[-8-] "I am thoroughly ashamed that I have been led to speak in such a fashion. Have done with your madness, then, and reflect now if not before that with many dying all the time by disease and many in the wars it is impossible for the city to maintain itself unless the multitude in it is constantly reinforced by those who are ever and anon being born. Let no one of you think that I am ignorant of the many disagreeable and painful features that belong to marriage and child-rearing. But bear in mind that we possess nothing at all good with which some bane is not mingled, and that in our most abundant and greatest blessings there reside the most abundant and greatest woes. If you decline to accept the latter, do not strive to obtain the former. Practically all who possess any real excellence and pleasure are obliged to work before its enjoyment, to work at the time, and to work afterward. Why should I lengthen my speech by going into each one of them in detail? Therefore even if there are some unpleasant features connected with marriage and the begetting of children, set over against them the better elements: you will find them more numerous and more vital. For, in addition to all the other blessings that naturally inhere in this state of life, the prizes offered by law--an infinitesimal portion of which determines many to undergo death--might induce anybody to obey me. And is it not a disgrace that for rewards which influence others to give up their own lives you should be unwilling either to marry wives or to rear children? [-9-] "Therefore, fellow-citizens (for I believe that I have now persuaded you both to hold fast to the name of citizens and to secure the additional title of men and fathers), I have administered this rebuke reluctantly but of necessity, not as your foe nor as one hating you, but rather loving you and wishing to obtain many others like you,--as one wishing you to guard lawful hearths, with houses full of descendants, that we may approach the gods together with wives and children, and associate with one another standing on an equality in whatever we possess and harvesting equally the hopes to which it gives rise. How could I call myself a good ruler over you if I should endure seeing you becoming constantly fewer? How could I any longer be rightfully named your father, if you rear no children? Therefore, if you really have a regard for me and have given me this title not out of flattery but as an honor, desire yourselves to become men and fathers. Thus you may yourselves share this title and also render me well named."