Oration 75
Imperial Dio Chrysostom Greek- The law is the guide of life, the common overseer of the cities, the just measuring-rod of affairs, toward which each man must set straight his own character; otherwise he will be crooked and base. Those, then, who keep it cleave to safety; but those who transgress it first of all destroy themselves, and then the rest as well, furnishing them with an example and an incitement to lawlessness and violence. And just as, among voyagers, those who do not stray from the beacon are saved above all and find their harbours, so those who live according to the law travel most safely through life and attain the lodging they need. 2. A man, indeed, has ere now repented of using another man as his counsellor; but never of using the law. And it is so much more useful to cities than their walls, that many cities continue unwalled, but without law it is not possible for any city to be inhabited. And it is profitable not only to mortals, but to the gods as well. The cosmos, at any rate, ever keeps the same law unmoved, and none of the eternal beings would transgress it. Whence, too, the law has reasonably been called king of men and of gods—dissolving violence, casting down outrage, chastening folly, punishing wickedness, benefiting all who are in need, both in private and in common, helping the wronged, and showing those who are perplexed about anything what is needful. 3. For whenever a man, on some troublesome matter befalling him, seeks what is advantageous, there is no need, I think, to summon friends or kinsmen, but to go to the laws and inquire. And the law would not, looking to its own interest, advise him the worse, nor would it, through ignorance of the better course, or through some occupation, or through unconcern, decline those who seek its counsel. On the contrary, it cares for all alike and has leisure for the affairs of others, and has nothing private or peculiar to itself. 4. And indeed the law is so much more useful than divination from the gods, inasmuch as some have ere now mistaken the oracles, and, thinking that they acted according to them, did the contrary, whence, I think, they met with calamities; but from the law there is nothing crooked nor ambiguous, but it states plainly all that is fitting for those who need it. And being ruler and master of all, it prevails without arms and without force; for, on the contrary, it itself dissolves force; but it presides with persuasion and over willing subjects. For it is by having persuaded beforehand and by being approved that it comes into being and receives its strength. 5. And so great is its power that it is even the helper of the gods; for it chastises the temple-robbers and those who transgress piety toward them. And indeed not even one man is able to wrong it; for each of those who transgress the law harms not it, but himself. 6. And it is full of such justice and humanity, that it has become more useful to the unfortunate than their kinsmen, and stronger for the wronged than their own might, and more kindly to fathers than their sons, and to children than their parents, and to brothers than their brothers. Many, at any rate, when wronged by their dearest, take refuge with it. And further, the law, though it has itself received good from no one, repays to all the gratitude due for the benefits they have conferred on others—exacting for parents the like return from children, and for the private benefactors of any from those who have been well served, and for those who show public munificence, from the city. 7. And it has made the prizes of benefactions most beautiful, having devised crowns and proclamations and front seats—which bring no expense to those who provide them, but are worth everything to those who receive them. And whatever it wishes, even of the cheapest things, this it has straightway made great and honourable. This is it that has shown the wild-olive to be so great and worthy of such zeal, and the parsley and the pine and the crown of the olive-spray; this it is that has shown the three words, by which each of the good is proclaimed, to be, for many, more precious than life. 8. This is it that gathers the festal assemblies, that honours the gods, that magnifies virtue; this it is that purges the sea, that makes the land gentle, the adopted son of Zeus, having strength unconquered and unsurpassable; differing so greatly from all in self-control and in trustworthiness, that to it we have all entrusted the fellowship of our wives, and the bloom of maidens, and the prime of boys. And further, though Justice is a maiden, to it alone, on account of its self-control, is she joined. 9. This is the succour of old age, the teacher of youth, the fellow-worker of poverty, the guardian of wealth, an ally to peace, an adversary to war. Nay rather, even in war itself it has the greatest strength. The herald sent from the bitterest foes—this it is that saves and guards, having given him for a weapon, stronger than any breastplate and any shield, the herald's staff; and this is the symbol of the law. Because of it no one any longer judges the dead to be enemies, nor displays hostility and outrage upon their bodies. 10. And it is so much more useful to cities than the rudders to ships, that the ship which has lost its tillers would not be destroyed unless a storm overtook it, but a city cannot be saved when the law is dissolved, even if nothing dreadful befall from without. And just as each man is administered and preserved by the intelligence within him, and the corruption of this brings madness and derangement, in like manner, if anyone should do away with law from life, he will, as one who has lost his reason, be brought round to utter madness and confusion.