[157]
Of my own countrymen also I have a similar tale to tell. For towards all other peoples with whom they have been at war, they forget their past enmities the moment they have concluded peace, but toward the Asiatics they feel no gratitude even when they receive favors from them; so eternal is the wrath which they cherish against the barbarians.1 Again, our fathers condemned many to death2 for defection to the Medes; in our public assemblies even to this day, before any other business is transacted, the Athenians call down curses3 upon any citizen who proposes friendly overtures to the Persians; and, at the celebration of the Mysteries, the Eumolpidae and the Kerykes,4 because of our hatred of the Persians, give solemn warning to the other barbarians also, even as to men guilty of murder, that they are for ever banned from the sacred rites.5
1 See Plat. Rep. 470c; Livy 31.29, “cum barbaris omnibus Graecis bellum est eritque.”
2 See Hdt. 9.5; Lyc. 1.122; Dem. 19.270.
3 The custom is attributed to Aristeides by Plut. Arist. 10.
4 The priests at Eleuis belonged to families traditionally descended from Eumolpus and Keryx.
Isocrates. Isocrates with an English Translation in three volumes, by George Norlin, Ph.D., LL.D. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1980.
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