Phocion (18.3-18.4)

Heaven forbid! they cried. And yet this man, said Phocion, has less to live upon than I, and finds it sufficient. And, in a word, said he, if I make no use of this great sum of money, it will do me no good to have it; or, if I use it, I shall bring myself, and the king as well, under the calumnies of the citizens. So the treasure went back again from Athens, after it had showed the Greeks that the man who did not want so great a sum was richer than the man who offered it.

Alexander was vexed and wrote back to Phocion that he could not regard as his friends those who wanted nothing of him. But not even then would Phocion take the money; he did, however, ask for the release of Echecratides the sophist, Athenodorus of Imbros, and two men of Rhodes, Demaratus and Sparton, who had been arrested upon sundry charges and imprisoned in Sardis.