Advice to Bride and Groom (24-28)

On another occasion, when a young man of the court had married a beautiful woman [*] of bad reputa-

Socrates [*] used to urge the ill-favoured among the mirror-gazing youth to make good their defect by virtue, and the handsome not to disgrace their face and figure by vice. So too it is an admirable thing for the mistress of the household, whenever she holds her mirror in her hands, to talk with herself—for the ill-favoured woman to say to herself, 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 [*] sent clothing and jewellery of the costly kind to the daughters of Lysander; but Lysander would not accept them, saying, These adornments will disgrace my daughters far more than they will adorn them. But Sophocles,[*] before Lysander, had said this: Adornment! No, you wretch! Naught that adorns ’Twould seem to be—your crazy mind’s desire. For, as Crates used to say, 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,[*] do not consecrate the bitter gall with the other parts of the offering, but remove it and cast it beside the altar—an intimation on the part of him who established this custom that bitterness and anger ought never to find a place in married life. For the acerbity of the mistress, like that of wine, ought to be salutary and pleasant, not bitter like that of aloes, nor suggestive of a dose of medicine.

Plato [*] advised Xenocrates, who was somewhat churlish in character but otherwise a good and honourable man, to sacrifice to the Graces. It is my opinion that the virtuous woman has especial need of graces in her relations with her husband, in order that, as Metrodorus [*] used to put it, 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.