Exordia

I think that you would rightly pay attention, men of Athens, if any man should promise to demonstrate that in the matters you are considering justice and expediency coincide. Now I believe that I shall do this without difficulty if you on your part will comply with a very slight request of mine. Let none of you, according as one or another has an opinion about the present situation, be positive that he is right in all his conclusions; but, if it turns out that something be said against these, let him consider it, listening to all the points patiently, and then, if some suggestion seems to have been rightly made, adopt it. For the measure that succeeds will belong no less to you who adopted it than to him who proposed it to you. Surely the first step toward sound deliberation is not to have reached a decision before you have heard the discussions upon which you should base your decision. For the occasion and the method of ratifying your resolutions and of deciding in the first instance what seems expedient are not the same.[*](A measure was often debated several times before being ratified. Debate should be leisurely, ratification prompt and decisive: Dem. Ex. 21. 3.)