"And are we two not come together," I continued, "for a closer partnership, being each a sharer in the other's body?"
"That, at any rate, is what folk say," she answered.
"Then as regards this bodily relation," I proceeded, "should you regard me as more lovable or less did I present myself, my one endeavour and my sole care being that my body should be hale and strong and thereby well complexioned, or would you have me first anoint myself with pigments, (8) smear my eyes with patches (9) of 'true flesh colour,' (10) and so seek your embrace, like a cheating consort presenting to his mistress's sight and touch vermillion paste instead of his own flesh?"
(8) "Red lead."
(9) Cf. Aristoph. "Ach." 1029.
(10) {andreikelon}. Cf. Plat. "Rep." 501 B, "the human complexion";
"Crat." 424 E.
"Frankly," she answered, "it would not please me better to touch paste than your true self. Rather would I see your own 'true flesh colour' than any pigment of that name; would liefer look into your eyes and see them radiant with health than washed with any wash, or dyed with any ointment there may be."
"Believe the same, my wife, of me then," Ischomachus continued (so he told me); "believe that I too am not better pleased with white enamel or with alkanet than with your own natural hue; but as the gods have fashioned horses to delight in horses, cattle in cattle, sheep in their fellow sheep, so to human beings the human body pure and undefiled is sweetest; (11) and as to these deceits, though they may serve to cheat the outside world without detection, yet if intimates try to deceive each other, they must one day be caught; in rising from their beds, before they make their toilet; by a drop of sweat they stand convicted; tears are an ordeal they cannot pass; the bath reveals them as they truly are."
(11) See "Mem." II. i. 22.
What answer (said I) did she make, in Heaven's name, to what you said?
What, indeed (replied the husband), save only, that thenceforward she never once indulged in any practice of the sort, but has striven to display the natural beauty of her person in its purity. She did, however, put to me a question: Could I advise her how she might become not in false show but really fair to look upon?
This, then, was the counsel which I gave her, Socrates: Not to be for ever seated like a slave; (12) but, with Heaven's help, to assume the attitude of a true mistress standing before the loom, and where her knowledge gave her the superiority, bravely to give the aid of her instruction; where her knowledge failed, as bravely try to learn. I counselled her to oversee the baking woman as she made the bread; to stand beside the housekeeper as she measured out her stores; to go tours of inspection to see if all things were in order as they should be. For, as it seemed to me, this would at once be walking exercise and supervision. And, as an excellent gymnastic, I recommended her to knead the dough and roll the paste; to shake the coverlets and make the beds; adding, if she trained herself in exercise of this sort she would enjoy her food, grow vigorous in health, and her complexion would in very truth be lovelier. The very look and aspect of the wife, the mistress, seen in rivalry with that of her attendants, being as she is at once more fair (13) and more beautifully adorned, has an attractive charm, (14) and not the less because her acts are acts of grace, not services enforced. Whereas your ordinary fine lady, seated in solemn state, would seem to court comparison with painted counterfeits of womanhood.