Panathenaicus

Even such is the discourse which has been read, in which you have represented your ancestors as devoted to peace and lovers of the Hellenes and champions of equality in the government of states, but have painted the Spartans as arrogant and warlike and self-seeking, as indeed they have been conceived by all men to be. “Such being the nature of each of these two cities, the Athenians are extolled by all men and are credited with being friendly to the masses, while the Spartans are envied and disliked by the majority of men.

There are, however, those who praise them and admire them and make bold to say that they have greater advantages than were possessed by your ancestors. For arrogance partakes of dignity—a quality held in high esteem—and men of that character are regarded as more high-minded than those who champion equality, just as those who are warlike are regarded as superior to those who are peaceable. For the latter are neither seekers after what they do not have nor staunch guardians of what they possess, while the former are effective in both respects—both in seizing whatever they covet and in keeping whatever they have once made their own.

And this is what is done by those who are men in the complete sense.[*](Manifestly Isocrates in this passage imitates Plat. Rep. 344, where Thrasymachus, maintaining that “justice is the interest of the stronger,” bids Socrates not to mark the consequences of injustice practised on a petty scale but those of the “most complete injustice,” such as a despotism. Cf. Plat. Gorg. 483.) But the eulogists of Sparta think they have even a stronger plea for self-seeking than what I have said. For they do not consider that men who break contracts and cheat and falsify accounts deserve to be termed self-seeking; for because they are in bad repute with all men they come off worse in all circumstances, whereas the self-seeking of the Spartans and of kings and despots is a gift from heaven which all men crave.

It is true that those who hold such power are the objects of abuse and execration but no man is so constituted by nature that he would not pray to the gods to be granted this power, preferably for himself, but, failing that, for those nearest and dearest to him. And this fact makes it manifest that all men regard it as the greatest good in the world to have the advantage over others. “It was, then, with such thoughts, as it seems to me, that you planned the general scope of your discourse.

But if I believed that you would refrain from revising what has been said and would let this discourse stand without criticism, I would not myself attempt to speak further. As it is, however, I do not suppose that you will feel disturbed in the least because I did not speak out my opinion on the question about which I was called in to advise you, for even at the time when you called us together you did not seem to me to be really concerned about it.

I suppose rather that you will object that, whereas you have deliberately chosen to compose a discourse which is not at all like any other, but which to those who read it casually will appear to be ingenuous and easy to comprehend, though to those who scan it thoroughly and endeavor to see in it what has escaped all others it will reveal itself as difficult and hard to understand, packed with history and philosophy, and filled with all manner of devices and fictions—not the kind of fictions which, used with evil intent, are wont to injure one's fellow-citizens, but the kind which, used by the cultivated mind, are able to benefit or to delight one's audience,—

you will object, I say, that, whereas you have chosen to do this, yet I have not allowed any of this to stand as you resolved that it should, but that I fail to see that in seeking both to explain the force of your words and to expound your real thoughts I thereby lessen the reputation of the discourse in proportion as I make it more patent and intelligible to its readers; for by implanting understanding in those who are without knowledge I render the discourse naked and strip it of the honor which would otherwise attach to it through those who study hard and are willing to take pains.

“But, while I acknowledge that my own intelligence is vastly inferior to your own, yet as surely as I appreciate this fact so surely do I know that in times when your city deliberates on matters of the greatest import those who are reputed to be the wisest some times miss the expedient course of action, whereas now and then some chance person from the ranks of men who are deemed of no account and are regarded with contempt hits upon the right course and is thought to give the best advice.

It would not, then, be surprising if something of the sort has come to pass in the present instance, where you think that you will gain the greatest credit if you conceal for the longest possible time the purpose you had in mind when you worked out your discourse, whereas I think that you will best succeed if you can with the least possible delay publish the thought by which you were governed when you composed it to all the world and especially to the Lacedaemonians, whom you have often discussed, sometimes with fairness and dignity, but then again with recklessness and extreme captiousness.

“For if one were to show them a discourse of the latter sort before I had explained it to them, they would inevitably hate you and dislike you for having written in denunciation of them. As it is, I think that while most of the Lacedaemonians will continue to abide in the ways to which they have been faithful in past times and will pay no more attention to what is written in Athens than to what is said beyond the Pillars of Heracles,

yet the most intelligent among them, who possess and admire certain of your writings, will not misapprehend anything of what is said in this discourse if they can find someone who will interpret it to them, and if they can take the time to ponder over it by themselves; on the contrary, they will appreciate the praise given to their own city, which is based on proof, while they will dismiss with contempt the abuse, which is uttered at random with no regard to the facts, and is offensive only in the words employed; and they will think that envy slipped in the calumnies which are found in your treatise,

but that you have recorded the exploits and the battles in which they themselves take great pride and because of which they enjoy a high repute with the rest of the world, and that you have made these achievements memorable by collecting them all and placing them side by side with each other and so have brought it about that many of the Spartans long to read and peruse your accounts of them, not because they crave to hear of their own deeds,

but because they wish to hear how you have dealt with them. And as they think and dwell upon these deeds, they will not fail to recall also those ancient exploits through which you have glorified their ancestors,[*](See 239 note.) but will often talk of them amongst themselves; and first of all they will tell of the time when, being still Dorians, they saw their own cities to be inglorious and insignificant and in need of many things, and, feeling them to be unworthy, took the field against the leading states of the Peloponnesus—against Argos and Lacedaemon and Messene—

conquered them in battle and drove the vanquished both from their cities and from their lands, and seized for themselves at that time all the possessions of the enemy and have continued to hold them to this day. And no man can point to a greater or a more marvellous achievement in those times nor to an enterprise more fortunate or more blessed of the gods than that which delivered those who engaged in it from their own poverty and placed them in possession of the prosperity of others.

“These were victories won with the aid of all who joined in that expedition. But after they had divided the territory with the Argives and the Messenians and for themselves had settled in Sparta—at this juncture, as you say, they were so proud that although they then numbered no more than two thousand men[*](The Spartans at the time of the Persian Wars numbered eight thousand according to Hdt. 7.234. Aristotle (Aristot. Pol. 2.9) states that in his day there were hardly one thousand.) they considered themselves unworthy to live unless they could make themselves masters of all the cities in the Peloponnesus.

In this state of mind, they undertook to wage war and did not cease, albeit they were involved in many misadventures and dangers, before they had reduced them all to subjection, except the city of the Argives. But when at length they held the greatest territory and the strongest power in Hellas and a reputation appropriate to men who had achieved such mighty things, they continued no less to pride themselves upon the fact that they could boast of a record unique and glorious:

for they, alone of the Hellenes, could say that, albeit so few in number, they had never followed the lead or done the bidding of any one of the populous states, but had throughout been free and independent; and that they themselves in the war against the barbarians had held the place of leadership among all the Hellenes and had attained this honor, not without good reason, but because they had fought more battles than any other people in those times and had never been defeated in any one of them, when a king led them forth to battle, but had been victorious in all.

And no one could urge a stronger proof than this of their valor and their hardihood and of their concord amongst themselves, except that which I shall now mention: for of all the other Hellenic states, many as they are, no man could cite or find a single one which has not been involved in the misadventures which are wont to happen to states,

whereas in the city of the Spartans no one can show an instance of civil faction or slaughter or unlawful exile, nor of seizure of property or outrage to women and children, nor even of revolution or abolition of debts or redistribution of lands, nor of any other of the irreparable ills.[*](Almost quoted from Isoc. 15.127.) And as the Spartans review these facts, they cannot fail to remember you also, who have collected them and discoursed upon them so ably, and to be most grateful to you.

“But I do not now have the same feeling about you as I had formerly. For in time past I admired your natural endowments and the manner in which you ordered your life and your devotion to work and above all the truth of your teaching, but now I envy and congratulate you because of your good fortune. For it seems to me that during your lifetime you will gain a reputation, not greater than you deserve—for that would be difficult—but one more widely extended and more heartily acknowledged than that which you now possess, and that after you have ceased to live you will partake of immortality,[*](See Isoc. 1.38 and note; Isoc. 2.37; Isoc. 5.134.) not the immortality which the gods enjoy, but that which plants in future generations a remembrance of those who have distinguished themselves in any noble endeavor.