Against Philon, On his Scrutiny

For when a man commits such offences in regard to his own relations, what would he do in regard to strangers? To prove that these also are true facts, hear the statement of the actual person who received the money and buried her.

TestimonyWhat inducement, then, could you have for approving this man? Because he has committed no offence ? But he is guilty of the gravest crimes against his country. Or do you think he will reform? Then, I say, let him reform first in his bearing towards the city, and claim a seat on the Council later, when he has done her a service as signal as the wrong that he did her before. The saner course is to recompense everyone for his services after they have been performed; for I consider it monstrous that for the offences which he has already committed he is never to pay the penalty, but for the benefits which he intends to confer he is to be already possessed of honor.

Or is it to make the citizens better when they see all men honored alike,—is this why he is to be approved? But the danger is that good men, when they observe that they and the bad are honored alike, will desist from their good behavior, expecting that the same persons who honor the wicked may well be forgetful of the virtuous.

And this further point is worthy of your attention,—that whereas anyone who had betrayed a fort or a ship or an army which happened to have in it some part of our people, would be visited with the extreme penalty, this man, who has betrayed the whole city, is planning not merely to escape requital but even to obtain honor! But surely anyone who has betrayed liberty in the flagrant manner of this man deserves to be faced with a judgement awarding him, not a seat on the Council, but slavery and the heaviest punishment.