In the first place, then, the name of fatherland
is closer to one’s heart than all else, for there is
nothing closer than a father. If one pays his father
proper honour, as law and nature direct, then one
should honour his fatherland still more, for his father
himself belonged to if and his father’s father and all
their forbears, and the name of father goes back
until it reaches the father-gods.

 

Even the gods
have countries that they rejoice in, and although
they watch over all the abodes of man, deeming that
every land and every sea is theirs, nevertheless each
honours the place in which he was born above all
other states. Cities are holier when they are homes
of gods, and islands more divine if legends are told
of the birth of gods in them. Indeed, sacrifices
are accounted pleasing to the gods when one goes to
their native places to perform the ceremony. If, then,
the name of native land is in honour with the gods,
should it not be far more so with mankind?