Later on, when Dion returned from exile, he
took with him from Athens two brothers, who had been his friends,
not from community in philosophic study, but with the ordinary
companionship common among most friends, which they form as the result
of relations of hospitality and the intercourse which occurs when
one man initiates the other in the mysteries. It was from this kind of
intercourse and from services connected with his return that these two
helpers in his restoration became his companions. Having come to
Sicily, when they perceived that Dion had been misrepresented to the
Sicilian Greeks, whom he had liberated, as one that plotted to
become monarch, they not only betrayed their companion and friend, but
shared personally in the guilt of his murder, standing by his
murderers as supporters with weapons in their hands. The guilt and
impiety of their conduct I neither excuse nor do I dwell upon it.
For many others make it their business to harp upon it, and will
make it their business in the future. But I do take exception to the
statement that, because they were Athenians, they have brought shame
upon this city. For I say that he too is an Athenian who refused to
betray this same Dion, when he had the offer of riches and many
other honours. For his was no common or vulgar friendship, but
rested on community in liberal education, and this is the one thing in
which a wise man will put his trust, far more than in ties of personal
and bodily kinship. So the two murderers of Dion were not of
sufficient importance to be causes of disgrace to this city, as though
they had been men of any note.
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