Ancient History Sourcebook:
Thucydides (c.460/455-c.399 BCE):
Pericles' Funeral Oration
from the Peloponnesian War (Book 2.34-46)
This famous speech was given by the Athenian leader
Pericles after the first battles of the Peloponnesian War. Funerals after
such battles were public rituals and Pericles used the occasion to make a
classic statement of the value of democracy.
Thucydides’ Introduction:
In
the same winter the Athenians gave a funeral at the public cost to those who
had first fallen in this war. It was a custom of their ancestors, and the
manner of it is as follows. Three days before the ceremony, the bones of the
dead are laid out in a tent which has been erected; and their friends bring
to their relatives such offerings as they please. In the funeral procession
cypress coffins are borne in cars, one for each tribe; the bones of the
deceased being placed in the coffin of their tribe. Among these is carried
one empty bier decked for the missing, that is, for those whose bodies could
not be recovered. Any citizen or stranger who pleases, joins in the
procession: and the female relatives are there to wail at the burial. The
dead are laid in the public sepulchre
in the Beautiful suburb of the city[JS1],
in which those who fall in war are always buried; with the exception of those
slain at Marathon[JS2],
who for their singular and extraordinary valour were interred on the spot
where they fell. After the bodies have been laid in the earth, a man chosen
by the state, of approved wisdom and eminent reputation, pronounces over them
an appropriate panegyric; after which all retire. Such is the manner of the
burying; and throughout the whole of the war, whenever the occasion arose,
the established custom was observed. Meanwhile these were the first that had
fallen, and Pericles, son of Xanthippus, was chosen to pronounce their
eulogium. When the proper time arrived, he advanced from the sepulchre to an
elevated platform in order to be heard by as many of the crowd as possible,
and spoke as follows:
"Most
of my predecessors in this place have commended him who made this speech part
of the law, telling us that it is well that it should be delivered at the
burial of those who fall in battle. For myself, I should have thought that the worth which had displayed itself in
deeds would be sufficiently rewarded by honours also shown by deeds[JS3];
such as you now see in this funeral prepared at the people's cost. And I
could have wished that the reputations of many brave men were not to be
imperilled in the mouth of a single individual, to stand or fall according as
he spoke well or ill. For it is hard to speak properly upon a subject where
it is even difficult to convince your hearers that you are speaking the truth[JS4].
On the one hand, the friend who is familiar with every fact of the story may
think that some point has not been set forth with that fullness which he
wishes and knows it to deserve; on the other, he who is a stranger to the
matter may be led by envy to suspect exaggeration if he hears anything above
his own nature. For men can endure to hear others praised only so long as
they can severally persuade themselves of their own ability to equal the
actions recounted: when this point is passed, envy comes in and with it
incredulity. However, since our ancestors have stamped this custom with their
approval, it becomes my duty to obey the law and to try to satisfy your
several wishes and opinions as best I may.
"I shall begin with our ancestors[JS5]:
it is both just and proper that they should have the honour of the first
mention on an occasion like the present. They dwelt in the country without
break in the succession from generation to generation, and handed it down
free to the present time by their valour. And if our more remote ancestors
deserve praise, much more do our own fathers, who added to their inheritance
the empire which we now possess, and spared no pains to be able to leave
their acquisitions to us of the present generation. Lastly, there are few
parts of our dominions that have not been augmented by those of us here, who
are still more or less in the vigour of life; while the mother country has
been furnished by us with everything that can enable her to depend on her own
resources whether for war or for peace. That part of our history which tells
of the military achievements which gave us our several possessions, or of the
ready valour with which either we or our fathers stemmed the tide of Hellenic
or foreign aggression, is a theme too familiar to my hearers for me to dilate
on, and I shall therefore pass it by. But
what was the road by which we reached our position, what the form of
government under which our greatness grew, what the national habits out of
which it sprang; these are questions which I may try to solve before I
proceed to my panegyric upon these men[JS6];
since I think this to be a subject upon which on the present occasion a
speaker may properly dwell, and to which the whole assemblage, whether
citizens or foreigners, may listen with advantage.
"Our
constitution does not copy the laws of neighbouring states; we are rather a
pattern to others than imitators ourselves. Its administration favours the
many instead of the few; this is why it is called a democracy [JS7] .
If we look to the laws[JS8] ,
they afford equal justice to all in their private differences; if no social
standing, advancement in public life falls to reputation for capacity, class
considerations not being allowed to interfere with merit [JS9] ;
nor again does poverty bar the way, if a man is able to serve the state, he
is not hindered by the obscurity of his condition. The freedom [JS10] which we enjoy in our government
extends also to our ordinary life. There, far from exercising a jealous
surveillance over each other, we do not feel called upon to be angry with our
neighbour for doing what he likes, or even to indulge in those injurious
looks which cannot fail to be offensive, although they inflict no positive
penalty. But all this ease in our private relations does not make us lawless
as citizens. Against this fear is our chief safeguard, teaching us to obey
the magistrates and the
laws, particularly such as regard the protection of the injured, whether
they are actually on the statute book, or belong to that code which, although
unwritten, yet cannot be broken without acknowledged disgrace.
"Further,
we provide plenty of means for the
mind to refresh itself [JS11]from business. We celebrate games and
sacrifices all the year round, and the elegance of our private establishments
forms a daily source of pleasure and helps to banish the spleen; while the
magnitude of our city draws the produce of the world into our harbour, so
that to the Athenian the fruits of other countries are as familiar a luxury
as those of his own.
"If
we turn to our military policy[JS12], there also we differ from our
antagonists. We throw open our city to the world, and never by alien acts
exclude foreigners from any opportunity of learning or observing, although
the eyes of an enemy may occasionally profit by our liberality; trusting less in system and policy than
to the native spirit of our citizens; while in education, where our rivals
from their very cradles by a painful discipline seek after manliness, at
Athens we live exactly as we please, and yet are just as ready to encounter
every legitimate danger. [JS13]In proof of this it may be noticed that
the Lacedaemonians do not invade our country alone, but bring with them all
their confederates; while we Athenians advance unsupported into the territory
of a neighbour, and fighting upon a foreign soil usually vanquish with ease
men who are defending their homes. Our
united force was never yet encountered by any enemy[JS14] , because we have at once to attend to
our marine and to dispatch our citizens by land upon a hundred different
services; so that, wherever they engage with some such fraction of our
strength, a success against a detachment is magnified into a victory over the
nation, and a defeat into a reverse suffered at the hands of our entire
people. And yet if with habits not of labour but of ease, and courage not of
art but of nature, we are still willing to encounter danger, we have the
double advantage of escaping the experience of hardships in anticipation and
of facing them in the hour of need as fearlessly as those who are never free
from them.
"Nor are these the only points in which
our city is worthy of admiration. We cultivate refinement without
extravagance and knowledge without effeminacy; wealth we employ more for use
than for show, and place the real disgrace of poverty not in owning to the
fact but in declining the struggle against it. Our public men have, besides
politics, their private affairs to attend to, and our ordinary citizens,
though occupied with the pursuits of industry, are still fair judges of
public matters; for, unlike any other
nation, regarding him who takes no part in these duties not as un-ambitious
but as useless, we Athenians are able to judge at all
events if we cannot originate, and, instead
of looking on discussion as a stumbling-block in the way of action, we think
it an indispensable preliminary to any wise action at all. Again, in our enterprises we
present the singular spectacle of
daring and deliberation, each carried to its highest point,
and both united in the same persons; although usually decision is the fruit
of ignorance, hesitation of reflection. But the palm of courage will surely
be adjudged most justly to those, who best know the difference between
hardship and pleasure and yet are never tempted to shrink from danger. In
generosity we are equally singular, acquiring our friends by conferring, not
by receiving, favours. Yet, of course, the doer of the favour is the firmer
friend of the two, in order by continued kindness to keep the recipient in
his debt; while the debtor feels less keenly from the very consciousness that
the return he makes will be a payment, not a free gift. And it is only the
Athenians, who, fearless of consequences, confer their benefits not from
calculations of expediency, but in the confidence of liberality.
"In
short, I say that as a city we are the school of Hellas, while I doubt if the world can produce a man
who, where he has only himself to depend upon, is equal to so many
emergencies, and graced by so happy a versatility, as the Athenian. And that this is no mere boast thrown
out for the occasion, but plain matter of fact, the power of the state
acquired by these habits proves. For Athens alone of her contemporaries is
found when tested to be greater than her reputation, and alone gives no
occasion to her assailants to blush at the antagonist by whom they have been
worsted, or to her subjects to question her title by merit to rule. Rather, the admiration of the present and
succeeding ages will be ours, since we have not left our power without
witness, but have shown it by mighty proofs[JS20]; and far from needing a Homer for our
panegyrist, or other of his craft whose verses might charm for the moment
only for the impression which they gave to melt at the touch of fact, we have
forced every sea and land to be the highway of our daring, and everywhere,
whether for evil or for good, have left imperishable
monuments behind us. Such is the Athens for which these men, in the
assertion of their resolve not to lose her, nobly fought and died; and well
may every one of their survivors be ready to suffer in her cause.
"Indeed
if I have dwelt at some length upon the character of our country, it has been
to show that our stake in the struggle is not the same as theirs who have no
such blessings to lose, and also that the
panegyric of the men over whom I am now speaking might be by definite proofs
established [JS21]. That panegyric is now in a great
measure complete; for the Athens that I have celebrated is only what the
heroism of these and their like have made her, men whose fame, unlike that of
most Hellenes, will be found to be only commensurate with their deserts. And
if a test of worth be wanted, it is to be found in their closing
scene, and
this not only in cases in which it set the final seal upon their merit, but
also in those in which it gave the first intimation of their having any. For
there is justice in the claim that steadfastness in his country's battles should
be as a cloak to cover a man's other imperfections; since the good action has
blotted out the bad, and his merit as a citizen more than outweighed his
demerits as an individual. But none of these allowed either wealth with its
prospect of future enjoyment to unnerve his spirit, or poverty with its hope
of a day of freedom and riches to tempt him to shrink from danger. No, holding that vengeance upon their
enemies was more to be desired than any personal blessings, and reckoning
this to be the most glorious of hazards, they joyfully determined to accept
the risk, to make sure of their vengeance, and to let their wishes wait; and
while committing to hope the uncertainty of final success, in the business
before them they thought fit to act boldly and trust in themselves. Thus
choosing to die resisting, rather than to live submitting, they fled only
from dishonour, but met danger face to face, and after one brief moment,
while at the summit of their fortune, escaped, not from their fear, but from
their glory.
"So died these men as
became Athenians. You, their survivors, must determine to have as unfaltering
a resolution in the field, though you may pray that it may have a happier
issue. And not contented with ideas derived only from words of the advantages
which are bound up with the defense of your country, though these would
furnish a valuable text to a speaker even before an audience so alive to them
as the present, you
must yourselves realize the power of Athens, and feed your eyes upon her from
day to day, till love of her fills your hearts; and then, when all her
greatness shall break upon you, you must reflect that it was by courage,
sense of duty, and a keen feeling of honour in action that men were enabled
to win all this, and that no personal failure in an enterprise could make
them consent to deprive their country of their valour, but they laid it at
her feet as the most glorious contribution that they could offer.
For this offering of their lives made
in common by them all, they each of them individually received that renown
which never grows old, and for a sepulchre, not so much that in which their
bones have been deposited, but that noblest of shrines wherein their glory is
laid up to be eternally remembered upon every occasion on which deed or story
shall call for its commemoration. For heroes have the whole earth for their
tomb; and in lands far from their own, where the column with its epitaph
declares it, there is enshrined in every breast a record unwritten with no
tablet to preserve it, except that of the heart. These take as your model and, judging happiness to be the fruit of
freedom and freedom of valour, never decline the dangers of war. For it is not the miserable that would
most justly be unsparing of their lives; these have nothing to hope for: it
is rather they to whom continued life may bring reverses as yet unknown, and
to whom a fall, if it came, would be most tremendous in its consequences. And
surely, to a man of spirit, the degradation of cowardice must be immeasurably
more grievous than the unfelt death which strikes him in the midst of his
strength and patriotism!
"Comfort, therefore, not condolence, is
what I have to offer to the parents of the dead who may be here. Numberless are the chances to which, as
they know, the life of man is subject; but fortunate indeed are they who draw
for their lot a death so glorious as that which has caused your mourning, and
to whom life has been so exactly measured as to terminate in the happiness in
which it has been passed. Still I know that this is a hard saying, especially
when those are in question of whom you will constantly be reminded by seeing
in the homes of others blessings of which once you also boasted: for grief is
felt not so much for the want of what we have never known, as for the loss of
that to which we have been long accustomed. Yet you who are still of an age
to beget children must bear up in the hope of having others in their stead;
not only will they help you to forget those whom you have lost, but will be
to the state at once a reinforcement and a security; for never can a fair or just policy be expected of the citizen who does
not, like his fellows, bring to the decision the interests and apprehensions
of a father. While those of you who have passed
your prime must congratulate yourselves with the thought that the best part
of your life was fortunate, and that the brief span that remains will be
cheered by the fame of the departed. For it is only the love of honour that
never grows old; and honour it is, not gain, as some would have it, that
rejoices the heart of age and helplessness.
"Turning
to the sons or brothers of the dead, I see an arduous struggle before you.
When a man is gone, all are wont to praise him, and should your merit be ever
so transcendent, you will still find it difficult not merely to overtake, but
even to approach their renown. The living have envy to contend with, while
those who are no longer in our path are honoured with a goodwill into which
rivalry does not enter. On the other hand, if I must say anything on the
subject of female excellence to those of you who will now be in widowhood, it
will be all comprised in this brief exhortation. Great will be your glory in
not falling short of your natural character; and greatest will be hers who is
least talked of among the men, whether for good or for bad.
"My
task is now finished. I have performed it to the best of my ability, and in
word, at least, the requirements of the law are now satisfied. If deeds be in
question, those who are here interred have received part of their honours
already, and for the rest, their children will be brought up till manhood at
the public expense: the state thus offers a valuable prize, as the garland of
victory in this race of valour, for the reward both of those who have fallen
and their survivors. And where the rewards for merit are greatest, there are
found the best citizens.
"And
now that you have brought to a close your lamentations for your relatives,
you may depart."
Source:
Thucydides
(c.460/455-c.399 BCE): Peloponnesian War, Book 2.34-46
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