But why dwell longer on such cases, when there are so many examples of the most savage creatures being tamed and made amenable to hard work?
When a Thessalian was asked which of his countrymen were the gentlest in manner, his answer was a good one: Those who are giving up war. But it is useless to multiply instances. Character is long-standing habit, and it would scarcely be beside |3| the mark to speak of the virtues of the mind as the virtues ‘of minding’.[[56]] One more illustration, and we will dispense with further elaboration of the subject. The Spartan legislator Lycurgus once took two puppies belonging to the same parents and brought them up in entirely different ways. The one he turned into a gluttonous good-for-nothing, the other into a keen and capable hunting-dog. Subsequently he got the Lacedaemonians together and said to them: ‘A great factor |B| in engendering virtue consists of habit and education—of instruction in the conduct of life—as I am about to prove to you here and now.’ He then brought forward the two young dogs, put down directly in front of them a plate of food and a hare, and let the dogs loose; whereupon the one darted after the hare, while the other made for the plate. The Lacedaemonians, who were not yet in the secret, failed to perceive the meaning of his demonstration, until he told them: ‘Both these dogs come from the same parents, but the difference in their education has turned the one into a glutton and the other into a hunter.’
No more need be said of habit and conduct of life. We may |C| proceed to the question of nurture.
In my opinion mothers should nurse their own children and offer them the breast; for their nursing will be of a more sympathetic and painstaking kind, since their love is from the heart, or, as the saying goes, ‘down to the finger-tips,’ whereas the affection of professional nurses and foster-mothers—who are paid for it—can only be spurious and factitious. That it is the duty of the mother herself to suckle and nurse her offspring is evident from the arrangement of nature, which has supplied every animal after parturition with the necessary provision of milk. Here Providence further shows its wisdom, inasmuch as it has furnished a woman with a pair of breasts, |D| so that, even if she bears twins, there may be a double source for them to draw upon. Moreover she will by so acting become more tender and affectionate to her child. It can, indeed, scarcely be otherwise; the connexion of nurse and nursling is the means of raising affection to its highest pitch. One can see how even a brute beast will yearn for its nursling, if you tear them apart.
If possible, then, the mother should endeavour to nurse the child herself. But if—as may sometimes happen—she is prevented by physical weakness, or if other children are speedily on the way, it is at least desirable not to accept as foster-mother or nurse the first that offers, but to choose the best possible. |E| To begin with, her character should be Greek. It is as with the treatment of the body. As soon as children are born, we have to mould their limbs in order that they may grow straight and shapely. Similarly their characters ought to be regulated from the first. For youth is supple and plastic, and it is while the mind is still soft and yielding that it acts as a mould for instruction, whereas it is always difficult to knead into shape |F| anything hard. As it is in soft wax that we make the impression of a seal, so it is in the minds of those who are still little children that we imprint a lesson.
That great thinker Plato is right, it seems to me, in exhorting a nurse to use discretion in the tales she tells to young children; otherwise their minds may become infected from the first with folly and corruption. It is also sound advice which the poet Phocylides gives in the words:
While yet but a child, it behoveth
To learn such deeds as are good.
Another point which we cannot afford to omit concerns the slave children who are to serve the young master and to be brought up with him. Pains must be taken, first, of course, that |4| they shall be well-behaved, but also that they shall talk Greek, and talk it with good articulation. Otherwise, through rubbing against barbarians and bad characters, he will pick up something of their vices. The proverb-makers have good reason for saying: If you have a lame man for a neighbour, you will learn to limp.
When children reach the age to be put under a mentor, it becomes especially necessary to take pains in the appointment of such a person. Otherwise we shall have them entrusted to some uncivilized or rascally fellow. What actually happens |B| is often in the highest degree absurd. Respectable slaves are made into farmers, skippers, traders, stewards, or money-lenders, while any low specimen who is found to be a glutton and a tippler and of no use in any kind of business is taken and put in charge of the sons. A fit and proper attendant should possess the same qualities of mind as Phoenix, the attendant of Achilles.