“You start me upon too long a discourse; still, in order that you may not think I abstain from lack of will to answer your questions, I say that just as our mind and body are two things, so too the soul is divided into two parts, of which one has the reason in it, and the other has the appetite. Then, just as in generation the body precedes the soul, so the unreasoning part of the soul precedes the reasoning part: which is clearly perceived in children, in whom anger and lust are seen almost as soon as they are born, but with the lapse of time reason appears. Hence care must be taken of the body earlier than of the soul, and of appetite earlier than of reason; but care of the body with a view to the soul, and of the appetite with a view to reason: for just as intellectual worth is perfected by instruction, so is moral worth perfected by practice. We ought, therefore, first to teach through habit, which is able to govern the as yet unreasoning appetites and to direct them towards the good by means of that fair use; next we ought to establish them through the understanding, which, although it shows its light more tardily, still furnishes a mode of making the virtues more perfectly fruitful to one whose mind is well trained by practice,—wherein, to my thinking, lies the whole matter.” 30.—My lord Gaspar said: “Before you go further, I should like to know what care ought to be taken of the body, since you said that we ought to take care of it earlier than of the soul.” “As to that,” replied my lord Ottaviano, laughing, “ask those who nourish their bodies well, and are plump and fresh; for mine, as you see, is not too well conditioned. Yet of this also it would be possible to say much, as of the proper time for marriage, to the end that the children may not be too near or too far from their father’s age; of the exercises and education to be followed from birth and during the rest of life, in order to make them handsome, strong and sturdy.” My lord Gaspar replied: “That which would best please women for making their children handsome and beautiful, methinks would be that community wherein Plato in his Republic wishes them to be held, and after that manner.”[441] Then my lady Emilia said, laughing: “It is not in the compact that you should fall to speaking ill of women again.” “I think,” replied my lord Gaspar, “that I give them great praise in saying that they wish to bring in a custom approved by so great a man.” Messer Cesare Gonzaga said, laughing: “Let us see whether this could have place among my lord Ottaviano’s precepts (I do not know if he has rehearsed them all), and whether it were well for the prince to make it law.” “The few that I have rehearsed,” replied my lord Ottaviano, “might perhaps suffice to make a prince good, as princes go nowadays; although if one cared to look into the matter more minutely, he would still have much more to say.” My lady Duchess added: