The Funeral Speech

That the State seriously concerns itself with those who die in battle it is possible to infer both from these rites in general and, in particular, from this law in accordance with which it chooses the speaker at our public funerals. For knowing that among good men the acquisition of wealth and the enjoyment of the pleasures that go with living are scorned,[*](A commonplace of funeral speeches: Thuc. 2.42.4.) and that their whole desire is for virtue and words of praise, the citizens were of the opinion that we ought to honor them with such eulogies as would most certainly secure them in death the glory they had won while living.