What was this? Nothing
subtle or clever: simply that whoever took money from the aspirants for
power or the corrupters of Greece were universally detested; it was
dreadful to be convicted of bribery; the severest punishment was
inflicted on the guilty, and there was no intercession or pardon. The
favorable moments for enterprise which fortune frequently offers to the
careless against the vigilant, to them that will do nothing against
those that discharge all their duty, could not be bought from orators or
generals; no more could mutual concord, nor distrust of tyrants and
barbarians, nor anything of the kind. But now all such principles have
been sold as in open market, and those imported in exchange, by which
Greece is ruined and diseased. What are they? Envy where a man gets a
bribe; laughter if he confesses it; mercy to the convicted; hatred of
those that denounce the crime; all the usual attendants upon corruption.
For as to ships and men and revenues and abundance of other materials,
all that may be reckoned as constituting national strength--assuredly
the Greeks of our day are more fully and perfectly supplied with such
advantages than Greeks of the olden time. But they are all rendered
useless, unavailable, unprofitable, by the agency of these traffickers.

That such is the present state of things, you must see without requiring
my testimony; that it was different in former times I will demonstrate,
not by speaking my own words, but by showing an inscription of your
ancestors, which they graved on a brazen column and deposited in the
citadel, not for their own benefit (they were right-minded enough
without such records), but for a memorial and example to instruct you
how seriously such conduct should be taken up. What says the
inscription then? It says:--"Let Arthmius, son of Pythonax the Zelite,
be declared an outlaw and an enemy of the Athenian people and their
allies, him and his family." Then the cause is written why this was
done: because he brought the Median gold into Peloponnesus. That is the
inscription. By the gods! only consider and reflect among yourselves
what must have been the spirit, what the dignity of those Athenians who
acted so. One Arthmius a Zelite, subject of the king (for Zelea is in
Asia), because in his master's service he brought gold into
Peloponnesus,--not to Athens,--they proclaimed an enemy of the Athenians
and their allies, him and his family, and outlawed. That is not by the
outla