Oration 21

Dio. How tall the youth is, and how comely; and besides, his form is of the ancient cast, such as I have not seen among the men of today, but only among the very old statues dedicated at Olympia. The images of later men appear ever worse and of meaner make—partly through the craftsmen, but more because the men themselves are such.—Truly you say a strange thing, if the beautiful have died out with time, like some plant or animal—as they say the lions in Europe have suffered, for their race is no longer there, though formerly they were both about Macedonia and in other places—if thus beauty has indeed departed from among men.—

Dio. Manly beauty, my good sir, at least; though the womanish kind perhaps abounds. A handsome man is rarely born now, and when born he escapes the notice of most—much more than handsome horses escape the muleteers. And if they should lay hold of such, it is with violence and to no good end; so that even those born, it seems to me, quickly cease and vanish away. For not only is virtue increased by praise, but beauty too, by those who honour and revere it; whereas, neglected, with no one looking to it, or with base men looking, it is quenched, like mirrors.—Should we, then, do as the Athenians often did, and record the present time as an "anarchy"—as though there were no handsome man?—

Dio. Yes, by Zeus, except in the way the Persians, at least, judged; and of the Greeks no one, or if any, one of the Thirty. Or do you not know about Critias, one of the Thirty, that he said the fairest form in males was the female, and again in females the contrary? And so the Athenians justly chose him for their lawgiver—at least for re-writing the ancient laws—who left none of them untouched.—Well; and how did the Persians judge?

—Dio. Is it not plain, when they made eunuchs of the handsome, that they might be as fair as possible for them? So far did they think the female surpassed in beauty. And well-nigh all the barbarians do likewise, just as the other animals do, because they have in mind only the pleasures of love. As, then, Daedalus is said to have made the bull, deceiving Pasiphae, by stretching the hide of a cow over wood, so those men put round the males the form of a woman, and otherwise do not know how to love.

And perhaps the nurture too is a cause among the Persians—their being reared a long time by women and by the elder eunuchs, while boys do not much consort with boys nor youths with youths, nor strip in the wrestling-schools and gymnasia. Whence I think it has come about with them to lie with their mothers; just as colts, when, being now grown larger, they still follow their mothers, seek to mount them.

And here too, the matter of nurture shows its strength. For a horse is far fairer than an ass, yet asses do not desire mares, because of their nature, unless one has been reared on mare's milk; and likewise a horse, reared as a colt by an ass, suffers the same. But among men even power is a lawless thing. Nero, at any rate, we all know in our own time, that he not only castrated his beloved, but even changed his name to a woman's—that of his own beloved and wife, whom that man, having desired, married, openly having shut away the former wife, for whose sake he had received the kingship.—

And what was the name of the woman, which he gave to the eunuch?—Dio. What is that to you? For it was certainly not Rhodogune that he was called. But that man even parted the hair on his head, and waiting-maids attended him whenever he walked, and he was clad in woman's raiment, and was forced to do the rest in that fashion; and at last great honours and boundless wealth were set forth, for whoever should make him a woman.—Did they, then, even promise it?

Dio. Why should they not promise so much to one who gave so greatly? Or do you not know how great the power of the giver is? Since indeed, even when they must declare a king, they choose the wealthiest, and the one from whom they hope to receive the most silver, and care nothing else what manner of man he may be, even if, having taken over the rule, he is going to cut them all to pieces—both all the rest and those very men who have received the money—and besides will strip them of all their possessions.

In this Nero most of all abounded, and no one contradicted him about anything he said, nor said that what he commanded was impossible; so that, not even if he should bid a man fly, but he promised him even this, and for a long time was kept indoors with him in the palace, as one who was going to fly. For he alone in no way spared money, neither giving nor receiving. Yet through this outrage alone, the one against the eunuch, he even died. For, angered, he disclosed his plans to those about him; and so they revolted from him and forced him in some way to perish.

For not even now is this clear; since, for all the rest, nothing prevented him from reigning the whole time—which even now all still desire to live. And most men even think, although in a manner he died not once but many times, along with those who very strongly believed him to be alive.—You are always finding out arguments to disparage the affairs of men, and now from nothing, so to speak, you have come to these things. But what I wished to ask, you did not let me.

—Dio. Perhaps you despise me and think I am talking nonsense, because I do not speak about Cyrus and Alcibiades, like the wise men, even now, but of Nero and such recent and inglorious affairs as I mention. And the cause of this is that I do not very much love nor emulate the tragedians; since I know that it is unseemly in tragedy to name those now living, but there is need of some ancient matter, and that not very credible either. The men of former times, then, were not ashamed to name those then living, both in speech and in writing; but those of today seek by all means to name those ancients.

And by what wisdom they do this I will tell you—and do not say that I talk nothing but nonsense; though perhaps I am far from it—for surely you have paid attention to one of the booksellers.—Why do you ask me this?—Dio. Because, knowing that the ancient books are sought after, as better written and on better paper, they take the basest of the books of today and steep them in grain, that the colour at least may become like the old ones, and, spoiling them besides, sell them as ancient.

But what was it that you have long been eager to ask?—About this youth, who he is and whose son; for I was never so astounded at anyone. For his age shows him a boy of perhaps sixteen or seventeen years, but his stature inferior to none of the men; and his modesty is so great that it makes even the one who approaches feel modest at once. And it is not possible to look upon his face for long, unless he too should chance to look away. For no one is so shameless nor so stony as to endure and to stand against looking at him, but at once one must turn and shift one's eyes. And this experience I greatly marvel at, that beauty, if it be accompanied by modesty, turns even the shameless and forces them to feel modest.—

Dio. Perhaps you have not noticed what happens in the waters.—How so?—Dio. That, when the sun shines upon them, it shines back most against the point directly opposite. And perhaps you have seen on walls the moving and running light, not real, but produced from the gleam of the sun in the water toward the point most directly opposite. Such a thing, then, shines back also from true modesty, and makes those who behold seem to feel modest; then, having gone away straightway, they are shameless.—As to me, even the trainer seemed to be, as it were, inspired and astounded.—

Dio. Then you will marvel still more, when you learn that this youth, being such, is no one's son.—How do you say he is no one's?—Dio. In the way that you asked whose he is. For I think you are asking whose son he is.—But is he one of the Sown men?—Dio. It would suit his stature and his manliness, if indeed they were fair and kindly in their natures, as this youth is, and not utterly hard and savage, the children of the earth; since, as for the body, you do not ill liken it, in likening it to a Boeotian rather than to a Laconian and an Attic one. For that he is supremely Greek there is surely no need to be in doubt.—

Why, then? Could there be any difference of race as regards beauty? Or do you think no one is born beautiful among the barbarians?—Dio. But do you not think that there is one kind of form and beauty that is barbarian, and another that is Greek—just as language too and dress—or do Achilles and Hector seem to you to have been beautiful alike?—Does not the poet recount Hector only as being manly?—Dio. Inasmuch as he burns the ships; for it was not fitting, I think, to make any mention of his beauty. But when he is dead and stripped, he says that the Achaeans, beholding, were astonished at his beauty, speaking somewhat thus: "and they gazed in wonder at the stature and the marvellous form of Hector."

For they had no leisure before, I think, to gaze upon him exactly; and the rest he recounts well-nigh more clearly than about any other of the fairest. For he says that his head was graceful and his hair very black and his body not hard. But about the form of Achilles he says nothing in detail, save of the hair, that he was fair-haired; and about the hair of Euphorbus and Patroclus, as having died in the very prime; and about the rest, a little about each, both men and women of the fairest. Only that no one would say that these were beautiful alike—neither Alexander or Euphorbus or Troilus to resemble at all Menelaus and Patroclus and Nireus; nor among the barbarians Sesostris the Egyptian, or Memnon the Ethiopian, or Ninyas or Eurypylus or Pelops.