this is madness not love. And it is absurd
to detract from woman's various excellence. Look at their self-restraint
and intelligence, their fidelity and uprightness, and that bravery
courage and magnanimity so conspicuous in many! And to say that they
have a natural aptitude for all other virtues, but are deficient as
regards friendship alone, is monstrous. For they are fond of their
children and husbands, and generally speaking the natural affection in
them is not only, like a fruitful soil, capable of friendship, but is
also accompanied by persuasion and other graces. And as poetry gives to
words a kind of relish by melody and metre and rhythm, making
instruction thereby more interesting, but what is injurious more
insidious, so nature, investing woman with beautiful appearance and
attractive voice and bewitching figure, does much for a licentious woman
in making her wiles more formidable, but makes a modest one more apt
thereby to win the goodwill and friendship of her husband. And as Plato
advised Xenocrates, a great and noble man in all other respects, but too
austere in his temperament, to sacrifice to the Graces, so one might
recommend a good and modest woman to sacrifice to Love, that her husband
might be a mild and agreeable partner, and not run after any other
woman, so as to be compelled to say like the fellow in the comedy, 'What
a wretch I am to ill-treat such a woman!' For to love in marriage is far
better than to be loved, for it prevents many, nay all, of those
offences which spoil and mar marriage.

Sec. XXIV. As to the passionate affection in the early days of
marriage,[148] my dear Zeuxippus, do not fear that it will leave any
sore or irritation, though it is not wonderful that there should be some
friction at the commencement of union with a virtuous woman, just as at
the grafting of trees, as there is also pain at the beginning of
conception, for there can be no complete union without some suffering.
Learning puts boys out somewhat when they first go to school, as
philosophy does young men at a later day, but the ill effects are not
lasting, either in their cases or in the case of lovers. As in the
fusion of two liquors, love does indeed at first cause a simmering and
commotion, but eventually cools down and settles and becomes tranquil.
For the union of lovers is indeed a complete union, whereas the union of
those that live together without love resembles only the friction and
concussion of Epicur