Plutarch's Morals. Plutarch
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ancients famous for enchantments and spells. So Juvenal, vi. 610, speaks of "Thessala philtia," and see Horace, "Odes," i. 27. 21, 22; "Epodes," v. 45.
169 Wyttenbach well compares the lines of Menander:—
ἔνεστ᾽ἀληθὲς φίλτρον εὐγνώμων τρόπός, τούτῳ κατακρατεῖν ἀνδρὸς εἴωθεν γυνή.
170 An allusion to Homer, "Iliad," xiv. 214–217.
171 Called by the Romans "pronuba Juno." See Verg. "Æneid," iv. 166; Ovid, "Heroides," vi. 43.
172 See Pausanias, vi. 25. The statue was made of ivory and gold.
173 Compare Terence, "Hecyra," 201. "Uno animo omnes socrus oderunt nurus." As to stepmotherly feelings, the "injusta noverca" has passed into a proverb with all nations. See for example Hesiod, "Works and Days," 823, ἄλλοτε μητρυιὴ πἐλει ἡμἐρη, ἄλλοτε μήτηρ.
174 Wyttenbach compares Seneca's "Fidelem si putaveris facies." "Ep." iii. p. 6.
175 Euripides, "Medea," 190–198.
176 Homer, "Iliad," xiv. 205, 209.
177 See Mulier Parturiens, Phaedrus' "Fables," i. 18.
178 Euripides, "Andromache," 930.
179 Proverb. Cf. Horace, "Oleum adde camino," ii. "Sat." iii. 321.
180 See Æsop's Fables, No. 121. Halme. Δραπέτης is the title. All readers of Plautus and Terence know what a bugbear to slaves the threat of being sent to the mill was. They would have to turn it instead of horses, or other cattle.
181 That is, Yoking oxen for the plough.
182 Procreation of children was among the ancients frequently called Ploughing and Sowing. Hence the allusions in this paragraph. So, too, Shakspere, "Measure for Measure," Act i. Sc. iv. 41–44.
183 The reference is to the rites of Cybele. See Lucretius, ii. 618.
184 See Erasmus, "Adagia." The French proverb is "La nuit tous les chats sont gris."
185 "Laws," p. 729, C.
186 From the words of Andromache to Hector, "Iliad," vi. 429, 430.
187 Theano was the wife of Pythagoras.
188 See Livy, xxix. 14. Propertius, v. 11. 51, 52. Ovid, "Fasti," iv. 305 sq.
189 And mother of the Gracchi.
190 Jeremy Taylor, in his beautiful sermon on "The Marriage Ring," has borrowed not a few hints from this treatise of Plutarch, as usual investing with a new beauty whatever he borrows, from whatever source. He had the classics at his fingers' end, and much of his unique charm he owes to them. But he read them as a philosopher, and not as a grammarian.
CONSOLATORY LETTER TO HIS WIFE.
§ i. Plutarch to his wife sends greeting. The messenger that you sent to me to announce the death of our little girl seems to have missed his way en route for Athens; but when I got to Tanagra I heard the news from my niece. I suppose the funeral has already taken place, and I hope everything went off so as to give you least sorrow both now and hereafter. But if you left undone anything you wished to do, waiting for my opinion, and thinking your grief would then be lighter, be it without ceremoniousness or superstition, both which things are indeed foreign to your character.
§ ii. Only, my dear wife, let us both be patient at this calamity. I know and can see very clearly how great it is, but should I find your grief too excessive, it would trouble me even more than the event itself. And yet I have not a heart hard as heart of oak or flintstone, as you yourself know very well, who have shared with me in the bringing up of so many children, as they have all been educated at home by ourselves. And this one I know was more especially beloved by you, as she was the first daughter after four sons, when you longed for a daughter, and so I gave her your name.191 And as you are very fond of children your grief must have a peculiar bitterness when you call to mind her pure and simple gaiety, which was without a tincture of passion or querulousness. For she had from nature a wonderful contentedness of mind and meekness, and her affectionateness and winning ways not only pleased one but also afforded a means of observing her kindliness of heart, for she used to bid her nurse192 give the teat not only to other children but even to her favourite playthings, and so invited them as it were to her table in kindliness of heart, and gave them a share of her good things, and provided the best entertainment for those that pleased her.
§ iii. But I see no reason, my dear wife, why these and similar traits in her character, that gave us delight in her lifetime, should now, when recalled to the memory, grieve and trouble us. Though, on the other hand, I fear that if we cease to grieve we may also cease to remember her, like Clymene, who says in the Play193—
"I hate the supple bow of cornel-wood, And would put down athletics,"
because she ever avoided and trembled at anything that reminded her of her son, for it brought grief with it, and it is natural to avoid everything that gives us pain. But as she gave us the greatest pleasure in embracing her and even in seeing and hearing her, so ought her memory living and dwelling with us to give us more, aye, many times more, joy than grief, since those arguments that we have often used to others ought to be profitable to us in the present conjuncture, nor should we sit down and rail against fortune, opposing to those joys many more griefs.
§ iv. Those who were present at the funeral tell me with evident surprise that you put on no mourning, and that you bedizened up neither yourself nor your maids with the trappings of woe, and that there was no ostentatious expenditure of money at the funeral, but that everything was done orderly and silently in the presence of