Plutarch: Lives of the noble Grecians and RomansPlutarch
PhilosophyPhilosophy
Plutarch: Lives of the noble Grecians and Romans
Plutarch
Greece -- Biography -- Early works to 1800; Rome -- Biography -- Early works to 1800
Pericles, on the other hand, informed the people, that they were in no
way obliged to give any account of those moneys to their allies, so long
as they maintained their defense, and kept off the barbarians from
attacking them; while in the meantime they did not so much as supply
one horse or man or ship, but only found money for the service; "which
money," said he, "is not theirs that give it, but theirs that receive
it, if so be they perform the conditions upon which they receive it."
And that it was good reason, that, now the city was sufficiently
provided and stored with all things necessary for the war, they should
convert the overplus of its wealth to such undertakings, as would
hereafter, when completed, give them eternal honor, and, for the
present, while in process, freely supply all the inhabitants with
plenty. With their variety of workmanship and of occasions for service,
which summon all arts and trades and require all hands to be employed
about them, they do actually put the whole city, in a manner, into
state-pay; while at the same time she is both beautified and maintained
by herself. For as those who are of age and strength for war are
provided for and maintained in the armaments abroad by their pay out of
the public stock, so, it being his desire and design that the
undisciplined mechanic multitude that stayed at home should not go
without their share of public salaries, and yet should not have them
given them for sitting still and doing nothing, to that end he thought
fit to bring in among them, with the approbation of the people, these
vast projects of buildings and designs of works, that would be of some
continuance before they were finished, and would give employment to
numerous arts, so that the part of the people that stayed at home might,
no less than those that were at sea or in garrisons or on expeditions,
have a fair and just occasion of receiving the benefit and having their
share of the public moneys.
The materials were stone, brass, ivory, gold, ebony cypress-wood; and
the arts or trades that wrought and fashioned them were smiths and
carpenters, molders, founders and braziers, stone-cutters, dyers,
goldsmiths, ivory-workers, painters, embroiderers, turners; those again
that conveyed them to the town for use, merchants and mariners and ship-
masters by sea, and by land, cartwrights, cattle-breeders, waggoners,
rope-makers, flax-workers, shoe-makers and leather-dressers, roadmakers,
miners. And every trade in the same nature, as a captain in an army has
his particular company of soldiers under him, had its own hired company
of journeymen and laborers belonging to it banded together as in array,
to be as it were the instrument and body for the performance of the
service. Thus, to say all in a word, the occasions and services of
these public works distributed plenty through every age and condition.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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