23
So far, so good. But if there were the most serious shortage of possible contributors, in Heaven’s name, which would you prefer—to organize syndicates for those services as for the equipment of war-vessels, or to rob your benefactors of what you have given them? I think I should prefer the syndicates. By the present law, while each of these thirty is performing a public service, Leptines affords a respite for the others, and that is all; after that, each of them will have to spend as much as before; but in the other case, each would pay a small contribution, proportioned to his means, and none would be hardly treated, even if his property were quite small.
24
Now some of our opponents, men of Athens, are so illogical that they make no attempt to answer these arguments, but take a different line, saying for instance how monstrous it is that on the one hand there is nothing left in the Exchequer, but on the other hand private individuals will grow wealthy because they have secured an immunity. But it is not fair to combine both these statements. For if a man has great wealth without doing you any wrong, there is surely no need to look on him with envy; but if they are prepared to say that he has stolen it or gained it in some other disreputable way, there are laws by which he can be suitably punished. But as long as they do not prosecute him, neither have they any right to make this allegation.