in that noble passage of Ovid, already quoted, where Jupiter, as his divine synod are looking down on the funeral pyre of Hercules, thus triumphs—
| Nic nisi maternâ Vulcanum parte potentem. | |
| Sentiet. Aeternum est, à me quod traxit, et expers | |
| Atque immune necis, nullaque domabile flamma | |
| Idque ego defunctum terrâ cœlestibus oris | |
| Accipiam, cunctisque meum lætabile factum | |
| Dis fore confido. | |
| “ | The part alone of gross maternal frame |
| Fire shall devour, while that from me he drew | |
| Shall live immortal and its force renew; | |
| That, when he's dead, I'll raise to realms above; | |
| Let all the powers the righteous act approve.” |
It is indeed a god speaking of his union with an earthly woman, but it expresses the common Roman thought as to marriage, the same which permitted a man to lend his wife to a friend, as if she were a chattel.
“She dwelt but in the suburbs of his good pleasure.”
Yet the same city as I have said leaned on the worship of Vesta, the Preserver, and in later times was devoted to that of Isis. In Sparta, thought, in this respect as in all others, was expressed in the characters of real life, and the women of Sparta were as much Spartans as the men. The citoyen, citoyenne of France was here actualized. Was not the calm equality they enjoyed as honorable as the devotion of chivalry? They intelligently shared the ideal life of their nation.
Like the men they felt
“Honor gone, all's gone,
Better never have been born.”
