These few instances, gathered from many that are more or less familiar
to the student of history, may serve to show in some degree the
influence of strong and able women in the affairs of Old Rome. They
show, also, the intellectual as well as moral force of the best type
of pagan womanhood, which was formed after classic ideals of an heroic
pattern.
There were still women of learning and distinction when the old
standards had fallen and society was sunk in the grossest materialism.
The last and greatest of these was an alien. It was at Tivoli, in the
shadow of the Sabine Hills, that Zenobia, a captive, and alone with
her children among the ruins of her past grandeur, solaced herself
with letters and philosophy. Her teacher, minister, counselor, and
friend, Longinus, had paid the penalty of his devotion with his life,
and the world was poorer by the loss of one of its immortal thinkers.
But he left an apt pupil in a woman who had treasured his wisdom
and profited by his marvelous knowledge. An Amazon in war, empress,
linguist, Platonist, with the grasp of a statesman and the insight of
a seer, this gifted, eloquent, and versatile woman of flashing dark
eyes, winning manners, and Oriental beauty, who graced a triumph like
a goddess and met misfortune like a philosopher, is a shining example
of the dignity and greatness of a type that was passing. “Who has ever
shown more prudence in council, more firmness in her undertakings, more
authority over her soldiers, more discernment in her conduct?” said her
arch-enemy Aurelian, who bowed to her talents, felt her fascinations,
but made a spectacle of her sorrow and humiliation to add a jewel to
his crown.
It is idle to depreciate the qualities of the pagan women. Under all
their disabilities, which were many, those whose position gave them
a certain freedom of movement often attained great heights through
their gifts of character and intellect. There were great wives, great
mothers, great administrators, great rulers, great writers among the
more sensitive races, and great women, which means a symmetry of mind,
heart, and intellect in large proportions. But the ages in which they
lived were masculine ones--masculine in their cruelties and their
vices, as well as in their force and their theories of virtue. Women
did not escape the contagion, and when they plunged into abysses of
corruption, it was with the abandon of a passionate temperament. Still,
it was the voices of those who were too strong and too intelligent to
be blindly led that were first raised in a moral protest, the echo of
which has not yet died away.