and by a bravery of speech transform himself from abject and miserable
to bold and noble, is not to be censured as obstinate and audacious,
but honored as invincible and great. So, although Homer described
Patroclus in the happinesses of his life as smooth and without envy,
yet in death he makes him have something of the bravo, and a soldier’s
gallant roughness:
Had twenty mortals, each thy match in might,
Opposed me fairly, they had sunk in fight.[173]
So Phocion, though otherwise very mild, after the sentence passed on
him, showed the greatness of his mind in many respects; particularly
to one of his fellow-sufferers, who miserably cried out and bewailed
his misfortune, What, says he, is it not a pleasure to thee to die with
Phocion?
6. Further, a man of state has not less but greater liberty to speak
any thing of himself when his merits are rewarded with injurious and
unkind returns. Achilles usually gave the Gods their glory, and spoke
modestly in this manner:
Whene’er, by Jove’s decree, our conquering powers
Shall humble to the dust Troy’s lofty towers.
But when he was unhandsomely reproached and aspersed with contumelies,
he added swelling words to his anger, and these in his own applause: