Isocrates, To Nicocles
George Norlin, Ed.

[46] How, then, can one advise or teach or say anything of profit and yet please such people? For, besides what I have said of them, they look upon men of wisdom with suspicion, while they regard men of no understanding as open and sincere; and they so shun the verities of life that they do not even know their own interests: nay, it irks them to take account of their own business and it delights them to discuss the business of others;