For instance, let me put aside generalities and speak
of my own case.



After raising so many Athenians
to high station and making them rich when they
were wretchedly poor before and helping all who
were in want, nay more, pouring out my wealth in
floods to benefit my friends, now that I have become
poor thereby I am no longer recognized or even
looked at by the men who formerly cringed and
kowtowed and hung upon my nod. On the contrary,
if I chance to meet any of them in the road, they
treat me as they would the gravestone of aman long
dead which time has overturned, passing by without even a curious glance..-- Indeed, some of them,
on catching sight of me in the distance, turn off in
another direction, thinking that the man who not
long ago showed himself their saviour and benefactor
will be an unpleasant and repulsive spectacle.