The Greeks, too, were Aryans, and they were the most refined and Æsthetic nation of antiquity; yet we look in vain in their literature for delineations of that Romantic Love which, according to our notions, ought to accompany so high a degree of culture.

FAMILY AFFECTIONS

Conjugal tenderness and the other family affections appear; indeed, to have been known and cherished by the Greeks at all times, in the days of Athenian supremacy, when women were kept in entire seclusion, no less than in Homeric times, when they seem to have enjoyed more liberty of action. Plutarch tells us in his Conjugal Precepts that “With women tenderness of heart is indicated by a pleasing countenance, by sweetness of speech, by an affectionate grace, and by a high degree of sensitiveness;” and Mr. Lecky thus eloquently sums up the evidence that the Greeks appreciated the various forms of domestic affection:—

“The types of female excellence which are contained in the Greek poems, while they are among the earliest, are also among the most perfect in the literature of mankind. The conjugal tenderness of Hector and Andromache; the unwearied fidelity of Penelope, awaiting through the long revolving years the return of her storm-tossed husband, who looked forward to her as the crown of all his labours; the heroic love of Alcestis, voluntarily dying that her husband might live; the filial piety of Antigone; the majestic grandeur of the death of Polyxena; the more subdued and saintly resignation of Iphigenia, excusing with her last breath the father who had condemned her; the joyous, modest, and loving Nausicaa, whose figure shines like a perfect idyll among the tragedies of the Odyssey—all these are pictures of perennial beauty, which Rome and Christendom, chivalry and modern civilisation, have neither eclipsed nor transcended. Virgin modesty and conjugal fidelity, the graces as well as the virtues of the most perfect womanhood, have never been more exquisitely portrayed.”

NO LOVE-STORIES

But Mr. Lecky, ignoring, like most writers, the enormous difference between conjugal and romantic love, forgets to notice the absolute silence of Greek literature on the subject of pre-matrimonial infatuation. Not one of the Greek tragedies is a “love-drama”; romantic love does not appear even in the writings of Euripides, who has so much to say about women, and who named most of his plays after his heroines. Had Love been known to Sophokles and Euripides, as it was known to Shakspere and Goethe, we should no doubt have a Greek Romeo and Juliet and a Greek Faust. For although there were certain limitations as to the scope and the dramatis personÆ of a Greek play, there was nothing whatever to exclude a love-story. And when we consider how the sentiment of Love colours all modern literature; how almost impossible it is for a play or a novel to succeed unless it embodies a love-story: the absolute ignoring of this passion in Greek literature forces on us the inevitable conclusion that Romantic Love was unknown to them, or only so faintly developed as to excite no interest whatever.

And this conclusion harmonises with the dictum of the best Greek scholars. It is true that Becker, in his Charikles, referring to the frequency with which the comedians introduce a youth desperately enamoured of a girl, faintly objects to the statement that “There is no instance of an Athenian falling in love with a free-born woman, and marrying her from violent passion,”—made by MÜller in his famous work on the Dorians. But he makes the fatal admission that “Sensuality was the soil from which such passion sprang, and none other than a sensual love was acknowledged between man and wife.” No one, of course, would deny that sensual passion prevailed in Athens; but sensuality is the very antipode of Romantic Love.

How are we to account for this anomaly—the absence of sexual romance in a nation which was so passionately enamoured of Beauty in its various forms?

The answer is to be found in the non-existence of opportunities for courtship, and the degraded position of woman. The following sentences, culled at random from Becker’s classical work, show how the Greek men regarded their women, whom they considered inferior to themselves in heart as well as in intellect. Iphigenia herself is made to admit by Euripides that one man is worth more than a myriad of women:—

“The ??et? (virtue) of which a woman was thought capable in that age differed but little from that of a faithful slave.” “Except in her own immediate circle, a woman’s existence was scarcely recognised.” “It was quite a Grecian view of the case to consider a wife as a necessary evil.” "Athenians, in speaking of their wives and children, generally said t???a ?a? ???a??a?, putting their wives last: a phrase which indicates very clearly what was the tone of feeling on this subject" (Smith).

Women “were not allowed to conclude any bargain or transaction of consequence on their own account,” though Plato urged that this concession should be made to them; and it was even “enacted that everything a man did by the counsel or request of a woman should be null.” “There were no educational institutions for girls, nor any private teachers at home.” “Hence there were no scientifically-learned ladies, with the exception of the HetÆrÆ.”

CHAPERONAGE VERSUS COURTSHIP

In such an arid, rocky soil Love of course could not grow or even germinate. Still more fatal to the romantic passion, however, was the absolute seclusion of the sexes, precluding all possibility of courtship and free choice among the young. Greek women were not allowed to enjoy the society of men, nor to attend “those public spectacles which were the chief means of Athenian culture,” and which would have afforded the young folks an opportunity of seeing and falling in love with one another. The wife was not even permitted to eat with her husband if male visitors were present, but had to retire to her private apartments, so absurd was the jealousy of the men. “The maidens lived in the greatest seclusion till their marriage, and, so to speak, regularly under lock and key,” which had the “effect of rendering the girls excessively bashful, and even prudish,” and so stupid, in all probability, that no wonder the men considered marriage a punishment, and sought entertainment with the educated HetÆrÆ—as to-day in France. Even young married women were obliged to have a chaperon. “No respectable lady thought of going out without a female slave.” “Even the married woman shrank back and blushed if she chanced to be seen at the window by a man.”

PLATO ON COURTSHIP

It is one of the most remarkable facts in the history of Love and of social philosophy that Plato, the most modern of all ancient thinkers, foresaw the importance of pre-matrimonial acquaintance as the basis of a rational and happy marriage choice long before any other writer. Making allowance for the fact that Greek notions as to what is within “the rules of modesty” differed from our own, the following passage cannot be too deeply pondered: “People,” Plato tells us in the sixth book of the Laws (p. 771), “must be acquainted with those into whose families and to whom they marry and are given in marriage; in such matters as far as possible to avoid mistakes is all-important, and with this serious purpose let games be instituted, in which youths and maidens shall dance together, seeing and being seen naked, at a proper age and on a suitable occasion, not transgressing the rules of modesty.”

PARENTAL VERSUS LOVERS’ CHOICE

Marriages in Greece were often arranged for girls while they were mere children, of course without any reference to their choice, since they were looked upon as the property of the father, who could dispose of them at his pleasure. Besides these early betrothals there was an obstacle to free choice in the Athenian law which forbade a citizen under very severe penalties to marry a foreigner. And again, “In the case of a father dying intestate, and without male children, his heiress had no choice in marriage; she was compelled by law to marry her nearest kinsman, not in the ascending line.... Where there were several co-heiresses, they were respectively married to their kinsmen, the nearest having the first choice”—a law resembling one in the Jewish code, and exemplified by Ruth, as pointed out in Smith’s Dictionary.

How Sexual Selection was rendered impracticable in Greece is further shown in the following citations from Becker: “The choice of the bride seldom depended on previous, or at least on intimate acquaintance. More attention was generally paid to the position of a damsel’s family, and the amount of her dowry, than to her personal qualities.” "It was usual for a father to choose for his son a wife, and one perhaps whom the bridegroom had never seen." “Widows frequently married again; this was often in compliance with the testamentary dispositions of their husbands, as little regard being paid to their wishes as in the case of girls.”

Thus we see that three causes combined to prevent the growth of Romantic Love in Greece—the degraded position of women, the absence of direct Courtship, and the impossibility of exercising Individual Preference.

THE HETÆRÆ

That the absolute seclusion and chaperonage of the young women, and their consequent ignorance and insipidity, were the reasons why they could neither feel nor inspire Romantic Love, is shown by the fact that there existed in Greece in the time of Perikles a mentally superior class of women who appear to have aroused Love, or something very like it, by means of the artistic and intellectual charms which they united with their physical beauty. These women were called ?ta??a?, or companions, evidently to distinguish them from the domestic women who were no “companions” after the first charm of novelty had worn away: a state of affairs for which of course the men themselves, who gave them no education and locked them up, were to blame.

What seems paradoxical is that these women, who were morally inferior to the others, should have been the first to inspire in men a more refined sort of Love; but the paradox is rendered the more probable by the circumstance that in India, likewise, we found the first traces of Romantic Love among the Bayaderes, a class corresponding to the HetÆrÆ.

There is reason to believe that Aspasia, who aided the greatest statesman of antiquity in writing his stirring speeches, inspired not only him but other great contemporaries with true Romantic passion—which they were enabled to feel because men of genius are not only intellectually but also emotionally ahead of their time.

Diotima was another of these women. She was also revered as a prophetess, and is credited by Plato with having given Sokrates, and through him Greece, the first adequate discourse on Love—a discourse, we may add, in which some flashes of true modern insight are mingled with the curiously confused notions of the Greeks on the subject of Love and Friendship. What these notions were is best seen by briefly considering the peculiarities of

PLATONIC LOVE

On this subject the most incorrect and absurd notions universally pervade modern literature and conversation. As commonly understood, “Platonic Love” means a friendship between a man and a woman from which all traces of passion are excluded. Such a notion is utterly foreign to Plato’s way of thinking, and is nowhere referred to in his writings. Platonic love has nothing to do with women whatever. It is an attachment between a man and a youth, which may be defined as friendship united with the ecstatic ardour which in modern life is associated only with Romantic Love.

Mr. George Grote thus describes what he calls the “truly Platonic conception of love”. It is “a vehement impulse towards mental communion with some favoured youth, in view of producing mental improvement, good, and happiness to both persons concerned: the same impulse afterwards expanding, so as to grasp the good and beautiful in a larger sense, and ultimately to fasten on goodness and beauty in the pure Ideal.”

Once more, Platonic love might be defined as creative friendship, which has for its object the conception of great ideas,—of works of art, literature, philosophy. Such a friendship, Plato tells us, should be formed between a man and a youth, not too young, but when his beard begins to grow and his intellect to develop; and such a friendship is apt to last throughout life.

Perhaps the most striking instance in Greek literature of Platonic love is that given in Plato’s Symposium as existing between the pure-minded Sokrates, who kept aloof from all Greek vices, and the beautiful young Alkibiades. This youth thus describes the effect which the discourse of Sokrates has on him: “When I hear him, my heart leaps in my breast, more than it does among the Korybantes, and tears roll down my cheeks at his words, and I notice that many others have the same experience. When I heard Perikles and other excellent orators, I came to the conclusion that they spoke well; but this experience was different from the other, and my soul did not lose its control or gnash its teeth like a prostrate slave, but by this Marsyas (= Sokrates) I was put into such a mood that the condition in which I found myself did not seem praiseworthy.”

He further describes Sokrates as being always “in love with beautiful youths, and talking with them, and being quite beside himself”; hence when he (Alkibiades) appears at the Symposium, and finds Sokrates sitting next to the most beautiful man in the company, he chides him in words which have exactly the sound of Jealousy inspired by Romantic Love: “And why did you recline here and not next to Aristophanes, or some other wit, or would-be wit, but, instead, crowded forward in order to be next to the handsomest?”

To which Sokrates replies: “Agathon, come to my assistance; for my love for this person has cost me dearly. Ever since I have loved him, I have not been allowed to look at anybody, or to talk with any one who is beautiful, or else this youth, in his jealousy and envy, does unheard-of-things, and chides me, and hardly refrains from violence. Be on your guard, therefore, that he may not resort to violence now, and reconcile us, or if he dares to become unruly, assist me; for I very much fear his madness and infatuation.”

Although this was probably said in the playful tone common to Sokrates, it yet is noticeable how closely the language used resembles the language of modern Romantic Love.

SAPPHO AND FEMALE FRIENDSHIP

To this form of Platonic or mono-sexual love there existed a female counterpart, as shown in some of the lyric effusions of Greek poets. Some of these poets, it is true, especially Anakreon, knew naught of the imaginative side of Love—of its protracted tortures and intermittent joys. Like a butterfly that kisses every flower on its way, he “cared only for the enjoyment of the passing moment.” But Sappho apparently wrote of Love in terms worthy of Heine or Byron, as shown even in this crude translation of one of her poems:—

Longinus calls this the most perfect expression in all ancient literature of the effects of Love. It happens, however, to have nothing to do with Love. For, as Plato’s “love” is merely ecstatic friendship between man and youth, so Sappho’s love is friendship between two women. This is the opinion of Bode and MÜller, and it is entirely borne out by the language of the original text.

It has been suggested that Sappho, being a woman, and a Greek woman, could not have addressed such glowing words to a man without violating the current notions of decorum; and hence wrote as if she were a man addressing a woman. But Sappho was one of the Æolian women who had greater liberty than the Athenians; and she was, moreover, a blue-stocking who would not have stuck at such a trifle as shocking Greek notions regarding woman’s privileges. And in some of her poems she does mention a youth “to whom she gave her whole heart, while he requited her passion with cold indifference” (MÜller).

One of the Platonists, Maximus Tyrius (dis. 24, p. 297), takes the same view regarding Sappho. “The love of the Lesbian poet,” he says, “what can it be, if we may compare remote with more recent things than the Sokratic art of love? For both appear to promote the same Friendship, she among women, he among men. They both confess they love many, and are captivated by all beauties. For what Alkibiades and Charmides are to Sokrates, Gyrinna and Atthis and Anaktoria are to Sappho.” “Even Sokrates confesses that it was from Sappho that he partly derived his noble views of the enthusiastic love of mental beauty” (PhÆdon, c. 225).

To one of the girls just referred to, Sappho addresses these words: “Again does the strength-dissolving Eros, that bittersweet, resistless monster, agitate me; but to thee, O Atthis, the thought of me is importunate; thou fliest to Andromeda.” “It is obvious,” says MÜller, “that this attachment bears less the character of maternal interest than of passionate love; as amongst Dorians in Sparta and Crete analogous connections between men and youths, in which the latter were trained to noble and manly deeds, were carried on in a language of high-wrought and passionate feeling, which had all the character of an attachment between persons of different sexes. This mixture of feelings, which among nations of a calmer temperament have always been perfectly distinct, is an essential feature of the Greek character.”

Greek Love, i.e. Friendship, being thus tinged and strengthened, as we see in the cases of Sokrates and Alkibiades, Sappho and Atthis, by jealousy, ecstatic adoration, exclusiveness, admiration of personal beauty, and other qualities which modern civilisation has transferred to Romantic Love, we are enabled to understand why Friendship was so much more potent and prevalent in antiquity than it is now, when, having lost these traits through the differentiation of emotions, it seems “insipid to those who have tasted Love.”

The lesson to be learned from this whole discussion on Greek Friendship is of extreme importance to the psychology of Love. It is this: The Greeks were too intellectual and refined not to have at least a vague presentiment of the higher possibilities and charms of imaginative Love. But Greek women—with the rare exceptions referred to—were too stupid to enable the men to realise their vague ideal. Hence they sought it in ardent attachments to youths, who were quick-minded and able to sympathise with their intellectual aspirations. And thus Greek Love became identical with male friendship—the female friendship referred to being a sort of compensating echo.

Greek Love is symbolised in the mythic youth Narcissus, who scorns all the beautiful nymphs that are eager for his caresses, and falls in love with his own image reflected in the water.

GREEK BEAUTY

It even seems as if, apart from Love, the Greeks admired youthful masculine beauty more than feminine charms; and many of them would probably have agreed with Schopenhauer that men are more beautiful than women. Certain it is that, as the most eminent critic of Greek art, Winckelmann, points out “the supreme beauty of Greek art is male rather than female.”

The following citation from Grote’s famous work on Plato suggests some reasons for this fact, besides reflecting further light on points discussed in the preceding pages:—

“In the Hellenic point of view, upon which Plato builds, the attachment of man to woman was regarded as a natural impulse and as a domestic, social sentiment; yet as belonging to a commonplace rather than to an exalted mind, and seldom or never rising to that pitch of enthusiasm which overpowers all other emotions, absorbs the whole man, and aims either at the joint performance of great exploits, or the joint prosecution of intellectual improvement by continued colloquy. We must remember that the wives and daughters of citizens were seldom seen abroad; that she had learned nothing except spinning and weaving; that the fact of her having seen so little and heard as little as possible, was considered as rendering her more acceptable to her husband; that her sphere of duty and exertion was confined to the interior of the family. The beauty of women yielded satisfaction to the senses, but little beyond. It was the masculine beauty of youth that fired the Hellenic imagination with glowing and impassioned sentiment. The finest youths, and those, too, of the best families and education, were seen habitually uncovered in the PalÆstra and at the public festival-matches; engaged in active contention and graceful exercise, under the direction of professional trainers. The sight of the living form in such perfection, movement, and variety, awakened a powerful emotional sympathy, blended with Æsthetic sentiment, which in the more susceptible natures was exalted into intense and passionate devotion. The terms in which this feeling is described, both by Plato and Xenophon, are among the strongest which the language affords—and are predicated even of Sokrates himself. Far from being ashamed of this feeling, they consider it admirable and beneficial, though very liable to abuse, which they emphatically denounce and forbid. In their view it was an idealising passion, which tended to raise a man above the vulgar and selfish pursuits of life, and even above the fear of death. The devoted attachments which it inspired were dreaded by the despots, who forbade the assemblage of youths for exercise in the PalÆstra.”

Another reason for the Greek preference of masculine beauty is suggested by Mr. Lecky, who attributes it to the fact that the principal art of the Greeks, sculpture, is “especially suited to represent male beauty, or the beauty of strength”; whereas “female beauty, or the beauty of softness,” became the principal object of the painters, after Christianity had won attention for the feminine virtues of gentleness and delicacy. (For further remarks on Greek Beauty, see the chapters on “Four Sources of Beauty,” and “The Nose.”)

CUPID’S ARROWS

Possibly some of my readers have not yet quieted all their doubts regarding the existence of real Love among the Greeks; for did they not have special deities of love—Aphrodite and Eros, Venus and Cupid? Quite so; but those familiar with Greek history know that the cult of Venus had but a remote connection with imaginative or Romantic Love, which alone is here under consideration. Yet our modern poets owe a vast debt of gratitude to the ancient bards for these mythic deities, whom they have simply taken and idealised, like Love itself. There is, especially, the mischievous Dan Cupid, who, in his modern metamorphosis, is still “the anointed sovereign of sighs and groans.” This little fellow seems to have been taken very seriously indeed by the earliest Greeks. He has one attribute—wings—which we readily understand, as Love is inconstant ever; but another of his attributes would excite the greatest surprise in our minds were we not so accustomed to it as to accept it as a matter of course, namely, his arrows. It would seem more in accordance with modern notions that he should produce his magic effects by means of Love-potions or other Love-charms, rather than with such a warlike weapon as an arrow.

A German feuilletonist, Dr. Michael Haberlandt, has lately advanced an ingenious theory to account for this weapon. The ancient Greeks had the peculiar belief that all diseases were caused by the invisible poisoned arrows of evil or angry deities; as in the well-known case of the offended Apollo sending his pest-laden arrows among the Hellenes. Now love, in the irresistible and maddening, though primitive form known to the early Greeks, was doubtless looked on as a real, mysterious affliction, and not merely as love sickness in the figurative modern sense: what more natural therefore than to attribute it to the arrows of a mischievous deity?

In course of time poetic fancy added to the image of Cupid other attributes that naturally suggested themselves: the wings to symbolise fickleness; a bandage to indicate blindness; while the arrows were represented as dipped in poison, gall, or honey. The curious fact may be added that the ancient East Indians, whose deities numbered 330,000,000 (in round numbers), likewise had a god of love armed with bow and arrows: a conception which they seem to have originated independently of the Greeks.

ORIGIN OF LOVE

Plato’s Symposium contains two curious theories of the cause and origin of love, which, in conclusion, may be briefly summarised, as they help to characterise Greek notions on this subject. The first is placed in the mouth of Sokrates, who says he heard it of the Hetaira Diotima. What, she asks, is the cause of this love-sickness, this anxiety of men and animals, first to get a mate, and then to take care of the offspring? It is, she replies, the desire to perpetuate themselves. For just as the famous heroes and heroines—Alkestis, Achilles, Kadros—would not have so nobly sacrificed their lives had they not been sustained by the thought that their fame and glory would survive among future generations; so the fact that parents in the affection for their young will even go so far as to sacrifice their own lives to protect them, is due to their craving for immortality in their offspring.

This theory may be regarded as a vague foreshadowing of Schopenhauer’s, which will be considered in another place.

The second theory of the origin of love is attributed by Plato to Aristophanes, who relates it in the form of a myth. Human nature, he begins, was not always as it is now. At the beginning there were three sexes: one, the male, descended of the sun-god; the second, female, descended of the earth; and the third, which united the attributes of both sexes, descended of the moon. Each of these beings, moreover, had two pairs of hands and legs, and two faces, and the figure was round, and in rapid motion revolved like a wheel, the pairs of legs alternately touching the ground and describing an arc in the air.

These beings were fierce, powerful, and vain, so they attempted to storm heaven and attack the gods. As Zeus did not wish to destroy them—since that would have deprived him of sacrifices and other forms of human devotion—he resolved to punish them by diminishing their strength. So he directed Apollo to cut each of them into two, which was done; and thus the number of human beings was doubled. Each of these half-beings now continually wandered about, seeking its other half. And when they found each other, their only desire was to be reunited by Vulcan and never be parted again. “And this longing and striving after union—this is what is meant by the name of Love.”

The waggish Aristophanes appends a caution to human beings not to offend Zeus again, because it was that god’s intention, on a repetition of the offence, to split human beings once more, so that they would have to hop about on one leg!

One of the metaphors used by the comic poet is very pretty, even if translated into terms of Modern Love. He compares the two divided halves of one human being to the dice which among the ancients were used as marks of hospitality, being broken into two pieces, of which each person received one, and which were afterwards fitted together in token of recognition. A pair of lovers, then, are like these halved dice, naturally belonging to each other, and craving to be reunited.