The Book of the Courtier
Jerome, who celebrates certain ones of his time with such admiring
praises as might well suffice for the saintliest man on earth.[343]
20.—“Then consider how many others there have been, of whom no mention
is made at all, because the poor creatures are kept shut up, without the
lofty pride to seek the name of saint from the rabble, as many accursed
hypocrites do to-day, who,—forgetful or rather regardless of Christ’s
teaching, which requires that when a man fasts he shall anoint his face
in order that he may not seem to fast, and commands that prayers, alms,
and other good works shall be done, not in the market-place nor in
synagogues, but in secret, so that the left hand shall not know of the
right,—affirm that there is no greater good thing in the world than to
give a good example: and so, with averted head and downcast eyes,
noising it abroad that they will not speak to women or eat anything but
raw herbs,—dirty, with cassocks torn, they beguile the simple. Yet they
abstain not from forging wills, setting mortal enmities between man and
wife, and sometimes poison, using sorceries, incantations and every sort
of villainy. And then they cite a certain authority out of their own
head, which says, _si non caste, tamen caute_;[344] and with this they
think to cure every great evil, and with good arguments to persuade
anyone who is not right wary that all sin, however grave it be, is
easily pardoned of God, provided it remain secret and do not give rise
to bad example. Thus, under a veil of sanctity and in secret they often
turn all their thoughts to corrupt the pure mind of some woman; often to
sow hatred between brothers; to govern states; to raise up one and cast
another down; to get men beheaded, imprisoned and proscribed; to be
ministers of the villainies and as it were receivers of the thefts that
many princes commit.
“Others shamelessly delight to appear dainty and fresh, with well-shaven
crown and garments fine, and in walking lift the cassock to display
their neat hose and their comeliness of person in making salutations.
Others use certain glances and gestures even in saying mass, whereby
they imagine they are graceful and attract attention. Villainous and
wicked men, utter strangers not only to religion but to all good
behaviour; and when they are reproved for their loose living, they make
a jest of it and laugh at him who speaks to them of it, and almost make
a merit of their vices.”
Then my lady Emilia said:
“You take such pleasure in speaking ill of friars, that you have entered
upon this subject without rhyme or reason. But you are very wrong to
murmur against ecclesiastics, and you burden your conscience quite
needlessly; since, but for those who pray to God for us, we should have
much greater scourges than we have.”
Then the Magnifico Giuliano laughed, and said:
“How did you guess so well, my Lady, that I was speaking of friars, when
I did not name them? But in truth what I do is not called murmuring, for
I speak very openly and plainly; nor am I speaking of the good, but of
the bad and guilty, of whom moreover I do not tell the thousandth part
of what I know.”
“Do not speak of friars now,” replied my lady Emilia; “because for my
part I esteem it grievous sin to listen to you, and so I shall go away
in order not to listen to you.”
21.—“I am content,” said the Magnifico Giuliano, “to speak no more of
this; but returning to the praises of women, I say that my lord Gaspar
shall not find me an admirable man, but I will find you a wife or
daughter or sister of equal and sometimes greater merit. Moreover, many
women have been the cause of countless benefits to their men-folk, and
sometimes have corrected many a one of his errours. Wherefore, women
being (as we have shown) naturally capable of the same virtues as men,
and the effects thereof being often seen, I do not perceive why,—in
giving them what it is possible for them to have, what they more than
once have had and still have,—I should be regarded as relating miracles,
whereof my lord Gaspar has accused me; seeing that there have always
been on earth, and now still are, women as like the Court Lady I have
fashioned, as men like the man these gentlemen have fashioned.”
Then my lord Gaspar said:
“Those arguments that have experience against them do not seem to me
good; and certainly if I were to ask you who these great women were that
have been as worthy of praise as the great men whose wives or sisters or
daughters they were, or that have been the cause of any benefit, and who
those were that have corrected the errours of their men-folk,—I think
you would be embarrassed.”
22.—“Verily,” replied the Magnifico Giuliano, “no other thing could make
me embarrassed save their multitude; and had I time enough, I should
tell you here the story of Octavia,[345] wife of Mark Antony and sister
of Augustus; that of Porcia,[346] Cato’s daughter and wife of Brutus;
that of Caia Cæcilia,[347] wife of Tarquinius Priscus; that of
Cornelia,[348] Scipio’s daughter; and of countless others who are very
celebrated: and not only of our own, but of barbarian nations; as that
of Alexandra,[349] wife of Alexander king of the Jews, who,—after her
husband’s death, when she saw the people kindled with fury and already
up in arms to slay the two children that he had left her, in revenge for
the cruel and grievous bondage in which the father had always kept
them,—so acted that she soon appeased their just wrath, and by her
prudence straightway won over for her children those minds which the
father, by countless injuries during many years, had made very hostile
to his offspring.”
“At least tell us,” replied my lady Emilia, “how she did it.”
“Seeing her children in such peril,” said the Magnifico, “she at once
caused Alexander’s body to be cast into the middle of the market-place.
Then, having called the citizens to her, she said that she knew their
minds to be kindled with very just wrath against her husband, because
the cruel injuries that he had iniquitously done them deserved it; and
that, as she had always wished, while he was alive, that she could make
him abstain from such a wicked life, so now she was ready to give proof
of it, and as far as possible to help them punish him after death; and
therefore let them take his body, and give it as food for dogs, and
outrage it in the most cruel ways they could devise: but she prayed them
to have mercy upon her innocent children, who could not have either
guilt or even knowledge of the father’s evil deeds. Of such efficacy
were these words, that the fierce wrath before conceived in the minds of
all that people was quickly softened and turned to a feeling of such
pity, that they not only with one accord chose the children for their
rulers, but also gave most honourable burial to the body of the dead.”
Here the Magnifico made a little pause; then he added:
“Do you not know that the wife and daughters of Mithridates showed much
less fear of death than Mithridates?[350] And Hasdrubal’s wife than
Hasdrubal?[351] Do you not know that Harmonia, daughter of Hiero the
Syracusan, chose to perish in the burning of her native city?”[352]
Then Frisio said:
“Where obstinacy is concerned, it is certain that some women are
occasionally to be found who never change their purpose; like the one
who being no longer able to say ‘Scissors’ to her husband, made the sign
of them to him with her hands.”[353]
23.—The Magnifico Giuliano laughed, and said:
“Obstinacy that tends to a worthy end ought to be called steadfastness;
as was the case of the famous Epicharis, a Roman freedwoman, who, being
privy to a great conspiracy against Nero, was of such steadfastness
that, although racked by all the direst tortures that can be imagined,
she never betrayed one of her accomplices; while in the same peril many
noble knights and senators basely accused brothers, friends and the
dearest and nearest they had in the world.[354]
“What will you say of that other woman who was called Leæna? In whose
honour the Athenians dedicated a tongueless lioness (_leæna_) in bronze
before the gate of the citadel, to show in her the steadfast virtue of
silence; because being likewise privy to a conspiracy against the
tyrants, she was not dismayed by the death of two great men (her
friends), and although rent by countless most cruel tortures, she never
betrayed one of the conspirators.”[355]
Then madonna Margarita Gonzaga said:
“Methinks you narrate too briefly these virtuous deeds done by women;
for these enemies of ours, although having heard and read them, yet
pretend not to know them and fain would have the memory of them lost:
but if you will let us women hear them, we at least shall deem ourselves
honoured by them.”
24.—Then the Magnifico Giuliano replied:
“So be it. I wish to tell you now of one who did what I think my lord
Gaspar himself will admit very few men do;” and he began: “In
Massilia[356] there was once a custom that is believed to have been
brought from Greece, which was that they publicly[357] kept a poison
compounded of hemlock, and allowed anyone to take it who proved to the
Senate that he ought to lay down his life because of any trouble that he
found therein, or for other just cause, to the end that whoever had
suffered a too hostile fortune or had enjoyed a too prosperous fortune,
should not drag on the one or change the other. Now Sextus Pompey,
finding himself—”[358]
Here Frisio, not waiting for the Magnifico Giuliano to go on, said:
“Methinks this is the beginning of a long story.”
Then the Magnifico Giuliano turned to madonna Margarita laughing, and
said:
“You see that Frisio will not let me speak. I wished to tell you now
about a woman who, having shown to the Senate that she had good reason
to die, cheerfully and fearlessly took the poison in Sextus Pompey’s
presence, with such steadfastness of spirit and with such affectionate
and thoughtful remembrances to her family, that Pompey and all the
others who saw such wisdom and confidence on a woman’s part in the dread
hour of death, were lost in wonderment and tears.”
25.—Then my lord Gaspar said, laughing:
“I too remember having read a speech in which an unhappy husband asks
leave of the Senate to die, and proves that he has just cause for it in
that he cannot endure the continual annoyance of his wife’s chatter, and
prefers to drink the poison, which you say was publicly kept for such
purposes, than his wife’s words.”
The Magnifico Giuliano replied:
“How many poor women would have just cause for asking leave to die
because they cannot endure, I will not say the evil words, but the very
evil deeds of their husbands! I know several such, who suffer in this
world the pains that are said to be in hell.”
“Do you not believe,” replied my lord Gaspar, “that there are also many
husbands who have such torment of their wives that they hourly wish for
death?”
“And what pain,” said the Magnifico, “can wives give their husbands that
is as incurable as are those that husbands give their wives?—who if not
for love, at least for fear, are submissive to their husbands.”
“Certain it is,” said my lord Gaspar, “that the little good they
sometimes do proceeds from fear, since there are few in the world who in
their secret hearts do not hate their husbands.”
“Nay, quite the contrary,” replied the Magnifico; “and if you recall
aright what you have read, we see in all the histories that wives nearly
always love their husbands more than husbands love their wives. When did
you ever see or read of a husband showing his wife such a token of love
as did the famous Camma to her husband?”
“I do not know,” replied my lord Gaspar, “who the woman was, nor what
token she showed.”
“Nor I,” said Frisio.