Cyropaedia

And do you really believe, said Chrysantas, that the mass meeting would adopt a resolution that each one should not have an equal share, but that the best should have the preference both in honours and gifts? Yes said Cyrus, I do, partly because we recommend[*](Rewards according to merit) it, and partly because it is mean to oppose a proposition that the one who suffers the most and does the most for the state should also receive the highest rewards. And I think, said he, that even to the worst it will seem proper that the good should have the larger share.

Now Cyrus wished for the sake of the peers themselves that this measure should pass; for he thought that even they themselves would be better, if they knew that they also should be judged by their works and should receive according to their deserts. And so it seemed to him to be the proper time to bring this matter to a vote now, while the peers also were questioning the commoners’ claims to equality. Accordingly, those in the tenth agreed to submit the question to a discussion and they said that whoever thought himself to be a man ought to advocate it.

But one of the captains said with a laugh: Well, I know a man of the commoners, too, who will support the proposition not to have share and share alike in that indiscriminate fashion.Another asked him whom he meant; and he answered: By Zeus, he is a messmate of ours, who in everything does his best to get the largest share.What! the largest share of hard work, too? asked another. No, by Zeus, said he; not by any means; but here I have been caught in a falsehood. For my observation is that he very good-naturedly consents to have a smaller share of hard work and other things of that sort than anybody else.

Well, men, said Cyrus, I am convinced that[*](The vicious and lazy have no place in an army) such fellows as this one of whom our friend has just been telling us must be weeded out of the ranks, if we are to keep our army industrious and obedient. For it seems to me that the majority of the soldiers are the sort to follow wherever any one leads; and the good and noble, I think, try to lead only to what is good and noble, and the vicious to what is vicious.