31
But if your estate be but indifferent, and by its centre and circumference confined to your necessary use, it is neither ungenerous nor base to confess your poverty and give place to such as are provided for those honorary expenses, and not, by taking up money on usury, to render yourself at the same time both miserable and ridiculous by such services. For they whose abilities fall short cannot well conceal themselves, being compelled either to be troublesome to their friends, or to court and flatter usurers, so that they get not any honor or power, but rather shame and contempt by such expenses. It is therefore always useful on such occasions to call to mind Lamachus and Phocion. For Phocion, when the Athenians at a solemn sacrifice called upon him, and often importuned him to give them something, said to them, I should be ashamed to give to you, and not pay this Callicles,—pointing to an usurer who was standing by. And as for Lamachus, he always put down in his bill of charges, when he was general, the money laid out for his shoes and coat. And to Hermon, when he refused the undertaking of an office because of his poverty, the Thessalians ordained a puncheon of wine a month, and a bushel and a half of meal every four days. It is therefore no shame to confess one’s poverty; nor are the poor in cities of less authority than those who feast and exhibit public shows, if they have but gotten freedom of speech and reputation by their virtue.
