1.—“_Marriage which might have been a mateship sweet._”
“In vain Plato urged that young men and women should be more frequently
permitted to meet one another, so that there should be less enmity and
indifference in the married life.” (“Nomoi,” Book VI.)—Westermarck
(“History of Human Marriage,” p. 361).
2.—“... _equal souls_ ...”
“The feeling which makes husband and wife true companions for better and
worse, can grow up only in societies where the altruistic sentiments of
man are strong enough to make him recognise woman as his equal, and
where she is not shut up as an exotic plant in a greenhouse, but is
allowed to associate freely with men. In this direction European
civilisation has been advancing for centuries.”—Westermarck (_loc.
cit._). (See also Note XIX., 6.)
7, 8.—“_Her only hope of thought or learning wide,
Some freer lot to seek than yoke forlorn of bride_.”
In Greece “the modest women were confined to their own apartments, and
were visited only by their husbands and nearest relations.... The
courtesans of Athens, by living in public, and conversing freely with
all ranks of people, upon all manner of subjects, acquired, by degrees,
a knowledge of history, of philosophy, of policy, and a taste in the
whole circle of the arts. Their ideas were more extensive and various,
and their conversation was more sprightly and entertaining than anything
that was to be found among the virtuous part of the sex. Hence their
houses became the schools of elegance; that of Aspasia was the resort of
Socrates and Pericles, and, as Greece was governed by eloquent men, over
whom the courtesans had an influence, the latter also influenced public
affairs.”—Alexander Walker (“Woman, as to Mind,” &c., p. 334).