Complete Works (208 page)

“Well, this war against the barbarians was endured to the end by the
[242]
whole city in defense of ourselves and our fellow speakers of Greek. But when peace prevailed and the city was held in honor, there came upon her what people generally inflict on the successful: jealousy and—through jealousy—ill-will. And that involved her, reluctantly, in fighting against Greeks. When war had broken out, the Athenians did battle with the Lacedaemonians at Tanagra for the freedom of the Boeotians, and although [b] the issue of the battle was unclear, the action that followed was decisive. For the Lacedaemonians withdrew and abandoned those whom they had come to aid, but our men were victorious at Oenophyta two days later and justly restored those who were unjustly in exile. They were the first after the Persian War to fight for the freedom of Greeks in the new way—[c] against Greeks; and since they proved to be brave men and liberated those to whose aid they came, they were the first to be buried in this tomb with civic honors.

“Later, when a great war
¹⁰
had broken out, and all the Greeks attacked our city, ravaged her land, and made sorry recompense for the services she had done them, our countrymen, who had been victorious over them at sea and had captured their Lacedaemonian leaders on Sphacteria, spared [d] the latter, sent them home, and made peace, even though they could have killed them. They thought that against men of their own race it is right to make war as far as victory rather than bring the common interests of Greece to ruin through resentment against one city, but against the barbarians it is right to make total war. The men who fought in that war and now lie here deserve praise, because they showed that if anyone maintained that in the former war, the one against the barbarians, any other people were braver than the Athenians, that was not true. By prevailing when Greece [e] was in discord, by getting the better of the foremost among the other Greeks, they showed on this occasion that they could conquer by themselves those with whom they had once conquered the barbarians in a common effort.

“After this peace a third war
¹¹
broke out—a war that defied all expectations
[243]
and was terrible. Many brave men who died in it lie here. Many fell on Sicilian shores after they had set up a great many trophies in battles for the freedom of the people of Leontini. Bound by oaths, they had sailed to those parts to defend them, but when their city found herself thwarted on account of the length of the voyage and could not reinforce them, they gave out and came to grief. Their enemies, even though they fought on the other side, have more praise for their self-control and valor than have the friends of other men. Many fell, too, in naval battles on the Hellespont, [b] after capturing all the enemy ships in one engagement,
¹²
and coming off victorious in many others.

“As for my saying that the war was terrible and defied all expectations, what I mean is that the other Greeks arrived at such a pitch of jealous rivalry against our city that they brought themselves to send an embassy to their worst enemy, the king, whom they had as our allies expelled in a common effort, to bring him back on their own, a barbarian against Greeks, and to muster everyone, Greeks and barbarians, against our city.

“And at just that point her strength and valor shone bright. For when [c] her enemies supposed that she was already beaten, and when her ships were blockaded at Mytilene, the citizens themselves embarked and went to the rescue with sixty ships. After they had, as everyone agrees, behaved most heroically in overcoming their enemies and rescuing their friends, they met with undeserved calamity: their dead were not picked up from the sea and do not lie here.
¹³
We ought to remember and praise those men forever, because by their valor we won not only that naval engagement, [d] but also the rest of the war. For it was through them that the opinion gained currency that our city could never be defeated in war, not even by all mankind. And that belief was true. We were overcome by our own quarrels, not by other men; by them we remain undefeated to this day, but we conquered ourselves and suffered defeat at our own hands.

“Afterwards, when tranquillity reigned and we were at peace with our [e] neighbors, there was civil war
¹⁴
among us, fought in such a way that, if people
had
to engage in internal strife, no one would pray for his city to be stricken in any other. So readily and naturally—so much contrary to the expectations of the other Greeks—did the citizens from the Piraeus and those from the city deal with each other! So moderately did they bring the war against the men at Eleusis to a conclusion!

“And the sole cause for all that was their genuine kinship, which provided
[244]
them, not in word but in fact, with a firm friendship based on ties of blood. We must also remember those who died at each other’s hands in that war and try to reconcile them in ceremonies such as today’s by what means we have—prayers and sacrifices—praying to the gods below who have power over them, since we ourselves are reconciled as well. For they did not lay hands on each other through wickedness or enmity, but through misfortune. And we, the living, are witnesses of this ourselves, [b] since we, who are of the same stock, have forgiven each other for what we did and for what we suffered.

“After that we got general peace, and the city enjoyed tranquillity. She forgave the barbarians; she had done them harm, and they gave as good as they got. But the Greeks aroused her indignation, because she recalled the thanks they had returned for the good she had done them—by making common cause with the barbarians, stripping her of the ships that had [c] once been their salvation, and dismantling walls once sacrificed by us to keep theirs from falling.
¹⁵
The city formed a policy of no longer protecting Greeks from being enslaved, either by each other or by barbarians, and conducted herself accordingly. So, since this was our policy, the Lacedaemonians, [b] thinking that we, the champions of freedom, had fallen and all they had to do now was enslave the other Greeks, set about that very task.

“And why should I prolong the tale? From here on I wouldn’t be speaking of things that happened in the past to former generations. We ourselves know how the foremost among the Greeks—the Argives and the Boeotians and Corinthians—came, in a state of panic, to feel a need for our city, and—wonder of wonders!—even the king reached such a point of perplexity that his deliverance came full circle to arising from nowhere other than this city, which he had kept zealously trying to destroy.

[e] “In fact, if one should wish to lay a just charge against our city, one would rightly blame her only by saying that she is always too compassionate and solicitous of the underdog. And during this time in particular, she was not able to persevere and stick to the policy she had decided on—namely,
[245]
to aid against enslavement none of the cities that had treated her people unfairly. On the contrary, she relented, came to the rescue, and released the Greeks from slavery by coming to their aid herself, with the result that they remained free until they once more enslaved themselves. On the other hand—out of respect for the trophies at Marathon and Salamis and Plataea—she could not stomach aiding the king in person; but merely by allowing exiles and mercenaries to assist him, she was, by common consent, his salvation. And after she had rebuilt her walls and fleet, she took the [b] war upon herself, when she was forced to do so, and fought with the Lacedaemonians in the Parians’ behalf.

“The king came to fear our city, when he saw that the Lacedaemonians were giving up the war at sea. Out of a wish to disengage himself, he demanded, as his price for continuing to fight on our side and that of the other allies, the Greeks on the Asian mainland whom the Lacedaemonians had previously made over to him.
¹⁶
He did so because he believed that [c] we would refuse and give him an excuse for disengaging. He was mistaken about the other allies; the Corinthians, the Argives, the Boeotians, and the rest were willing to hand them over to him and made a sworn treaty on terms that if he would give them money, they would hand over the Greeks on the mainland. We alone could not bring ourselves to betray them or swear the oath. That is how firm and sound the high-mindedness and liberality of our city are, how much we are naturally inclined to hate the [d] barbarians, through being purely Greek with no barbarian taint. For people who are barbarians by birth but Greeks by law—offspring of Pelops, Cadmus, Aegyptus, Danaus and many others—do not dwell among us.
¹⁷
We dwell apart—Greeks, not semibarbarians. Consequently, our city is imbued with undiluted hatred of foreignness.

“For all that, we found ourselves once again isolated, because we refused to commit a shameful and sacrilegious deed by betraying Greeks to barbarians. [e] So we arrived in the same circumstances that had led to our defeat before, but this time, with divine help, we managed the war better: we disengaged ourselves while still in possession of our ships, walls, and colonies. That is how glad the enemy, too, were to make peace! But we lost brave men in this war also, victims of rough terrain at Corinth and
[246]
treason at Lechaeum. Brave, too, were those who extricated the king from his difficulties and banished the Lacedaemonians from the sea. I remind you of those men, and it is fitting for you to praise them with me and do them honor.

“And these, in truth, were the deeds of the men who lie here and of others who have died for Athens. Many fine words have been spoken about them, but those that remain unsaid are a great deal more numerous and finer still; many days and nights would not suffice for one who sets [b] out to complete the enumeration. Therefore we must remember the fallen, and every man, just as in war, must encourage their descendants not to desert the ranks of their ancestors and not to yield to cowardice and fall back. So then, I myself both so encourage you today, sons of brave men, and in the future, whenever I meet any of you, I will remind you and [c] exhort you to do your utmost to be as brave as can be.

“On this occasion, though, it is my duty to repeat the words that our fathers commanded us to report to those left at home every time they were about to put their lives at risk, in case they lost them. I will tell you what I heard from them and what—judging by what they said then—they would gladly say to you now, if only they could. Whatever I report you must imagine you are hearing from them in person. And this is what they said:

“‘Sons, the present circumstance itself reveals that you are sprung from [d] brave fathers. Free to live on ignobly, we prefer to die nobly rather than subject you and your descendants to reproach and bring disgrace on our fathers and all our ancestors. We consider the life of one who has brought disgrace on his own family no life, and we think that no one, human being or god, is his friend, either on the earth or beneath it after his death.

“‘Therefore, you must remember what we say and do whatever you do to the accompaniment of valor, knowing that without it all possessions [c] and all ways of life are shameful and base. For neither does wealth confer distinction on one who possesses it with cowardice (the riches of a man like that belong to another, not himself) nor do bodily beauty and strength, when they reside in a worthless and cowardly man, seem to suit him. On the contrary, they seem out of character; they show up the one who has them for what he is and reveal his cowardice. Moreover, all knowledge
[247]
cut off from rectitude and the rest of virtue has the look of low cunning, not wisdom.

“‘For these reasons, make it your business from beginning to end to do your absolute utmost always in every way to surpass us and our ancestors in glory. If you do not, be sure that if we excel you in valor, our victory, as we see it, brings us shame, but if we are excelled by you, our defeat brings happiness. And the surest way to bring about our defeat and your [b] victory would be if you would prepare yourselves not to abuse and waste the good repute of your ancestors, because you are aware that for a man with self-respect nothing is more disgraceful than to make himself honored not through himself, but through his ancestors’ glory. Honors that come from ancestors are a noble and magnificent treasure for their descendants, but it is shameful and unmanly to enjoy the use of a treasure of wealth and honors and fail to hand it on to the following generation because of a lack of acquisitions and public recognition on one’s own part. And if [c] you will live as we advise you to live, you will come to us as friends to friends, when your destiny conveys you here; but if you have neglected our advice and behaved as cowards, no one will welcome you. So ends what is to be reported to our sons.

“‘And as for those of our fathers and mothers who still live, one ought ceaselessly to encourage them to bear the sorrow, should it fall to their lot, as easily as they can, instead of joining them in lamentations. For they [d] will stand in no need of a stimulus for grief; the misfortune that has befallen them will be enough to provide that. A better course is to try to heal and soothe them, by reminding them that the gods have answered their most earnest prayers. For they prayed for their sons to live not forever, but bravely and gloriously. And that—the greatest of boons—is what they received. It is not easy for a mortal to have
everything
in his life turn out as he would have it.

“‘If they bear their sorrows courageously, they will seem to be really fathers of courageous sons—and just as courageous themselves; but if they [e] succumb to grief, they will provide grounds for suspicion that either they are not our fathers or the people who praise us are mistaken. Neither of these must happen. On the contrary, they above all must be our encomiasts in action, by showing themselves to be true men, with the look of truly being the fathers of true men.
Nothing too much
has long been thought an excellent adage—because it is, in truth, excellent. For that man’s life is best arranged for whom all, or nearly all, the things that promote happiness
[248]
depend on himself. Such a man does not hang from other men and necessarily rise or fall in fortune as they fare well or badly; he is the temperate, he is the brave and wise man. He above all, when wealth and children come and when they go, will pay heed to the adage: because he relies on himself, he will be seen neither to rejoice nor to grieve
too much
.