thus, - Should I prove lewd and wicked too?—on the other side, - thus the fair one, What if chaste beside? For it adds a - kind of veneration to a woman not so handsome, that she - is more beloved for the perfections of her mind than the - outside graces of her body.
-Dionysius, the tyrant of Sicily, sent several costly
- presents of rich apparel, necklaces, and bracelets to the
- daughters of Lysander, which however the father would
- never permit the virgins to accept, saying: These gaudy
- presents will procure more infamy than honor to my
- daughters. And indeed, before Lysander, Sophocles in
- one of his tragedies had uttered the following sentence to
- the same effect:
-
-
-
For, as Crates said, that is ornament which adorns; and
- that adorns a woman which renders her more comely and
- decent. This is an honor conferred upon her, not by the
-
-
They who offer to Juno as the Goddess of Wedlock - never consecrate the gall with the other parts of the sacrifice, but having drawn it forth, they cast it behind the - altar. Which constitution of the lawgiver fairly implies - that all manner of passionate anger and bitterness of reproach should be exterminated from the thresholds of - nuptial cohabitation. Not but that a certain kind of - austerity becomes the mistress of a family; which however should be like that of wine, profitable and delightful, - not like aloes, biting and medicinally ungrateful to the - palate.
-Plato observing the morose and sour humor of - Xenocrates, otherwise a person of great virtue and worth, - admonished him to sacrifice to the Graces. In like manner, I am of opinion that it behooves a woman of moderation to crave the assistance of the Graces in her behavior - towards her husband, thereby (according to the saying of - Metrodorus) to render their society mutually harmonious - to each other, and to preserve her from being waspishly - proud, out of a conceit of her fidelity and virtue. For it - becomes not a frugal woman to be neglectful of decent - neatness, nor one who has great respect to her husband to - refrain complacency in her conversation; seeing that, as - the over-rigid humor of a wife renders her honesty irksome, so sluttery begets a hatred of her sparing and pinching housewifery.
-She who is afraid to laugh or to appear merry and
- gay before her husband, for fear of waking his jealousy,
- may be said to resemble one that forbears to anoint herself at all, lest she should be thought to use unnecessary
- or harlotry perfumes, or that neglects to wash her face, to
- avoid the suspicion of painting. Thus we find that poets
-
-
The Egyptian women were anciently never wont to - wear shoes, to the end they might accustom themselves to - stay at home. But altogether different is the humor of - our women; for they, unless allowed their jewels, their - bracelets, and necklaces, their gaudy vestments, gowns, and - petticoats, all bespangled with gold, and their embroidered - buskins, will never stir abroad.
-Theano, as she was dressing herself one morning in
- her chamber, by chance discovered some part of her naked
- arm. Upon which, one of the company crying out, Oh,
- what a lovely arm is there!—'Tis very true, said she, but
- yet not common. Thus ought a chaste and virtuous woman not only to keep her naked arms from open view, but
-
-
Phidias made the statue of Venus at Elis with one - foot upon the shell of a tortoise, to signify two great duties - of a virtuous woman, which are to keep at home and be - silent. For she is only to speak to her husband, or by - her husband. Nor is she to take amiss the uttering - her mind in that manner, through another more proper - organ.
-Princes and kings honor themselves in giving honor - to philosophers and learned men. On the other side, - great personages admired and courted by philosophers are - no way honored by their flatteries, which are rather a prejudice and stain to the reputation of those that use them. - Thus it is with women, who in honoring and submitting to - their husbands win for themselves honor and respect, but - when they strive to get the mastery, they become a greater - reproach to themselves than to those that are so ignominiously henpecked. But then again, it behooves a husband to control his wife, not as a master does his vassal, - but as the soul governs the body, with the gentle hand - of mutual friendship and reciprocal affection. For as - the soul commands the body, without being subject to - its pleasures and inordinate desires, in like manner should - a man so exercise his authority over his wife, as to soften it - with complaisance and kind requital of her loving submission.
-Philosophers assert that, of bodies which consist of
- several parts, some are composed of parts distinct and
- separate, as a navy or army royal; others of contiguous
- parts, as a house or a ship; and others of parts united at
- the first conception, equally partaking of life and motion
- and growing together, as are the bodies of all living creatures.
-
-
In Leptis, a city of Libya, it was an ancient custom - for the bride, the next day after the nuptial solemnity, to - send home to the mother of the bridegroom to borrow a - boiler, which she not only refused to lend, but sent back - word that she had none to spare; to the end that the new - married woman, having by that means tried the disposition - of her mother-in-law, if afterwards she found her humor - peevish and perverse, might with more patience brook her - unkindness, as being no more than what she expected. - Rather it becomes the daughter to avoid all occasions of - distaste. For it is natural to some mothers to be jealous - that the wife deprives her of that filial tenderness which - she expects from her son. For which there is no better - cure than for a wife so to contrive the gaining of her husband's love as not to lessen or withdraw his affection from - his mother.
-It is generally observed that mothers are fondest of
- their sons, as expecting from them their future assistance
-
-
The commanders of the Grecian auxiliaries that - marched in aid of Cyrus gave these instructions to their - soldiers, that, if their enemies advanced whooping and hallowing to the combat, they should receive the charge, - observing an exact silence; but on the other side, if they - came on silently, then to rend the air with their martial - shouts. Thus prudent wives, when their husbands in the - heat of their passion rant and tear the house down, should - make no returns, but quietly hold their peace; but if they - only frown out their discontents in moody anger, then, with - soft language and gently reasoning the case, they may endeavor to appease and qualify their fury.
-Rightly therefore are they reprehended by Euripides,
- who introduce the harp and other instruments of music at
- their compotations. For music ought rather to be made
- use of for the mitigation of wrath and to allay the sorrows
- of mourning, not to heighten the voluptuousness of those
- that are already drowned in jollity and delight. Believe
- yourselves then to be in an error that sleep together for
- pleasure, but when angry and at variance make two
- beds, and that never at that time call to your assistance
- the Goddess Venus, who better than any other knows
-
-
-
-
Though it becomes a man and his wife at all times - to avoid all occasions of quarrelling one with another, yet - is there no time so unseasonable for contention as when - they are between the same sheets. As the woman in difficult labor said to those that were about to lay her upon her - bed; How, said she, can this bed cure these pains, since it - was in this very bed that my pleasures were the cause of - all my throes? And still less will those reproaches and - contests which the bed produces be reconciled at any other - time or place.
-Hermione seems to be in the right, speaking to this
- effect in one of the tragedies of Euripides:
-
-
-
-
However, these mischiefs rarely happen but where women
- at variance and jealous of their husbands open not only
- their door but their ears to whole swarms of twattling gossips, that widen the difference. For then it behooves a
- prudent woman to shut her ears and beware of listening to
- such enchanting tattlers, calling to mind the answer of
- Philip, when he was exasperated by his friends against the
- Greeks for cursing and reviling him, notwithstanding all
- the benefits they had received at his hands: What would
- they have done, said he, had we used them with unkindness
- and severity. The same should be the reply of a prudent
- woman to those she-devils, when they bewail her condition,
- and cry, A woman so loving, so chaste and modest, and yet
- abused by her husband! For then should she make answer,
-
-
A certain master, whose slave had been run away - from him for several months together, after a long search - at length found him suddenly in a workhouse, and said, - Where could I have desired to meet with thee more to my - wish than in such a place as this? Thus, when a woman - is grown jealous of her husband and meditates nothing but - present divorce, before she be too hasty, let her reason - with herself in this manner: In what condition would - my rival choose to see me with greater satisfaction than as - I am, all in a fret and fume, enraged against my husband, - and ready to abandon both my house and marriage-bed - together?
-The Athenians yearly solemnized three sacred seedtimes: the first in Scirus, in memory of the first invention
- by their ancestors of ploughing and sowing; the second at
- a place called Rharia; and the third under Pelis, which
- they call
The orator Gorgias, in a full assembly of the Grecians, resorting from all parts to the Olympic games, making an oration to the people, wherein he exhorted them to
- live in peace, unity, and concord among one another, Melanthus cried out aloud: This man pretends to give us advice,
- and preaches here in public nothing but love and union,
-
-
It is reported that the scent of sweet perfumes will - make a cat grow mad. Now, supposing those strong perfumes which are used by many men should prove offensive - to their wives, would it not be a great piece of unnatural - unkindness to discompose a woman with continual fits - rather than deny himself a pleasure so trivial? But when - it is not their husbands' perfuming themselves, but their - lascivious wandering after lewd and extravagant women, - that disturbs and disorders their wives, it is a great piece - of injustice, for the tickling pleasure of a few minutes, to - afflict and disquiet a virtuous woman. For since they who - are conversant with bees will often abstain from women, - to prevent the persecution of those little but implacable - enemies of unclean dalliance, much rather ought a man to' - be pure from the pollutions of harlotry, when he approaches his chaste and lawful wife.
-They whose business it is to manage elephants
- never put on white frocks, nor dare they that govern wild
- bulls appear in red, those creatures being scared and exasperated by those colors. And some report that tigers, when
- they hear a drum beat afar off, grow mad and exercise
- their savage fury upon themselves. If then there are
- some men that are offended at the gay and sumptuous
- habit of their wives, and others that brook as ill their gadding
-
-
What said a woman to King Philip, that pulled - and hauled her to him by violence against her will? Let - me go, said she, for when the candles are out, all women - are alike. This is aptly applied to men addicted to adultery and lust. But a virtuous wife, when the candle is - taken away, ought then chiefly to differ from all other - women. For when her body is not to be seen, her chastity, her modesty, and her peculiar affection to her husband ought then to shine with their brightest lustre.
-Plato admonishes old men to carry themselves with - most gravity in the presence of young people, to the end - the awe of their example may imprint in youth the greater - respect and reverence of age. For the loose and vain - behavior of men stricken in years breeds a contempt of - gray hairs, and never can expect veneration from juvenility. Which sober admonition should instruct the husband to bear a greater respect to his wife than to all other - women in the world, seeing that the nuptial chamber must - be to her either the school of honor and chastity or that - of incontinency and wantonness. For he that allows himself those pleasures that he forbids his wife, acts like a - man that would enjoin his wife to oppose those enemies to - which he has himself already surrendered.
-As to what remains, in reference to superfluity of - habit and decent household furniture, remember, dear - Eurydice, what Timoxenas has written to Aristylla.
-And do you, Pollianus, never believe that women will
- be weaned from those toys and curiosities wherein they
- take a kind of pride, and which serve for an alleviation
- of their domestic solitude, while you yourself admire the
- same things in other women, and are taken with the gayety
-
-
Since then thou art arrived at those years which are
- proper for the study of such sciences as are attained
- by reason and demonstration, endeavor to complete this
- knowledge by conversing with persons that may be serviceable to thee in such a generous design. And as for
- thy wife, like the industrious bee, gather everywhere from
- the fragrant flowers of good instruction, replenish thyself
- with whatever may be of advantage to her, and impart
- the same to her again in loving and familiar discourse,
- both for thy own and her improvement.
-
-
-
-
Nor is it less to thy commendation to hear what she
- returns:
-
-
-
-
For such studies as these fix the contemplations of
- women upon what is laudable and serious, and prevent
- their wasting time upon impertinent and pernicious vanity.
- For that lady that is studious in geometry will never affect
- the dissolute motions of dancing. And she that is taken
- with the sublime notions of Plato and Xenophon will look
- with disdain upon the charms and enchantments of witches
- and sorcerers; and if any ridiculous astrologer promises to
- pull the moon down from the sky, she will laugh at the
- ignorance and folly of the women who believe in him,
- being herself well grounded in astronomy, and having
-
-
True it is, that never any woman brought forth a perfect
- child without the assistance and society of man, but there
- are many whose imaginations are so strongly wrought upon
- by the sight or bare relation of monstrous spectacles, that
- they bring into the world several sorts of immature and
- shapeless productions. Thus, unless great care be taken
- by men to manure and cultivate the inclinations of their
- wives with wholesome and virtuous precepts, they often
- breed among themselves the false conceptions of extravagant and loose desires. But do thou, Eurydice, make it
- thy business to be familiar with the learned proverbs of
- wise and learned men, and always to embellish thy discourse with their profitable sentences, to the end thou
- mayst be the admiration of other women, that shall behold
- thee so richly adorned without the expense or assistance
- of jewels or embroideries. For pearls and diamonds are
- not the purchase of an ordinary purse; but the ornaments
- of Theano, Cleobuline, Gorgo the wife of King Leonidas,
- Timoclea the sister of Theagenes, the ancient Roman
- Claudia, or Cornelia the daughter of Scipio,—already
- so celebrated and renowned for their virtues,—will cost,
- but little, yet nothing will set thee out more glorious or
- illustrious to the world, or render thy life more comfortable
- and happy. For if Sappho, only because she could compose an elegant verse, had the confidence to write to a
- haughty and wealthy dame in her time:
-
-
-
-
why may it not be much more lawful for thee to boast - those great perfections that give thee a greater privilege, - not only to gather the flowers, but to reap the fruits themselves, which the Muses bestow upon the lovers and real - owners of learning and philosophy?
-Now that the nuptial ceremonies are over, and that the priestess of Ceres has joined you both together in the bands of matrimony according to the custom of the country, I thought a short discourse of this nature might not be either unacceptable or unseasonable, but rather serve as a kind epithalamium to congratulate your happy conjunction; more especially, since there can be nothing more useful in conjugal society than the observance of wise and wholesome precepts, suitable to the harmony of matrimonial converse. For among the variety of musical moods and measures there is one which is called Hippothoros, a sort of composition to the flute and hautboy, made use of to encourage and provoke stallions to cover mares. But philosophy being furnished with many noble and profitable discourses, there is not any one subject that deserves a more serious study than that of wedlock, whereby they who are engaged in a long community of bed and board are more steadfastly united in affection, and made more pliable one to another in humor and condition. To this purpose, having reduced under several short heads and similes some certain instructions and admonitions which you, as tutored up in philosophy, have frequently already heard, I send you the collection as a present, beseeching the Muses so with their presence to assist the Goddess Venus, that the harmony of your mutual society and complacency in domestic diligences may
Solon advised that the bride should eat a quince before she entered the nuptial sheets; intimating thereby, in my opinion, that the man was to expect his first pleasures from the breath and speech of his new-married bed-fellow.
In Boeotia it is the custom, when they veil the virgin bride, to set upon her head a chaplet of wild asparagus, which from a thorny stalk affords a most delicious fruit, to let us understand that a new-married woman, discreetly brooking at the beginning the first distastes of marriage restraints, grows yieldingly complaisant at length, and makes conforming wedlock a happiness to each. And indeed such husbands who cannot bear with the little disdains and first froppishness of imprudent youth are like to those that choose the sour grapes and leave to others the ripe delicious clusters. On the other side, those young ladies that take a disdain to their husbands by reason of their first debates and encounters may be well compared to those that patiently endure the sting but fling away the honey.
It especially behooves those people who are newly married to avoid the first occasions of discord and dissension; considering that vessels newly formed are subject to be bruised and put out of shape by many slight accidents, but when the materials come once to be settled and hardened by time, nor fire nor sword will hardly prejudice the solid substance.
Fire takes speedy hold of straw or hare’s fur, but
They who bait their hooks with intoxicated drugs with little pains surprise the hungry fish, but then they prove unsavory to the taste and dangerous to eat. Thus women that by the force of charms and philters endeavor to subdue their husbands to the satisfaction of their pleasure become at length the wives of madmen, sots, and fools. For they whom the sorceress Circe had enchanted, being then no better than swine and asses, were no longer able to please or do her service. But she loved Ulysses entirely, whose prudence avoided her venomous intoxications and rendered his conversation highly grateful.
They who rather choose to be the mistresses of senseless fools than the obedient wives of wise and sober husbands are like those people that prefer misguidance of the blind before the conduct of them that can see and know the way.
They will not believe that Pasiphae, the consort of a prince, could ever be enamored of a bull, and yet themselves are so extravagant as to abandon the society of their husbands,—men of wisdom, temperance, and gravity,—and betake themselves to the bestial embraces of those who are given wholly to riot and debauchery as if they were dogs or goats.
Some men, either unable or unwilling to mount themselves into their saddles through infirmity or laziness, teach their horses to fall upon their knees, and in that posture to receive their riders. In like manner there are
We behold the moon then shining with a full and glorious orb, when farthest distant from the sun; but, as she warps back again to meet her illustrious mate, the nearer she makes her approach, the more she is eclipsed until no longer seen. Quite otherwise, a woman ought to display the charms of her virtue and the sweetness of her disposition in her husband’s presence, but in his absence to retire to silence and reservedness at home.
Nor can we approve the saying of Herodotus, that a woman lays aside her modesty with her shift. For surely then it is that a chaste woman chiefly vails herself with bashfulness, when, in the privacies of matrimonial duties, excess of love and maiden reverence become the secret signals and testimonies of mutual affection.
As in musical concords, when the upper strings are so tuned as exactly to accord, the base always gives the tone; so in well-regulated and well-ordered families, all things are carried on with the harmonious consent and agreement of both parties, but the conduct and contrivance chiefly redounds to the reputation and management of the husband.
It is a common proverb, that the sun is too strong for the north wind; for the more the wind ruffles and strives to force a man’s upper garment from his back, the faster he holds it, and the closer he wraps it about his shoulders. But he who so briskly defended himself from
Cato ejected a certain Roman out of the senate for kissing his wife in the presence of his daughter. It is true, the punishment was somewhat too severe; but if kissing and colling and hugging in the sight of others be so unseemly, as indeed it is, how much more indecent is it to chide and brawl and maunder one at another while strangers are in company? If lawful familiarity and caresses between man and wife are not to be allowed but in their private retirements, shall the bitter interchanges and loud discoveries of invective and inconsiderate passion be thought an entertainment pleasingly proper for unconcerned and public ears?
As there is little or no use to be made of a mirror, though in a frame of gold enchased with all the sparkling variety of the richest gems, unless it render back the true similitude of the image it receives; so is there nothing of profit in a wealthy dowry, unless the conditions, the temper, the humor of the wife be conformable to the natural disposition and inclination of the husband, and he sees the virtues of his own mind exactly represented in hers. Or, if a fair and beautiful mirror that makes a sad and pensive visage look jocund and gay, or a wanton or smiling countenance show pensive and mournful, is therefore presently rejected as of no value; thus may not she be thought an angry, peevish, and importunate woman, that
As they who are offended to see their wives eat and drink freely in their company do but whet their appetites to glut and gormandize in corners by themselves; so they who refuse to frolic in retirement with their wives, or to let them participate of their private pastimes and dalliances, do but instruct them to cater for their own pleasures and delights.
The Persian kings, when they contain themselves within the limits of their usual banquets, suffer their married wives to sit down at their tables; but when they once design to indulge the provocations of amorous heats and wine, then they send away their wives, and call for their concubines, their gypsies, and their songstresses, with their lascivious tunes and wanton galliards. Wherein they do well, not thinking it proper to debauch their wives with the tipsy frolics and dissolute extravagances of their intemperance.
If therefore any private person, swayed by the unruly motions of his incontinency, happen at any time to make a trip with a kind she-friend or his wife’s chambermaid, it becomes not the wife presently to lower and take pepper in the nose, but rather to believe that it was his respect to
Princes that be addicted to music increase the number of excellent musicians; if they be lovers of learning, all men strive to excel in reading and in eloquence; if given to martial exercises, a military ardor rouses straight the drowsy sloth of all their subjects. Thus husbands effeminately finical only teach their wives to paint and polish themselves with borrowed lustre. The studious of pleasure render them immodest and whorish. On the other side, men of serious, honest, and virtuous conversations make sober, chaste, and prudent wives.
A young Lacedaemonian lass, being asked by an acquaintance of hers whether she had yet embraced her husband, made answer, No; but that he had embraced her. And after this manner, in my opinion, it behooves an honest woman to behave herself toward her husband, never to shun nor to disdain the caresses and dalliances of his amorous inclinations, when he himself begins; but never herself to offer the first occasion of provocation. For the one savors of impudent harlotry, the other displays a female pride and imperiousness void of conjugal affection.
It behooves a woman not to make peculiar and private friendships of her own, but to esteem only her husband’s acquaintance and familiars as hers. Now as the Gods are our chiefest and most beneficial friends, it behooves her to worship and adore only those Deities which her husband reputes and reverences for such. But as for quaint opinions and superstitious innovations, let them be exterminated from her outermost threshold. For no sacrifices or services can be acceptable to the Gods, performed by women, as it were, by stealth and in secret, without the knowledge of the husband.
Plato asserts those cities to be the most happy and best regulated where these expressions, This is mine,
This is not mine,
are seldomest made use of. For that then the citizens enjoy in common, so far as is convenient, those things that are of greatest importance. But in wedlock those expressions are utterly to be abolished. For as the physicians say that the right side being bruised or beaten communicates its pain to the left; so indeed the husband ought to sympathize in the sorrows and afflictions of the woman, and much more does it become the wife to be sensible of the miseries and calamities of the husband; to the intent that, as knots are made fast by knitting the bows of a thread one within another, so the ligaments of conjugal society may be strengthened by the mutual interchange of kindness and affection. This Nature herself instructs us, by mixing us in our bodies; while she takes a part from each, and then blending the whole together produces a being common to both, to the end that neither may be able to discern or distinguish what was belonging to another, or lay claim to assured propriety. Therefore is community of estate and purses chiefly requisite among married couples, whose principal aim it ought to be to mix and incorporate their purchases and disbursements into one substance, neither pretending to call this hers or that his, but accounting all inseparable peculiar to both. However, as in a goblet where the proportion of water exceeds the juice of the grape, yet still we call the mixture wine; in like manner the house and estate must be reputed the possession of the husband, although the woman brought the chiefest part.
Helen was covetous, Paris luxurious. On the other side, Ulysses was prudent, Penelope chaste. Happy therefore was the match between the latter; but the nuptials of the former brought an Iliad of miseries as well upon the Greeks as barbarians.
The question being put by some of his friends to a certain Roman, why he had put away his wife, both sober,
King Philip so far doted on a fair Thessalian lady, that she was suspected to have used some private arts of fascination towards him. Wherefore Olympias labored to get the supposed sorceress into her power. But when the queen had viewed her well, and duly examined her beauty, beheld the graces of her deportment, and considered her discourse bespake her no less than a person of noble descent and education; Hence, fond suspicions, hence vainer calumnies! said she, for I plainly find the charms which thou makest use of are in thyself. Certainly therefore a lawful wife surpasses the common acceptation of happiness when, without enhancing the advantages of her wealth, nobility, and form, or vaunting the possession of Venus’s cestus itself, she makes it her business to win her husband’s affection by her virtue and sweetness of disposition.
Another time the same Olympias, understanding that a young courtier had married a lady, beautiful indeed, but of no good report, said: Sure, the Hotspur had little brains, otherwise he would never have married with his eyes. For they are fools who in the choice of a wife believe the report of their sight or fingers; like those who telling out the portion in their thoughts take the woman upon content, never examining what her conditions are, or whether she is proper to make him a fit wife or no?
Socrates was wont to give this advice to young men that accustomed themselves to their mirrors:—if ill-favored, to correct their deformity by the practice of virtue; if handsome, not to blemish their outward form with inward vice. In like manner, it would not be amiss for a mistress of a family, when she holds her mirror in her hands, to discourse her own thoughts:—if deformed, thus, Should I prove lewd and wicked too?—on the other side, thus the fair one, What if chaste beside? For it adds a kind of veneration to a woman not so handsome, that she is more beloved for the perfections of her mind than the outside graces of her body.
Dionysius, the tyrant of Sicily, sent several costly presents of rich apparel, necklaces, and bracelets to the daughters of Lysander, which however the father would never permit the virgins to accept, saying: These gaudy presents will procure more infamy than honor to my daughters. And indeed, before Lysander, Sophocles in one of his tragedies had uttered the following sentence to the same effect:
For, as Crates said, that is ornament which adorns; and that adorns a woman which renders her more comely and decent. This is an honor conferred upon her, not by the
They who offer to Juno as the Goddess of Wedlock never consecrate the gall with the other parts of the sacrifice, but having drawn it forth, they cast it behind the altar. Which constitution of the lawgiver fairly implies that all manner of passionate anger and bitterness of reproach should be exterminated from the thresholds of nuptial cohabitation. Not but that a certain kind of austerity becomes the mistress of a family; which however should be like that of wine, profitable and delightful, not like aloes, biting and medicinally ungrateful to the palate.
Plato observing the morose and sour humor of Xenocrates, otherwise a person of great virtue and worth, admonished him to sacrifice to the Graces. In like manner, I am of opinion that it behooves a woman of moderation to crave the assistance of the Graces in her behavior towards her husband, thereby (according to the saying of Metrodorus) to render their society mutually harmonious to each other, and to preserve her from being waspishly proud, out of a conceit of her fidelity and virtue. For it becomes not a frugal woman to be neglectful of decent neatness, nor one who has great respect to her husband to refrain complacency in her conversation; seeing that, as the over-rigid humor of a wife renders her honesty irksome, so sluttery begets a hatred of her sparing and pinching housewifery.
She who is afraid to laugh or to appear merry and gay before her husband, for fear of waking his jealousy, may be said to resemble one that forbears to anoint herself at all, lest she should be thought to use unnecessary or harlotry perfumes, or that neglects to wash her face, to avoid the suspicion of painting. Thus we find that poets
The Egyptian women were anciently never wont to wear shoes, to the end they might accustom themselves to stay at home. But altogether different is the humor of our women; for they, unless allowed their jewels, their bracelets, and necklaces, their gaudy vestments, gowns, and petticoats, all bespangled with gold, and their embroidered buskins, will never stir abroad.
Theano, as she was dressing herself one morning in her chamber, by chance discovered some part of her naked arm. Upon which, one of the company crying out, Oh, what a lovely arm is there!—’Tis very true, said she, but yet not common. Thus ought a chaste and virtuous woman not only to keep her naked arms from open view, but
Phidias made the statue of Venus at Elis with one foot upon the shell of a tortoise, to signify two great duties of a virtuous woman, which are to keep at home and be silent. For she is only to speak to her husband, or by her husband. Nor is she to take amiss the uttering her mind in that manner, through another more proper organ.
Princes and kings honor themselves in giving honor to philosophers and learned men. On the other side, great personages admired and courted by philosophers are no way honored by their flatteries, which are rather a prejudice and stain to the reputation of those that use them. Thus it is with women, who in honoring and submitting to their husbands win for themselves honor and respect, but when they strive to get the mastery, they become a greater reproach to themselves than to those that are so ignominiously henpecked. But then again, it behooves a husband to control his wife, not as a master does his vassal, but as the soul governs the body, with the gentle hand of mutual friendship and reciprocal affection. For as the soul commands the body, without being subject to its pleasures and inordinate desires, in like manner should a man so exercise his authority over his wife, as to soften it with complaisance and kind requital of her loving submission.
Philosophers assert that, of bodies which consist of several parts, some are composed of parts distinct and separate, as a navy or army royal; others of contiguous parts, as a house or a ship; and others of parts united at the first conception, equally partaking of life and motion and growing together, as are the bodies of all living creatures.
In Leptis, a city of Libya, it was an ancient custom for the bride, the next day after the nuptial solemnity, to send home to the mother of the bridegroom to borrow a boiler, which she not only refused to lend, but sent back word that she had none to spare; to the end that the new married woman, having by that means tried the disposition of her mother-in-law, if afterwards she found her humor peevish and perverse, might with more patience brook her unkindness, as being no more than what she expected. Rather it becomes the daughter to avoid all occasions of distaste. For it is natural to some mothers to be jealous that the wife deprives her of that filial tenderness which she expects from her son. For which there is no better cure than for a wife so to contrive the gaining of her husband’s love as not to lessen or withdraw his affection from his mother.
It is generally observed that mothers are fondest of their sons, as expecting from them their future assistance
The commanders of the Grecian auxiliaries that marched in aid of Cyrus gave these instructions to their soldiers, that, if their enemies advanced whooping and hallowing to the combat, they should receive the charge, observing an exact silence; but on the other side, if they came on silently, then to rend the air with their martial shouts. Thus prudent wives, when their husbands in the heat of their passion rant and tear the house down, should make no returns, but quietly hold their peace; but if they only frown out their discontents in moody anger, then, with soft language and gently reasoning the case, they may endeavor to appease and qualify their fury.
Rightly therefore are they reprehended by Euripides, who introduce the harp and other instruments of music at their compotations. For music ought rather to be made use of for the mitigation of wrath and to allay the sorrows of mourning, not to heighten the voluptuousness of those that are already drowned in jollity and delight. Believe yourselves then to be in an error that sleep together for pleasure, but when angry and at variance make two beds, and that never at that time call to your assistance the Goddess Venus, who better than any other knows
Though it becomes a man and his wife at all times to avoid all occasions of quarrelling one with another, yet is there no time so unseasonable for contention as when they are between the same sheets. As the woman in difficult labor said to those that were about to lay her upon her bed; How, said she, can this bed cure these pains, since it was in this very bed that my pleasures were the cause of all my throes? And still less will those reproaches and contests which the bed produces be reconciled at any other time or place.
Hermione seems to be in the right, speaking to this effect in one of the tragedies of Euripides:
However, these mischiefs rarely happen but where women at variance and jealous of their husbands open not only their door but their ears to whole swarms of twattling gossips, that widen the difference. For then it behooves a prudent woman to shut her ears and beware of listening to such enchanting tattlers, calling to mind the answer of Philip, when he was exasperated by his friends against the Greeks for cursing and reviling him, notwithstanding all the benefits they had received at his hands: What would they have done, said he, had we used them with unkindness and severity. The same should be the reply of a prudent woman to those she-devils, when they bewail her condition, and cry, A woman so loving, so chaste and modest, and yet abused by her husband! For then should she make answer,
A certain master, whose slave had been run away from him for several months together, after a long search at length found him suddenly in a workhouse, and said, Where could I have desired to meet with thee more to my wish than in such a place as this? Thus, when a woman is grown jealous of her husband and meditates nothing but present divorce, before she be too hasty, let her reason with herself in this manner: In what condition would my rival choose to see me with greater satisfaction than as I am, all in a fret and fume, enraged against my husband, and ready to abandon both my house and marriage-bed together?
The Athenians yearly solemnized three sacred seedtimes: the first in Scirus, in memory of the first invention by their ancestors of ploughing and sowing; the second at a place called Rharia; and the third under Pelis, which they call
The orator Gorgias, in a full assembly of the Grecians, resorting from all parts to the Olympic games, making an oration to the people, wherein he exhorted them to live in peace, unity, and concord among one another, Melanthus cried out aloud: This man pretends to give us advice, and preaches here in public nothing but love and union,
It is reported that the scent of sweet perfumes will make a cat grow mad. Now, supposing those strong perfumes which are used by many men should prove offensive to their wives, would it not be a great piece of unnatural unkindness to discompose a woman with continual fits rather than deny himself a pleasure so trivial? But when it is not their husbands’ perfuming themselves, but their lascivious wandering after lewd and extravagant women, that disturbs and disorders their wives, it is a great piece of injustice, for the tickling pleasure of a few minutes, to afflict and disquiet a virtuous woman. For since they who are conversant with bees will often abstain from women, to prevent the persecution of those little but implacable enemies of unclean dalliance, much rather ought a man to’ be pure from the pollutions of harlotry, when he approaches his chaste and lawful wife.
They whose business it is to manage elephants never put on white frocks, nor dare they that govern wild bulls appear in red, those creatures being scared and exasperated by those colors. And some report that tigers, when they hear a drum beat afar off, grow mad and exercise their savage fury upon themselves. If then there are some men that are offended at the gay and sumptuous habit of their wives, and others that brook as ill their gadding
What said a woman to King Philip, that pulled and hauled her to him by violence against her will? Let me go, said she, for when the candles are out, all women are alike. This is aptly applied to men addicted to adultery and lust. But a virtuous wife, when the candle is taken away, ought then chiefly to differ from all other women. For when her body is not to be seen, her chastity, her modesty, and her peculiar affection to her husband ought then to shine with their brightest lustre.
Plato admonishes old men to carry themselves with most gravity in the presence of young people, to the end the awe of their example may imprint in youth the greater respect and reverence of age. For the loose and vain behavior of men stricken in years breeds a contempt of gray hairs, and never can expect veneration from juvenility. Which sober admonition should instruct the husband to bear a greater respect to his wife than to all other women in the world, seeing that the nuptial chamber must be to her either the school of honor and chastity or that of incontinency and wantonness. For he that allows himself those pleasures that he forbids his wife, acts like a man that would enjoin his wife to oppose those enemies to which he has himself already surrendered.
As to what remains, in reference to superfluity of habit and decent household furniture, remember, dear Eurydice, what Timoxenas has written to Aristylla.
And do you, Pollianus, never believe that women will be weaned from those toys and curiosities wherein they take a kind of pride, and which serve for an alleviation of their domestic solitude, while you yourself admire the same things in other women, and are taken with the gayety
Since then thou art arrived at those years which are proper for the study of such sciences as are attained by reason and demonstration, endeavor to complete this knowledge by conversing with persons that may be serviceable to thee in such a generous design. And as for thy wife, like the industrious bee, gather everywhere from the fragrant flowers of good instruction, replenish thyself with whatever may be of advantage to her, and impart the same to her again in loving and familiar discourse, both for thy own and her improvement.
Nor is it less to thy commendation to hear what she returns:
For such studies as these fix the contemplations of women upon what is laudable and serious, and prevent their wasting time upon impertinent and pernicious vanity. For that lady that is studious in geometry will never affect the dissolute motions of dancing. And she that is taken with the sublime notions of Plato and Xenophon will look with disdain upon the charms and enchantments of witches and sorcerers; and if any ridiculous astrologer promises to pull the moon down from the sky, she will laugh at the ignorance and folly of the women who believe in him, being herself well grounded in astronomy, and having
True it is, that never any woman brought forth a perfect child without the assistance and society of man, but there are many whose imaginations are so strongly wrought upon by the sight or bare relation of monstrous spectacles, that they bring into the world several sorts of immature and shapeless productions. Thus, unless great care be taken by men to manure and cultivate the inclinations of their wives with wholesome and virtuous precepts, they often breed among themselves the false conceptions of extravagant and loose desires. But do thou, Eurydice, make it thy business to be familiar with the learned proverbs of wise and learned men, and always to embellish thy discourse with their profitable sentences, to the end thou mayst be the admiration of other women, that shall behold thee so richly adorned without the expense or assistance of jewels or embroideries. For pearls and diamonds are not the purchase of an ordinary purse; but the ornaments of Theano, Cleobuline, Gorgo the wife of King Leonidas, Timoclea the sister of Theagenes, the ancient Roman Claudia, or Cornelia the daughter of Scipio,—already so celebrated and renowned for their virtues,—will cost, but little, yet nothing will set thee out more glorious or illustrious to the world, or render thy life more comfortable and happy. For if Sappho, only because she could compose an elegant verse, had the confidence to write to a haughty and wealthy dame in her time:
why may it not be much more lawful for thee to boast those great perfections that give thee a greater privilege, not only to gather the flowers, but to reap the fruits themselves, which the Muses bestow upon the lovers and real owners of learning and philosophy?
optical character recognition
-μετὰ τὸν πάτριον θεσμόν, ὃν ὑμῖν ἡ τῆς Δήμητρος ἱέρεια
- συνειργνυμένοις ἐφήρμοσεν, οἶμαι καὶ τὸν λόγον ὁμοῦ συνεφαπτόμενον
- ὑμῶν καὶ συνυμεναιοῦντα χρήσιμον ἄν τι ποιῆσαι καὶ τῷ νόμῳ
-
ὁ Σόλων ἐκέλευε τὴν νύμφην τῷ νυμφίῳ συγκατακλίνεσθαι μήλου κυδωνίου
- κατατραγοῦσαν αἰνιττόμενος ἔοικεν ὅτι δεῖ τὴν
ἐν Βοιωτίᾳ τὴν νύμφην κατακαλύψαντες ἀσφαραγωνιᾷ
ἐν ἀρχῇ μάλιστα δεῖ τὰς διαφορὰς καὶ τὰς προσκρούσεις φυλάττεσθαι
- τοὺς γεγαμηκότας, ὁρῶντας
-
ὥσπερ τὸ πῦρ ἐξάπτεται μὲν εὐχερῶς ἐν ἀχύροις καὶ θρυαλλίδι καὶ
- θριξὶ λαγῴαις, σβέννυται
-
ἡ διὰ τῶν φαρμάκων θήρα ταχὺ μὲν αἱρεῖ καὶ λαμβάνει ῥᾳδίως τὸν
- ἰχθύν, ἄβρωτον δὲ ποιεῖ καὶ φαῦλον· οὕτως αἱ φίλτρα τινὰ καὶ
- γοητείας ἐπιτεχνώμεναι τοῖς ἀνδράσι καὶ χειρούμεναι διʼ ἡδονῆς
-
αἱ βουλόμεναι μᾶλλον ἀνοήτων κρατεῖν ἀνδρῶν ἢ φρονίμων ἀκούειν
- ἐοίκασι τοῖς ἐν ὁδῷ βουλομένοις μᾶλλον ὁδηγεῖν τυφλοὺς; ἢ τοῖς
- γιγνώσκουσιν ἀκολουθεῖν καὶ βλέπουσι.
-
τὴν Πασιφάην ἀπιστοῦσι βοὸς ἐρασθῆναι
-
οἱ τοῖς ἵπποις ἐφάλλεσθαι διʼ ἀσθένειαν ἢ μαλακίαν αὐτοὺς ἐκείνους
- ὀκλάζειν καὶ ὑποπίπτειν διδάσκουσιν οὕτως ἔνιοι τῶν λαβόντων
- εὐγενεῖς ἢ πλουσίας γυναῖκας οὐχ ἑαυτοὺς
-
τὴν σελήνην, ὅταν ἀποστῇ τοῦ ἡλίου, περιφανῆ
-
οὐκ ὀρθῶς Ἡρόδοτος
ὥσπερ ἂν φθόγγοι δύο σύμφωνοι ληφθῶσι,
-
ὁ ἥλιος τὸν βορέαν ἐνίκησεν. ὁ γὰρ ἄνθρωπος
-
ὁ Κάτων ἐξέβαλε τῆς βουλῆς τὸν φιλήσαντα τὴν ἑαυτοῦ γυναῖκα τῆς
- θυγατρὸς παρούσης. τοῦτο μὲν οὖν ἴσως σφοδρότερον εἰ δʼ αἰσχρόν
- ἐστιν,
-
· ὥσπερ ἐσόπτρου κατεσκευασμένου χρυσῷ καὶ λίθοις ὄφελος οὐδέν
- ἐστιν, εἰ μὴ δείκνυσι τὴν μορφὴν ὁμοίαν, οὕτως οὐδὲ πλουσίας γαμετῆς
- ὄνησις,
-
οἱ τὰς γυναῖκας μὴ ἡδέως βλέποντες ἐσθιούσας μετʼ αὐτῶν διδάσκουσιν
- ἐμπίπλασθαι μόνας γενομένας. οὕτως οἱ μὴ συνόντες ἱλαρῶς ταῖς γυναιξὶ
- μηδὲ παιδιᾶς κοινωνοῦντες αὐταῖς καὶ γέλωτος
-
· τοῖς τῶν Περσῶν βασιλεῦσιν αἱ γνήσιαι γυναῖκες παρακάθηνται δειπνοῦσι
- καὶ συνεστιῶνται· βουλόμενοι δὲ παίζειν καὶ μεθύσκεσθαι ταύτας μὲν
- ἀποπέμπουσι, τὰς δὲ μουσουργοὺς καὶ παλλακίδας
-
οἱ φιλόμουσοι τῶν βασιλέων πολλοὺς μουσικοὺς ποιοῦσιν, οἱ φιλόλογοι
- λογίους, οἱ φιλαθληταὶ
-
Λάκαινα παιδίσκη, πυνθανομένου τινὸς εἰ
ἰδίους οὐ δεῖ φίλους κτᾶσθαι τὴν γυναῖκα, κοινοῖς δὲ χρῆσθαι τοῖς τοῦ
- ἀνδρός· οἱ δὲ θεοὶ φίλοι πρῶτοι καὶ μέγιστοι. διὸ καὶ θεοὺς οὓς ὁ
-
ὁ Πλάτων
Φιλόπλουτος ἡ Ἑλένη, φιλήδονος ὁ Πάρις· φρόνιμος ὁ Ὀδυσσεύς,
- σώφρων ἡ Πηνελόπη. διὰ τοῦτο μακάριος γάμος ὁ τούτων καὶ ζηλωτός, ὁ
-
ὁ Ῥωμαῖος ὑπὸ τῶν φίλων νουθετούμενος ὅτι σώφρονα γυναῖκα καὶ
- πλουσίαν καὶ ὡραίαν ἀπεπέμψατο, τὸν κάλτιον
ὁ βασιλεὺς Φίλιππος ἤρα Θεσσαλῆς γυναικὸς αἰτίαν ἐχούσης
- καταφαρμακεύειν αὐτόν. ἐσπούδασεν οὖν ἡ Ὀλυμπιὰς λαβεῖν τὴν
- ἄνθρωπον ὑποχείριον. ὡς δʼ εἰς ὄψιν ἐλθοῦσα τὸ τʼ εἶδος εὐπρεπὴς
- ἐφάνη
-
πάλιν ἡ Ὀλυμπιάς, αὐλικοῦ τινος νεανίσκου γήμαντος εὐπρεπῆ γυναῖκα
- κακῶς ἀκούουσαν, “οὗτοσ” εἶπεν “οὐκ ἔχει λογισμόν· οὐ γὰρ
- ἂν τοῖς
-
ὁ Σωκράτης ἐκέλευε τῶν ἐσοπτριζομένων
-
ταῖς Λυσάνδρου θυγατράσιν ὁ τύραννος ὁ
-
-
“κόσμος γάρ ἐστιν,” ὡς ἔλεγε Κράτης, “τὸ κοσμοῦν” κοσμεῖ δὲ
- τὸ κοσμιωτέραν τὴν γυναῖκα ποιοῦν. ποιεῖ δὲ τοιαύτην οὔτε χρυσὸς οὔτε
- σμάραγδος οὔτε
-
οἱ τῇ γαμηλίᾳ θύοντες Ἥρᾳ τὴν χολὴν οὐ
-
ὁ Πλάτων τῷ Ξενοκράτει βαρυτέρῳ τὸ ἦθος
-
ἡ φοβουμένη γελάσαι πρὸς τὸν ἄνδρα καὶ παῖξαί
ταῖς Αἰγυπτίαις ὑποδήμασι χρῆσθαι πάτριον οὐκ ἦν, ὅπως ἐν οἴκῳ
- διημερεύωσι. τῶν δὲ
ἡ Θεανὼ παρέφηνε τὴν χεῖρα περιβαλλομένη
-
τὴν Ἠλείων ὁ Φειδίας Ἀφροδίτην ἐποίησε χελώνην πατοῦσαν, οἰκουρίας
- σύμβολον ταῖς γυναιξὶ καὶ σιωπῆς. δεῖ γὰρ ἢ πρὸς τὸν ἄνδρα λαλεῖν
- ἢ διὰ τοῦ ἀνδρός, μὴ δυσχεραίνουσαν εἰ διʼ ἀλλοτρίας
-
οἱ πλούσιοι καὶ οἱ βασιλεῖς τιμῶντες τοὺς φιλοσόφους αὑτούς τε,
- κοσμοῦσι κἀκείνους, οἱ δὲ
-
τῶν σωμάτων οἱ φιλόσοφοι τὰ μὲν ἐκ διεστώτων
-
ἐν Λέπτει τῆς Λιβύης πόλει πάτριόν ἐστι
-
τοὺς υἱοὺς δοκοῦσι μᾶλλον ἀγαπᾶν αἱ μητέρες ὡς δυναμένους αὐταῖς
- βοηθεῖν, οἱ δὲ πατέρες
-
τοῖς περὶ τὸν Κῦρον Ἕλλησι παρήγγειλαν οἱ στρατηγοὶ τοὺς πολεμίους,
- ἂν μὲν βοῶντες ἐπίωσι, δέχεσθαι μετὰ σιωπῆς, ἂν δʼ ἐκεῖνοι σιωπῶσιν
- αὐτοὺς μετὰ βοῆς ἀντεξελαύνειν. αἱ δὲ νοῦν ἔχουσαι γυναῖκες ἐν ταῖς
- ὀργαῖς τῶν ἀνδρῶν κεκραγότων
-
ὀρθῶς ὁ Εὐριπίδης
-
-
ἀεὶ μὲν δεῖ καὶ πανταχοῦ φεύγειν τὸ προσκρούειν τῷ ἀνδρὶ τὴν
- γυναῖκα καὶ τῇ γυναικὶ τὸν ἄνδρα, μάλιστα δὲ φυλάττεσθαι τοῦτο ποιεῖν
- ἐν τῷ
-
ἡ Ἑρμιόνη δοκεῖ τι λέγειν ἀληθὲς λέγουσα
-
-
τοῦτο δʼ οὐχ ἁπλῶς γιγνόμενόν ἐστιν, ἀλλʼ ὅταν αἱ πρὸς τοὺς
- ἄνδρας διαφοραὶ καὶ ζηλοτυπίαι ταῖς τοιαύταις
-
ὁ τὸν δραπέτην ἰδὼν διὰ χρόνου καὶ διώκων, ὡς κατέφυγε φθάσας εἰς
- μυλῶνα,
Ἀθηναῖοι τρεῖς ἀρότους ἱεροὺς ἄγουσι, πρῶτον
-
Γοργίου τοῦ ῥήτορος ἀναγνόντος ἐν Ὀλυμπίᾳ λόγον περὶ ὁμονοίας
- τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ὁ Μελάνθιος
εἰ καθάπερ τὸν αἴλουρον ὀσμῇ μύρων ἐκταράττεσθαι καὶ μαίνεσθαι
- λέγουσιν , οὕτω τὰς
-
οἱ προσιόντες ἐλέφασιν ἐσθῆτα λαμπρὰν οὐ
-
γυνή τις πρὸς τὸν Φίλιππον ἄκουσαν ἐφελκόμενον αὐτὴν “ἄφες μʼ” εἶπε· “πᾶσα γυνὴ τοῦ λύχνου
-
ὁ Πλάτων
περὶ δὲ φιλοκοσμίας σὺ μέν, ὦ Εὐρυδίκη, τὰ πρὸς Ἀρίστυλλαν ὑπὸ
- Τιμοξένας γεγραμμένα ἀναγνοῦσα πειρῶ διαμνημονεύειν σὺ δέ, ὦ
- Πολλιανέ, μὴ νόμιζε περιεργίας ἀφέξεσθαι τὴν γυναῖκα καὶ
-
, πῶς οὐχί σοι μᾶλλον ἐξέσται μέγα φρονεῖν ἐφʼ ἑαυτῇ καὶ
- λαμπρόν, ἂν μὴ τῶν ῥόδων ἀλλὰ καὶ τῶν καρπῶν μετέχῃς, ὧν αἱ
- Μοῦσαι φέρουσι καὶ χαρίζονται τοῖς παιδείαν καὶ φιλοσοφίαν
- θαυμάζουσιν;
optical character recognition
ὁ Σόλων ἐκέλευε τὴν νύμφην τῷ νυμφίῳ συγκατακλίνεσθαι μήλου κυδωνίου
- κατατραγοῦσαν αἰνιττόμενος ἔοικεν ὅτι δεῖ τὴν
ἐν Βοιωτίᾳ τὴν νύμφην κατακαλύψαντες ἀσφαραγωνιᾷ
ἐν ἀρχῇ μάλιστα δεῖ τὰς διαφορὰς καὶ τὰς προσκρούσεις φυλάττεσθαι
- τοὺς γεγαμηκότας, ὁρῶντας
-
ὥσπερ τὸ πῦρ ἐξάπτεται μὲν εὐχερῶς ἐν ἀχύροις καὶ θρυαλλίδι καὶ
- θριξὶ λαγῴαις, σβέννυται
-
ἡ διὰ τῶν φαρμάκων θήρα ταχὺ μὲν αἱρεῖ καὶ λαμβάνει ῥᾳδίως τὸν
- ἰχθύν, ἄβρωτον δὲ ποιεῖ καὶ φαῦλον· οὕτως αἱ φίλτρα τινὰ καὶ
- γοητείας ἐπιτεχνώμεναι τοῖς ἀνδράσι καὶ χειρούμεναι διʼ ἡδονῆς
-
αἱ βουλόμεναι μᾶλλον ἀνοήτων κρατεῖν ἀνδρῶν ἢ φρονίμων ἀκούειν
- ἐοίκασι τοῖς ἐν ὁδῷ βουλομένοις μᾶλλον ὁδηγεῖν τυφλοὺς; ἢ τοῖς
- γιγνώσκουσιν ἀκολουθεῖν καὶ βλέπουσι.
-
τὴν Πασιφάην ἀπιστοῦσι βοὸς ἐρασθῆναι
-
οἱ τοῖς ἵπποις ἐφάλλεσθαι διʼ ἀσθένειαν ἢ μαλακίαν αὐτοὺς ἐκείνους
- ὀκλάζειν καὶ ὑποπίπτειν διδάσκουσιν οὕτως ἔνιοι τῶν λαβόντων
- εὐγενεῖς ἢ πλουσίας γυναῖκας οὐχ ἑαυτοὺς
-
τὴν σελήνην, ὅταν ἀποστῇ τοῦ ἡλίου, περιφανῆ
-
οὐκ ὀρθῶς Ἡρόδοτος
ὥσπερ ἂν φθόγγοι δύο σύμφωνοι ληφθῶσι,
-
ὁ ἥλιος τὸν βορέαν ἐνίκησεν. ὁ γὰρ ἄνθρωπος
-
ὁ Κάτων ἐξέβαλε τῆς βουλῆς τὸν φιλήσαντα τὴν ἑαυτοῦ γυναῖκα τῆς
- θυγατρὸς παρούσης. τοῦτο μὲν οὖν ἴσως σφοδρότερον εἰ δʼ αἰσχρόν
- ἐστιν,
-
ὥσπερ ἐσόπτρου κατεσκευασμένου χρυσῷ καὶ λίθοις ὄφελος οὐδέν
- ἐστιν, εἰ μὴ δείκνυσι τὴν μορφὴν ὁμοίαν, οὕτως οὐδὲ πλουσίας γαμετῆς
- ὄνησις,
-
οἱ τὰς γυναῖκας μὴ ἡδέως βλέποντες ἐσθιούσας μετʼ αὐτῶν διδάσκουσιν
- ἐμπίπλασθαι μόνας γενομένας. οὕτως οἱ μὴ συνόντες ἱλαρῶς ταῖς γυναιξὶ
- μηδὲ παιδιᾶς κοινωνοῦντες αὐταῖς καὶ γέλωτος
-
·τοῖς τῶν Περσῶν βασιλεῦσιν αἱ γνήσιαι γυναῖκες παρακάθηνται δειπνοῦσι
- καὶ συνεστιῶνται· βουλόμενοι δὲ παίζειν καὶ μεθύσκεσθαι ταύτας μὲν
- ἀποπέμπουσι, τὰς δὲ μουσουργοὺς καὶ παλλακίδας
-
οἱ φιλόμουσοι τῶν βασιλέων πολλοὺς μουσικοὺς ποιοῦσιν, οἱ φιλόλογοι
- λογίους, οἱ φιλαθληταὶ
-
Λάκαινα παιδίσκη, πυνθανομένου τινὸς εἰ
ἰδίους οὐ δεῖ φίλους κτᾶσθαι τὴν γυναῖκα, κοινοῖς δὲ χρῆσθαι τοῖς τοῦ
- ἀνδρός· οἱ δὲ θεοὶ φίλοι πρῶτοι καὶ μέγιστοι. διὸ καὶ θεοὺς οὓς ὁ
-
ὁ Πλάτων
Φιλόπλουτος ἡ Ἑλένη, φιλήδονος ὁ Πάρις· φρόνιμος ὁ Ὀδυσσεύς,
- σώφρων ἡ Πηνελόπη. διὰ τοῦτο μακάριος γάμος ὁ τούτων καὶ ζηλωτός, ὁ
-
ὁ Ῥωμαῖος ὑπὸ τῶν φίλων νουθετούμενος ὅτι σώφρονα γυναῖκα καὶ
- πλουσίαν καὶ ὡραίαν ἀπεπέμψατο, τὸν κάλτιον
ὁ βασιλεὺς Φίλιππος ἤρα Θεσσαλῆς γυναικὸς αἰτίαν ἐχούσης
- καταφαρμακεύειν αὐτόν. ἐσπούδασεν οὖν ἡ Ὀλυμπιὰς λαβεῖν τὴν
- ἄνθρωπον ὑποχείριον. ὡς δʼ εἰς ὄψιν ἐλθοῦσα τὸ τʼ εἶδος εὐπρεπὴς
- ἐφάνη
-
πάλιν ἡ Ὀλυμπιάς, αὐλικοῦ τινος νεανίσκου γήμαντος εὐπρεπῆ γυναῖκα
- κακῶς ἀκούουσαν, “οὗτοσ” εἶπεν “οὐκ ἔχει λογισμόν· οὐ γὰρ
- ἂν τοῖς
-
ὁ Σωκράτης ἐκέλευε τῶν ἐσοπτριζομένων
-
ταῖς Λυσάνδρου θυγατράσιν ὁ τύραννος ὁ
-
-
“κόσμος γάρ ἐστιν,” ὡς ἔλεγε Κράτης, “τὸ κοσμοῦν” κοσμεῖ δὲ
- τὸ κοσμιωτέραν τὴν γυναῖκα ποιοῦν. ποιεῖ δὲ τοιαύτην οὔτε χρυσὸς οὔτε
- σμάραγδος οὔτε
-
οἱ τῇ γαμηλίᾳ θύοντες Ἥρᾳ τὴν χολὴν οὐ
-
ὁ Πλάτων τῷ Ξενοκράτει βαρυτέρῳ τὸ ἦθος
-
ἡ φοβουμένη γελάσαι πρὸς τὸν ἄνδρα καὶ παῖξαί
ταῖς Αἰγυπτίαις ὑποδήμασι χρῆσθαι πάτριον οὐκ ἦν, ὅπως ἐν οἴκῳ
- διημερεύωσι. τῶν δὲ
ἡ Θεανὼ παρέφηνε τὴν χεῖρα περιβαλλομένη
-
τὴν Ἠλείων ὁ Φειδίας Ἀφροδίτην ἐποίησε χελώνην πατοῦσαν, οἰκουρίας
- σύμβολον ταῖς γυναιξὶ καὶ σιωπῆς. δεῖ γὰρ ἢ πρὸς τὸν ἄνδρα λαλεῖν
- ἢ διὰ τοῦ ἀνδρός, μὴ δυσχεραίνουσαν εἰ διʼ ἀλλοτρίας
-
οἱ πλούσιοι καὶ οἱ βασιλεῖς τιμῶντες τοὺς φιλοσόφους αὑτούς τε,
- κοσμοῦσι κἀκείνους, οἱ δὲ
-
τῶν σωμάτων οἱ φιλόσοφοι τὰ μὲν ἐκ διεστώτων
-
ἐν Λέπτει τῆς Λιβύης πόλει πάτριόν ἐστι
-
τοὺς υἱοὺς δοκοῦσι μᾶλλον ἀγαπᾶν αἱ μητέρες ὡς δυναμένους αὐταῖς
- βοηθεῖν, οἱ δὲ πατέρες
-
τοῖς περὶ τὸν Κῦρον Ἕλλησι παρήγγειλαν οἱ στρατηγοὶ τοὺς πολεμίους,
- ἂν μὲν βοῶντες ἐπίωσι, δέχεσθαι μετὰ σιωπῆς, ἂν δʼ ἐκεῖνοι σιωπῶσιν
- αὐτοὺς μετὰ βοῆς ἀντεξελαύνειν. αἱ δὲ νοῦν ἔχουσαι γυναῖκες ἐν ταῖς
- ὀργαῖς τῶν ἀνδρῶν κεκραγότων
-
ὀρθῶς ὁ Εὐριπίδης
-
-
ἀεὶ μὲν δεῖ καὶ πανταχοῦ φεύγειν τὸ προσκρούειν τῷ ἀνδρὶ τὴν
- γυναῖκα καὶ τῇ γυναικὶ τὸν ἄνδρα, μάλιστα δὲ φυλάττεσθαι τοῦτο ποιεῖν
- ἐν τῷ
-
ἡ Ἑρμιόνη δοκεῖ τι λέγειν ἀληθὲς λέγουσα
-
-
τοῦτο δʼ οὐχ ἁπλῶς γιγνόμενόν ἐστιν, ἀλλʼ ὅταν αἱ πρὸς τοὺς
- ἄνδρας διαφοραὶ καὶ ζηλοτυπίαι ταῖς τοιαύταις
-
ὁ τὸν δραπέτην ἰδὼν διὰ χρόνου καὶ διώκων, ὡς κατέφυγε φθάσας εἰς
- μυλῶνα,
Ἀθηναῖοι τρεῖς ἀρότους ἱεροὺς ἄγουσι, πρῶτον
-
Γοργίου τοῦ ῥήτορος ἀναγνόντος ἐν Ὀλυμπίᾳ λόγον περὶ ὁμονοίας
- τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ὁ Μελάνθιος
εἰ καθάπερ τὸν αἴλουρον ὀσμῇ μύρων ἐκταράττεσθαι καὶ μαίνεσθαι
- λέγουσιν , οὕτω τὰς
-
οἱ προσιόντες ἐλέφασιν ἐσθῆτα λαμπρὰν οὐ
-
γυνή τις πρὸς τὸν Φίλιππον ἄκουσαν ἐφελκόμενον αὐτὴν “ἄφες μʼ” εἶπε· “πᾶσα γυνὴ τοῦ λύχνου
-
ὁ Πλάτων
περὶ δὲ φιλοκοσμίας σὺ μέν, ὦ Εὐρυδίκη, τὰ πρὸς Ἀρίστυλλαν ὑπὸ
- Τιμοξένας γεγραμμένα ἀναγνοῦσα πειρῶ διαμνημονεύειν σὺ δέ, ὦ
- Πολλιανέ, μὴ νόμιζε περιεργίας ἀφέξεσθαι τὴν γυναῖκα καὶ
-
, πῶς οὐχί σοι μᾶλλον ἐξέσται μέγα φρονεῖν ἐφʼ ἑαυτῇ καὶ
- λαμπρόν, ἂν μὴ τῶν ῥόδων ἀλλὰ καὶ τῶν καρπῶν μετέχῃς, ὧν αἱ
- Μοῦσαι φέρουσι καὶ χαρίζονται τοῖς παιδείαν καὶ φιλοσοφίαν
- θαυμάζουσιν;
+
ὁ Σόλων ἐκέλευε τὴν νύμφην τῷ νυμφίῳ συγκατακλίνεσθαι μήλου κυδωνίου κατατραγοῦσαν αἰνιττόμενος ἔοικεν ὅτι δεῖ τὴν
ἐν Βοιωτίᾳ τὴν νύμφην κατακαλύψαντες ἀσφαραγωνιᾷ
ἐν ἀρχῇ μάλιστα δεῖ τὰς διαφορὰς καὶ τὰς προσκρούσεις φυλάττεσθαι τοὺς γεγαμηκότας, ὁρῶντας
+
ὥσπερ τὸ πῦρ ἐξάπτεται μὲν εὐχερῶς ἐν ἀχύροις καὶ θρυαλλίδι καὶ θριξὶ λαγῴαις, σβέννυται
+
ἡ διὰ τῶν φαρμάκων θήρα ταχὺ μὲν αἱρεῖ καὶ λαμβάνει ῥᾳδίως τὸν ἰχθύν, ἄβρωτον δὲ ποιεῖ καὶ φαῦλον· οὕτως αἱ φίλτρα τινὰ καὶ γοητείας ἐπιτεχνώμεναι τοῖς ἀνδράσι καὶ χειρούμεναι διʼ ἡδονῆς
+
αἱ βουλόμεναι μᾶλλον ἀνοήτων κρατεῖν ἀνδρῶν ἢ φρονίμων ἀκούειν ἐοίκασι τοῖς ἐν ὁδῷ βουλομένοις μᾶλλον ὁδηγεῖν τυφλοὺς; ἢ τοῖς γιγνώσκουσιν ἀκολουθεῖν καὶ βλέπουσι.
+
τὴν Πασιφάην ἀπιστοῦσι βοὸς ἐρασθῆναι
+
οἱ τοῖς ἵπποις ἐφάλλεσθαι διʼ ἀσθένειαν ἢ μαλακίαν αὐτοὺς ἐκείνους ὀκλάζειν καὶ ὑποπίπτειν διδάσκουσιν οὕτως ἔνιοι τῶν λαβόντων εὐγενεῖς ἢ πλουσίας γυναῖκας οὐχ ἑαυτοὺς
+
τὴν σελήνην, ὅταν ἀποστῇ τοῦ ἡλίου, περιφανῆ
+
οὐκ ὀρθῶς Ἡρόδοτος
ὥσπερ ἂν φθόγγοι δύο σύμφωνοι ληφθῶσι,
+
ὁ ἥλιος τὸν βορέαν ἐνίκησεν. ὁ γὰρ ἄνθρωπος
+
ὁ Κάτων ἐξέβαλε τῆς βουλῆς τὸν φιλήσαντα τὴν ἑαυτοῦ γυναῖκα τῆς θυγατρὸς παρούσης. τοῦτο μὲν οὖν ἴσως σφοδρότερον εἰ δʼ αἰσχρόν ἐστιν,
+
ὥσπερ ἐσόπτρου κατεσκευασμένου χρυσῷ καὶ λίθοις ὄφελος οὐδέν ἐστιν, εἰ μὴ δείκνυσι τὴν μορφὴν ὁμοίαν, οὕτως οὐδὲ πλουσίας γαμετῆς ὄνησις,
+
οἱ τὰς γυναῖκας μὴ ἡδέως βλέποντες ἐσθιούσας μετʼ αὐτῶν διδάσκουσιν ἐμπίπλασθαι μόνας γενομένας. οὕτως οἱ μὴ συνόντες ἱλαρῶς ταῖς γυναιξὶ μηδὲ παιδιᾶς κοινωνοῦντες αὐταῖς καὶ γέλωτος
+
·τοῖς τῶν Περσῶν βασιλεῦσιν αἱ γνήσιαι γυναῖκες παρακάθηνται δειπνοῦσι καὶ συνεστιῶνται· βουλόμενοι δὲ παίζειν καὶ μεθύσκεσθαι ταύτας μὲν ἀποπέμπουσι, τὰς δὲ μουσουργοὺς καὶ παλλακίδας
+
οἱ φιλόμουσοι τῶν βασιλέων πολλοὺς μουσικοὺς ποιοῦσιν, οἱ φιλόλογοι λογίους, οἱ φιλαθληταὶ
+
Λάκαινα παιδίσκη, πυνθανομένου τινὸς εἰ οὐκ ἔγωγʼ
εἶπεν ἀλλʼ ἐμοὶ ἐκεῖνος.
οὗτος ὁ τρόπος, οἶμαι, τῆς οἰκοδεσποίνης, μήτε φεύγειν μήτε δυσχεραίνειν τὰ τοιαῦτα τοῦ ἀνδρὸς ἀρχομένου μήτε αὐτὴν κατάρχεσθαι· τὸ
+
ἰδίους οὐ δεῖ φίλους κτᾶσθαι τὴν γυναῖκα, κοινοῖς δὲ χρῆσθαι τοῖς τοῦ ἀνδρός· οἱ δὲ θεοὶ φίλοι πρῶτοι καὶ μέγιστοι. διὸ καὶ θεοὺς οὓς ὁ
+
ὁ Πλάτων τὸ ἐμὸν καὶ τὸ
ἣκιστα
+
Φιλόπλουτος ἡ Ἑλένη, φιλήδονος ὁ Πάρις· φρόνιμος ὁ Ὀδυσσεύς, σώφρων ἡ Πηνελόπη. διὰ τοῦτο μακάριος γάμος ὁ τούτων καὶ ζηλωτός, ὁ
+
ὁ Ῥωμαῖος ὑπὸ τῶν φίλων νουθετούμενος ὅτι σώφρονα γυναῖκα καὶ πλουσίαν καὶ ὡραίαν ἀπεπέμψατο, τὸν κάλτιον καὶ γὰρ
+
ἔφη καλὸς ἰδεῖν καὶ καινός, ἀλλʼ οὐδεὶς οἶδεν ὅπου με θλίβει.
δεῖ τοίνυν μὴ προικὶ μηδὲ γένει μηδὲ κάλλει τὴν γυναῖκα πιστεύειν, ἀλλʼ ἐν οἷς ἅπτεται μάλιστα τοῦ ἀνδρός, ὁμιλίᾳ τε καὶ ἤθει καὶ συμπεριφορᾷ, ταῦτα μὴ σκληρὰ μηδʼ ἀνιῶντα
+
ὁ βασιλεὺς Φίλιππος ἤρα Θεσσαλῆς γυναικὸς αἰτίαν ἐχούσης καταφαρμακεύειν αὐτόν. ἐσπούδασεν οὖν ἡ Ὀλυμπιὰς λαβεῖν τὴν ἄνθρωπον ὑποχείριον. ὡς δʼ εἰς ὄψιν ἐλθοῦσα τὸ τʼ εἶδος εὐπρεπὴς ἐφάνη
+χαιρέτωσαν
εἶπεν ἡ Ὀλυμπιάς αἱ διαβολαί σὺ γὰρ ἐν σεαυτῇ τὰ φάρμακα ἔχεις.
ἄμαχον οὖν τι γίγνεται πρᾶγμα γαμετὴ γυνὴ καὶ νόμιμος, ἂν ἐν αὑτῇ πάντα θεμένη, καὶ προῖκα καὶ γένος καὶ
+
πάλιν ἡ Ὀλυμπιάς, αὐλικοῦ τινος νεανίσκου γήμαντος εὐπρεπῆ γυναῖκα κακῶς ἀκούουσαν, οὗτοσ
εἶπεν οὐκ ἔχει λογισμόν· οὐ γὰρ ἂν τοῖς
+
δεῖ δὲ μὴ τοῖς ὄμμασι γαμεῖν δὲ τοῖς δακτύλοις, ὥσπερ ἔνιοι ψηφίσαντες πόσα
+
ὁ Σωκράτης ἐκέλευε τῶν ἐσοπτριζομένων
+οὖν, ἂν καὶ σώφρων γένωμαι;ʼ
τῇ γὰρ αἰσχρᾷ σεμνότερον
ταῖς Λυσάνδρου θυγατράσιν ὁ τύραννος ὁ
+ταῦτα τὰ κόσμια καταισχυνεῖ μου μᾶλλον ἢ κοσμήσει τὰς θυγατέρας.
πρότερος δὲ Λυσάνδρου Σοφοκλῆς
κόσμος γάρ ἐστιν,
ὡς ἔλεγε Κράτης, τὸ κοσμοῦν
κοσμεῖ δὲ τὸ κοσμιωτέραν τὴν γυναῖκα ποιοῦν. ποιεῖ δὲ τοιαύτην οὔτε χρυσὸς οὔτε σμάραγδος οὔτε
+
οἱ τῇ γαμηλίᾳ θύοντες Ἥρᾳ τὴν χολὴν οὐ
+
ὁ Πλάτων τῷ Ξενοκράτει βαρυτέρῳ τὸ ἦθος
+ἡδέως συνοικῇ καὶ μὴ ὀργιζομένη ὅτι σωφρονεῖ
δεῖ γὰρ μήτε τὴν εὐτελῆ καθαριότητος ἀμελεῖν μήτε τὴν φίλανδρον φιλοφροσύνης ποιεῖ γὰρ ἡ χαλεπότης ἀηδῆ τὴν εὐταξίαν τῆς γυναικός
+
ἡ φοβουμένη γελάσαι πρὸς τὸν ἄνδρα καὶ παῖξαί οὐ δύνασαί μοι καὶ φίλῳ χρῆσθαι καὶ κόλακι,
οὕτω λογίζεσθαι περὶ τῆς σώφρονος καὶ
+οὐ δύναμαι αὐτῇ καὶ ὡς γαμετῇ καὶ ὡς ἑταίρᾳ συνεῖναι
ταῖς Αἰγυπτίαις ὑποδήμασι χρῆσθαι πάτριον οὐκ ἦν, ὅπως ἐν οἴκῳ διημερεύωσι. τῶν δὲ
ἡ Θεανὼ παρέφηνε τὴν χεῖρα περιβαλλομένη
+καλὸς ὁ πῆχυς, ἀλλʼ οὐ δημόσιοσ
ἔφη. δεῖ δὲ μὴ μόνον τὸν
+
τὴν Ἠλείων ὁ Φειδίας Ἀφροδίτην ἐποίησε χελώνην πατοῦσαν, οἰκουρίας σύμβολον ταῖς γυναιξὶ καὶ σιωπῆς. δεῖ γὰρ ἢ πρὸς τὸν ἄνδρα λαλεῖν ἢ διὰ τοῦ ἀνδρός, μὴ δυσχεραίνουσαν εἰ διʼ ἀλλοτρίας
+
οἱ πλούσιοι καὶ οἱ βασιλεῖς τιμῶντες τοὺς φιλοσόφους αὑτούς τε, κοσμοῦσι κἀκείνους, οἱ δὲ
+
τῶν σωμάτων οἱ φιλόσοφοι τὰ μὲν ἐκ διεστώτων
+
ἐν Λέπτει τῆς Λιβύης πόλει πάτριόν ἐστι
+
τοὺς υἱοὺς δοκοῦσι μᾶλλον ἀγαπᾶν αἱ μητέρες ὡς δυναμένους αὐταῖς βοηθεῖν, οἱ δὲ πατέρες
+
τοῖς περὶ τὸν Κῦρον Ἕλλησι παρήγγειλαν οἱ στρατηγοὶ τοὺς πολεμίους, ἂν μὲν βοῶντες ἐπίωσι, δέχεσθαι μετὰ σιωπῆς, ἂν δʼ ἐκεῖνοι σιωπῶσιν αὐτοὺς μετὰ βοῆς ἀντεξελαύνειν. αἱ δὲ νοῦν ἔχουσαι γυναῖκες ἐν ταῖς ὀργαῖς τῶν ἀνδρῶν κεκραγότων
+
ὀρθῶς ὁ Εὐριπίδης
ἀεὶ μὲν δεῖ καὶ πανταχοῦ φεύγειν τὸ προσκρούειν τῷ ἀνδρὶ τὴν γυναῖκα καὶ τῇ γυναικὶ τὸν ἄνδρα, μάλιστα δὲ φυλάττεσθαι τοῦτο ποιεῖν ἐν τῷ
+πῶς δʼ ἂν ἡ κλίνη ταῦτα θεραπεύσειεν οἷς ἐπὶ τῆς κλίνης περιέπεσον;ʼ
ἃς δʼ ἡ κλίνη γεννᾷ διαφορὰς καὶ λοιδορίας καὶ ὀργάς, οὐ ῥᾴδιόν ἐστιν
+
ἡ Ἑρμιόνη δοκεῖ τι λέγειν ἀληθὲς λέγουσα
+
τοῦτο δʼ οὐχ ἁπλῶς γιγνόμενόν ἐστιν, ἀλλʼ ὅταν αἱ πρὸς τοὺς ἄνδρας διαφοραὶ καὶ ζηλοτυπίαι ταῖς τοιαύταις
+τί οὖν, ἂν καὶ
ὅταν οὖν αἱ διαβάλλουσαι λέγωσιν ὅτι λυπεῖ σε φιλοῦσαν ὁ
+
ὁ τὸν δραπέτην ἰδὼν διὰ χρόνου καὶ διώκων, ὡς κατέφυγε φθάσας εἰς μυλῶνα, ποῦ δʼ ἂν
ἔφη σὲ μᾶλλον εὑρεῖν ἐβουλήθην ἢ ἐνταῦθα;ʼ
γυνὴ τοίνυν διὰ ζηλοτυπίαν ἀπόλειψιν γράφουσα καὶ χαλεπῶς ἔχουσα λεγέτω πρὸς ἑαυτὴν ποῦ δʼ ἂν ἡ ζηλοῦσὰ
+
Ἀθηναῖοι τρεῖς ἀρότους ἱεροὺς ἄγουσι, πρῶτον
+εὔκαρπον Κυθέρειαν
προσηγόρευσε. διὸ δεῖ μάλιστα
+
Γοργίου τοῦ ῥήτορος ἀναγνόντος ἐν Ὀλυμπίᾳ λόγον περὶ ὁμονοίας τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ὁ Μελάνθιος
+
ἔφη συμβουλεύει περὶ ὁμονοίας, ὃς αὑτὸν καὶ τὴν γυναῖκα καὶ τὴν θεράπαιναν ἰδίᾳ τρεῖς ὄντας ὁμονοεῖν οὐ πέπεικεν
ἦν γὰρ ὡς ἔοικέ τις ἔρως τοῦ Γοργίου καὶ ζηλοτυπία τῆς γυναικὸς
+
εἰ καθάπερ τὸν αἴλουρον ὀσμῇ μύρων ἐκταράττεσθαι καὶ μαίνεσθαι λέγουσιν , οὕτω τὰς
+
οἱ προσιόντες ἐλέφασιν ἐσθῆτα λαμπρὰν οὐ
+
γυνή τις πρὸς τὸν Φίλιππον ἄκουσαν ἐφελκόμενον αὐτὴν ἄφες μʼ
εἶπε· πᾶσα γυνὴ τοῦ λύχνου
+
τοῦτο πρὸς τοὺς μοιχικοὺς καὶ ἀκολάστους εἴρηται καλῶς, τὴν δὲ
+
ὁ Πλάτων αἰσχύνεσθαι τοὺς νέους,
ἵνα κἀκεῖνοι πρὸς αὐτοὺς αἰδημόνως ἔχωσιν· ὅπου
γὰρ ἀναισχυντοῦσι γέροντες,
οὐδεμίαν αἰδῶ τοῖς νέοις οὐδʼ εὐλάβειαν ἐγγίγνεσθαι. τούτου δεῖ μεμνημένον τὸν ἄνδρα
+
περὶ δὲ φιλοκοσμίας σὺ μέν, ὦ Εὐρυδίκη, τὰ πρὸς Ἀρίστυλλαν ὑπὸ Τιμοξένας γεγραμμένα ἀναγνοῦσα πειρῶ διαμνημονεύειν σὺ δέ, ὦ Πολλιανέ, μὴ νόμιζε περιεργίας ἀφέξεσθαι τὴν γυναῖκα καὶ πατὴρ
ἐσσι
αὐτῇ καὶ πότνια μήτηρ ἠδὲ κασίγνητος
+
οὐχ ἧττον σεμνὸν ἀκοῦσαι γαμετῆς λεγούσης ἄνερ,
τὰ τοιαῦτα μαθήματα πρῶτον ἀφίστησι τῶν ἀτόπων τὰς γυναῖκας· αἰσχυνθήσεται γὰρ ὀρχεῖσθαι
+ἀτὰρ σὺ μοί ἐσσι
καθηγητὴς καὶ φιλόσοφος καὶ διδάσκαλος τῶν καλλίστων καὶ θειοτάτων,
, πῶς οὐχί σοι μᾶλλον ἐξέσται μέγα φρονεῖν ἐφʼ ἑαυτῇ καὶ λαμπρόν, ἂν μὴ τῶν ῥόδων ἀλλὰ καὶ τῶν καρπῶν μετέχῃς, ὧν αἱ Μοῦσαι φέρουσι καὶ χαρίζονται τοῖς παιδείαν καὶ φιλοσοφίαν θαυμάζουσιν;