Part 15 (1/2)
”A good wife's duty 'tis, Nicostratus, Not to command, but to obey her spouse; Most mischievous a wife who rules her husband.”
Menander, the greatest representative of the New Comedy, has been compared to a mirror, so clear were the images he presented of human life. His epigrammatic sayings are justly famous, and many of them refer to woman. ”Manner, not money, makes a woman's charm,” says he in one pa.s.sage; and in another:
”When thou fair woman seest, marvel not; Great beauty's oft to countless faults allied.”
”Where women are, there every ill is found,” is still another disparaging sentiment, as is his repet.i.tion of the frequent gibe at marriage:
”Marriage, if truth be told (of this be sure), An evil is--but one we must endure.”
Yet the poet was also appreciative of the good qualities in woman, as is seen in the sentiment: ”A good woman is the rudder of her household;”
with which we may compare the words of another poet:
”A sympathetic wife is man's chiefest treasure;”
and at times Menander notes how even a woman of serious faults may prove to be the greatest blessing:
”How burdensome a wife extravagant; Not as he would may he who's ta'en her live.
Yet this of good she has: she bears him children; She watches o'er his couch, if he be sick, With tender care; she's ever by his side When fortune frowns; and should he chance to die, The last sad rites with honor due she pays.”
Surely a touching portraiture of woman's gentle ministry, and worthy to be compared with Scott's famous lines! In spite of the numerous complaints against woman, the plays of the New Comedy usually ended in a happy marriage--the wild youth falls in love with the penniless maiden, reforms, discovers her to be wellborn, and wins over the angry parent; then follow joyous wedding festivities, and happiness ever afterward.
Such is the usual course of the plot. Satirical reflections on woman, especially when made in poetry, must not be taken too seriously; and where romantic love is also the theme for song, we may be sure that woman, though much abused, is yet tenderly regarded and highly esteemed among men.
A social movement for the emanc.i.p.ation of woman, which had occupied the attention of thinking men and women of Athens in the latter half of the fifth century before Christ, which had been started by Aspasia in her salon, which had been discussed by Socrates and the Socratics, especially aeschines, and which had brought about a battle royal between the dramatists Euripides and Aristophanes, naturally called for scientific treatment at the hands of the philosophers. The works of Plato, Aristotle, and Xenophon accordingly devote much s.p.a.ce to the consideration of the Woman Question. The female s.e.x, hitherto ”accustomed to live cowed and in obscurity,”--as Plato puts it,--justly claimed more favorable conditions; and the philosophers who endeavored to bring about a better social status a.s.serted that woman deserved proper recognition at the hands of men.
Plato had taken seriously to heart the lessons of the Peloponnesian War.
He was keenly sensitive to the evils of democracy as then existent, and recognized the need of governmental and social reform. He felt that in the disregard of women at least half the citizen population had been neglected, and we have in his works the strongest a.s.sertion of the equality of the s.e.xes.
”And so,” he says, in one of his dialogues, ”in the administration of a State, neither a woman as a woman nor a man as a man has any special function, but the gifts of nature are equally diffused in both s.e.xes; all the pursuits of men are the pursuits of women also, and in all of these woman is only a lesser man.” ”Very true.” ”Then are we to impose all our enactments on men and none on women?” ”That will never do.” ”One woman has a gift of healing, another not; one is a musician, another is not.” ”Very true.” ”And one woman has a turn for gymnastic and military exercises, while another is unwarlike and hates gymnastics.” ”Beyond question.” ”And one woman is a philosopher, and another is an enemy of philosophy; one has spirit, and another is without spirit.” ”This is also true.”
From these premises, recognizing the diversity of gifts among women and the correspondence of their talents with those of men, though less in degree, Plato affirms that women should receive a training similar to that accorded to men; to them should be given the same education and a.s.signed the same duties, though the lighter tasks should fall to them as being less strong physically.
”There shall be compulsory education,” says Plato, in his Laws, ”for females as well as males; they shall both go through the same exercises.
I a.s.sert, without fear of contradiction, that gymnastic exercises and horsemans.h.i.+p are as suitable to women as to men. I further affirm that nothing can be more absurd than the practice which prevails in our country, of men and women not following the same pursuits with all their strength and with one mind, for thus the State, instead of being a whole, is reduced to a half.”
The view of Plato, as stated in his _Republic_, which aroused the most hostile criticism was his theory of the community of women as well as of property. But this grew out of the fundamental thesis in his theory of government: that the State must be developed into a perfect unity. The family as a private possession disturbed this unity, and must therefore be dispensed with.
This theory, however, proved too extreme, even for Plato himself, and in his Laws he returns to the idea of marriage, but he follows the Spartan system by putting marriage under the constant surveillance of legislation. He wishes every man to contract that marriage which is most beneficial to the State, not that which is most pleasing to himself. He urges that people of opposing temperaments and of different conditions in life should wed,--the stronger with the weaker, the richer with the poorer,--”perceiving that the city ought to be well mingled, like a cup in which the maddening wine is hot and fiery, but, when chastened by a soberer G.o.d, receives a fair a.s.sociate and becomes an excellent and temperate drink.” By such arguments he endeavors to beguile the spirits of men into believing that the equability of their children's disposition is of more importance than equality when they marry.
The philosopher does not seem to see the humor in his proposal to bring together contrary natures, nor the pain he would inflict on the parties most concerned. With him the interest of the State is supreme, and to that everything must yield.
However, even amid such extreme doctrines we find wise counsel, inspired by a more practical and humane spirit. Plato finds fault with the prevailing custom of not giving young people an opportunity to become acquainted with each other before marriage; and he recognizes, from the excellent influence of the wife's activity in the home, how much she might contribute to the well-being of the State if she were taken out of seclusion and intimately a.s.sociated with the life of her husband.
The woman's rights movement reached its high-water mark in the works of Plato. Thenceforth there were a gradual decline in the conception of woman's capacities and a lessening of the demands for her emanc.i.p.ation.
Aristotle is less generous than Plato in his concessions to woman. ”The male is by nature superior, and the female inferior; the one rules, the other is ruled; this principle of necessity is extended to all mankind.”
Thus he a.s.serts woman's inferiority to man and he insists upon her silent and pa.s.sive obedience. The difference of functions and duties he bases upon difference of nature. ”The temperance and courage of a man are other than those of a woman. For a man who is courageous only as a woman is will seem timid, and a woman will seem impudent if she has merely the reserve and modesty of an honest man. Thus, in a family, a woman's duties differ from a man's--his it is to acquire, hers to preserve.” Each woman, however, has her part in the State, and should be prepared for it. ”In women the qualities of the body are beauty and height; those of the soul are temperance and love of work, without baseness. An individual and a State should desire each of these qualities in both men and women.” Yet, while a.s.serting woman's inferiority, Aristotle recognizes the sanct.i.ty of marriage and of the family, and preaches to men faithfulness and regard and appreciation in their att.i.tude toward women. In his _Ethics_ he dwells with delicacy on the affectionate regard husband and wife should each have for the other.
They should bear with and encourage each other in all the events of life. And while he insists upon the limitations of woman's intelligence and reasoning powers, he yet recognizes her superiority to man in qualities of the heart; and when he wishes to give an example of disinterested and ideal affection, it is woman who serves as his model.
On the whole, Aristotle draws a more pleasing picture of woman's character and position than Plato, in spite of the greater equality granted by the latter. Plato's philosophy was primarily the product of imagination, Aristotle's of experience; Plato was essentially theoretical, Aristotle practical. Hence the teachings of the Stagirite were doubtless based on examples of conjugal unity and felicity which he saw about him, and he extended to the Athenian people in general the views of marital relations that prevailed in his own circle.