Panegyric on the Empress Eusebia

1. What, then, are we to think of those who owe a great debt, indeed a debt beyond all greatness — I do not mean of gold or silver, but simply whatever good a man has chanced to receive from his neighbor — and who then neither attempt nor even purpose to repay such a debt, but are slack and careless about doing what lies in their power and discharging their obligation? Are they not plainly to be reckoned base and worthless? For I think there is no other wrongdoing that we hate less than ingratitude, and we reproach men for it whenever, after receiving kindness, they prove ungrateful toward their benefactors. And it is not only the man who, having been treated well, repays it with evil deeds or words who is ungrateful, but also the man who keeps silent and conceals it, consigning the favors to oblivion and effacing them. Of that brutish and inhuman wickedness the examples are very few and easily counted; but many conceal the appearance of having been treated well, with what intent I do not know. They say, however, that they are avoiding the reputation of a certain fawning and ignoble flattery. For my part, although I know clearly that what they say is unsound, I yet let them go, and let it stand that they escape, as they suppose, an unmerited reputation for flattery — though they show themselves liable at once to many passions and to diseases utterly base and servile. For either, not understanding, they are too insensible in matters where one ought by no means to be insensible; or, understanding, they are forgetful of what one ought to remember for all time; and if they remember and yet shrink back for whatever reason, they are by nature cowardly and envious, and simply ill-disposed toward all mankind — men who are unwilling to be gentle and kindly even toward their benefactors, and who then, if there is need to abuse and bite anyone, look angry and fierce like wild beasts, and who, fleeing true praise as though it were a lavish expense, somehow find fault with the celebration of noble deeds, when they might examine this one thing only: whether men honor the truth and value it more than the appearance of granting a favor in their praises. For one cannot even say that praise is a useless thing, either to those for whom it is bestowed or again to others who, having been allotted the same rank in life as those men, fell short of them in the virtue of their actions. For to the former it is a sweet thing to hear, and it makes them more eager toward what is noble and distinguished in their deeds; and the latter it has urged on, by persuasion and by force, to emulate those deeds, when they see that none even of their predecessors were deprived of the one thing which alone it is noble to give and to receive in public. For to give money openly and to look about so that as many as possible may know what has been given is the mark of a man without taste; nor would anyone hold out his hands to receive a gift before the eyes of all, unless he had altogether shaken off the modesty and decency of his character. Arcesilaus, even when giving, used to try to escape the notice of the man who received; but the other understood from the deed who had done it. As for praise, it is something to be coveted to find as many listeners as possible, yet it is to be welcomed, I think, even with a few. And Socrates praised many, and Plato and Aristotle; while Xenophon praised both Agesilaus the king and Cyrus the Persian — not only that ancient Cyrus, but also the one with whom he marched against the king — and in composing his praises he did not conceal himself.

2. To me it seems a strange thing if we are to praise eagerly men who are noble and good, yet shall not think a good woman worthy of celebration, supposing as we do that virtue belongs to women no less than to men. For if we think that a woman ought to be temperate and intelligent, and such as to render to each his due, and brave in dangers, and high-minded and generous, and, in a word, to possess all such qualities, shall we then deprive her of the encomiums due to her deeds, fearing to be thought flatterers? Homer was not ashamed to praise Penelope, nor the wife of Alcinous, nor any other woman who proved exceptionally good or even laid claim to virtue in some small degree. And so that lady too did not miss the celebration due her for this very thing. And besides, shall we receive a kindness and obtain some good, whether small or greater, from a woman no less than from a man, and yet shrink from repaying the gratitude due for it? But perhaps they will say that the very act of asking is ridiculous and unworthy of a reasonable and noble-minded man, and that even Odysseus the wise was base and cowardly because he supplicated the king's daughter as she played in the meadow with the maidens her companions by the river's banks. Let them then refrain too from Athena, the daughter of Zeus, whom Homer says, likening herself to a fair and noble maiden, guided Odysseus along the road that led to the palace, becoming his counselor and teacher of what he must do and say when he had entered within — so that, like some orator perfect in his art, she sang the praise of the queen, beginning from her lineage on high. The verses he wrote on this matter run thus: \u201cFirst of all you will find the mistress in the halls; / Arete is her name, called so, and she is sprung / From the very same parents who bore King Alcinous.\u201d And taking up the origin of the family from on high, from Poseidon, I think, and telling all they did and suffered, and how her uncle, when her father had perished young and a bridegroom, married her and honored her \u201cas no other woman on earth is honored,\u201d and all that she enjoys \u201cfrom her dear children and from Alcinous himself,\u201d and further, I think, from the council of elders and the people, who look upon her like a goddess as she passes through the city — he set the crown upon these praises with words enviable for both man and woman, saying, \u201cFor she herself is not lacking in good understanding,\u201d and that she knew well how to judge, even among those toward whom she was well disposed, and to resolve with justice the mutual complaints that arose among the citizens. If, then, having supplicated this lady, you should find her kindly disposed, he said to him, \u201cThen there is hope you will see your friends and reach your high-roofed home.\u201d And Odysseus was persuaded by her counsel. Do we then still need greater images and clearer proofs to escape the suspicion of seeming to flatter? Shall we not now, imitating that wise and divine poet, praise Eusebia, the most excellent of women — desiring indeed to set forth a praise worthy of her, yet content if we attain even moderately to so many noble pursuits, and to the good qualities that belong to her: temperance and justice, or gentleness and fairness, or her affection toward her husband, or her magnanimity in matters of money, or her honoring of her household and kindred? And it is fitting, I think, following as it were in the footsteps of what has already been said, so to arrange our order of praise, rendering to her the same treatment: making mention, as is proper, of her country and her parents, and how she was married and to whom, and all the rest in the same manner as those poets did.

3. Now, although I have many august things to say about her country, some of them I think I shall pass over on account of their antiquity; for they seem not far removed from myth — such as the tale told of the Muses, that they came of course from Pieria, and that it was not from Helicon but from there that they came up to Olympus, being summoned to their father. This, then, and any other such thing more befitting myth than reasoned discourse, must be set aside; but to say a few things not familiar to all is perhaps not out of place, nor foreign to the present discourse. They say that the descendants of Heracles, the sons of Temenus, settled the land of the Macedonians — men who, holding the Argive allotment and falling into faction, at last made the colony the end of their quarrel and rivalry with one another; then, having seized Macedonia and left behind a prosperous race, they continued as kings descended from kings, inheriting the honor as though it were an estate. To praise all of them would be neither true nor, I think, easy. But although many good men arose and left behind most noble memorials of the Hellenic manner, Philip and his son surpassed in virtue all who of old ruled Macedonia and Thrace — and, I myself think, all who ruled the Lydians or the Medes and Persians and Assyrians, save only the son of Cambyses, who transferred the kingship from the Medes to the Persians. For the former was the first to attempt to increase the power of the Macedonians, and having subdued most of Europe he made the sea his boundary toward the east and the south, and toward the north, I think, the Ister, and toward the west the Oricic nation. His son, in turn, reared under the wise man of Stagira, so far surpassed all others in magnanimity, and moreover excelled his own father in generalship and daring and the other virtues, that he thought it not worth his while to live unless he should master all mankind and all nations. And so he traversed the whole of Asia, subduing it, and was the first of men to do obeisance to the rising sun; and when he had set out for Europe, that by embracing what remained he might become lord of all land and sea, his destined end overtook him at Babylon. And the Macedonians ruled over all the cities and nations they had gained under him. Need we, then, demonstrate by greater proofs how glorious and great Macedonia was of old? And the chief part of this same land is that city which they raised up — when the Thessalians, I think, had fallen — naming it after their victory over them.

4. And about these matters I need say nothing further at length.

As for nobility of birth, what trouble need we further take in seeking a clearer and more evident proof? For she is the daughter of a man judged worthy to hold the office that gives its name to the year — an office of old powerful and called outright kingly, but which changed its name because of those who used its power wrongly; and now, since its power has failed, after the constitution shifted toward monarchy, it remains an honor that by itself, though stripped of all other power, seems still a counterweight to every authority. To private men it lies stored up like a prize and reward of virtue or fidelity, or of some good will and service toward the rulers of the whole, or of some brilliant action; and upon kings it is set, beside the goods they already possess, like an ornament and adornment. For of the other titles and offices that preserve some faint and dim image of that ancient constitution, the rulers have either utterly despised and condemned them because of their own power, or, while admitting them, enjoy the titles for life; but this one alone, I think, they have neither despised at the outset, but rejoice even to obtain it for a year; and there is not, nor has there ever been, any private man or king who did not count it enviable to be named consul. And if anyone supposes that because that man was the first of his line to attain it and became the founder of his family's good repute, he is therefore inferior to the others, he is greatly deceived and does not understand: for it is in every way better and more august to furnish to one's descendants the beginning of so great a distinction than to receive it from one's ancestors. Since indeed it is better to be the founder of a very great city than its citizen, and to receive any good whatever is in every way inferior to giving it. And it seems that children receive from their fathers, and citizens from their cities, certain starting points, as it were, toward good repute. But whoever in turn renders back of himself to his ancestors and his country a greater ground for honor, making her more brilliant and august and his fathers more renowned — that man, it seems, leaves to no one any rivalry in the matter of noble birth; nor is there anyone who will say he has proved superior to him. For from good men a good man must be born; but he who, sprung from renowned ancestors, has become more renowned, with fortune breathing in the same direction as his virtue — that man gives no one any room to doubt whether he lays claim to noble birth with good reason.

5. Now Eusebia, of whom my discourse treats, was the child of a consul, and is the wife of a king who is brave, temperate, intelligent, just, kindly, gentle, and magnanimous — who, when he had recovered the empire that was his by inheritance, taking it from the man who had seized it by force, and needed marriage for the begetting of children who would inherit his honor and authority, judged her worthy of his partnership, though he was already lord of nearly the whole inhabited world. And yet how could anyone seek a greater testimony than this — not only concerning her noble birth, but concerning absolutely all the goods that she who was to unite with so great a king ought, I think, to bring as a dowry from her home: right education, fitting intelligence, the bloom and prime of body, and beauty so great as to eclipse all other maidens, just as, I think, around the full moon the bright stars, outshone, hide their form. For no one of these things by itself seems sufficient for partnership with a king, but all together — as though some god were fashioning a fair and temperate bride for a good king — meeting from afar in the same person, and not drawn merely by the eyes, led the bridegroom to great felicity. For beauty, deprived, I think, of the help that comes from family and of the other goods, has not the power even to persuade a licentious private man to kindle the marriage torch, while the two together, when they have met, have often made a marriage; but where they fall short of the harmony and grace that come from character, they have not appeared very enviable.

6. Knowing this clearly, I would reasonably say, the temperate king, after much deliberation, chose this marriage — learning, I think, all that one had to learn about her by report, and inferring her good order from her mother. About whom, why need we spend time saying the rest, as though we had no praise proper to her of whom our discourse treats to set forth? Yet perhaps it is neither a great nor a laborious thing to say and to hear this much: that her family was thoroughly Hellenic, of the Hellenes of purest stock, and her city the mother-city of Macedonia; and that her temperance surpassed that of Evadne, the wife of Capaneus, and of that Thessalian Laodameia. For those women, robbed of their husbands while they were fair and young and still bridegrooms, by the violence of envious divinities or the threads spun by the Fates, scorned to live, because of their love; but she, when destiny had overtaken her wedded husband, devoted herself to her children, and won for herself such renown for temperance that, whereas to Penelope, while her husband was still alive and wandering, the young men came as suitors from Ithaca and Samos and Dulichium, to her no man, however fair and tall or strong and rich, ever ventured to come and treat of these matters; but a king judged her daughter worthy to share his home, and celebrated the marriage splendidly after his trophies, feasting nations and cities and peoples.

7. But if anyone longs to hear of these things — how the bride was summoned from Macedonia together with her mother, and what was the manner of the procession, with chariots and horses and carriages of every kind wrought of gold and silver and orichalcum by the finest art — let him know that he desires very childish things to hear. For just as, I think, when some musician is skilled in his art — let him be, if you will, Terpander, or that man of Methymna, who, the story goes, when he made use of a marvelous escort, met with a dolphin more devoted to music than his fellow voyagers and was carried to the Laconian headland; for, I think, what he wrought by his art charmed the wretched sailors, while they themselves despised that very art and made no account of music — if, then, anyone, choosing the better of those two men and giving to his body the adornment befitting his art, should lead him into a theater of men and women and children of every kind, differing in nature and age and other pursuits, would you not think that the children, and those of the men and women who are like children, gazing at the costume and the lyre, would be utterly amazed at the sight, and that of the men the more ignorant, and of the women all the multitude except a very few, would judge the playing by pleasure and pain, but that a musical man, who knew thoroughly the rules of the art, would not endure the melodies poorly mixed for the sake of pleasure, but would be displeased both if he corrupted the modes of music and if he used the harmonies improperly and not in accordance with the rules of true and divine music? And seeing him abiding by what is established, and producing for the spectators no counterfeit pleasure but one pure and unmixed, he goes away praising and admiring him, because with art and doing no wrong to the Muses he has consorted with the theater. But the man who praises the purple robe and the lyre he thinks talks nonsense and is foolish; and if he relates such things at greater length, adorning with most pleasant diction and smoothing over the base and ignoble character of his narratives, he thinks him more ridiculous than those who attempt to turn millet-seeds on a lathe — as, I think, they say Myrmecides did, setting himself against the art of Phidias.

8. We, then, will not willingly subject ourselves to these charges, by singing some long catalogue of costly garments and gifts of every sort, of necklaces and crowns from the king, nor of how the peoples came out to welcome her, rejoicing, nor of all the splendid and enviable things that occurred and were reputed along that journey. But since she passed within the palace and was deemed worthy of this title, what first deed of hers was there, and again a second, and after it a third, and very many indeed from then on? For not even if I should very much wish to speak and to compose long books about these matters do I suppose I would be equal to the multitude of the deeds by which she bore brilliant witness to her own wisdom and gentleness and temperance and humanity and fairness and generosity and the other virtues, more brilliantly than the present discourse about her attempts to make clear and to teach those who long ago knew them through her deeds. Yet since that proved difficult, or rather impossible, it is not at all fitting to be wholly silent about everything, but rather to try as far as possible to speak of them, and to make this a sign of her wisdom and of all her other virtue: that she so disposed her husband toward herself as is worthy of a fair and noble woman.

So that I, for my part, while I consider many other things about Penelope worthy of praise, admire this above all: that she persuaded her husband to love and cherish her exceedingly, though he scorned, as they say, the embraces of goddesses, and dishonored no less the kinship of the Phaeacians. And yet they all loved him passionately — Calypso and Circe and Nausicaa — and their palaces were exceedingly fair, with gardens and parks planted within them with trees most spreading and shady, and meadows luxuriant with varied flowers and soft grass; \u201cand four springs in a row flowed with bright water\u201d; and around the house flourished a vine in its prime, of noble grape, I think, weighed down with clusters; and among the Phaeacians were other such things, except that, being so much more costly, inasmuch as they were made by art, they shared less in the grace of what grows of itself and seemed less lovely than those. And of the luxury, and the wealth, and besides the peace and tranquility about those islands, who would you think would not be overcome — a man who had endured so many toils and dangers, and still suspected he would suffer worse, some at sea and some in his very house, being about to contend alone against a full hundred vigorous young men, a thing that not even at Troy ever befell him? If, then, someone should ask Odysseus jestingly, somewhat thus: \u201cWhy, O wisest orator, or general, or whatever one must call you, did you willingly endure so many toils, when you might have been prosperous and happy, and perhaps even immortal, if one is to believe at all the promises of Calypso — yet you, choosing the worse before the better, added to yourself so many toils, unwilling even to remain in Scheria, when you might have ceased there from your wandering and been freed from your dangers? But you decided to wage war upon us in your own house, and to accomplish certain labors and another expedition no less toilsome, in all likelihood, nor lighter than the former one.\u201d What, then, do you think that man would have to say to this? Is it not that, wishing to be with Penelope, he supposed that his labors and campaigns would furnish her with pleasant tales? For this reason indeed the poet has made his mother counsel him to remember everything, both the sights he saw and the things he heard, \u201cthat hereafter you may tell them to your wife,\u201d she says. And he, forgetting nothing, as soon as he arrived and had mastered with justice the young men who reveled at the palace, related to her all at once everything he had done and endured, and whatever else, persuaded by the oracles, he purposed to accomplish; and he kept nothing secret from her, but thought her worthy to share his counsels and to consider with him and help discover what must be done. Does this seem to you a small praise of Penelope? Or has any other woman ever surpassed her virtue — a woman who, being the wife of a king brave and magnanimous and temperate, implanted in her husband so great a good will toward herself, blending with the affection breathed in by the loves the affection that, like a divine stream, is borne upon good and noble souls? For there are these two jars of friendship, and she, drawing from each in equal measure, became the partner of his counsels, and the king, being by nature gentle and kindly and reasonable, she summons more fittingly toward what is his nature, and turns justice toward forgiveness. So that no one could say to whom this queen has, justly perhaps or even unjustly, been the cause of punishment or of any chastisement, small or great.

9. Now at Athens, they say, when men used their ancestral customs and lived obedient to their own laws, inhabiting a great and populous city, if ever the votes of the jurors came out equal for the defendants against the prosecutors, the vote of Athena, set on the side of the man who was about to lose his case, would acquit both of the charge — the one bringing the accusation of the appearance of being a malicious prosecutor, and the other, naturally, of the appearance of being guilty of the wrongdoing. This law, then, humane and gracious, preserved in the cases that the king judges, she renders gentler still. For when the defendant comes within a little of obtaining an equal share in the votes, she persuades, adding her entreaty and supplication on his behalf, to release him altogether from the charge. And he willingly grants such things to a willing heart, and not, as Homer says of Zeus being forced by his wife to agree to whatever she conceded, does he give \u201cwilling, yet with an unwilling heart.\u201d And perhaps it is not out of place to grant such things hardly and reluctantly against insolent and boastful men. But not even if some are very fit to suffer ill and be chastised must they by all means be destroyed; which this queen too, considering, has never ordered any evil at any time — neither chastisement nor punishment — to be brought, far less upon any kingdom or city, but not even upon a single household of the citizens. And I would add, very confidently, that I say no falsehood, that she cannot be charged with the misfortune of even one man or a single woman, whatever befell them; but of the goods that she does and has done, and to whom, I would gladly enumerate the most to you, reporting each in turn: how this man, through her, enjoys his ancestral inheritance, and that man was freed from punishment, though he had become liable to the laws; another escaped a malicious prosecution, having come within a little of danger; and countless men obtained honor and office. And there is no one in the world who will say that I lie in these things, even if I do not list the men by name. But I hesitate, lest I seem to be reproaching some men with their misfortunes, and not composing a praise of her good deeds, but a catalogue of others' calamities. Yet to furnish no proof of so many deeds, nor to bring it into the open, seems somehow empty and leads the praise into disbelief. Therefore, setting those things aside, I will now speak of such things as it is without offense for me to say and noble for her to hear.

10. For when she had set the good will of her husband as a face most far-shining, in the words of the wise Pindar, at the beginning of her deeds, she at once filled her whole family and kindred with honor — placing those already known and older over greater affairs and showing them blessed and enviable, and made them friends of the king and gave them the beginning of their present good fortune. For even if they seem, as is indeed true, honored for their own sake, to her, I think, one will add the praise; for it is plain that she is seen to distribute not merely by the partnership of kindred, but much more by virtue — than which I do not know how anyone could utter a greater encomium. Toward these men, then, such was her conduct. But as many as were still unknown because of their youth and needed in any way to be made known, to these she distributed lesser honors. And she left out no one in doing good to all. And she did such good things not only to her kinsmen, but whatever guest-friendship she learned had existed toward her parents, she did not leave it without profit to those who possessed it, but honors these too, I think, like kinsmen; and as many as she counted her father's friends, to all of them she distributed wondrous rewards of friendship.

11. But I, since I see that my discourse needs proofs as though in a court of law, will offer myself to you as a witness and praiser of these things on her behalf. But lest you ever, suspecting my testimony before you have heard my words, be disturbed, I swear to you that I will say nothing false or fabricated; and you would believe, even unsworn, that I say all this not for the sake of flattery. For I have already, by the gift of God and of the king, all good things — through the eager goodwill, I think, of this lady too — concerning which a flatterer would let fall every word; so that, if I had spoken before obtaining these, perhaps I should have had to dread the unjust suspicion; but now, having come into this fortune and recalling her deeds toward myself, I will furnish you a sign of my own gratitude and a true testimony of her deeds. For I learn that Darius too, while he was still a spearman of the Persian monarch, fell in with the Samian guest-friend near Egypt as the man was fleeing his own country, and having received a purple cloak as a gift, which he greatly desired, afterward gave in return the tyranny of Samos, when, I think, he had become lord of all Asia. If, then, I too, having received many things from her while it was still possible for me to live in tranquility, and the greatest things through her from the noble and high-minded king, should confess that I fall short of repaying an equal return — for she has, I think, received everything from the very one who has bestowed favors on us as well — yet by wishing the memory of her deeds to become immortal and reporting these things to you, I shall perhaps appear not more ungracious than the Persian, if one ought to judge by looking at the intention and not at the man to whom fortune granted to repay the benefit many times over.

What, then, is the great kindness I claim to have received, and for what I confess myself for all time her debtor in gratitude, you are exceedingly eager to hear. And I will not conceal it.

12. For this king, having been gentle to me almost from my earliest childhood, surpassed all rivalry in honor: he snatched me from such great dangers as not even a man in his prime could well escape, unless he met with some divine and inconceivable deliverance; and then, when my house had been seized as though it were a wilderness by one of the powerful, he took it away with justice and made me rich again. And I could tell you of other deeds of his toward me worthy of much gratitude, on account of which, while showing myself for all time well disposed and faithful to him, I perceived recently, from what cause I do not know, that he had become harsher toward me. But she, when she first heard not the name of any wrongdoing, but only of an empty suspicion, demanded that the matter be examined, and that he not earlier admit or accept a false and unjust slander; and she did not cease entreating these things until she had brought me into the king's presence and made me obtain a hearing; and when I was acquitted of every unjust charge, she rejoiced with me, and when I desired to go home again, she provided a safe escort, having first persuaded the king to permit it. But some divinity, who seems to me to have contrived what went before, or some strange chance, cutting short this journey, sends me to behold Hellas — she having asked this favor of the king on my behalf, when I was already departing, since she had learned that I delighted in letters and considered the place suitable for education. And I then prayed God to grant many good things to her and, as is fitting, to the king first of all, because they granted me to see the true country I longed for and loved. For we who dwell about Thrace and Ionia are descendants of Hellas, and whoever of us is not too unfeeling longs to greet his fathers and to embrace the land itself. And this indeed had long been, as is natural, a thing I longed for, and I wished it to be mine more than much gold and silver. For I say that the company of good men, weighed against any amount of gold whatever, draws down the balance and does not allow the temperate judge to give even a slight inclination the other way.

As for education and philosophy, the affairs of Hellas have now, I think, suffered something like the Egyptian fables and tales. For the Egyptians say that the Nile among them is in all other respects the savior and benefactor of the land, and that it wards off from them destruction by fire, whenever the sun, through certain long cycles, meeting or consorting with noble stars, fills the air with fire and sets all things ablaze. For it has not the power, they say, to make vanish or to use up the springs of the Nile. So neither has philosophy departed altogether from the Hellenes, nor has it failed Athens or Sparta or Corinth; and least of all, thanks to these springs, is thirsty Argos without it. For many springs are in the city itself, and many also before the city around that ancient Mases; and Sicyon, not Corinth, possesses Peirene itself. But of Athens many are the streams pure and native, and many flow in from outside and are brought there, precious no less than those within; and the Athenians cherish and love them, wishing to be rich in the one thing whose wealth alone is, one might almost say, enviable.

13. But what, then, has happened to us? And what discourse do we now purpose to bring to its end, if not a praise of dear Hellas, which one cannot recall without admiring everything about her? But someone, perhaps, reminded of what went before, will say that we wished from the start to set forth these things, and that, like the Corybantic worshipers roused by the flutes to dance and leap with no reason, we too, stirred by the memory of our beloved, have sung an encomium of the country and its men. To this man one must make defense, saying somewhat thus: O marvelous one, and truly a leader of a noble art, you devise a clever thing, not permitting or allowing us to depart even slightly from what is praised, since you yourself, I think, do this with art. But to us this love, which you say is the cause of the disorder in our words, since it has now come upon us, bids us, I think, not to shrink overmuch nor to be cautious of the charges. For we are not laying hold of foreign matters when we wish to show how many goods she has been the cause of by honoring the name of philosophy. And this thing — I do not know in what way it lay upon me, when I loved the work exceedingly and was terribly enamored of the pursuit, yet fell short, I do not know how, so that I had only the name and the reputation, deprived of the reality — she honored even the name. For another cause I can neither myself discover nor learn from anyone else, on account of which she became to me so eager a helper and defender from evil and savior, securing with much toil that the good will of the noble king should remain for us undefiled and unharmed — than which I never came to consider any human good greater, not the gold on the earth and beneath the earth as its equal, nor all the silver that now is beneath the rays of the sun, and if ever any other should be added, the greatest mountains themselves, with their very rocks and trees, changing into this nature, nor the greatest empire, nor any other of all things. For from her these many goods have come to me, such as no one would have hoped for — and that to me, who did not greatly need many things, nor fed myself on such hopes.

But true good will cannot be requited with gold, nor could anyone purchase it from that source; rather it comes by some divine and superior portion, when good men join their eager efforts. This indeed belonged to me, by the will of God, from the king, when I was a child; and when it was all but lost, it was again preserved, the queen defending me and warding off the false and strange suspicions. And when she had altogether dissolved these, using my life as a clear proof, and the king again summoned me from Hellas, I obeyed; did she then leave me there, as one no longer needing much help, since there was nothing troublesome or suspicious in the way? And how should I act piously by keeping silent and concealing things so manifest and august? For when this resolve of the king concerning me was confirmed, she rejoiced exceedingly and joined in the song like a musician, bidding me take courage and neither, fearing the greatness of what was given, refuse to receive it, nor, using a rude and self-willed frankness, basely dishonor the necessary request of one who had wrought so many good things. And I obeyed, not indeed enduring this very gladly, but knowing well that to disobey was otherwise exceedingly difficult. For those who are able to do whatever they wish by force surely suffice, when they entreat, to abash and persuade.