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Translated by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson.
Clement of Alexandria in Print
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This Part: 134 Pages
Page 38
And, in truth, those women who are crazy about these stupid and luxurious purples, "purple (dark) death has seized," [1547] according to the poetic saying. On account of this purple, then, Tyre and Sidon, and the vicinity of the Lacedaemonian Sea, are very much desired; and their dyers and purple-fishers, and the purple fishes themselves, because their blood produces purple, are held in high esteem. But crafty women and effeminate men, who blend these deceptive dyes with dainty fabrics, carry their insane desires beyond all bounds, and export their fine linens no longer from Egypt, but some other kinds from the land of the Hebrews and the Cilicians. I say nothing of the linens made of Amorgos [1548] and Byssus. Luxury has outstripped nomenclature.
The covering ought, in my judgment, to show that which is covered to be better than itself, as the image is superior to the temple, the soul to the body, and the body to the clothes. [1549] But now, quite the contrary, the body of these ladies, if sold, would never fetch a thousand Attic drachms. Buying, as they do, a single dress at the price of ten thousand talents, they prove themselves to be of less use and less value than cloth. Why in the world do you seek after what is rare and costly, in preference to what is at hand and cheap? It is because you know not what is really beautiful, what is really good, and seek with eagerness shows instead of realities from fools who, like people out of their wits, imagine black to be white.
[1547] Iliad, v. 83.
[1548] Flax grown in the island of Amorgos.
[1549] [Matt. vi. 25.]
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