Thucydides:  The Funeral Oration of Pericles.

In this passage from Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War, the Athenians have gathered to
bury their warriors fallen in the first battles with Sparta.   In keeping with custom, Pericles, Athens' most
respected statesman and general, a "man of approved wisdom and eminent reputation," is chosen to give
the funeral oration.  In his eulogy, Pericles strives to rally the spirits of his countrymen by contrasting
Athenian enlightenment with the narrow militaristic ethos of its enemies.

"Our constitution does not copy the laws of neighbouring states; we are rather a pattern to others than imitators
ourselves. Its administration favours the many instead of the few; this is why it is called a democracy. If we look to
the laws, they afford equal justice to all in their private differences; if no social standing, advancement in public life
falls to reputation for capacity, class considerations not being allowed to interfere with merit; nor again does
poverty bar the way, if a man is able to serve the state, he is not hindered by the obscurity of his condition. The
freedom which we enjoy in our government extends also to our ordinary life. There, far from exercising a jealous
surveillance over each other, we do not feel called upon to be angry with our neighbour for doing what he likes, or
even to indulge in those injurious looks which cannot fail to be offensive, although they inflict no positive penalty.
But all this ease in our private relations does not make us lawless as citizens. Against this fear is our chief
safeguard, teaching us to obey the magistrates and the laws, particularly such as regard the protection of the
injured, whether they are actually on the statute book, or belong to that code which, although unwritten, yet
cannot be broken without acknowledged disgrace.

"Further, we provide plenty of means for the mind to refresh itself from business. We celebrate games and
sacrifices all the year round, and the elegance of our private establishments forms a daily source of pleasure and
helps to banish the spleen; while the magnitude of our city draws the produce of the world into our harbour, so
that to the Athenian the fruits of other countries are as familiar a luxury as those of his own.

"If we turn to our military policy, there also we differ from our antagonists. We throw open our city to the world,
and never by alien acts exclude foreigners from any opportunity of learning or observing, although the eyes of an
enemy may occasionally profit by our liberality; trusting less in system and policy than to the native spirit of our
citizens; while in education, where our rivals from their very cradles by a painful discipline seek after manliness, at
Athens we live exactly as we please, and yet are just as ready to encounter every legitimate danger. In proof of
this it may be noticed that the Lacedaemonians do not invade our country alone, but bring with them all their
confederates; while we Athenians advance unsupported into the territory of a neighbour, and fighting upon a
foreign soil usually vanquish with ease men who are defending their homes. Our united force was never yet
encountered by any enemy, because we have at once to attend to our marine and to dispatch our citizens by land
upon a hundred different services; so that, wherever they engage with some such fraction of our strength, a
success against a detachment is magnified into a victory over the nation, and a defeat into a reverse suffered at the
hands of our entire people. And yet if with habits not of labour but of ease, and courage not of art but of nature,
we are still willing to encounter danger, we have the double advantage of escaping the experience of hardships in
anticipation and of facing them in the hour of need as fearlessly as those who are never free from them.

"Nor are these the only points in which our city is worthy of admiration. We cultivate refinement without
extravagance and knowledge without effeminacy; wealth we employ more for use than for show, and place the
real disgrace of poverty not in owning to the fact but in declining the struggle against it. Our public men have,
besides politics, their private affairs to attend to, and our ordinary citizens, though occupied with the pursuits of
industry, are still fair judges of public matters; for, unlike any other nation, regarding him who takes no part in
these duties not as unambitious but as useless, we Athenians are able to judge at all events if we cannot originate,
and, instead of looking on discussion as a stumbling-block in the way of action, we think it an indispensable
preliminary to any wise action at all. Again, in our enterprises we present the singular spectacle of daring and
deliberation, each carried to its highest point, and both united in the same persons; although usually decision is the
fruit of ignorance, hesitation of reflection. But the palm of courage will surely be adjudged most justly to those,
who best know the difference between hardship and pleasure and yet are never tempted to shrink from danger. In
generosity we are equally singular, acquiring our friends by conferring, not by receiving, favours. Yet, of course,
the doer of the favour is the firmer friend of the two, in order by continued kindness to keep the recipient in his
debt; while the debtor feels less keenly from the very consciousness that the return he makes will be a payment,
not a free gift. And it is only the Athenians, who, fearless of consequences, confer their benefits not from
calculations of expediency, but in the confidence of liberality.

"In short, I say that as a city we are the school of Hellas, while I doubt if the world can produce a man who,
where he has only himself to depend upon, is equal to so many emergencies, and graced by so happy a versatility,
as the Athenian. And that this is no mere boast thrown out for the occasion, but plain matter of fact, the power of
the state acquired by these habits proves. For Athens alone of her contemporaries is found when tested to be
greater than her reputation, and alone gives no occasion to her assailants to blush at the antagonist by whom they
have been worsted, or to her subjects to question her title by merit to rule. Rather, the admiration of the present
and succeeding ages will be ours, since we have not left our power without witness, but have shown it by mighty
proofs; and far from needing a Homer for our panegyrist, or other of his craft whose verses might charm for the
moment only for the impression which they gave to melt at the touch of fact, we have forced every sea and land to
be the highway of our daring, and everywhere, whether for evil or for good, have left imperishable monuments
behind us. Such is the Athens for which these men, in the assertion of their resolve not to lose her, nobly fought
and died; and well may every one of their survivors be ready to suffer in her cause.

"Indeed if I have dwelt at some length upon the character of our country, it has been to show that our stake in the
struggle is not the same as theirs who have no such blessings to lose, and also that the panegyric of the men over
whom I am now speaking might be by definite proofs established. That panegyric is now in a great measure
complete; for the Athens that I have celebrated is only what the heroism of these and their like have made her,
men whose fame, unlike that of most Hellenes, will be found to be only commensurate with their deserts. And if a
test of worth be wanted, it is to be found in their closing scene, and this not only in cases in which it set the final
seal upon their merit, but also in those in which it gave the first intimation of their having any. For there is justice in
the claim that steadfastness in his country's battles should be as a cloak to cover a man's other imperfections; since
the good action has blotted out the bad, and his merit as a citizen more than outweighed his demerits as an
individual. But none of these allowed either wealth with its prospect of future enjoyment to unnerve his spirit, or
poverty with its hope of a day of freedom and riches to tempt him to shrink from danger. No, holding that
vengeance upon their enemies was more to be desired than any personal blessings, and reckoning this to be the
most glorious of hazards, they joyfully determined to accept the risk, to make sure of their vengeance, and to let
their wishes wait; and while committing to hope the uncertainty of final success, in the business before them they
thought fit to act boldly and trust in themselves. Thus choosing to die resisting, rather than to live submitting, they
fled only from dishonour, but met danger face to face, and after one brief moment, while at the summit of their
fortune, escaped, not from their fear, but from their glory.

"So died these men as became Athenians. You, their survivors, must determine to have as unfaltering a resolution
in the field, though you may pray that it may have a happier issue. And not contented with ideas derived only from
words of the advantages which are bound up with the defence of your country, though these would furnish a
valuable text to a speaker even before an audience so alive to them as the present, you must yourselves realize the
power of Athens, and feed your eyes upon her from day to day, till love of her fills your hearts; and then, when all
her greatness shall break upon you, you must reflect that it was by courage, sense of duty, and a keen feeling of
honour in action that men were enabled to win all this, and that no personal failure in an enterprise could make
them consent to deprive their country of their valour, but they laid it at her feet as the most glorious contribution
that they could offer. For this offering of their lives made in common by them all they each of them individually
received that renown which never grows old, and for a sepulchre, not so much that in which their bones have been
deposited, but that noblest of shrines wherein their glory is laid up to be eternally remembered upon every
occasion on which deed or story shall call for its commemoration. For heroes have the whole earth for their tomb;
and in lands far from their own, where the column with its epitaph declares it, there is enshrined in every breast a
record unwritten with no tablet to preserve it, except that of the heart. These take as your model and, judging
happiness to be the fruit of freedom and freedom of valour, never decline the dangers of war. For it is not the
miserable that would most justly be unsparing of their lives; these have nothing to hope for: it is rather they to
whom continued life may bring reverses as yet unknown, and to whom a fall, if it came, would be most
tremendous in its consequences. And surely, to a man of spirit, the degradation of cowardice must be
immeasurably more grievous than the unfelt death which strikes him in the midst of his strength and patriotism!

"Comfort, therefore, not condolence, is what I have to offer to the parents of the dead who may be here.
Numberless are the chances to which, as they know, the life of man is subject; but fortunate indeed are they who
draw for their lot a death so glorious as that which has caused your mourning, and to whom life has been so
exactly measured as to terminate in the happiness in which it has been passed. Still I know that this is a hard
saying, especially when those are in question of whom you will constantly be reminded by seeing in the homes of
others blessings of which once you also boasted: for grief is felt not so much for the want of what we have never
known, as for the loss of that to which we have been long accustomed. Yet you who are still of an age to beget
children must bear up in the hope of having others in their stead; not only will they help you to forget those whom
you have lost, but will be to the state at once a reinforcement and a security; for never can a fair or just policy be
expected of the citizen who does not, like his fellows, bring to the decision the interests and apprehensions of a
father. While those of you who have passed your prime must congratulate yourselves with the thought that the best
part of your life was fortunate, and that the brief span that remains will be cheered by the fame of the departed.
For it is only the love of honour that never grows old; and honour it is, not gain, as some would have it, that
rejoices the heart of age and helplessness.

"Turning to the sons or brothers of the dead, I see an arduous struggle before you. When a man is gone, all are
wont to praise him, and should your merit be ever so transcendent, you will still find it difficult not merely to
overtake, but even to approach their renown. The living have envy to contend with, while those who are no longer
in our path are honoured with a goodwill into which rivalry does not enter. On the other hand, if I must say
anything on the subject of female excellence to those of you who will now be in widowhood, it will be all
comprised in this brief exhortation. Great will be your glory in not falling short of your natural character; and
greatest will be hers who is least talked of among the men, whether for good or for bad.

"My task is now finished. I have performed it to the best of my ability, and in word, at least, the requirements of
the law are now satisfied. If deeds be in question, those who are here interred have received part of their honours
already, and for the rest, their children will be brought up till manhood at the public expense: the state thus offers a
valuable prize, as the garland of victory in this race of valour, for the reward both of those who have fallen and
their survivors. And where the rewards for merit are greatest, there are found the best citizens.

"And now that you have brought to a close your lamentations for your relatives, you may depart."

Source:  Thucydides, The History of the Peloponnesian War.  Richart Crawley, Translator.
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