4
Shall we then make a law that hereafter neither Council nor Assembly shall be permitted to deliberate or to vote on any subject? Not so, in my opinion; for we ought not to be deprived of our rights, where we have been misled; we ought to be instructed how to avoid such mistakes, and we ought to make a law, not to strip us of our own authority, but to punish those who mislead us.
5
Now if, putting these considerations aside, you would examine the real problem, whether it is more advantageous that you should possess the power of bestowing this privilege, even though you are sometimes duped into bestowing it on a scoundrel, or that by being wholly dispossessed of it you should be unable to grant honors even where they are deserved, you would find the former course the more advantageous. And why? Because the result of rewarding too many citizens is to encourage many to do you good service, but the result of rewarding no one, even if deserving, is to discourage emulation in all.
6
There is also this other reason, that those who reward an undeserving individual may be credited with some degree of artlessness,εὐήθειαhas many shades of meaning from simplicity to folly. Here the contrast with κακίαshows that the milder sense predominates; not so in Dem. 20.145. but those who never requite their benefactors are charged with baseness. Just so far as it is better to be thought artless than unscrupulous, it is more honorable to repeal this law than to enact it.
7
Nor again, men of Athens, on reflection does it seem to me reasonable, when finding fault with some on the ground of the rewards they already enjoy, to rob useful citizens of their honors. For if, while these immunities exist, some of the recipients are, as our opponents say, worthless and unprofitable, what result are we to expect when there is no chance whatever of reward for the good citizens?
