e
or labour he has devoted to that object; whether he has at any time
done any other similar action; whether he is claiming a reward
for himself for what is in reality the result of another person's
exertions, or of the kindness of the gods. Whether he has ever, in the
case of any one else, pronounced that he ought not to be rewarded for
such a reason; or, whether he has already had sufficient honour paid
to him for what he has done; or, whether what has been done is an
action of such a sort that, if he had not done it, he would have been
deserving of punishment; but that he does not deserve reward for
having done it; or, whether he is premature in his demand for a
reward, and is proposing to sell an uncertain hope for a certain
reward; or, whether he claims the reward in order to avoid some
punishment, by its appearing as if the case had already been decided
in his favour.

XXXIX. But as to the question of the reward, it will be necessary to
consider what reward, how great a reward is claimed, and why it is
claimed; and also, to what reward, and to how great a reward, the
conduct in question is entitled. And in the next place, it will be
requisite to inquire what men had such honours paid them in the time
of our ancestors, and for what causes those honours were paid. And, in
the next place, it will be urged that they ought not to be made too
common. And this will be one common topic for any one who speaks in
opposition to a person who claims a reward;--that rewards for virtue
and eminent services ought to be considered serious and holy things,
and that they ought not to be conferred on worthless men, or to be
made common by being bestowed on men of no particular eminence. And
another will be, to urge that men will become less eager to practise
virtue when the reward of virtue has been made common; for those
things which are scarce and difficult of attainment appear honourable
and acceptable to men. And a third topic is, to put the question,
whether, if there are any instances of men who, in the times of our
ancestors, were thought worthy of such honours on account of their
eminent virtue, they will not be likely to think it some diminution
of their own glory, when they see that such men as these have such
rewards conferred on them. And then comes the enumeration of those
men, and the comparison of them with those against whom the orator is
speaking. But the topics to be used by the man who is claiming the
reward are,