Parodos
[Agon]
Stop! For immediately I seize and hold you by the waist without escape. Come, tell me, which of the sons of Jupiter do you deem to have been the bravest in soul, and to have undergone most labours?
Just Cause.
I consider no man superior to Hercules.
1050
Unjust Cause.
Where, pray, did you ever see cold Herculean baths? And yet, who was more valiant than he?
Just Cause.
These are the very things which make the bath full of youths always chattering all day long, but the palaestras empty.
Unjust Cause.
You next find fault with their living in the market-place; but I commend it. For if it had been bad, Homer would never have been for representing Nestor as an orator; nor all the other wise men. I will return, then, from thence to the tongue, which this fellow says our youths ought not to exercise, while I maintain they should.
1055
And again, he says they ought to be modest: two very great evils. For tell me to whom you have ever seen any good accrue through modesty and confute me by your words.
1060
Just Cause.
To many. Peleus, at any rate, received his sword on account of it.
Unjust Cause.
A sword? Marry, he got a pretty piece of luck, the poor wretch! While Hyperbolus, he of the lamps, got more than many talents by his villainy, but by Jupiter, no sword!
Just Cause.
And Peleus married Thetis, too, through his modesty.
Unjust Cause.
And then she went off and left him; for he was not lustful, nor an agreeable bedfellow to spend the night with.
Now a woman delights in being wantonly treated. But you are an old dotard. For (to Phidippides). consider, O youth, all that attaches to modesty, and of how many pleasures you are about to be deprived—of women, of games at cottabus, of dainties, of drinking-bouts, of giggling. And yet, what is life worth to you if you be deprived of these enjoyments?
1070
Well, I will pass from thence to the necessities of our nature. You have gone astray, you have fallen in love, you have been guilty of some adultery, and then have been caught. You are undone, for you are unable to speak. But if you associate with me, indulge your inclination, dance, laugh, and think nothing disgraceful. For if you should happen to be detected as an adulterer, you will make this reply to him,
1075
that you have done him no injury: and then refer him to Jupiter, how even he is overcome by love and women . And yet, how could you, who are a mortal, have greater power than a god?
1080
Just Cause.
But what if he should suffer the radish through obeying you, and be depillated with hot ashes? What argument will he be able to state, to prove that he is not a blackguard?
Unjust Cause.
And if he be a blackguard, what harm will he suffer?
1085
Just Cause.
Nay, what could he ever suffer still greater than this?
Unjust Cause.
What then will you say if you be conquered by me in this?
Just Cause.
I will be silent: what else can I do?
Unjust Cause.
Come, now, tell me; from what class do the advocates come?
Just Cause.
From the blackguards.
1090
Unjust Cause.
I believe you. What then? From what class do tragedians come?
1090
Just Cause.
From the blackguards.
Unjust Cause.
You say well. But from what class do the public orators come?
Just Cause.
From the blackguards.
Unjust Cause.
Then have you perceived that you say nothing to the purpose? And look which class among the audience is the more numerous.
Just Cause.
Well now, I’m looking.
Unjust Cause.
What, then, do you see?
Just Cause.
By the gods, the blackguards to be far more numerous. This fellow, at any rate, I know; and him yonder; and this fellow with the long hair.
Unjust Cause.
What, then, will you say?
Just Cause.
We are conquered. Ye blackguards, by the gods, receive my cloak, for I desert to you.
