Aristophanes

“ PRAXAGORA: The ugliest and the most flat-nosed will be side by side with the most charming, and to win the latter's favours, a man will first have to get into the former.
BLEPYRUS: But what about us oldsters? If we have to lay the old women first, how can we keep our tools from failing before we get into the Promised Land?
PRAXAGORA: They will make no resistance. Never fear; they will make no resistance. ”

“ Don't be jealous of the young girls; voluptuousness resides in the pure outline of their beautiful limbs and blossoms on their rounded breasts; but you, old woman, you who are tricked out and perfumed as if for your own funeral, are an object of love only for grim Death himself. ”

“ As for myself, I am going to slip quietly into the house and replace my husband's cloak and other gear where I took them from, before he can suspect anything.
LEADER OF THE CHORUS: There! it's done according to your bidding. Now tell us how we can be of service to you, so that we may show you our obedience, for we have never seen a cleverer woman than you.
PRAXAGORA: Wait! I only wish to use the power given me in accordance with your wishes; for, in the market-place, in the midst of the shouts and danger, I appreciated your indomitable courage. ”

“ Thus ugly Lysicrates' nose will be as proud as the handsomest face?
PRAXAGORA: Yes, by Apollo! this is a truly popular decree, and what a set-back it will be for one of those elegants with their fingers loaded with rings, when a man with heavy shoes says to him, "Give way to me and wait till I have done; you will pass in before me."
BLEPYRUS: But if we live in this fashion, how will each one know his children?
PRAXAGORA: The youngest will look upon the oldest as their fathers. ”

“ Turn round, examine everywhere and keep a good look-out; be on your guard against every trick, for they might spy on us from behind. Let us make as much noise as possible as we tramp. It would be a disgrace for all of us if we allowed ourselves to be caught in this deed by the men. Come, wrap yourselves up well, and search both right and left, so that no mischance may happen to us. Let us hasten our steps; here we are close to the meeting-place whence we started for the Assembly, and here is the house of our leader, the author of this bold scheme, which is now decreed by all the citizens. ”

“ The Ecclesiazusæ is, like the Lysistrata, a picture of woman's ascendency, but one much more depraved than the other. In the dress of men the women steal into the public assembly, and by means of the majority of voices which they have thus surreptitiously obtained, they decree a new constitution, in which there is to be a community of goods and of women. ”

“ Ah! how heartily they will strangle all the old men, since even now, when each one knows his father, they make no bones about strangling him! then, my word! won't they just scorn and crap upon the old folks! ”

“ FIRST OLD WOMAN singing again: May your tongue be stopped; may you be unable to find your couch when you want to be loved. And on your couch, when your lips seek a lover, may you embrace only a viper!
YOUNG GIRL singing again: Alas! alas! what is to become of me? There is no lover! I am left here alone; my mother has gone out.
Interrupting her song
There's no need to mention the rest.
Then singing again
Oh! my dear nurse, I adjure you to call Orthagoras, and may heaven bless you. Ah! poor child, desire is consuming you like an Ionian woman ”

“ These young things know nothing about it; it's only the women of ripe age who understand the art of love, and no one could know how to fondle the lover who possessed me so well as myself; the young girls are all flightiness. ”

“ PRAXAGORA: The poor will no longer be obliged to work; each will have all that he needs, bread, salt fish, cakes, tunics, wine, chaplets and chick-pease; of what advantage will it be to him not to contribute his share to the common wealth? ”

“ Let us not lose a moment in taking off our false beards, for we might be recognized and denounced. Let us stand under the shadow of this wall; let us glance round sharply with our eye to beware of surprises, while we quickly resume our ordinary dress. ”

“ But when the thing was looked at closely, it was seen that this fine decree was mere moonshine and would produce nothing, and you would have willingly burnt this very same Euripides alive.
CHREMES: The cases are quite different, my good fellow. We were the rulers then, but now it's the women.
CITIZEN: Whom, by Posidon, I will never allow to piss on my nose.
CHREMES: I don't know what the devil you're chattering about. Slave, pick up that bundle.
HERALD a woman: Let all citizens come, let them hasten at our leader's bidding! It is the new law. The lot will teach each citizen where he is to dine ”

“ By Posidon! that's grand, if it's true!
PRAXAGORA: I shall prove it and you shall be my witness and even he
pointing to BLEPYRUS
will have no objections to raise.
CHORUS singing: You have served your friends, but now it behooves you to apply your ability and your care to the welfare of the people. Devote the fecundity of your mind to the public weal; adorn the citizens' lives with a thousand enjoyments and teach them to seize every favorable opportunity. Devise some ingenious method to secure the much-needed salvation of Athens ”

“ Therefore it is difficult to advise men so hard to please as you, who are afraid of those who wish to love you, but those who are not willing you constantly supplicate. There was a time when we did not make use of Assemblies at all, but considered Agyrrhius [76] a villain. But now, when we do make use of them, he who has received money praises the custom above measure; but he who has not received, says that those who seek to receive pay in the Assembly are worthy of death. ”

“ What? give up your goods! Is there a man of sense who will do such a thing? Giving is not one of our customs. Receiving is another matter; it's the way of the gods themselves. Look at the position of their hands on their statues; when we ask a favour, they present their hands turned palm up so as not to give, but to receive.
CHREMES: Wretch, let me do what is right. Come, I'll make a bundle of all these things. Where is my strap?
CITIZEN: Are you really going to carry them in?
CHREMES: Undoubtedly, and there are my two tripods strung together already.
CITIZEN: What folly! ”

“ Ah! here is our leader, returning from the Assembly. Hasten to relieve your chins of these flowing manes. Look at your comrades yonder; they have already made themselves women again some while ago.
They remove the beards as PRAXAGORA and the other women enter from the right through the Orchestra.
PRAXAGORA: Friends, success has crowned our plans. But off with these cloaks and these boots quick, before any man sees you; unbuckle the Laconian straps and get rid of your staffs ”

“ And the ugly men, watching closely after the handsome fellows will say, "Hi! friend, where are you running to? Go in, but you must do nothing; it's the ugly and the flat-nosed to whom the law gives the right to make love first; amuse yourself on the porch while you wait, in handling your fig-leaves and playing with yourself." Well, tell me, does that picture suit you?
BLEPYRUS AND CHREMES: Marvellously well.
PRAXAGORA: I must now go to the market-place to receive the property that is going to be placed in common and to choose a woman with a loud voice as my herald. ”

“ Loose paraphrases of difficult Greek authors,—of which the world has more than enough already,—would be any thing but new, while an attempt to improve the author by substituting modern conceits, or fanciful interpretations, whenever the quaintness or freedom of the original appeared likely to offend the reader, would be inconsistent with his professed object. ”

“ PRAXAGORA: Even if you sleep outdoors there will be no more danger, for all will have the means of living. Besides, if anyone wanted to steal your cloak, you would give it to him yourself. Why not? You will only have to go to the common store and be given a better one. ”

“ And you, my tripod, bear this urn for me; you shall be the water-bearer; and you, cock, whose morning song has so often roused me in the middle of the night to send me hurrying to the Assembly, you shall be my flute-girl. Scaphephorus, do you take the large basin, place it in the honeycombs and twine the olive-branches over them, bring the tripods and the phial of perfume; as for the humble crowd of little poets, I will just leave them behind.
CITIZEN watching CHREMES from a distance: What folly to carry one's goods to the common store ”

“ PRAXAGORA: But those around will prevent it. Hitherto, when anyone saw an old man beaten, he would not meddle, because it did not concern him; but now each will fear the sufferer may be his own father and such violence will be stopped. ”

“ Chorus. It is time for us to advance, O men,—for this [113] we ought mindfully to be always repeating, so that it may never escape [114] our memories. For the danger is not trifling, if we be caught entering upon so great an enterprise in secret. Let us go to the Assembly, O men; for the Thesmothetes threatened, that whoever should not come at dawn very early, in haste, looking sharp and sour, content [115] with garlic-pickle, he would not give him the three obols. ”

“ For you have Laconian shoes, and staffs, and your husbands' garments, as we ordered.
6th Wom. I secretly brought away this club of [25] Lamia's as he was sleeping.
Prax. This is one of those clubs, under whose [26] weight he fizzles.
6th Wom. By Jupiter the Preserver, [27] he would be a fit person, if there ever was one, to cheat [28] the commonwealth, clothed in the leathern garment of Argus.
Prax. But come! so that we may also transact what is next, whilst [29] the stars are still in the heavens; for the assembly, to which we are prepared to go, will take place with the dawn. ”

“ Well done, O sweetest Praxagora, and cleverly! Whence, you rogue, did you learn this so prettily?
Prax. During the flight [96] I dwelt with my husband in the Pnyx; and then I learnt by hearing the orators.
1st Wom. No wonder then, my dear, you are [97] clever and wise: and we [98] women elect you as general on the spot, if you will effect these things, which you have in your mind. But if Cephalus [99] should be unlucky enough to meet [100] and insult you, how will you reply to him in the Assembly? ”

“ Blep. By Bacchus, neither could I my Laconian shoes! but as I wanted to ease myself, I put my feet into my wife's buskins and am hastening, in order that I might [141] not do it in the blanket, for it was clean-washed. [142]
Neigh. What then can it be? Has some woman among her friends invited her to breakfast?
Blep. In my [143] opinion it is so. She's certainly not an ill body, as far [144] as I know.
Neigh. Come, you are as long about it as the rope of a draw-well. [145] It is time for me to go to the Assembly, if I find my garment, the only one I had. ”

“ Epicrates was remarkable for a bushy beard; hence Plato, the comic poet, nicknamed him σακεσφόρος. "Epicrates 'of the beard' had been a popular character since his participation in the expedition of Thrasybulus, for the liberation of the city. He understood how to make a right good use of this position. His and Phormisius' embassy to the court of Susa, gave occasion to a special comedy of Plato, the comic poet." Droysen. ↑ "Pherecrates, the comic poet, said of the hobgoblin Lamia, that it puffs with heaving its club. ”

“ Prax. "Carded," quoth 'a! you who ought to exhibit no part of your person to the meeting! [Turning to the others.] Therefore we should be finely off, if [34] the Assembly chanced to be full, and then some of us strode over and took up her dress [35] and exhibited her Phormisius. [36] Now if we take our seats first, we shall escape observation when we have wrapped our garments close round us: and when we let our beards hang down, which we will tie on there, who would not think us men on seeing us? At any rate Agyrrhius' [37] has the beard of Pronomus, without being noticed. ”

“ That of Voss has been less available, being so absolutely literal as often to be more difficult than the Greek itself. Droysen, on the contrary, being expressed in easy idiomatic language, may be understood by any one who can read German at all. In conclusion, it only remains to observe, that three of the plays now offered to the public, the Lysistrata, Thesmophoriazusæ, and Ecclesiazusæ, have never before appeared in English prose. ”

“ Come now, do you tie yours on, and quickly become a man: and I myself also, when I have placed the chaplets, [46] will tie on my beard along with you, if it should seem proper to me to make any speech. [47]
2nd Wom. Come hither, dearest Praxagora, see, you rogue, how laughable even the affair seems.
Prax. How laughable?
2nd Wom. Just as if one were to tie a beard on fried cuttle-fish. [48]
Prax. Purifier, [49] you must carry round—the cat. [50] Come forward to the front! [51] Ariphrades, [52] cease talking! Come forward and sit down! [Here the women mimic the ceremonies of the lustration.] ”