have
been justified in killing me, had I tried in word only to impair the
ancient glory of our city?"[783] And, "What think you these wretches
would have said, if the states had departed, when I was curiously
discussing these points?"[784] And indeed the whole of that speech _On
the Crown_ most ingeniously introduces his own praises in his
antitheses, and answers to the charges brought against him.

Sec. IX. However it is worth while to notice in his speech that he most
artistically inserts praise of his audience in the remarks about
himself, and so makes his speech less egotistical and less likely to
raise envy. Thus he shows how the Athenians behaved to the Euboeans and
to the Thebans, and what benefits they conferred on the people of
Byzantium and on the Chersonese, claiming for himself only a subordinate
part in the matter. Thus he cunningly insinuates into the audience with
his own praises what they will gladly hear, for they rejoice at the
enumeration of their successes,[785] and their joy is succeeded by
admiration and esteem for the person to whom the success was due. So
also Epaminondas, when Meneclidas once jeered at him as thinking more of
himself than Agamemnon ever did, replied, "It is your fault then, men of
Thebes, by whose help alone I put down the power of the Lacedaemonians in
one day."

Sec. X. But since most people very much dislike and object to a man's
praising himself, but if he praises some one else are on the contrary
often glad and readily bear him out, some are in the habit of praising
in season those that have the same pursuits business and characters as
themselves, and so conciliate and move the audience in their own favour;
for the audience know at the moment such a one is speaking that, though
he is speaking about another, yet his own similar virtue is worthy of
their praise.[786] For as one who throws in another's teeth things of
which he is guilty himself must know that he upbraids himself most, so
the good in paying honour to the good remind those who know their
character of themselves, so that their hearers cry out at once, "Are not
you such a one yourself?" Thus Alexander honouring Hercules, and
Androcottus again honouring Alexander, got themselves honoured on the
same grounds. Dionysius on the contrary pulling Gelon to pieces, and
calling him the Gelos[787] of Sicily, was not aware that through his
envy he was weakening the importance and dignity of his own authority.

Sec. XI. T