Erasmus: de Laude Matrimonii

Quanquam pro tua singulari sapientia, ipse abunde per te sapis affinis iucundissime, nec alienis eges consiliis, tamen hoc uel ueteri nostrae amicitiae, quae ab ipsis prope cunabulis una cum aetate nobis accreuit, uel tuis summis in me ofhciis, uel arctissimae denique affinitati debere me putaui, si is esse uellem, quem tu me semper existimasti uirum et amicum et gratum, ut id quod ad tuam tuorumque salutem ac dignitatem plurimurn interesse iudicassem, te libenter ac libere admonerem. Aliena nonnunquam rectius quam nostra perspicimus. Tuum consilium meis in rebus persaepe sum secutus, neque minus felix mihi comperi quam erat amicum.

Although, by reason of your singular sapience, you yourself are abundantly wise, most pleasant kinsman by affinity, nor do you need others’ counsels, nevertheless I thought I owed this either to our old friendship, which from almost our very cradles grew together with our age, or to your highest services toward me, or, finally, to our most close affinity—if I wished to be the man whom you have always judged me to be, a man and a friend and a grateful one—, that, in what I had judged to concern very greatly your and your household’s welfare and dignity, I should gladly and freely admonish you. We sometimes perceive others’ affairs more rightly than our own. Your counsel in my affairs I have very often followed, nor have I found it less fortunate for me than it was friendly.

Nunc si uicissim in tuis meum sequi uoles, futurum arbitror ut neque me suasisse, neque te poeniteat paruisse.

Now, if in turn in your affairs you will wish to follow my counsel, I think it will come about that neither I shall repent of having advised, nor you of having obeyed.

Cenauit apud me sexto Mus Apriles, cura in uilla montana essem, Antonius Baldus, homo, ut scis, tuarum rerum studiosissimus, generique tuo iam inde ab initio coniunctissimus. Triste plenumque lachrymarum conuiuium. Nunciabat mihi magno utriusque dolore, maitrem tuam, foeminam integerrimam, e uiuis concessisse; sororem tuam luctu ac desiderio uictam, sterilitati dicatarum uirginum choro asscriptam esse, ad te unum spem stirpis tuae redisse, amicos summo consensu tibi puellam summo genere natam, forma praestanti, optime moratam, postremo tui amantissimam, summa cum dote obtulisse; te uero nescio qua seu doloris impotentia, seu religione, ita celibatum decreuisse ut nec generis studio, nec sobolis amore, nec amicorum ullis, aut monitis, aut precibus, aut lachrymis abduci possis a sententia.

He dined at my house on the sixth of April, while I was at the mountain villa, Antonius
Baldus, a man, as you know, most devoted to your affairs, and from the very beginning most
closely connected to your son-in-law. A sad and tear-filled banquet. He was announcing to
me, with great grief on the part of both, that your mother, a woman of utmost integrity, had
departed from among the living; that your sister, overcome by grief and longing, had been
enrolled in the choir of virgins dedicated to sterility; that to you alone the hope of your
lineage had returned; that your friends, with the highest unanimity, had offered to you a girl
born of the highest lineage, outstanding in form, of the best manners, and finally most loving
toward you, with the highest dowry; but that you, indeed, by I know not what—either the
ungovernableness of grief or religious scruple—had so decreed celibacy that neither by zeal
for your lineage, nor by love of offspring, nor by any admonitions or prayers or tears of your
friends could you be drawn away from your resolve.

Tu tamen uel me autore, menteur istam mutabis, et celibatu relicto, sterili ac parum humano uitae instituto, sanctissimo coniugio indulgebis. Qua in te neque tuorum charitatem, quae tamen alioquin animum tuum uincere debebat, neque autoritatem quicquam mihi prodesse cupio, nisi clarissimis rationibus ostendero id fore tibi longe tutu honestius, tutu utilius, tum iucundius, quid quod etiam hoc tempore necessarium.

Yet you, even with me as author, will change that mind, and, celibacy left behind, a sterile and rather inhuman institution of life, you will indulge in most holy conjugal union. In this matter with you I wish that neither the charity of your own—which otherwise ought to have conquered your mind—nor authority profit me at all, unless by the most clear reasons I shall have shown that this will be for you by far safer and more honorable, safer and more useful, then more pleasant; and what is more, that at this time it is necessary.

Nam primum hac in re, si te honesti ratio mouet, quae apud probos uiros plurimum ualere debet, quid matrimonio honestius, quod ipse Christus honestauit, qui nuptiis una cum matre, non solum interesse dignatus est, uerumetiam nuptiale conuiuium miraculorum suorum primitiis consecrauit? Quid sanctius, quod ipse rerum parens instituit, adiunxit, sanctificauit, quod ipsa sanxit natura? Quid eo laudabilius, quod qui reprehendit hereseos damnetur?

For first, in this matter, if the consideration of the honest moves you, which among upright men ought to prevail most, what is more honest than matrimony, which Christ himself honored, who at a wedding, together with his mother, not only deigned to be present, but even consecrated the nuptial banquet with the first-fruits of his miracles? What more holy, which the parent of things himself instituted, joined, sanctified, which nature herself sanctioned? What more laudable than that, to reprehend which one is condemned of heresy?

Quid aequius quam id reddere posteris, quod ipsi a maioribus accepimus? Quid inconsyderatius quam id sanctimoniae studio, perinde ut prophanum fugere, quod deus ipse totius sanctimoniae fons ac parens sanctissimum haberi uoluit? Quid inhumanius quam hominem ab humanae conditionis legibus abhorrere?

What more equitable than to render to posterity what we ourselves received from our elders? What more inconsiderate than, out of zeal for sanctimony, to flee as if profane that which God himself, the fount and parent of all sanctity, willed to be held most holy? What more inhuman than for a man to abhor the laws of the human condition?

Quid ingratius quam id negare maioribus, quod ipse nisi a maioribus accepisses ne esses quidem qui negare posses? Quod si matrimonii quaerimus autorem, non a Lycurgo, non a Mose, non a Solone, sed ab ipso summo rerum omnium opifice conditum et institutum est, ab eodem et laudatum, ab eodem honestatum consecratumque. Siquidem initio cum hominem e limo finxisset, miseram prorsus et inamoenam eius uitam fore intellexit, nisi sociam Euam adiungeret.

What is more ungrateful than to deny to the ancestors that which, unless you had received it from the ancestors, you would not even exist to be able to deny? And if we seek the author of marriage, it was founded and instituted not by Lycurgus, not by Moses, not by Solon, but by the very highest Artificer of all things; by the same it was praised, by the same made honorable and consecrated. Since indeed, in the beginning, when he had fashioned the human being from slime, he understood that his life would be utterly wretched and unlovely, unless he should join Eve as a companion.

Quare uxorem non e luto illo quo uirum, sed ex Adae cratibus eduxit, quo prorsus intelligeremus nihil nobis uxore charius esse debere, nihil coniunctius, nihil tenacius adglutinatum. Idem ille post diluuium mortalium generi reconciliatus hanc primam legem prouulgasse legitur, non uti celibatum amplecterentur, sed ut crescerent, ut multiplicarentur, ut terram implerent. At quo pacto, nisi coniugio darent operam?

Wherefore he brought forth a wife not from that clay from which the man, but from Adam’s ribs, so that
we might thoroughly understand that nothing ought to be dearer to us than a wife, nothing more conjoined,
nothing more tenaciously agglutinated. The same One, reconciled to the race of mortals after the deluge, is read to have promulgated this first law, not that they should embrace celibacy, but that they should grow, that they should multiply, that they should fill the earth. But in what way,
unless they gave their effort to conjugal union?

Et ne hic uel Mosaicae legis libertatem, uel tempestatis illius necessitatem causemur, quid aliud sibi uult illud in Euangelicis quoque literis repetitum comprobatumque Christi suffragium? Propter hoc, inquit, relinquet homo patrem et matrem et adhaerebit uxori suae. Quid parentum pietate sanctius?

And lest here we plead either the liberty of the Mosaic law, or
the necessity of that season, what else does that suffrage of Christ, repeated and approved also in the Evangelical writings, mean? For this cause,
he says, a man will leave father and mother and will adhere to his wife. What is more sacred than piety toward parents?

At huic tamen coniugalis praefertur fides. Quo autore? Nempe Deo.

Yet to this, conjugal fidelity is preferred. By what author? Surely God.

Quo tempore? Non Iudaismi tantum, sed Christianismi quoque. Iam si caetera sacramenta, quibus Ecclesia Christi potissimum nititur, religiosa quadam ueneratione coluntur, quis non uidet huic plurimum religionis deberi, quod et a Deo, et primum omnium est institutum?

At what time? Not of Judaism only, but of Christianity as well. Now, if the other sacraments, upon which the Church of Christ chiefly relies, are observed with a certain religious veneration, who does not see that to this the greatest measure of religion is owed, since it is both instituted by God and is the first of all?

Et caetera quidem in terris, hoc in Paradiso, caetera ad remedium, hoc ad consortium felicitatis, caetera naturae collapsae surit adhibita, unum illud conditae datum est. Si leges a mortalibus institutas sanctas habemus, non erit coniugii lex sanctissima, quam ab eodem accepimus, a quo et uitam, quae una prope cum ipso hominum genere nata est?

And the rest indeed are on earth, this in Paradise; the rest for remedy, this for a consortium of felicity; the rest have been applied to a collapsed nature, that one was given to nature when constituted. If we hold as sacred the laws instituted by mortals, will not the law of marriage be most sacred, which
we have received from the same one from whom also life, which was born almost together with the human race itself,
was born?

Denique ut legem exemplo confirmaret, adole1scens, ut dictum est, ad nuptiale conuiuium uocatus, una cum matre libens adfuit, nec adfuit modo, uerumetiam prodigioso munere cohonestauit, haud alibi miraculorum suorum initium auspicatus. Cur igitur, inquies, Christus ipse a coniugio abstinuit? Quasi uero non plurima sint in Christo, quae mirari potius quam imitari debeamus, sine patte natus, sine parentis dolore processit, clauso monumento prodiit.

Finally, that he might confirm the law by example, as a youth, as it has been said, to
the nuptial banquet invited, together with his mother he gladly was present, nor was he present only,
but he also honored it with a prodigious gift, having at no other place of his miracles
inaugurated the beginning. Why then, you will say, did Christ himself abstain from marriage? As if indeed there were not very many things in Christ which we ought rather to marvel at than to imitate,
born without a father, he proceeded without a parent’s pain, with the sepulcher closed
he came forth.

Quid in eo non supra naturam? Sint haec illi propria, nos intra naturae legem uiuentes, suspiciamus illa quae supra naturam surit. Sed e uirgine nasci uoluit.

What in him is not above nature?
Let these things be proper to him; we, living within the law of nature, let us look up to those things which are above nature.
But he willed to be born of a virgin.

E uirgine quidem, sed coniugata. Virgo mater Deum decebat; coniugata nobis quid esset agendum significauit. Virginitas eam decebat, quae caelestis afl3atu numinis illibata pareret illibatum.

From a virgin indeed, but married. A virgin mother was fitting for God; a married woman signified to us what ought to be done. Virginity was fitting for her who, by the celestial afflatus of the numen, undefiled, would bear the Undefiled.

Sed Ioseph sponsus nobis casti coniugii leges commende. Qui magis coniugalem societatem potuit commendare, quam quod arcanam illam, et angelicis quoque mentibus stupendam, diuinae naturae cum humano corpore animaque coniunctionem; quod ineffabilem illum et aeternum in ecclesiam suam amorem declarare uolens, se sponsumillius,illam sponsam suam appelle? Magnum, inquit Paulus, matrimonii sacraznentum est, in Christo et in Ecclesia.

But let Joseph the bridegroom commend to us the laws of chaste conjugal union. Who could more commend the conjugal society than he who that arcane, and even to angelic minds astounding, conjunction of the divine nature with a human body and soul; who, wishing to declare that ineffable and eternal love for his Church, calls himself her bridegroom, and her his bride? Great, says Paul, is the sacrament of marriage, in Christ and in the Church.

Si qua fuisset in rerum natura sanctior copula, si quod foedus religiosius quam coniugium, profecto ab eo sumpta fuisset imago. Quid simile usquam de caelibatu legis in arcanis literis? Honoranduzn connubiuzn, et thorus immaculatus praedicatur, celibatus ne nominatur quidem.

If there had been in the nature of things a holier bond,
if any covenant more religious than marriage, assuredly from it the image would have been taken.
What similar thing is there anywhere about celibacy in the arcane letters of the Law? Marriage is proclaimed honorable, and the bed undefiled; celibacy is not even named.

lam uero Mosaica lex sterile coniugium execratur, atque ob id a communibus aris quosdam submotos legimus. Quamobrem tandem? nempe ideo quod tanquam inutiles, et sibi duntaxat uiuentes, populum nulla sobole augerent.

Now indeed the Mosaic law execrates sterile marriage, and on that account we read that certain persons were removed from the common altars. For what reason then? namely because, as if useless, and living only for themselves, they did not augment the people with any offspring.

Quod si lex damnat sterile matrimonium, caelibes multo amplius damnauit. Si natura poenam non effugit, ne uoluntas quidem effugiet. Si damnantur quorum uoluntati natura defuit, quid commerentur ii, qui ne operam quidem dederunt ne steriles essent?

But if the law condemns sterile matrimony, it has condemned celibates much more.
If nature does not escape punishment, neither will the will escape.
If those are condemned whose will nature failed, what do they deserve, who did not even make an effort not to be sterile?

Hebraeorum leges hoc honoris habebant matrimonio, ut qui sponsarn duxisset, eodem anno non cogeretur in bellum exire. Periclitatur ciuitas, nisi sint qui eam armis tueantur. At certum exitium est, nisi sint qui coniugii beneficio iuuentutem, semper mortalitate deficientem sufficiant.

The laws of the Hebrews had this honor for marriage: that he who had taken a betrothed woman as wife, in the same year would not be compelled to go out into war. The commonwealth is in peril, unless there are those who guard it with arms. But there is certain destruction, unless there are those who by the benefit of conjugal union supply the youth, ever failing through mortality.

Quia et Romanae leges eos qui caelibes essent damno etiam mulctabant, a reipublicae muneribus secludebant. At qui liberis rempublicam auxissent, eis tanquam bene meritis praemium e publico statuebant. Argumento est ius trium liberorum, ne caetera persequar.

For even the Roman laws mulcted with a penalty those who were celibate, and excluded them from the offices of the republic. But those who had augmented the republic with children, for them, as well-deserving, they established a reward from the public treasury. As evidence is the right of three children, not to pursue the rest.

Lycurgus leges tulit, ut qui uxores non ducerent, hi et aestate arcerentur a ludis ac spectaculis, hyeme uero nudi forum circuirent, seque execrati iusta pati dicerent, quod legibus non paruissent.

Lycurgus enacted laws, that those who did not take wives should, in summer, be barred from games and spectacles, but in winter go around the forum naked, and having execrated themselves, say that they were suffering what was just, because they had not obeyed the laws.

Iam uis scire quantum matrimonio tribuerit antiquitas, uiolati matrimonii poenam perpende. Graeci quondam uiolatum matrimonii ius decenni bello uindicandum censuerunt. Ad haec non Romanis modo, uerumetiam et Hebraeis et Barbaricis legibus, adulteris pena capitalis statuebatur.

Now you wish to know how much antiquity ascribed to matrimony; weigh the penalty for violated matrimony. The Greeks once judged that the violated right of matrimony must be vindicated by a ten-year war. Moreover, not by Roman laws only, but also by Hebrew and Barbarian laws, a capital penalty was established for adulterers.

Furem quadrupli poena absoluebat, adulterii scelus securis expiabat. Apud Hebraeos autem populi manibus lapidabatur, qui id uiolasset, sine quo populus non esset. Nec hoc contenta legum seueritas, illud etiam permisit, deprehensum adulterum sine iudicio, sine legibus confodere, nimirum id donans dolori maritali, quod grauate concedit uim a capite propellenti, quasi ledat atrocius, qui coniugem adimat quam qui uitam.

He absolved the thief by a fourfold penalty,
and expiated the crime of adultery by the axe. Among the Hebrews, moreover, he who had violated that without which a people would not exist was stoned by the hands of the people. Nor was the severity of the laws content with this,
it even permitted a detected adulterer to be stabbed without trial, without laws,
assuredly granting to marital dolor that which it grudgingly concedes to one repelling violence from his own head, as if he injures more atrociously who takes away a consort than he who takes away life.

Profecto sanctissimam quandam rem coniugium uideri necesse est, quod uiolatum humano sanguine sit expiandum, cuius poena, nec leges nec iudicem expectare cogitur, quod ius nec in parricidio est. Sed quid de scriptis legibus agimus? Naturae haec lex est, non in tabulis aereis exarata, sed animis nostris penitus insita, cui qui non paret, ne homo quidem sit existimandus, nedum bonus ciuis.

Assuredly, the conjugal union must be seen as a certain most‑sacred thing,
which, if violated, must be expiated by human blood; whose penalty,
is not compelled to await either laws or a judge—a right which does not exist even in parricide. But why are we dealing with written laws? This is the law of Nature, not inscribed on bronze tablets,
but deeply implanted in our minds; whoever does not obey it ought not even to be reckoned a human being,
much less a good citizen.

Nam si, ut Stoici homines acutissimi disputant, recte uiuere, est naturae ductum sequi, quid tam naturae consentaneum quam matrimonium? Nihil enim tam a natura, non hominibus modo, uerumetiam reliquo animantium generi insitum est, quam ut suam quodque speciem ab interitu uindicet, et propagatione posteritatis, tanquam immortalem efficiat. Quod sine coniugali coniunctione fieri non posse quis ignoret?

For if, as the Stoics, most keen men, argue, to live rightly is to follow the leading of nature, what is so consonant with nature as matrimony? For nothing has been so implanted by nature, not in human beings only,
but indeed also in the rest of the race of living creatures, as that each
species may vindicate its own from destruction, and by the propagation of posterity, as it were, make it immortal
Who would be ignorant that this cannot be done without conjugal union?

Turpissimum auteur uidetur, muta pecora naturae parere legibus, homines Gigantum more naturae bellum indicere. Cuius opus si oculis haud cecutientibus inspiciamus, intelligemus in omni rerum genere coniugii speciem quandam inesse uoluisse. Omitto enim iam de arboribus, in quibus Plinio autore certissimo, adeo manifesto sexus discrimine coniugium inuenitur, ut nisi marita arbor in foeminas circunstantes ramis incumbat, tanquam concubitu, hae plane steriles mansurae sint.

Most disgraceful, moreover, it seems, that mute herds obey the laws of nature, while men, in the manner of the Giants, declare war on nature. If we inspect her work with eyes not at all blinking, we shall understand that in every kind of things she has willed that a certain form of conjugial union be present. I pass over now the trees, in which, with Pliny as a most certain author, a marriage is found with so manifest a discrimination of sex, that unless the husband-tree presses with its branches upon the females standing around, as though by concubitus, these will plainly remain sterile.

Taceo de gemmis, in quibus sexum inueniri scripsit idem autor, at non solus. Nonne ita res cunctas uinculis quibusdam connexuit, ut aliae aliis egere uideantur? Quid caelum perpetuo motu uersabile, nonne dum tellurem omnium parentem subiectam, uario rerum genere foecundat, uelut infuso semine, mariti fungitur officio?

I pass over gems, in which the same author wrote that sex is found, and not he alone. Has it not thus connected all things with certain bonds, so that some seem to need others? What of the heaven, turning with perpetual motion—does it not, while it fecundates the earth, the mother of all, lying beneath, with a manifold variety of things, as if with seed poured in, discharge the office of a husband?

Sed singula percurrere nimis longum arbitror. Quorsum autem haec spectant? eo uidelicet, ut intelligamus coniugali societate et constare et contineri 1 omnia, sine ea dissolui, interire, collabi cuncta.

But to run through the particulars I judge too long. To what, however, do these things look? namely to this: that we may understand that by conjugal society
both all things consist and are contained 1, and that without it everything is dissolved, perishes, collapses.

Fingunt ueteres illi ac sapientissimi poetae, quibus studium fuit philosophiae praecepta fabularum inuoluchris tegere, Gigantes anguipedes terrae filios, extructis in caelum montibus bellum superis intulisse. Quid haec sibi uult fabula? Nimirum immanes quosdam ac feros homines et obscuros, a coniugali concordia uehementer abhorruisse, eoque fulmine praecipitatos, hoc est, funditus interisse, cum id uitarent, quo solo constat humani generis incolumitas.

Those ancients and most wise poets, whose zeal was to cover the precepts of philosophy with the wrappings of fables, feign that the snake‑footed Giants, sons of Earth, with mountains piled up to heaven, brought war against the gods above. What does this fable mean? Assuredly, that certain monstrous, savage, and obscure men vehemently abhorred conjugal concord, and for that were hurled headlong by a thunderbolt—that is, perished utterly—since they shunned that by which alone the incolumity of the human race consists.

At iidem Orpheum poetam ac citharedum saxa durissima cantu mouisse commemorant. Quid signifcantes? Nempe uirum et sapientem et facundum, homines saxeos et ferarum ritu uiuentes, a uago concubitu prohibuisse, atque ad matrimonii sanctissimas leges adduxisse.

But the same men recount that Orpheus, poet and citharode, moved the hardest rocks by his song. What signifying? Namely a man both wise and eloquent, stony men living after the rite of wild beasts, he forbade from vagrant concubinage, and led them to the most sacred laws of matrimony.

Apparet igitur qui connubii amore non tangitur, eum non hominem, sed saxum uideri, hostem naturae, numini rebellem, suapte stulticia sibi perniciem accersere.

It appears, therefore, that he who is not touched by the love of connubial union seems not a man, but a stone, an enemy of nature, rebellious to divinity, and by his own stupidity summons ruin upon himself.

Age uero, quandoquidem in fabulas minime fabulosas incidimus, idem Orpheus, cum apud inferos Plutonem ipsum manesque permouit ut Euridicen suam liceret abducere, quid aliud poetas cogitasse putamus quam ut nobis coniugalem amorem commendarent, qui apud inferos quoque sanctus ac religiosus haberetur? Eodem pertinet quod antiquitas coniugio Iouem Gamelium praefecerat, Iunonem pronubam, Lucinam, quae parturientibus adesset: superstitiose quidem errans in deorum nominibus, at non errans in hoc quod matrimonium rem sacram ac dignam, quae diis curae sit, iudicarit. Diuersi quidem apud diuersos populos ac nationes, ritus legesque fuere.

Come now, since we have fallen upon fables by no means fabulous, that same
Orpheus, when in the underworld he moved Pluto himself and the shades that it
might be permitted to lead away his Eurydice, what else do we suppose the poets
to have conceived than to commend to us conjugal love, which would be held holy
and religious even in the underworld? To the same point pertains that antiquity
set over marriage Jupiter Gamelios, Juno as Pronuba, and Lucina, who would be
present to women in childbirth: superstitiously indeed erring in the names of
the gods, yet not erring in this, that it judged marriage a sacred thing and
worthy to be a care to the gods. Different indeed among different peoples and
nations were the rites and the laws.

Nulla unquam gens tam fuit barbara, tam ab humanitate omni aliena, apud quam coniugii nomen non sanctum, non uenerandum sit habitum. Hoc Thrax, hoc Sarmata, hoc Indus, hoc Graecus, hos Latinus, hoc uel extremus orbis Anglus, aut si qui sint his quoque semotiores, religiosum habuit. Quid ita?

Never at any time
was there a nation so barbarous, so alien from all humanity, among whom the name of conjugal union
was not held sacred, not venerable. This the Thracian, this the Sarmatian,
this the Indian, this the Greek, this the Latin, this even the Englishman at the world’s farthest edge, or if there
be any even more remote than these, has held as religious. Why so?

quia necesse est omnibus esse commune, quod communis hominum parens inseuit, et adeo penitus inseuit, ut huius rei sensus non solum ad turtures et columbos, uerumetiam ad immanissimas feras pertingat, siquidem leones in uxorem mites sunt. Pro catulis dimicant tigrides. Asinos per obstantes ignes agit prolis tuendae pietas.

because it is necessary that what the common parent of humankind has sown be common to all, and has so deeply
sown, that the sense of this thing reaches not only to turtledoves and doves, but even to the most enormous wild beasts,
since lions are gentle toward their wife. On behalf of their cubs tigresses fight. Through fires standing in the way the piety of safeguarding offspring drives asses.

Atque hoc sane ius naturae uotant, ut efficacissimum, ita latissime patens. Vt igitur diligens cultor non est, qui praesentibus rebus contentus, arbores adultas satis quidem accurate tractat, caeterum neque propagandi neque inserendi curam agit, propterea quod necesse est, paucis annis eos hortos quantumuis diligenter excultos interire, ita parum diligens in Republica ciuis censendus, qui praesenti turba contentas, de propaganda ciuium multitudine non cogitat. Nemo igitur unquam egregius ciuis habitus est, qui non liberis gignendis recteque instituendis operam dederit.

And indeed they call this the law of nature: as it is most efficacious, so it is most widely extending. Thus,
a diligent cultivator is not he who, content with present things, treats grown trees quite accurately indeed,
but takes care neither for propagating nor for grafting,
because it is necessary that in a few years those gardens, however diligently cultivated, should perish; in the same way, a not very diligent citizen in the Republic is to be judged, who,
content with the present throng, does not think about propagating the multitude of citizens. Therefore no one has ever been held an outstanding citizen who has not devoted effort to the begetting of children and to their right instruction.

Apud Hebraeos et Persas laudi in primis erat quam plurimas habere uxores, tanquam ci patria plurimum deberet, qui eam numerosissima sobole locupletasset.

Among the Hebrews and Persians it was held especially for praise to have as many wives as possible, as though the fatherland owed the most to him, who had enriched it with a most numerous progeny.

Num tu Abraham ipso sanctior uideri studes? Is pater multarum gentium non esset appellatus, idque Deo auspice, si uxoris contubernium refugisset. Num tu Iacob religiosior haberi quaeris?

Do you strive to seem holier than Abraham himself? He would not have been called the father of many nations —and that under God’s auspices—if he had shunned cohabitation with a wife. Do you seek to be considered more religious than Jacob?

Is Rachelis amplexus tam diuturna seruitute, redimere non dubitauit. Num Solomone sapientior? At quantum ille uxorum gregem domi aluit?

He did not hesitate to redeem the embraces of Rachel by so long a servitude.
Are you wiser than Solomon? But what a flock
of wives did he keep at home?

Num Socrate castior, qui Xantippen foeminam etiam morosam domi pertulisse legitur, non tam ut ille suo more iocabatur, quo domi disceret tolerantiam, sed ne in naturae officio claudicasse uideretur? Intellexit enim uir unus, Apollinis oraculo sapiens iudicatus, bac lege se genitum, ad hanc natum, hoc se debere naturae. Nam si recte a ueteribus philosophis dictum est, si non temere a nostris theologis comprobatum, si merito, uelut adagionis uice ubique decantatum, neque deum neque naturam quicquam frustra facere, car haec membra tribuit, car hos stimulos, hanc gignendi uim addidit, si coelibatus laudi ducitur?

Are you more chaste than Socrates, who Xanthippe, a woman even peevish, is read to have endured at home, not so much, as he in his wonted way used to jest, in order that he might learn tolerance at home, as lest he should seem to have limped in the office of nature? He understood, for the one man, judged wise by the oracle of Apollo, by this law that he was begotten, for this that he was born, this he owed to nature. For if it has been rightly said by the ancient philosophers, if not rashly approved by our theologians, if deservedly, as by way of an adage everywhere sung, that neither God nor nature does anything in vain, why did it assign these members, why these stimuli, add this power of begetting, if celibacy is accounted laudable?

Si quis te magnifico munere donaret, arcu, ueste, aut gladio, indignus accepto uideberis, si uti eo aut noles, aut nescies. 1 Cum caetera omnia tanta ratione sint constituta, haud uerisimile uideri debet, bac una in re naturam dormitasse.

If someone were to present you with a magnificent gift—a bow, a vesture, or a sword—you will seem unworthy of the thing received, if you either are unwilling to use it or do not know how. 1 Since all the other things are constituted with such reason, it ought not to seem likely that in this one matter nature has slumbered.

Nec audio qui mihi dicat foedam illam pruriginem et Veneris stimulos non a natura, sed peccato profectam. Quid tam dissimile ueri? Quasi uero matrimonium, cuius munus sine his stimulis peragi nequit, non culpam precesserit.

Nor do I heed the one who tells me that that foul prurience and the stimuli of Venus have proceeded not from nature, but from sin. What is so unlike to truth? As though in very deed marriage, whose office cannot be performed without these stimuli, had not preceded the fault.

Iam in caeteris animantibus unde illi stimuli? an a natura an peccato? Mirum ni a natura.

Now, in the other living creatures, whence are those stimuli? From nature or from sin? A wonder if not
from nature.

Postremo nos imaginatione foedum reddimus, quod suapte natura pulchrum ac sanctum est. Alioqui si res non opinione uulgi, sed ipsa natura uelimus expendere, qui minus foedum est brutorum animantium more edere, mandere, concoquere, excernere, dormire, quam licita permissaque Venere uti? At uirtuti potius quam naturae parendum, perinde quasi uirtus sit ulla dicenda, quae cum natura pugnet, unde nisi proficiscatur, ne esse quidem poterit, quae cultu et disciplina perficiatur.

Finally, we by imagination render foul what by its own nature is beautiful and holy. Otherwise, if we wish to weigh matters not by the opinion of the crowd but by nature itself, which is the less foul—to eat, chew, digest, excrete, sleep after the manner of brute animals, or to make use of Venus that is lawful and permitted? But (they say) virtue rather than nature is to be obeyed, just as if any “virtue” ought to be so called which fights with nature, from which, unless it proceeds, it cannot even exist, and which is perfected by cultivation and discipline.

Sed apostolorum te institutum delectat, qui et ipsi caelibatum sunt secuti, et alios ad id uitae genus sunt cohortati. Imitentur sane apostolos uiri apostolici, quorum cum sit muneris et docere et instituere plebem, non queunt simul et gregi et uxori satisfacere, quanquam et apostolis uxores fuisse constat. Episcopis caelibatum concedamus.

But the institution of the apostles delights you, who both they themselves followed celibacy, and encouraged others to that kind of life.
Let apostolic men indeed imitate the apostles, whose duty it is both to teach and to instruct the people; they cannot at once satisfy both the flock and a wife, although it is established that the apostles also had wives.
Let us concede celibacy to bishops.

Quid tu apostolicum institutum sequeris, ab apostolico munere longe alienissimus, homo nimirum et prophanus et priuatus? Illis hoc ueniae datum est, ut uacent a coniugii munere, quo magis uacaret copiosiorem prolem Christo gignere. Sit istud sacerdotum ac monachorum priuilegium, quos apparet in Essenorum institutum successisse.

Why do you follow the apostolic institution, being far the most alien from the apostolic office, a man, to wit, both profane and private? To them this leave of indulgence was granted, that they might be free from the duty of marriage, in order that they might the more be free to beget a more copious progeny for Christ. Let that be the privilege of priests and monks, who appear to have succeeded into the institution of the Essenes.

Tui status alia ratio est. At ipse Christus, inquies, beatos pronunciauit, qui sese castrarunt ob regnum Dei. Non reiicio autoritatem, sed sententiam interpretor.

Your status has a different rationale. But Christ himself, you will say, pronounced blessed those who castrated themselves on account of the kingdom of God.
I do not reject the authority, but I interpret the sentence.

Primum arbitror hoc Christi dogma ad ea tempora potissimum pertinere, quibus oportebat ecclesiasten ab omnibus mundi negotiis quam maxime expeditum esse. Cursitandum erat per omnes terras, imminebat undique persecutor. Nunc is est rerum ac temporum status ut nusquam reperias minus inquinatam morum integritatem quam apud coniugatos.

First I judge this dogma of Christ to pertain chiefly to those times, in which
it was fitting that the ecclesiast be as much as possible unencumbered from all the affairs of the world.
There was need to run to and fro through all lands; the persecutor was looming on every side. Now
such is the status of things and of the times that nowhere will you find an integrity of morals less unpolluted
than among the married.

Exaggerent quantumlibet suum institutum monachorum ac uirginum examina, iactent quantum uolent ceremonias cultusque suos, quibus potissimum inter cacteros eminent: sanctissimum uitae genus est, pure casteque seruatum coniugium. Praeterea non is sese castrat, qui uiuit caelebs, sed qui caste sancteque colit coniugii munus. Arque utinam uere castrati sint, quicunque suis uiciis magnificum castrationis praetexunt titulum sub umbra castitatis turpius libidinantes.

Let them exaggerate their institute as much as they please, the ranks of monks and virgins; let them vaunt their ceremonies and their cults as much as they will, by which they chiefly stand out among the rest: the most holy genus of life is conjugal union, kept pure and chaste. Moreover, it is not he who lives celibate that castrates himself, but he who cultivates the office of marriage chastely and holily. And would that they were truly castrated, whoever, under the shadow of chastity, lusting more shamefully, cloak with their vices the magnificent title of castration.

Neque enim mei pudoris esse puto, commemorare in quae dedecora saepe prolabantur qui naturae repugnant. Postremo ne praecipit quidem Christus ulli coelibatum, at idem diuortium palam interdicit. Mihi sane uidetur, non pessime consulturus rebus ac moribus hominum, qui sacerdotibus quoque ac monachis, si res ita ferat, ius indulgeat coniugii.

For I do not think it befitting to my modesty to recount into what disgraces those often slip who resist nature. Finally, Christ does not even prescribe celibacy to anyone, but the same openly forbids divorce. It seems to me, indeed, that he would not be taking the worst counsel for the affairs and morals of men who would also indulge to priests and to monks, if the case so require, the right of marriage.

Sed diuina quaedam res est, angelica res est uirginitas, at humana quaedam res est coniugium. Ego nunc homo loquor homini. Laudanda quidem res est uirginitas, at ita si non haec laus ad quam plurimos transferatur.

But virginity is a certain divine thing, an angelic thing, while marriage is a certain human thing.
I now, a man, speak to a man. Virginity is indeed
a thing to be lauded, but only thus, if this praise be not transferred to as many as possible.

Quam si uulgo usurpare homines incipiant, quid uirginitate dici cogitariue possit exitialius? Tum si in caeteris maxime laudem mereatur uirginitas, in te certe reprehensione carere non potest, per quem stabit quo minus optimum illud genus et immortalitate cum primis dignum oblitteretur. Postremo i minimum abest a uirginitatis laude, qui ius illibatum coniugii seruat, qui uxorem gignendae proli, non libidini habet.

Which, if men begin to usurp it in common, what could be said or thought more deadly than virginity? Then if in other respects virginity most of all deserves praise, in you certainly it cannot be without reprehension, through whom it will stand that the less that best stock, and preeminently worthy of immortality, be obliterated. Lastly, he is not at all far from the praise of virginity, who preserves the inviolate right of marriage, who has a wife for the begetting of progeny, not for libido.

Si frater fratris sine liberis defuncti semen excitare iubetur, tu uniuersi tui generis spem interire sines, praesertim cum ad te unum reciderit? Neque uero me clam est, magnis uoluminibus priscorurn patrum decantatas uirginitatis laudes, quorum Hieronymus adeo miratur eam, ut non multum absit a contumelia matrimonii et ab episcopis orthodoxis ad palinodiam inuitaretur. Verum donetur hic ardor illis temporibus, nunc optarim ut isti qui passim sine delectu ad caelibatum ac uirginitatem adhortantur aetatem, quae sibi nondum est nota, hoc operae collocarent in describenda imagine casti purique matrimonii.

If a brother is commanded to raise up the seed of a brother deceased without children,
will you allow the hope of your whole lineage to perish, especially since it has devolved upon you alone?
Nor indeed is it unknown to me, the praises of virginity celebrated in great volumes by the ancient fathers,
among whom Jerome so admires it that he is not far from a contumely against matrimony and was invited by orthodox bishops to a palinode.
But let this ardor be granted to those times; now I would wish that those who everywhere, without selection, exhort an age
which is not yet known to itself to celibacy and virginity, would invest this effort in describing the image of chaste
and pure matrimony.

Atqui his ipsis quibus tantopere placet uirginitas, non displicet bellum aduersus Turcarum gentem, qui numero tot partibus nos superant, quorum si rectum est iudicium, consequetur ut in primis rectum et honestum habeatur, pro uirili liberis gignendis operam dare et iuuentutem in belli usum sufficere. Nisi forte bombardas, tela, naues, ad hoc bellum apparandas putant, uiris opus esse non putant. lidem probant ut ethnicorum parentes ferro trucidemus, quo liceat filios etiam inscientes baptizare.

And yet to these same people to whom virginity so greatly pleases, it is not
displeasing to wage war against the nation of the Turks, who in number surpass us by so many parts,
if their judgment is right; it will follow that among the first things it be held right and
honorable to give effort, to a virile extent, to begetting children, and to supply youth for
the use of war. Unless perhaps they think that for this war bombards, missiles, ships must be prepared, and that there is no need of men. The same people approve that the parents of the Gentiles
we slaughter with iron, so that it may be permitted to baptize the children even unknowing.

Id si uerum est, quanto mitius est idem efficere coniugiorum ofhcio. Quare si quid honestum, si pietas, si religio, si officium, si uirtus te mouet, cur ab eo abhorres quod Deus instituit, natura sanxit, ratio suadet, diuinae pariter et humanae literae laudant, leges iubent, omnium gentium consensus approbat, ad quod optimi cuiusque exemplum adhortatur? Quod si pleraeque res etiam acerbae uiro bono surit expetendae, non alio nomine quam quod honestae surit, matrimonium profecto multo maxime expetendum, de quo quis dubitare possit plusne habeat honestatis an uoluptatis?

If that is true, how much more gently is it to effect the same by the office of marriage. Wherefore if anything honorable, if piety, if religion, if duty, if virtue moves you, why do you shrink from that which God has instituted, nature has sanctioned, reason advises, the divine and likewise the human letters praise, the laws command, the consensus of all nations approves, to which the example of each of the best exhorts? But if very many things, even bitter ones, are to be sought by a good man under no other name than that they are honorable, marriage assuredly is by far the most to be sought, about which who could doubt whether it has more of honorableness or of voluptuousness?

Quid enim dulcius quam cum ea uiuere cum qua sis non beneuolentiae modo, uerumetiam corporum mutua quadam communione arctissime copulatus? Si magnam quandam animi delectationem ex reliquorum necessariorum beneuolentia capimus, quam dulce imprimis sit habere qui cum animi tui secretos affectus communices, qui cum perinde ut tecum loquaris, cuius fidei te tuto committas, qui tuas fortunas suas esse ducat, quid tu credis habere felicitatis mariti uxorisque coniunctionem, qua nulla possit in rerum natura inueniri, neque maior neque firmior? Cum caeteris enim amicis animorum duntaxat beneuolentia coniungimur, cum uxore et summa charitate et corporum permutatione, et sacramenti foedere, et fortunarum omnium societate copulamur.

What indeed is sweeter than to live with her with whom you are bound most closely, not only by benevolence, but even by a certain mutual communion of bodies? If we take a certain great delectation of mind from the benevolence of our other intimates, how sweet above all is it to have one with whom you may share the secret affections of your mind, with whom you may converse just as though with yourself, to whose good faith you may safely commit yourself, who deems your fortunes to be his own—what do you think the conjunction of husband and wife has of felicity, than which none can be found in the nature of things, neither greater nor firmer? For with other friends we are joined only by benevolence of souls; with a wife we are coupled both by highest charity and by a permutation of bodies, and by the covenant of the sacrament, and by a partnership of all fortunes.

Praeterea in caeteris amiciciis quanta simulatio? quanta perfidia? Saepe ii quos nostri amantissimos existimauimus, sicut hyrundines exacta aestate deuolant, ita fortuna reflante deficiunt.

Furthermore, in the rest of friendships, how much pretense? how much perfidy? Often those whom we have reckoned most loving toward us, just as swallows, with summer finished, fly away, so, as Fortune blows back, they fail.

Nonnunquam recentior amicus ueterem eiicit. 1 Paucos audiuimus, quorum fides usque ad uitae finem constiterit, uxoria charitas non perfidia corrumpitur, nulla simulatione obscuratur, nulla rerum mutatione conuellitur, denique sola morte, imo ne morte quidem distrahitur. Illa parentum, illa sororum, illa fratrum pietatem, tui mmrte contemnit, te unum respicit, ex te pendet, tecum emori cupit.

Sometimes a more recent friend ejects an old one.
1 We have heard of few whose faithfulness has stood firm unto the end of life; uxorial charity is not corrupted by perfidy, is obscured by no dissimulation, is wrenched by no mutation of things; finally, by death alone—nay, not even by death—is it torn apart. That one scorns the piety of parents, of sisters, of brothers; for your sake it despises death, looks to you alone, hangs upon you, desires to die together with you.

Res est? habes quae tueatur, habes quae augeat. Non est?

Is there an estate? You have one who
may protect it, you have one who may augment it. Is there not?

habes quae quaerat. Si res secundae sint, duplicatur felicitas; sin aduersae, erit quae te consoletur, quae assideat, quae inseruiat, quae tuum malum suum esse cupiat. An tu uoluptatem ullam cum hac tanta coniunctione conferendam cerises?

you have one who will seek it. If things are prosperous,
happiness is doubled; but if adverse, there will be one to console you, to sit beside you, to
serve you, who will wish your misfortune to be her own. Do you think any pleasure is to be compared with this so great a union?

Si domi agis, adest quae solitudinis taedium depellat; si foris, est quae discedentem osculo prosequatur, absentem desyderet, redeuntem laeta excipiat. Dulcis iuuentae tuae sodalis, gratum senectutis solacium. Natura homini quidem dulcis est uel quaeuis societas, quippe quem ad beneuolentiam atque amicitiam genuit.

If you stay at home, there is one who drives away the tedium of solitude; if out of doors, there is one who accompanies you departing with a kiss, who longs for you when absent,
who gladly receives you returning. A sweet comrade of your youth, a welcome consolation of old age.
By nature, indeed, for a human even any companionship whatsoever is sweet, since Nature has begotten him toward benevolence and friendship.

Haec igitur quomodo non erit dulcissima, in qua nihil non commune est? Contra autem, si feras quoque solitudinem horrere, societate delectari uidemus, mea sententia, ne homo quidem sit existimandus, qui ab hac societate omnium et honestissima et iucundissima abhorreat. Quid enim eo homine odiosius, qui tanquam sibi uni natus, sibi uiuat, sibi quaerat, sibi parcat, sibi sumptum faciat, neminem amet, ametur a nemine?

How then will this not be most sweet, in which everything is in common? On the contrary, if we see that even wild beasts shudder at solitude and are delighted by society, in my judgment he is not even to be esteemed a man who recoils from this society—both most honorable and most pleasant. For what is more odious than the man who, as though born for himself alone, lives for himself, seeks for himself, spares himself, incurs expense for himself, loves no one, and is loved by no one?

An non istiusmodi portentum dignum censebitur, quod cum Timone illo ex uniuerso hominum contubernio in medium mare proiiciatur? Neque hic ausim illas tibi uoluptates proponere, quibus cum natura nihil uoluerit esse homini dulcius, nescio tamen quo pacto a magnis ingeniis dissimulantur potius quam contemnuntur. Quanquam quis adeo seuero, ne dicam stupido, sit natus ingenio, qui eiusmodi uoluptatum genere non capiatur, praesertim si citra numinis, aut hominis offensam, citra famae detrimentum possit contingere?

Will not a portent of this sort be deemed worthy to be, together with that Timon, cast out from the universal fellowship of men into the middle of the sea? Nor would I here dare to propose to you those pleasures, than which nature has willed nothing to be sweeter to man, yet I know not by what fashion they are rather dissimulated by great geniuses than contemned. And yet who has been born with a disposition so severe, not to say stupid, as not to be taken by a kind of pleasures of this sort, especially if it can befall without offense to divinity or to man, without detriment of fame?

Equidem eum non hominem, sed plane saxum dixerim, etiam si minima bonorum quae habet coniugium pars est ea corporum uoluptas. Sed fac te istam ut uiro indignam contemnere, quanquam ne uiri quidem uocabulum sine his meremur; ponantur, si uis, inter extrema coniugii commoda: iam quid casto amore esse potest amabilius, imo quid sanctius atque honestius? Accrescit interim dulcis afhnium turba, duplicatur parentum, fratrum, sororum, nepotum numerus.

Indeed I would call him not a human, but plainly a stone, even if that pleasure of bodies is the least part of the goods which marriage possesses. But grant that you despise that as unworthy of a man—although not even the name of man do we merit without these; let them, if you wish, be placed among the extreme, that is, the least, advantages of marriage: now what can be more lovable than chaste love, nay, what more sacred and more honorable? Meanwhile the sweet throng of kinsfolk by affinity increases, the number of parents, brothers, sisters, and nephews is doubled.

Natura enim unam duntaxat matrem, unum patrem tribuere potest. Coniugio pater alter, altera mater accedit, qui te, ut cui sua uiscera commiserint, singulari pietate non prosequi non possunt. Iam uero quanti illud aestimabis, ubi pulcherrima coniunx pulchra faciet te prole parentem?

For nature can bestow only one mother, one father. By marriage
another father, another mother comes in addition, who, as to one to whom they have entrusted their own vitals, cannot but attend you with singular piety. And now, how highly will you value that, when a most beautiful spouse will make you a parent with fair progeny?

Vbi quis tibi paruulus aula luserit Aeneas, qui tuos, tuaeque coniugis uultus referat, qui te blanda balbutie patrem appellitet? Iam accesserit coniugali charitati uinculum adamantinum, quod ne mors quidem ipsa queat abrumpere. Felices, inquit Flaccus noster, ter et amplius, Ouos irrupta tenet copula, nec malis Diuulsos queremoniis, Suprema citius soluet angor die.

When some little Aeneas shall have played for you in the hall, who will mirror your features and your wife’s, who with winsome babble will address you as father? Then there will be added to conjugal charity an adamantine bond, which not even death itself can sunder. “Happy,” says our Flaccus, “thrice and more, those whom an unbroken coupling holds, and, not torn apart by evil complaints, whom anguish will sooner loosen on the last day.”

Habes qui senectutem tuam oblectent, qui oculos claudant, qui iusta persoluant, in quibus renatus uidearis, quibus superstitibus tu ne occidisse quidem puteris. Non abeunt ad alienos haeredes, quae tibi parasti. Ita tanquam omnibus perfuncto, ne mors quidem ipsa acerba uideri poterit.

You have those who will delight your old age, who will close your eyes, who will discharge the due rites, in whom you may seem reborn, with whom surviving you will not even be thought to have died. They do not pass away to alien heirs, the things which you have prepared for yourself. Thus, as one who has been through everything, not even death itself will be able to seem bitter.

Omnibus, uelimus nolimus, senectus imminet. Hac ratione natura prospexit ut in liberis ac nepotibus repubescamus. Quis enim grauiter ferat senectutem, ubi suos uultus, quos adolescens gessit, in filio conspexerit?

Old age, whether we will it or not, impends over all. By this plan nature has provided that we grow young again in children and grandchildren. For who would bear old age grievously, when he has beheld in his son his own features, which he bore as an adolescent?

Mors omnibus parata est, at hac una uia uelut immortalitatem quandam meditatur naturae prouidentia, dum sic aliud ex alio propage, ut ueluti cum planta arbore excisa repullulat, nec interisse uideatur, qui prole relicta moritur.

Death is prepared for all, but by this one way
as if a certain immortality is meditated by the providence of nature, while it thus propagates one from another
as, just as when a shoot, with the tree cut down, sprouts anew, nor does he seem to have perished who dies with progeny left behind.

At minime me fugit quid inter haec obmurmures. Beata res est coniugium, si omnia secunda eueniant, sed quid si morosa contingat uxor? quid si impudica?

But it by no means escapes me what you murmur among these things. Marriage is a blessed thing, if all things turn out favorable; but what if a morose wife should befall? what if an unchaste one?

quid si liberi impii proueniant? Occurrent animo tuo exempla eorum quibus coniugium exitium attulerit. Exaggera quantum potes, sed tamen hominum ista uicia fuerint, non coniugii.

What if children should prove impious? Examples will occur to your mind of those for whom marriage has brought ruin. Exaggerate as much as you can, yet nevertheless those have been the vices of men, not of marriage.

Crede mihi, non solet nisi malis maritis 1 mala uxor contingere. Adde quod tibi in manu est, ut bonam eligas. Quid si corrumpatur?

Believe me, a bad wife is not wont to befall any but bad husbands 1. Add this: it is in your hand to choose a good one. What if she be corrupted?

A malo quidem marito uxor bona corrumpi potest; a bono mala corrigi consueuit. Falso uxores accusamus. Nemo, si quid mihi credis, unquam nisi suo uicio improbam uxorem habuit.

A good wife indeed can be corrupted by a bad husband; by a good husband a bad wife is wont to be corrected. We accuse wives falsely. No one, if you credit me at all, ever had a depraved wife except by his own fault.

Iam ex bonis parentibus, ferme similes nascuntur liberi, quanquam et hi utcunque nati, fere tales euadunt quales illos finxeris institutione. Iam uero non est quod zelotypiam metuas. Iste stulte amantium morbus est, castus ac legitimus amor zelotypiam nescit.

Now from good parents, children for the most part are born similar; although even these, however they are born, for the most part turn out such as you shape them by instruction. And indeed there is no reason to fear jealousy. That is the foolish disease of lovers; chaste and legitimate love does not know jealousy.

Quid tibi tragoediae in mentem ueniunt? Haec maritum adultera securi percussit, haec ueneno sustulit, illa morum odio ad mortem adegit. Cur non potius Tiberii Gracchi Cornelia succurrit?

Why do tragedies come to mind for you? This adulteress struck her husband with an axe, this
one removed him by poison, that one drove him to death through hatred of his morals. Why does not rather Cornelia of Tiberius
Gracchus come to mind?

Cur non Alcestis non optimi mariti coniunx optima? Cur non occurrit uel Iulia Pompeii, uel Catonis Portia? Cur non aeterno nomine digna Arthemisia?

Why not Alcestis, the best wife of a not-so-excellent husband? Why does there not occur either Julia of Pompey, or Portia of Cato? Why not Artemisia, worthy of an eternal name?

Cur non Hypsicratea Mithridatis Pontici regis uxor? Cur non Terciae Aemiliae comitas in mentem uenit? Cur non Turiae fides?

Why not Hypsicratea, the wife of Mithridates, king of Pontus? Why does not the comity of Tertia Aemilia come to mind? Why not the fidelity of Turia?

Cur non Lucretia, Lentulaque succurrit? Cur non Arria illa a Plinio celebrata? Cur non innumerae aliae, quarum et pudicitia et fides in maritos ne morte quidem potuit immutari.

Why
do not Lucretia and Lentula come to mind? Why does not that Arria celebrated by Pliny come to mind? Why
do not countless others, whose both pudicity and fidelity toward their husbands, not even by death
could be altered, come to mind?

Rara, inquis, auis in terris, mulier proba. Et tu rara uxore dignum te finge. Mulier, inquit sapiens ille, bona, parc bona.

Rare, you say, is a bird upon the earth, a woman of probity. And you, fashion yourself worthy of a rare wife
“A woman,” said that wise man, “good—sparingly good.”

Aude tuis moribus dignam sperare. Plurimum in hoc situm est quam deligas, quomodo fingas, qualem ipse te illi praebeas. Sed dulcior est, inquies, libertas.

Dare to hope for one worthy of your own morals. Very much depends on this: whom you select, how you fashion her, what sort of man you present yourself to her. “But liberty is sweeter,” you will say.

Quisquis uxorem accipit, compedes accipit, quas sola mors possit excutere. Quid autem dulce esse homini soli possit? Si dulcis est libertas, sociam asciscendam censeo, qua cum bonum istud tibi commune esse uelis, quanquam quid ista seruitute liberius, ubi ita uterque alteri obnoxius est, ut neuter manumitti uelit?

Whoever takes a wife
takes shackles, which only death can shake off. But what, moreover, can be sweet
to a man alone? If freedom is sweet, I think a partner should be taken on, with whom
you may wish that that good be common to you; although what is freer than that servitude, where
each is so bound to the other that neither would wish to be manumitted?

Astrictus es ei, quem in amicitiam recipis. At hic nemo libertatem ademptam clamitat. At uereris ne liberis morte absumptis, orbus in luctum incidas.

You are bound to him whom you receive into friendship.
But here no one clamors that liberty has been taken away. But you fear lest,
with your children consumed by death, bereft, you fall into mourning.

Si orbitatem times, ob id ipsum ducenda uxor est, quae sola hoc praestare potest, ne simus orbi. Sed quid tu tam diligenter, imo anxie, omnia matrimonii incommoda disquiris, quasi caelibatus nihil habeat incommoda? Quasi uero ulla sit uita mortalium, quae non sit omnibus fortunae subiecta casibus.

If you fear childlessness, on that account a wife is to be taken, who alone can furnish this, that we not be bereft. But why do you so diligently, nay anxiously, sift out all the inconveniences of marriage, as if celibacy had no inconveniences? As though truly there were any life of mortals that is not subject to all the chances of Fortune.

E uita migret oportet, qui nihil incommoda ferre uelit. Quod si ad caelestem illam uitam respicias, mors haec hominum uita est, haud uita dicenda. Sin intra humanam conditionem animum contineas, nihil est coniugali uita neque tutius neque tranquillius neque iucundius neque amabilius neque felicius.

He must depart from life, who wishes to bear no inconveniences.
But if you look toward that celestial life, this life of men is death, not to be called life.
But if you confine your mind within the human condition, nothing is safer, more tranquil, more pleasant, more amiable, or more felicitous than conjugal life.

Sed quid nos de honesto ac iucundo disputamus, cum non utilitas modo suadeat, uerumetiam necessitas ad coniugium impellat? Tolle matrimonium, perpaucis annis uniuersum hominum genus funditus intereat necesse est. Xerxen illam Persarum regem, cum ex aedito loco ingentem illam hominum multitudinem intueretur, lachrymas non tenuisse dicunt, quod ex tot hominum milibus, post annos sexaginta, nullus omnino superfuturus esset.

But why are we disputing about the honest and the pleasant, when not utility only
persuades, but even necessity impels to marriage? Remove matrimony,
and in very few years the entire race of men must utterly perish. That Xerxes, the king of the Persians, they say, when from an elevated place he was gazing upon that huge multitude of men, did not hold back tears, because out of so many thousands of men,
after sixty years, none at all would be surviving.

Cur quod ille de suis copias intellexit, non etiam de uniuerso hominum genere perspicimus? Sublato coniugio, quotusquisque ex tot regionibus, prouinciis, regnis, urbibus, cetibus post centum annos supererit? Eamus nunc, et caelibatum miremur, qui aeternam sit generi nostro cladem allaturus.

Why do we not perceive, regarding the entire human race, what that man understood about his own troops? With marriage removed, how many, from so many regions, provinces, kingdoms, cities,
assemblies, will survive after 100 years? Let us go now and marvel at celibacy, which
is going to bring an eternal calamity upon our race.

Quae pestis aut lues a superis aut inferis immitti possit nocentior? Quid ab ullo diluuio timeri possit acerbius? Quid tristius expectetur, etiamsi Phaethonteum redeat incendium?

What pest or plague from the supernal or the infernal could be sent in more noxious? What more bitter could be feared from any deluge? What sadder could be expected, even if the Phaethontean conflagration should return?

At ex huiusmodi quidem tempestatibus multa relinqui solent incollumia, ex caelibatu nihil reliqui fieri potest. Videmus quantum morborum agmen, quot casuum discrimina, noctes diesque hominum paucitati insidientur, quot pestis absumit, quot absorbet mare, quot Mauors abripit. Taceo enim de quotidianis mortibus.

But from
such tempests indeed many things are wont to be left unharmed; from celibacy
nothing can be left remaining. We see what a host of diseases, how many hazards of mischance, lie in wait for the paucity of men night and day, how many the plague consumes,
how many the sea swallows, how many Mavors snatches away. I am silent, to be sure, about the daily deaths.

Circumuolat undique mors. ruit, rapit, properat quantum potest genus nostrum extinguere, et nos celibatum miramur, coniugium fugimus? Nisi forte placet Essenorum institutum, aut Dulopolitarum, quorum gentem facinorosorum nunquam deficiens numerositas propage.

Death flutters around on every side. It rushes, it snatches, it hastens as much as it can to extinguish our race, and we marvel at celibacy, we flee marriage? Unless perhaps the institution of the Essenes, or of the Dulopolitans, pleases, whose nation of malefactors a never-failing numerosity propagates.

Num expectamus ut luppiter aliquis nos eodem munere donet quod apibus tribuisse dicitur, ut sine concubitu fetificemus, et posteritatis semina a flosculis ore legamus? An uero postulamus, ut sicut e louis cerebro Mineruam prognatam poetae fabulantur, ita nobis e capite liberi exiliant? An denique ut iuxta ueterum fabulas, e terra, e saxis proiectis, e duris arborum truncis homines producantur?

Do we wait for some Jupiter
to bestow on us the same gift which he is said to have granted to bees, that we might beget without sexual intercourse,
and gather with the mouth the seeds of posterity from little blossoms? Or indeed do we demand,
that just as the poets fable that Minerva was begotten from the brain of Jove, so children should leap forth for us from the head?
Or finally, that, according to the fables of the ancients, from the earth, from stones cast, from the hard trunks of trees men be produced?

E terme gremio permulta sine nostro cultu enascuntur. Plantulae sub ombra matris saepe pullulascunt, at homini hanc unam propagandi uiam natura esse uoluit, ut mutua mariti uxorisque opera mortalium genus ab interitu uindicaretur, quod si fugiant tuo exemplo mortales, ne ista quidem, quae tu miraris, esse poterunt. Caelibatum miraris, suspicis uirginitatem?

From the bosom of the earth very many things arise without our cultivation. Seedlings often sprout under the mother’s shade, but for man nature willed this one way of propagating: that by the mutual work of the husband
and wife the race of mortals be safeguarded from destruction; but if mortals flee it by your example,
not even those things which you marvel at will be able to exist. Celibacy
you marvel at, do you look up to virginity?

At nec caelibes erunt nec uirgines, si coniugii usum sustuleris. Cur igitur praelata est uirginitas? cur honorata, si exitium adfert mortaliums?

But there will be neither celibates nor virgins, if you abolish the use of marriage.
Why then has virginity been preferred? why honored, if it brings destruction upon mortals?

Laudata est, sed pro tempore, sed in paucis. Voluit enim Deus hominibus caelestis illius uitae tanquam imaginem quandam et simulachrum ostendi, ubi neque nubent ullae neque nuptum dabunt ulli. Sed ad exemplum paucitas idonea est, multitudo inutilis.

It has been praised, but for the time, but in the few. For God wished that to men, as it were, a certain image and simulacrum of that heavenly life be shown, where none marry nor are given in marriage. But for an exemplar, fewness is suitable, a multitude useless.

Vt enim non omnes agri, quanquam feraces, ad usum uitae seruntur, sed pars negligitur, pars oculis pascendis colitur. At patitur hoc ipsa rerum copia, in tanta aruorum amplitudine, exiguam partem sterilem relinqui. Verum si nulli serantur, quis non uideat nobis ad glandes fore redeundum?

For not all fields,
although fertile, are sown for the uses of life, but part is neglected, part is cultivated to feast the eyes.
But the very abundance of things permits this, that, in so great an expanse of fields, a small part be left sterile. Yet if none were sown, who does not see
that we would have to return to acorns?

Ita caelibatus in tanta hominum multitudine, in paucis quidem laudem habet, in omnibus summam reprehensionem habiturus. Nam si maxime in aliis sit uirtutis nomen habitura uirginitas, in te certe uiciosa fuerit. Caeteri enim puritati studuisse uidebuntur, tu generis parricida iudicaberis, quod cum honesto coniugio propagare potueris, turpi caelibatu passus sis interire.

Thus celibacy in so great a multitude of men,
indeed has praise in the few, but in all it will incur the highest reprehension. For if virginity is going to have, most of all in others, the name of virtue, in you certainly
it would be vitiated. For the rest will seem to have been devoted to purity, you a parricide of your lineage
will be judged, in that, although you could have propagated it by honorable conjugal union, by shameful celibacy
you have suffered it to perish.

Liceat e numerosa sobole uirginem Deo consecrare. Rustici frugum primitias superis immolant, non uniuersum prouentum, at te unum stirpis tuae reliquias esse memineris oportet. Nihil autem refert uirum occidas an seruare recuses, qui a te uno seruari et poterat, et facile poterat.

Let it be permitted, out of a numerous offspring, to consecrate a virgin to God. Rustics immolate the first-fruits of their crops to the gods above, not the whole yield, but you ought to remember that you alone are the remnant of your stock. It makes no difference whether you kill a man or refuse to preserve him—one who by you alone both could be saved, and could easily be saved.

At sororis exemplum te ad caelibatum adhortatur. At ista uel una te potissimum debebas a caelibatu deterreri. Generis enim spem, quae prius utrisque erat communis, nunc totam ad te unum reuolutam intelligis.

But your sister’s example exhorts you to celibacy. But this very thing, even alone, ought especially to have deterred you from celibacy. For the hope of the family line, which before was common to you both, now you understand to have been wholly rolled back upon you alone.

Detur haec uenia sexui, detur aetati, puella dolore uitaa peccauit, stultarum muliercularum aut stultarum monachorum impulsu sese praecipitem dedit. Tu maior natu, uirum te esse memineris necesse est. Illa maioribus suis commori uoluit, tu ne moriantur operam dabis.

Let this pardon be given to her sex, let it be given
to her age; the girl sinned from life’s sorrow, at the impulse of foolish womenfolk or of foolish
monks she cast herself headlong. You, elder by birth, that you are a man
you must remember. She wished to die with her forebears; that they not die
you will take pains.

Soror subduxit sese officio, tu duorum tibi partes obeundas esse cogita. Non dubitarunt filiae Loth cum patre temulento rem habere, satius esse iudicantes nefario etiam incestu generi consulere quam pati interire. Tu matrimonio honesto, sancto, pudico, sine offensa, summa cum uoluptate, non consules tuo generi alioquin intermorituro?

Your sister has withdrawn herself from duty; consider that the roles of two must be undertaken by you.
The daughters of Lot did not hesitate to have relations with their drunken father, judging it better to consult for their race even by nefarious incest than to suffer it to perish.
Will you, by a marriage honorable, holy, modest, without offense, with the highest pleasure, not consult for your race otherwise about to die out?

Quare sinamus eos Hippolyti institutumimitari, sectenturcaelibatum, uel qui mariti fieri possunt, patres non possunt, uel quorum tenuitas liberis educandis non suppeditat, uel quorum genus aliorum opera possit propagari; aut certe eiusmodi est, ut magis Reipublicae conducat intermori quam propagari. Tu uero cum teste medico uiro neque imperito, et minime mendaci, magnam posteritatem promittere uidearis; patrimonium habeas arnIplissimum, genus autem tum optimum, tum clarrissimum, ita ut obliterari sine nephario scelere, magnoque Reipublicae detrimento non possit; tum adsit aetas integra, nec desit forma; offeratur uero coniunx puella, qua neque integriorem neque illustriorem ullam uiderunt ciues tui, pudica, modesta, pia, facie diuina, cum dote amplissima; cum rogent amici, lachrymentur propinqui, instent affines, patria flagitet, ipsi maiorum tuorum cineres e tumulis idipsum te obtestentur, tu tamen adhuc contaris, adhuc caelibatum cogitas? Si qua res parum honesta abs te peteretur, si qua difficilis tamen uel tuorum uota uel generis charitas animum tuum expugnare debuerat, quanto aequius est id amicorum lachrymas, patriae pietatem, maiorum charitatem abs te obtinere, ad quod te diuinae pariter et humanae leges hortantur, natura instigat, ratio ducit, honestas allicit, tot commoda inuitant, necessitas etiam ipsa cogit.

Wherefore let us allow those to imitate Hippolytus’s institution, let them follow celibacy—either those who can become husbands but cannot become fathers, or those whose poverty does not supply for rearing children, or those whose lineage can be propagated by the efforts of others; or certainly is of such a sort that it is more conducive to the Republic that it die out rather than be propagated. But you, since with a physician as witness—a man neither unskilled nor in the least mendacious—you seem to promise a great posterity; since you have a most ample patrimony, and a lineage both most excellent and most most illustrious, such that it cannot be obliterated without nefarious crime and great detriment to the Republic; since your age is in full vigor, nor is beauty lacking; moreover a spouse, a maiden, is offered, than whom your fellow citizens have seen no one more intact nor more illustrious—chaste, modest, pious, with a divine face, with a most ample dowry; since friends entreat, kinsmen weep, in-laws press, the fatherland demands, the very ashes of your ancestors from their tombs adjure you for this very thing—do you still hesitate, do you still think of celibacy? If some matter not quite honorable were asked of you, if something difficult, nevertheless either the vows of your own or the love of your race ought to have stormed your spirit; how much more equitable is it that the tears of friends, the piety owed to the fatherland, the love of your ancestors obtain from you that to which both divine and human laws together exhort you, nature instigates, reason leads, honorableness allures, so many advantages invite, necessity itself even compels.

Sed iam argumentorum plus satis. Confido te iamdudum me monitore sententiam mutasse, animumque ad salubriora consilia appulisse. Bene uale.

But now more than enough of arguments. I trust that long since, with me as monitor, you have changed your opinion, and have brought your mind to more salubrious counsels. Fare well.