bear to enter the lists--such an one, I take it,
would but meet his deserts if all men cried out upon him for a fool.
[11] Let not such be our fate, my friends. Our own hearts bear us
witness that we, too, from our boyhood up, have been trained in the
school of beauty and nobleness and honour, and now let us go forward to
meet our foes. They, I know right well, when matched with us, will prove
but novices in war. He is no true warrior, though he be skilled with the
javelin and the bow and ride on horseback with the best, who, when the
call for endurance comes, is found to fail: toil finds him but a novice.
Nor are they warriors who, when they should wake and watch, give way to
slumber: sleep finds them novices. Even endurance will not avail, if a
man has not learnt to deal as a man should by friends and foes: such an
one is unschooled in the highest part of his calling. [12] But with you
it is not so: to you the night will be as the day; toil, your school
has taught you, is the guide to happiness; hunger has been your daily
condiment, and water you take to quench your thirst as the lion laps the
stream. And you have that within your hearts which is the rarest of all
treasures and the most akin to war: of all sweet sounds the sweetest
sound for you is the voice of fame. You are fair Honour's suitors, and
you must needs win your title to her favour. Therefore you undergo toil
and danger gladly.

[13] "Now if I said all this of you, and my heart were not in my words,
I should but cheat myself. For in so far as you should fail to fulfil my
hopes of you, it is on me that the shame would fall. But I have faith in
you, bred of experience: I trust in your goodwill towards me, and in our
enemy's lack of wit; you will not belie my hopes. Let us go forth with a
light heart; we have no ill-fame to fear: none can say we covet
another man's goods unlawfully. Our enemy strikes the first blow in an
unrighteous cause, and our friends call us to protect them. What is more
lawful than self-defence? What is nobler than to succour those we love?
[14] And you have another ground of confidence--in opening this campaign
I have not been forgetful of the gods: you have gone in and out with me,
and you know how in all things, great and small, I strive to win their
blessing. And now," he added, "what need of further words? I will leave
you now to choose your own men, and when all is ready you will march
into Media at their head. Meanwhile I will re