Vous verrez que vous avez affaire a un homme.
You will learn that you have to deal with a man.
Fighting men have in all times been distinguished on account of the
beauty of their women. The charming fable of the loves of Venus and
Mars, described by the most ancient of poets, expresses allegorically,
this truth. All the demi-gods had their amorous adventures; the most
valiant were always the most passionate and the happiest. Hercules took
the maidenheads of fifty girls, in a single night. Thesus loved a
thousand beauties, and slept with them. Jason abandoned Hypsipyle for
Medea, and her, for Creusa. Achilles, the swift of foot, forgot the
tender Deidamia in the arms of his Briseis.
It has been remarked that the lovers did not have very scrupulous tastes
in their methods of attaining satisfaction from the women they loved.
The most common method was abduction and the women always submitted to
this without a murmur of any sort. Helen was carried off by Theseus,
after having also been abducted by Paris. The wife of Atreus was
abducted by Thyestus, and from that arose the implacable hatred between
the two families. Rape was no less common. Goddesses themselves and the
favorites of the Gods were at the risk of falling prey to strong mortals.
Pirithous, aided by Theseus, even attempted to snatch Proserpina from the
God of the under-world. Juno herself was compelled to painful submission
to the pursuit of Ixion, and Thetis succumbed despite herself, to the
assaults of Peleus. The gift of foretelling the future, with which
Apollo endowed Cassandra, did not insure her against the brutal caresses
of Ajax, son of Oileus.
In the infancy of society, there was never known any other distinction
except between the weak and the strong: the strong commanded and the weak
obeyed. For that reason, women were regarded in the light of beings
destined by nature, to serve the pleasures and even the caprices of men.
Never did her suitors express a tender thought for Penelope, and, instead
of making love to her, they squandered her property, slept with her
slaves, and took charge of things in her house.
Circe gave herself to Ulysses who desired to slay her, and Calypso, full
blown goddess as she was, was obliged to make his advances for him. The
fine sentiments that Virgil puts into the mouth of the shade of Creusa,
content with having died while serving against the Greeks, "she was a
Trojan, and she wedded the son of Venus"; the confession with which
Andromache, confronted by the murderer of her first husband, responds to
the question of AEneas; these ideas, I say, and these sentiments,
appertained to the polished century of Augustus and not to the epoch or,
scene of the Trojan War. Virgil, in his AEneid, had never subscribed to
the precepts of Horace, and of common sense:
Aut famam sequere, aut sibi convenientia finge
Horace Ars Poet. 119.
From this manner of dealing with women arose another reason for the
possession of beauty by the valiant. One coveted a woman much as one
would covet a fine flock of sheep, and, in the absence of laws, the one
in possession of either the one or the other of these desirable objects
would soon be dispossessed of them if he was not courageous enough to
guard them against theft. Wars were as much enterprises for ravishing
women as they were for taking other property, and one should remember
that Agamemnon promised to retire from before Troy if the Trojans would
restore Helen and his riches to Menelaus; things which Paris had
despoiled him of.
Also, there was never any of that thing we call "conjugal honor" among
the Greeks; that idea was far too refined; it was a matter too complex
ever to have entered the heads of these semi-barbarous people. This is
exemplified in the fact that, after the taking of Troy, Helen, who had,
of her own free will, belonged successively to Paris, and to Deiphobus,
afterwards returned to Menelaus, who never offered her any reproach.
That conduct of Menelaus was so natural that Telemachus, who, in his trip
to Sparta found Helen again with Menelaus, just as she was before her
abduction, did not show the least astonishment.
The books which bear the most remarkable resemblance to each other are
the Bible and Homer, because the people they describe and the men about
whom they speak are forerunners of civilization in pretty much the same
degree. Sarah was twice snatched from the bosom of Abraham and he was
never displeased with his wife and continued to live on good terms with
her. David, a newcomer on the throne, hastened to have Michol brought to
him although she had already married another man.
The best proof that, during the time of the Romans the women preferred
soldiers to other men is in the claims to successful enterprises by the
bragging soldier of Plautus. Pyrgopolinices thought it was only
necessary to pose as a great warrior, to have all the women chasing after
him; therefore, his parasite and his slave spoke of nothing but the
passions be inspired in women. Tradition has it that among the Samnites,
the bravest men had the choice of the fairest women, and to this custom
is attributed one of the reasons these people were so warlike.
In the times of chivalry the greatest exploits were achieved for the
pleasure of one's Lady-Love, and there were even such valiant knights, as
Don Quixote, who went about the world proving by force of arms that their
ladies had no peer. The poverty-stricken troubadours singing
harmoniously about their beautiful women found them flying away in the
arms of knights who had broken lances at tournaments, or had performed
the greatest feats of arms. In fine, all the peoples of the world have
said with Dryden:
"None but the brave deserves the fair."