Lectures · Lecture 4

4.1

When a discussion once arose as to whether sons and daughters ought to be given the same education, he said: Trainers of horses and dogs make no distinction whatever in the training of males and females; for female dogs are taught to hunt just as the males are, and if one wishes horses, whether female, to perform the work of horses well, one may see them taught no different a training from the males. But when it comes to human beings, must the males somehow have some special thing in their education and upbringing beyond the females — as though the same virtues did not need to belong equally to both, to man and woman alike, or as though it were possible to arrive at the same virtues not through the same lessons but through different ones? That there are not one set of virtues for a man and another for a woman is easy to learn. In the first place, a man must have practical wisdom, and so too must a woman; for what use would there be in a man or a woman without practical wisdom? Next, both must live justly, neither less than the other; for a man would not be a good citizen if he were unjust, and a woman would not manage her household well unless she did so justly, but being unjust she will wrong her own husband, as they say Eriphyle did. Again, it is admirable for a woman to have self-control, and equally admirable for a man; for the laws punish committing adultery and submitting to adultery on equal terms. And greediness, and drunkenness, and other like evils, being acts of intemperance and greatly disgracing those caught up in them, show that self-control is most necessary for every human being, both female and male; for it is through self-control alone that we escape intemperance, and in no other way. As for courage, one might perhaps say that it belongs to men alone. But this is not so either. For the best woman too must be manly and free of cowardice, so as to be bent neither by toil nor by fear; otherwise, how will she still have self-control, if someone, whether by frightening her or by bringing toils upon her, can compel her to endure some shameful thing? And indeed women must also be able to defend themselves, unless, by Zeus, they mean to show themselves worse than hens and other female birds, which fight for their chicks against animals far larger than themselves. How then would women not have need of courage? And that they have a share also in the strength that comes through arms was shown by the race of the Amazons, who subdued many nations by arms; so that if this is somewhat lacking in other women, it is due rather to lack of training than to nature.

4.2

. . . the virtues of a man and a woman, then it is entirely necessary that the same upbringing and the same education should belong to both. For in the case of every animal and plant, the care that is rightly applied must produce in it the virtue proper to it. Or, if a man and a woman had to be able to play the flute alike, and if this were necessary to the life of each of them, we would teach both the art of flute-playing equally; and if each had to play the lyre, . . . But if both must become good in the virtue proper to a human being, and must be able alike to exercise practical wisdom, and to have self-control, and to share in courage and in justice, the one no less than the other, shall we not then educate each of them alike, and teach both equally the art from which a human being becomes good? Yet this is how it must be done, and not otherwise. "What then?" someone perhaps says. "Do you expect men to learn spinning just as women do, and women to engage in physical exercise just as men do?" This I would no longer expect. But I say that, since in the human race the male nature is the stronger and the female nature the weaker, the most fitting tasks are to be assigned to each nature; the heavier tasks are to be given to the stronger, and the lighter to the weaker. For this reason spinning would be more fitting for women than for men, as would keeping the house; and physical exercise more fitting for men than for women, as would life out of doors. Nevertheless, sometimes even certain men might reasonably take up some of the lighter tasks, and those regarded as women's work; and women in turn might do some of the harder tasks, and those thought rather to belong to men, whenever their bodily condition, or need, or the occasion demands it. For perhaps all human tasks lie open in common and are shared by men and women, and none is of necessity set apart for the one or the other; yet some tasks are more suited to this nature, and others to that; and for this reason some are called men's work and others women's work. But whatever tasks have their reference to virtue — these, one might rightly say, belong equally to each nature, if indeed we say that the virtues too belong no more to the one than to the other.

4.3

From this, I think, it follows reasonably that both female and male ought to be educated alike in whatever pertains to virtue. And beginning straightaway from infancy, they must be taught that this thing is good and that thing bad — the same being bad for both — and that this is beneficial and that harmful, and that this is to be done and that not to be done; from which practical wisdom arises in those who learn, in girls and boys alike, and in no way differently in the one than in the other. Next, a sense of shame toward everything disgraceful must be instilled in them; and when this is present, it is inevitable that both man and woman should be self-controlled. And indeed, whoever is rightly educated, be it male or female, must be habituated to endure toil, must be habituated not to fear death, must be habituated not to be cast down before any misfortune; by all of which one becomes courageous. And it was shown a little earlier that women too must have a share in courage. Furthermore, to flee greediness and to honor equality, and, being human, to wish to do good to other human beings and not to do them harm — this is the finest lesson, and it makes those who learn it just. But why should a man learn these things any more than a woman? For if, by Zeus, it is fitting that women be just, then both must have learned the same things, at least the most authoritative and greatest of them. But if in some small matter the one shall know something and the other not, or conversely the one shall know it and the other not — something belonging to some particular craft — this does not yet show the education of the two to be different; only let neither have learned different things from the other in any of the greatest matters, but the same things. And if anyone asks me what knowledge presides over this education, I shall say to him that, just as no man could be rightly educated without philosophy, so neither could any woman. And I do not mean by this that women must have precision in argument and some excessive cleverness, if indeed they are to philosophize as women; for I do not altogether commend this even in men. But I mean that women must acquire goodness of character and nobility of conduct; since philosophy too is nothing other than the practice of nobility of character.