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Now, if it were my view that, of those qualities that constitute virtue, courage alone was their possession, I might praise this and be done with the speaking, but since it fell to their lot also to have been nobly born and strictly brought up and to have lived with lofty ideals, because of all which they had every reason to be good men, I should be ashamed if I were found to have passed over any of these topics.Blass censures the author for not following in the sequel a threefold division of his theme, which is here implied and may be found in Plat. Menex. 237 a-b: nobility of birth, upbringing and education, and exploits. These topics are treated, but not consecutively. Peculiar to this speech is the passage on the ten tribes, Dem. 60.27-32. I shall begin from the origin of their race.Blass compares Isocrates, Helen16 τὴν μὲν οὖν ἀρχὴν τοῦ λόγου ποιήσομαι τοιαύτην τοῦ γένους αὐτῆς, (Isoc. 10.16).
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The nobility of birth of these men has been acknowledged from time immemorial by all mankind. For it is possible for them and for each one of their remote ancestors man by man to trace back their being, not only to a physical father, but also to this land of theirs as a whole, a common possession, of which they are acknowledged to be the indigenous children.This topic appears in Plat. Menex. 237 b-c. For alone of all mankind they settled the very land from which they were born and handed it down to their descendants, so that justly one may assume that those who came as migrants into their cities and are denominated citizens of the same are comparable to adopted children; but these men are citizens of their native land by right of legitimate birth.This topic appears in Hyp. Epitaph. 7.
