Also we must abandon a furious mode of walking, and choose a grave and leisurely, but not a lingering step.
Nor is one to swagger in the ways, nor throw back his head to look at those he meets, if they look at him, as if he were strutting on the stage, and pointed at with the finger. Nor, when pushing up hill, are they to be shoved up by their domestics, as we see those that are more luxurious, who appear strong, but are enfeebled by effeminacy of soul.
A true gentleman must have no mark of effeminacy visible on his face, or any other part of his body. Let no blot on his manliness, then, be ever found either in his movements or habits. Nor is a man in health to use his servants as horses to bear him. For as it is enjoined on them, “to be subject to their masters with all fear, not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward,”[730] as Peter says; so fairness, and forbearance, and kindness, are what well becomes the masters. For he says: “Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another; love as brethren, be pitiful, be humble,” and so forth, “that ye may inherit a blessing,”[731] excellent and desirable.
The model Maiden.
Zeno the Cittiæan thought fit to represent the image of a young maid, and executed the statue thus: “Let her face be clean, her eyebrows not let down, nor her eyelids open nor turned back. Let her neck not be stretched back, nor the members of her body be loose. But let the parts that hang from the body look as if they were well strung; let there be the keenness of a well-regulated mind[732] for discourse, and retention of what has been rightly spoken; and let her attitudes and movements give no ground of hope to the licentious; but let there be the bloom of modesty, and an expression of firmness. But far from her be the wearisome trouble that comes from the shops of perfumers, and goldsmiths, and dealers in wool, and that which comes from the other shops where women, meretriciously dressed, pass whole days as if sitting in the stews.”
Amusements and Associates.
And let not men, therefore, spend their time in barbers’ shops and taverns, babbling nonsense; and let them give up hunting for the women who sit near,[733] and ceaselessly talking slander against many to raise a laugh.
The game of dice[734] is to be prohibited, and the pursuit of gain, especially by dicing,[735] which many keenly follow. Such things the prodigality of luxury invents for the idle. For the cause is idleness, and a love[736] for frivolities apart from the truth. For it is not possible otherwise to obtain enjoyment without injury; and each man’s preference of a mode of life is a counterpart of his disposition.
But, as appears, only intercourse with good men benefits; on the other hand, the all-wise Instructor, by the mouth of Moses, recognising companionship with bad men as swinish, forbade the ancient people to partake of swine; to point out that those who call on God ought not to mingle with unclean men, who, like swine, delight in corporeal pleasures, in impure food, and in itching with filthy pruriency after the mischievous delights of lewdness.
Further, He says: “Thou art not to eat a kite or swift-winged ravenous bird, or an eagle,”[737] meaning: Thou shalt not come near men who gain their living by rapine. And other things also are exhibited figuratively.