On the Property of Aristophanes (6-10)

This is especially to be observed when a number of persons are brought to trial on the same charge. For, as a rule, the last to be judged are let off, since your anger has then ceased, and as you listen to them you willingly admit their disproofs.[*]

But from that business I will now pass, as I can do no good there. Far more miserable, in my opinion, are the children of Aristophanes: for, having done no wrong to anyone in either private or public affairs, not only have they been bereft of their patrimony in violation of your laws, but their one remaining hope, of being reared with the means of their grandfather, has been placed in this serious predicament.

Moreover we, bereft of our kinsfolk, bereft of the dowry,[*] and compelled to rear three small children, are attacked besides by base informers, and are in danger of losing what our ancestors bequeathed to us after they had acquired it by honest means. Yet, gentlemen, my father in all his life spent more on the State than on himself and his family,—twice the amount that we have now, as he often reckoned in my presence.

So you must not rashly convict of guilt the man who spent little on himself, but a great deal on you each year; you ought rather to condemn all those persons who have made a habit of squandering both their patrimony and whatever they can get from elsewhere on the most disgraceful pleasures.