I suppose rather that you will object that, whereas you have deliberately chosen to
 compose a discourse which is not at all like any other, but which to those who read it
 casually will appear to be ingenuous and easy to comprehend, though to those who scan it
 thoroughly and endeavor to see in it what has escaped all others it will reveal itself as
 difficult and hard to understand, packed with history and philosophy, and filled with all
 manner of devices and fictions—not the kind of fictions which, used with evil intent, are
 wont to injure one’s fellow-citizens, but the kind which, used by the cultivated mind, are
 able to benefit or to delight one’s audience,— you will object, I say, that, whereas you have chosen to do this, yet I have not allowed
 any of this to stand as you resolved that it should, but that I fail to see that in
 seeking both to explain the force of your words and to expound your real thoughts I
 thereby lessen the reputation of the discourse in proportion as I make it more patent and
 intelligible to its readers; for by implanting understanding in those who are without
 knowledge I render the discourse naked and strip it of the honor which would otherwise
 attach to it through those who study hard and are willing to take pains. “But, while I acknowledge that my own intelligence is vastly inferior to your own, yet
 as surely as I appreciate this fact so surely do I know that in times when your city
 deliberates on matters of the greatest import those who are reputed to be the wisest some
 times miss the expedient course of action, whereas now and then some chance person from
 the ranks of men who are deemed of no account and are regarded with contempt hits upon the
 right course and is thought to give the best advice. It would not, then, be surprising if something of the sort has come to pass in the
 present instance, where you think that you will gain the greatest credit if you conceal
 for the longest possible time the purpose you had in mind when you worked out your
 discourse, whereas I think that you will best succeed if you can with the least possible
 delay publish the thought by which you were governed when you composed it to all the world
 and especially to the Lacedaemonians, whom you have often discussed, sometimes with
 fairness and dignity, but then again with recklessness and extreme captiousness. “For if one were to show them a discourse of the latter sort before I had explained it
 to them, they would inevitably hate you and dislike you for having written in denunciation
 of them. As it is, I think that while most of the Lacedaemonians will continue to abide in
 the ways to which they have been faithful in past times and will pay no more attention to
 what is written in Athens than to what is said
 beyond the Pillars of Heracles,