39
The agreement does not permit anything to have greater effect than the terms contained in it, nor that anyone should bring forward any law or decree or anything else whatever to contravene its provisions; yet these men from the very outset paid no heed to this agreement, but made use of our money as if it had been their very own; so rascally are they as sophists and dishonest as men.
40
For my own part, I swear by Zeus the king and by all the gods, I never made it a matter of reproach to anyone, men of the jury, nor blamed him, if he chose to be a sophist and to pay money to Isocrates; I should be mad if I concerned myself about anything of that sort. But, by Zeus, I do not think it right that men, because they look down on people and think themselves clever, should covet the property of others and seek to defraud them, trusting in their power of speech. That is the part of a rascally sophist, who should be made to suffer for it.
41
This fellow Lacritus, men of the jury, has not come into court relying on the justice of his case, but realizing perfectly what he and his brothers have done in the matter of this loan; and because he considers that he is clever and will easily provide arguments to defend evil practices,The close parallel between this passage and the portrayal of the school of Socrates in Aristoph. Cl. will hardly escape the reader. he thinks he will lead you astray just as he pleases. For it is precisely in these matters that he professes himself to be clever, and he asks money, and collects pupils, promising to instruct them in these very things.
