On the Property of Aristophanes: Against the Treasury

Now I submit, gentlemen of the jury, that a man who has himself married a portionless woman, who has bestowed large sums with his two daughters, and who has accepted a small dowry for his son, ought surely in reason to be credited with allying himself to these people without a thought of money.

Nay, more, Aristophanes, although he was now married, must have preferred to be intimate with many people rather than my father, as may readily be conceived. For there was a great difference both in his age and still more in his nature. It was my father’s way to mind his own business; whereas Aristophanes sought to concern himself not only with private but also with public affairs, and whatever money he had he spent in the pursuit of glory.

You will perceive the truth of what I say from his actual conduct. First, when Conon wanted to send someone to Sicily,[*](In 393 B.C., to undermine the friendship between Dionysius, despot of Syracuse, and the Spartans, who had helped him to attain his power in 406 B.C.) he offered himself and went off with Eunomus, who was a friend and guest of Dionysius, and who had rendered a great many services to your people, as I have been told by those who were with him at the Peiraeus.

The voyage was undertaken in hopes of persuading Dionysius to connect himself by marriage with Evagoras,[*](Despot of Salamis in Cyprus, and steady friend of Athens.) and to become an enemy of the Lacedaemonians and a friend and ally of your city. This they set out to do amid many dangers arising from the sea and from the enemy, and they prevailed on Dionysius not to send some warships which he had then prepared for the Lacedaemonians.