Of sin and trouble and untowardness,
That love is folly, friendship but a snare?
Prit, cow! this is no time for laziness!
The cud thou chewest is not what it seems!
Get up and moo! Tear ‘round and quit thy dreams!
Xanthippe Vindicated
The admirers of Sorosis have waited patiently for that sisterhood to discuss and vindicate the character of that long maligned and grossly misunderstood victim of history, Xanthippe. But Sorosis procrastinates, and fails to declare that Socrates would have tried any woman’s temper.
Xanthippe has been called a shrew, a harridan, a scold, a virago, a termagant. Her temper has been represented as hasty, and her poor, patient husband, Socrates, has commanded not only respect for his genius, but pity for his domestic woes. It is extraordinary that such a misconception of the facts arose. It is remarkable that hitherto not one apologist for Xanthippe has arisen.
But the champion of woman, of womanhood—yea, even of woman’s rights—cannot study the facts preserved in history concerning this ill-assorted pair without perceiving the gross injustice done to a simple-minded and worthy dame. Reduced to its simplest terms, our proposition is that Xanthippe lived and died a victim to the Socratic method.
Ladies, put yourselves in her place. Married to an ugly man in the bloom of her youthful beauty,—to a man conspicuously ugly, with a flat nose, thick lips, bulging eyes, so ugly that the handsome Alcibiades compared him to Silenus,—we see at the outset that it was clearly a mariage de convenance. Think of the discoveries the poor girl made after the wedding! Her homely husband refused to wear shoes or stockings when the courting days had passed. He not only never dressed for dinner, but even refused to change his clothes at all, day in and day out. Having once secured a housekeeper he rarely stayed at home, was constantly off in the city, loafing in the market-place, disputing with every comer. He had given up his trade as a sculptor as soon as he had her dowry to spend, and spent his time gadding about with young men and neglecting the proud, fair girl at home.