Oration 88

Though I have often praised your character, as that of a good man worthy to hold the first place among the best, never before have I admired it as now. For that a man in the very prime of his years, falling short of none in power and possessing abundance, with full license to indulge in luxury by day and by night, should yet still reach out after culture and be a lover of what is fine in the experience of discourse, and not shrink even if it be needful to toil—this seemed to me very greatly the work of a noble soul, and not merely of one ambitious for honour, but in truth of a lover of wisdom. For indeed the best of the men of old used to say that they not only flourished but grew old in learning.

And you seem to me to be very rightly minded, in holding that a statesman has need of experience and power in discourse. For toward being loved, and toward having strength, and toward being honoured, and toward not being despised, the greatest benefit comes from this. For by what do men, when they have taken fright, gain courage rather than by speech? By what are those who run riot and exalt themselves brought low and chastised? From what do they hold off their desires? And whose admonition do they bear more gently than the man at whose speech they take delight?

Often, then, one may see in the cities others spending money and conferring favours and adorning the city with offerings, but those who speak being praised, as being the cause even of those men's deeds. Wherefore too the most ancient of the poets, who received their poetry from the gods, said that neither the strong nor the fair are looked upon as gods, but those who speak. That you have observed these things and are attempting to act upon them, I praise you and admire you.

And on my own behalf I feel no ordinary gratitude, that you have thought me useful to you for this purpose and this undertaking. For until now, just as one of the men of old said that he was a sufficient seer for himself, so I too thought that I sufficed for myself in matters of discourse—and that scarcely. But you raise me up and persuade me to take courage, if to a man who has come to the height of culture and is so great I can be of use. And perhaps I might be—just as to one going along a road, very strong and vigorous, a boy or some old herdsman sometimes points out a short cut or even a highway which he chanced not to know.

But, that there be not much talk before the business, I must now set my hand to what you have enjoined. Now a stripling or a young man who wishes to withdraw from affairs and devote himself to practice and to acquire a power suited to the contest has need of other exercises and pursuits. But you are neither inexperienced in the work, nor able to give up affairs, nor have you need of forensic power and cleverness, but of that which both befits and suffices for a statesman.

Know this first, then, that you have no need of toil and hardship—for to the man who has long practised these things they advance very far, but to the man who has used them little they bind up the soul and make it shrink from coming near, just as, when one wearies with heavier exercises those unaccustomed to bodily training, he makes them weaker—but, just as bodies unused to toil need anointing rather and moderate movement than gymnastics, so you, in respect of discourse, have need rather of a care mingled with pleasure than of practice and toil. Of the poets, then, I would counsel you to read, not casually, Menander among the comic poets and Euripides among the tragic; and these not in this way, reading them yourself, but having them performed for you by others who are skilled—best of all with pleasure, but at any rate without pain; for the perception is greater when one is freed from the occupation of reading.

And let none of the wiser sort blame me for having preferred Menander to the old comedy, or Euripides to the old tragedians; for the physicians do not prescribe the most expensive foods to those who need treatment, but the beneficial. It would be a long task to tell how many useful things come from these. For the representation by Menander of every character and charm has surpassed all the cleverness of the old comic poets; and the smoothness and persuasiveness of Euripides, though it may not perfectly attain to the loftiness and dignity of tragedy, is yet very useful to a statesman, and besides he is clever at filling out characters and passions, and he mingles in his poems maxims useful for all things, being not inexperienced in philosophy.

Homer, however, comes first and middle and last, for every boy and man and old man, giving of himself as much as each is able to take. And lyric and elegiac poetry and iambics and dithyrambs are worth much to the man who has leisure; but for one who intends to act and at the same time to increase his actions and his discourses

there would be no leisure for them. But the historians the statesman must read with diligence for many reasons, since, even apart from discourse, to be experienced in actions and good fortunes and misfortunes—which befall men and cities not only according to reason, but sometimes even contrary to reason—is exceedingly necessary for a statesman and for one who chooses to manage public affairs. For the man who knows the most things that have happened to others will best accomplish the things he himself undertakes, and will get safely through with what means he has, and, faring well, will not be lifted up beyond measure, and will bear all ill-fortune nobly, because not even amid his prosperity was he unmindful of the change to the contrary.

With Herodotus, then, if ever you have need of cheerfulness, you will consort with much repose. For the relaxed and sweet quality of his narrative will give the impression that the composition is fabulous rather than historical. But of the foremost, Thucydides seems to me the best, and of the second rank Theopompus. For he too has something rhetorical about the delivery of his discourses, and is neither without power nor careless in interpretation, and the easygoing quality of his diction is not so base as to grieve you. But Ephorus hands down much history, though the flat and relaxed character of his narrative is not suited to you.

Of the orators, who does not know the best—that Demosthenes surpassed all the orators in power of delivery and cleverness of thought and abundance of words, and Lysias in brevity and simplicity and continuity of thought and in concealing his cleverness? Only I would not counsel you to read these for the most part, but Hyperides rather and Aeschines. For the powers of these are simpler and their structures easier to grasp, and the beauty of their words in no way falls short of those others. But Lycurgus too I would counsel you to read, who is lighter than these and shows in his discourses a certain simplicity and nobility of character.

And here I say that—even if some reader of this advice, of the very exact sort, should blame me—one must not be inexperienced even in the more recent men of a little before our time; I mean those about Antipater and Theodorus and Plution and Conon and such material. For the powers of these would be useful to us in this way too, that we should consort with them without having our judgment enslaved, as with the ancients. For from being able to find fault with something said, we most of all take courage toward attempting the same things, and one matches himself more pleasantly with the man he is persuaded by, being judged, when compared, not inferior, and sometimes even appearing better.

But I will now turn to the Socratics, whom indeed I say are most necessary to every man who reaches after discourse. For just as no dish is pleasing to the taste without salt, so no kind of discourse seems to me as it could be agreeable to the ear if it lack the Socratic charm. To praise the rest would be a long task, and to read them is no light matter.

But Xenophon I, for my part, think alone of the ancients able to suffice a statesman: whether one is leading an army in war or governing a city, whether speaking before the people or in the council-chamber, or whether even in a court of law one should wish to speak not merely as an orator, but as a statesman and a kingly man, what befits such a one in his cause—for all these things Xenophon seems to me the best and most profitable. For his thoughts are clear and simple and appear easy to everyone, and the form of his narrative is agreeable and charming and persuasive, having much plausibility and much grace and address, so that his power resembles not only cleverness of speech but even a kind of enchantment.

If, at any rate, you should be willing to read his treatise on the Anabasis very diligently, you will find no kind of discourse that you could be called upon to make which has not been distinctly treated, and which would not offer itself like a rule to the man who wishes to direct himself by it or to imitate it. For whether it be useful to a statesman to encourage those who are utterly cast down, he shows often how one ought to do this; or whether to exhort and to summon them on, no one with an ear for the Greek tongue could fail to be roused by the hortatory discourses of Xenophon

(my own mind, at any rate, is stirred, and sometimes I weep in the midst of reading, consorting with his discourses after so many years); or whether to deal prudently with the proud and exalted, and neither to suffer anything at their hands, when they take offence, nor unseemly to enslave one's own judgment and do in all things what is pleasing to them—these too are there. And how one ought to use secret discourses both with generals, apart from the multitude, and with the multitude, not in the same way; and in what manner to converse with kings; and how to deceive enemies to their harm but friends to their advantage; and to those vainly disturbed to speak the truth without pain and with conviction; and not lightly to trust those in power, and the means by which those in power deceive and by which men outgeneral and are outgeneralled—all these things the work sufficiently contains.

For inasmuch, I think, as he mingled the discourses with the actions, having neither received them by hearsay nor imitated them, but himself acting and speaking at the same time, he made them most plausible in all his works, and in this one most of all, which I happened to mention. And be well assured, you will in no way repent it, but both in the council and before the people you will perceive the man stretching out his hand to you, if you consort with him eagerly and zealously.

To write, then, I do not counsel you in his manner, save very rarely, but rather to dictate. For first, the man who dictates is more like the speaker than the writer; next, it is done with less toil; next, it contributes less to power than writing, but more to habit. And I do not think it worth your while to write those scholastic fictions, but, if anything, certain of the discourses you take pleasure in reading—especially those of Xenophon—either contradicting what has been said or putting the same things in another way.

And to take up by memory, indeed, if it be easy for you to remember, their works is better. For by the manner of their narrative and the exactness of their thoughts it makes one very familiar with them. I mean not that you should string together a whole work, like a boy, in a connected piece, but that, if anything please you greatly, you should hold this fast. More about this I should have written to a stripling; but for you so much suffices. For even if you should take up the least, it will profit much; and if you should be ill-disposed and do it with pain, it is not at all necessary.

But I seem to have drawn out the counsel very long; and you are the cause, having persuaded and challenged me—just as in wrestling those who are superior, by yielding to the weaker, sometimes make them believe they are stronger; and you seem, in the things you happen to know better, to have urged me on to write as though I knew less. But I should wish, if it be agreeable to you, that we might some time be in the same place, that, both consorting with the ancients and conversing about them, we might be of some use;

just as for painters and modellers it does not suffice to say that the colours ought to be of such a kind and the lines of such a kind, but the greatest benefit comes if one should see them either painting or modelling; and as for trainers it does not suffice to tell the holds, but it is needful also to show them to the learner—so too in such counsels the benefit would be greater, if one should see the very man who has given the counsel doing it. As for me, even if I should have to read aloud while you listen, for the sake of your benefit I would not shrink from it, both loving you and admiring your zeal for honour and being grateful for the honour you show me.