The Eunuch (5-7)

The close of the trial, however, took a new turn; Diocles, discontinuing the advertisement of his own merits, passed over to Bagoas and made a great effort to show up his private life, and Bagoas met this attack by exploring the history of Diocles in like manner.

LYCINUS Well said, and you have me voting with you in this. But when they had their fill of hard words, and their fill of caustic observations, Diocles at length said in conclusion that it was not at all permissible for Bagoas to lay claim to philosophy and the rewards of merit in it, since he was a eunuch; such people ought to be excluded, he thought, not simply from all that but even from temples and holy-water bowls and all the places of public assembly, and he declared it an ill-omened, ill-met sight if on first leaving home in the morning, one should set eyes on any such person. He had a great deal to say, too, on that score, observing that a eunuch was neither man nor woman but something composite, hybrid, and monstrous, alien to human nature.

PAMPHILUS The charge you tell of, Lycinus, is novel, anyhow, and now I too, my friend, am moved to laughter, hearing of this incredible accusation. Well, what of the other? Held his peace, did he not? Or did he venture to say something himself in reply to this?

LYCINUS At first, through shame and cowardice—for that sort of behaviour is natural to them—he remained silent a long while and blushed and was plainly in a sweat, but finally in a weak, effeminate voice he said that Diocles was acting unjustly in trying to exclude a eunuch from philosophy, in which even women had a part; and he brought in Aspasia, Diotima, and Thargelia[*] to support his also a certain Academic eunuch hailing from among the Pelasgians, who shortly before our time achieved a high reputation among the Greeks.[*] But if that person himself were alive and advanced similar claims, Diocles would (he said) have excluded him too, undismayed by his reputation among the common sort; and he repeated a number of humorous remarks made to the man by Stoics and Cynics regarding his physical imperfection.[*]