[12] Aristotel. Rhetoric. i. 5, p. 1360, b. 31, i. 9, p. 1367. Dionys. Hal. Ars Rhetoric. c. 6, pp. 260-267.
“Nec enim artibus inventis factum est, ut argumenta inveniremus; sed dicta sunt omnia, antequam præciperentur: mox ea scriptores observata et collecta ediderunt” (Quintilian, Inst. Or. v. 10).
Plato in this harangue conforms to the established type — Topics on which he insists.
The funeral discourse which we read in the Menexenus is framed upon this classical model. It dwells, with emphasis and elegance, upon the patriotic common-places which formed the theme of rhetors generally. Plato begins by extolling the indigenous character of the Athenian population; not immigrants from abroad (like the Peloponnesians), but born from the very soil of Attica:[13] which, at a time when other parts of the earth produced nothing but strange animals and plants, gave birth to an admirable breed of men, as well as to wheat and barley for their nourishment, and to the olive for assisting their bodily exercises.[14] Attica was from the beginning favoured by the Gods; and the acropolis had been an object of competition between Athênê and Poseidon.[15] She was the common and equal mother of all the citizens, who, from such community of birth and purity of Hellenic origin, had derived the attributes which they had ever since manifested — attachment to equal laws among themselves, Panhellenic patriotism, and hatred of barbarians.[16] The free and equal political constitution of Athens — called an aristocracy, or presidency of the best men, under the choice and approval of the multitude — as it was and as it always had been, is here extolled by Plato, as a result of the common origin.
[13] Plat. Menex. pp. 237-245. 245 D: οὐ γάρ Πέλοπες οὐδὲ Κάδμοι οὐδὲ Αἴγυπτοί τε καὶ Δαναοὶ οὐδὲ ἄλλοι πολλοί, φύσει μὲν βάρβαροι ὄντες, νόμῳ δὲ Ἕλληνες, συνοικοῦσιν ἡμῖν, ἀλλ’ αὐτοὶ Ἕλληνες, οὐ μιξοβάρβαροι οἰκοῦμεν, &c.
[14] Plat. Menex. pp. 237 D, 238 A.
[15] Plat. Menex. p. 237 C.
[16] Plat. Menex. pp. 238 D, 239 A, 245 C-D. 239 A: ἡ ἰσογονία ἡμᾶς ἡ κατὰ φύσιν ἰσονομίαν ἀναγκάζει ζητεῖν κατὰ νόμον, καὶ μηδενὶ ἄλλῳ ὑπείκειν ἀλλήλοις ἢ ἀρετῆς δόξῃ καὶ φρονήσεως. 245 D: ὅθεν καθαρὸν τὸ μῖσος ἐντέτηκε τῇ πόλει τῆς ἀλλοτρίας φύσεως (i.e. of the βάρβαροι).
Alluding briefly to the victories over Eumolpus and the Amazons, the orator passes on to the battles of Marathon, Salamis, and Platæa, which he celebrates with the warmth of an Hellenic patriot.[17] He eulogizes the generous behaviour of Athens towards the Greeks, during the interval between the Persian and the Peloponnesian wars, contrasting it with the unworthy requital which she received from Sparta and others. He then glances at the events of the Peloponnesian wars, though colouring them in a manner so fanciful and delusive, that any one familiar with Thucydides can scarcely recognise their identity — especially in regard to the Athenian expedition against Syracuse.[18] He protests against the faithlessness of Sparta, towards the close of the Peloponnesian war, in allying herself with the common anti-Hellenic enemy — the Great King — against Athens: and he ascribes mainly to this unholy alliance the conquest of Athens at the end of the war.[19] The moderation of political parties in Athens, when the Thirty were put down and the democracy restored, receives its due meed of praise: but the peculiar merit claimed for Athens, in reference to the public events between 403 B.C. and 387 B.C., is — That she stood alone among Greeks in refusing to fraternise with the Persian King, or to betray to him the Asiatic Greeks. Athens had always been prompted by generous feeling, even in spite of political interests, to compassionate and befriend the weak.[20] The orator dwells with satisfaction on the years preceding the peace concluded by Antalkidas; during which years Athens had recovered her walls and her ships — had put down the Spartan superiority at sea — and had rescued even the Great King from Spartan force.[21] He laments the disasters of Athenian soldiers at Corinth, through difficulties of the ground — and at Lechæum, through treachery. These are the latest political events to which he alludes.[22]
[17] Plat. Menex. pp. 240-241.