[76]
There is another thing that he did not understand, that the
Athenian democracy, never eager to acquire riches, coveted glory more than any
other possession in the world. Here is the proof: once they possessed greater
wealth than any other Hellenic people, but they spent it all for love of honor;
they laid their private fortunes under contribution, and recoiled from no peril
for glory's sake. Hence the People inherits possessions that will never die; on
the one hand the memory of their achievements, on the other, the beauty of the
memorials set up in their honor, yonder Propylaea, the Parthenon, the porticoes,
the docks,—not a couple of jugs, or three or four bits of gold plate,
weighing a pound apiece, which you, Androtion, will propose to melt down again,
whenever the whim takes you.
Demosthenes. Demosthenes with an English translation by A. T. Murray, Ph.D., LL.D. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1939.
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