tention of the Gods respecting her. And ought not the
country which the Gods praise to be praised by all mankind? The second
praise which may be fairly claimed by her, is that at the time when the
whole earth was sending forth and creating diverse animals, tame and
wild, she our mother was free and pure from savage monsters, and out of
all animals selected and brought forth man, who is superior to the rest
in understanding, and alone has justice and religion. And a great proof
that she brought forth the common ancestors of us and of the departed,
is that she provided the means of support for her offspring. For as a
woman proves her motherhood by giving milk to her young ones (and she
who has no fountain of milk is not a mother), so did this our land prove
that she was the mother of men, for in those days she alone and first of
all brought forth wheat and barley for human food, which is the best and
noblest sustenance for man, whom she regarded as her true offspring. And
these are truer proofs of motherhood in a country than in a woman, for
the woman in her conception and generation is but the imitation of the
earth, and not the earth of the woman. And of the fruit of the earth she
gave a plenteous supply, not only to her own, but to others also; and
afterwards she made the olive to spring up to be a boon to her children,
and to help them in their toils. And when she had herself nursed them
and brought them up to manhood, she gave them Gods to be their rulers
and teachers, whose names are well known, and need not now be repeated.
They are the Gods who first ordered our lives, and instructed us in the
arts for the supply of our daily needs, and taught us the acquisition
and use of arms for the defence of the country.

Thus born into the world and thus educated, the ancestors of the
departed lived and made themselves a government, which I ought briefly
to commemorate. For government is the nurture of man, and the government
of good men is good, and of bad men bad. And I must show that our
ancestors were trained under a good government, and for this reason they
were good, and our contemporaries are also good, among whom our departed
friends are to be reckoned. Then as now, and indeed always, from that
time to this, speaking generally, our government was an aristocracy--a
form of government which receives various names, according to the
fancies of men, and is sometimes called democracy, but is really an
aristocracy or governm