§1#1## LIBER PRIMVS.
Si tanta in terris moraretur fides, quanta merces eius expectatur in caelis, nulla omnino vestrum, sorores dilectissimae, ex quo deum vivum cognovisset, et de sua, id est de feminae conditione didicisset, laetiorem habitum, ne dicam gloriosiorem appetisset, ut non magis in sordibus ageret, et squalorem potius affectaret, ipsam se circumferens Evam lugentem et paenitentem, quo plenius id quod de Eva trahit (ignominiam dico primi delicti et invidiam perditionis humanae) omni satisfactionis habitu expiaret.
BOOK ONE. If there were as much faith remaining on earth as there is reward expected for it in heaven, no one of you at all, my dearest sisters, from the time she had known the living God and learned of her own—that is, woman’s—condition, would have desired a more joyous, not to say a more glorious, garb, so as not rather to go about in sordid weeds, and rather to affect squalor, carrying about her very self as Eve mourning and repentant, in order that she might more fully expiate by every garb of satisfaction that which she derives from Eve—I mean the ignominy of the first sin and the odium of human perdition.
In doloribus et anxietatibus paris, mulier, et ad virum tuum conversio tua, et ille dominatur tui. Et Evam te esse nescis? Vivit sententia dei super sexum istum in hoc saeculo;
"In sorrows and anxieties dost thou bring forth children, woman, and thy turn is to thy husband, and he rules over thee." And do you not know that you are Eve?
vivat et reatus necesse est.
The sentence of God upon this sex of yours lives in this world; of necessity, the guilt must live also.
Tu es diaboli ianua, tu es arboris illius resignatrix tu es divinae legis prima desertrix, tu es quae eum suasisti quem diabolus aggredi non valuit.
You are the devil’s gateway; you are the unsealer of that tree; you are the first deserter of the divine law; you are she who persuaded him whom the devil was not valiant enough to attack.
Tu imaginem dei, hominem, tam facile elisisti.
You so easily destroyed God's image, man.
Propter tuum meritum, id est mortem, etiam filius dei mori habuit: et adornari tibi in mente est super pelliceas tuas tunicas? Age nunc, si ab initio rerum et Milesi(??) oves tonderent, et Seres arbores nerent, et Tyrii tinguerent, et Phryges insuerent, et Babylonii intexerent, et margaritae canderent, et ceraunia coruscarent, si ipsum quoque aurum iam de terra cum cupiditate prodisset, si iam et speculo tantum mentiri liceret, et haec Eva concupiit de paradiso expulsa, iam mortua, opinor? Ergo nec nunc appetere debet aut nosse, si cupit reviviscere, quae nec habuerat nec noverat quando vivebat.
On account of your desert—that is, death—even the Son of God had to die; and is it in your mind to adorn yourself over your tunics of skins? Come now, if from the beginning of things both the Milesians sheared sheep, and the Seres spun trees, and the Tyrians dyed, and the Phrygians embroidered, and the Babylonians wove, and pearls shone, and ceraunias flashed; if gold itself too had already come forth from the earth with covetousness, if already even the mirror were permitted to lie so much, and Eve, expelled from paradise, already dead, had coveted these things, I suppose? Therefore neither now ought she to desire or know them, if she wishes to live again, she who had neither possessed nor known them when she was alive.
Ideo omnia ista damnatae et mortuae mulieris impedimenta sunt, quasi ad pompam funeris constituta.
Therefore all these things are the encumbrances of a condemned and dead woman, as if prepared for a funeral procession.
Nam et illi qui ea constituerunt damnati in poenam mortis deputantur, illi scilicet angeli qui ad filias hominum de caelo ruerunt, ut haec quoque ignominia feminae accedat.
For those too who devised them are destined for the punishment of death—namely, those angels who rushed down from heaven to the daughters of men, so that this ignominy of woman might also be added.
Nam cum et materias quasdam bene occultas et artes plerasque non bene revelatas saeculo multo magis imperito prodidissent, siquidem et metallorum opera nudaverant et herbarum ingenia traduxerant et incantationum vires provulgaverant et omnem curiositatem usque ad stellarum interpretationem designaverant, proprie et quasi peculiariter feminis instrumentum istud muliebris gloriae contulerunt, lumina lapillorum quibus monilia variantur, et circulos ex auro quibus brachia artantur, et medicamenta ex fuco quibus lanae colorantur, et illum ipsum nigrum pulverem quo oculorum exordia producuntur.
For when they had betrayed to a much more ignorant age certain well-hidden materials and many arts not well-revealed—since they had laid bare the workings of metals, and betrayed the properties of herbs, and published the powers of incantations, and pointed out every curiosity even to the interpretation of the stars—they conferred, properly and as it were peculiarly upon women, this instrument of feminine glory: the brilliance of the small stones with which necklaces are varied, and the bands of gold with which arms are constricted, and the medicaments of dye with which wools are colored, and that very black powder with which the outlines of the eyes are elongated.
Haec qualia sunt, interim iam ex doctorum suorum qualitate et conditione pronuntiari potest, quod nihil ad integritatem peccatores, nihil ad castitatem adamatores, nihil ad timorem dei desertores spiritus aut monstrare potuerunt aut praestare.
What kind of things these are can meanwhile already be pronounced from the quality and condition of their teachers: that the sinner-spirits, the deserters of God, could neither show nor afford anything toward integrity, anything toward chastity, anything toward the fear of God.
Si doctrinae dicendae sunt, mali magistri male docuerint necesse est; si mercedes pro libidine, nullius rei turpis merces decora est.
If they are to be called doctrines, bad masters must have taught badly; if rewards for lust, the reward of no shameful thing is honorable.
Quid autem tanti fuit ista monstrare sicut conferre? utrumne mulieres sine materiis splendoris et sine ingeniis decoris placere non possent hominibus, quae adhuc incultae et incompositae et, ut ita dixerim, crudae ac rudes angelos moverant? anne sordidi et per gratuitum usum contumeliosi amatores viderentur, si nihil feminis in connubium allectis contulissent? Sed haec non capit aestimare.
But what was of such great importance to show these things as to confer them? Was it that women could not please men without materials of splendor and without arts of beauty, women who, while still unadorned and unarranged and, so to speak, crude and rustic, had moved angels? Or would they have seemed mean and, through gratuitous use, abusive lovers, if they had conferred nothing on the women they had enticed into marriage? But this is not for us to estimate.
Nihil plus desiderare poterant quae angelos possidebant, magno scilicet nupserant.
They could desire nothing more who possessed angels; they had indeed married grandly.
Enimvero qui utique interdum cogitabant unde cecidissent et post libidinum vaporata momenta caelum suspirabant, illud ipsum bonum feminarum naturalis decoris, ut causam mali, sic remuneraverunt, ne eis profuisset felicitas sua, sed ut devectae de simplicitate et sinceritate una cum ipsis in offensam dei pervenirent.
But in truth, those who surely sometimes thought whence they had fallen, and after the vaporized moments of lust sighed for heaven, requited that very good of women's natural beauty as a cause of evil, so that their happiness might not benefit them, but that, dragged down from simplicity and sincerity, they might arrive together with them into the offense of God.
Certi erant omnem et gloriam et ambitionem et affectionem per carnem placendi deo displicere.
They were certain that all glory, ambition, and affection of pleasing through the flesh displease God.
Hi sunt nempe angeli quos iudicaturi sumus, hi sunt angeli quibus in lavacro renuntiamus, haec sunt utique per quae ab homine iudicari meruerunt.
These are indeed the angels whom we are to judge; these are the angels whom we renounce in the bath of baptism; these are indeed the things through which they deserved to be judged by man.
Quid ergo faciunt apud iudices suos res eorum? quod est commercium damnaturis cum damnandis? opinor, quod Christo et Beliae.
What, then, are their things doing in the hands of their judges? What commerce is there for those who are to judge with those who are to be judged? The same, I suppose, as between Christ and Belial.
Qua constantia tribunal illud ascendimus decreturi adversus eos quorum munera appetimus? Nam et vobis eadem tunc substantia angelica repromissa, idem sexus qui et viris, eandem indicandi dignationem pollicetur.
With what constancy do we ascend that tribunal to decree against those whose gifts we desire? For to you also the same angelic substance is then promised, the same sex as to men promises the same dignity of judging.
Nisi ergo hic iam praeiudicaverimus res eorum praedamnando quas in illis damnaturi sumus, illi potius nos iudicabunt atque damnabunt.
Unless, therefore, we already prejudge here by pre-condemning their things which we are to condemn in them, they will rather judge and condemn us.