§6.1Idem cum in conventum venisset Arcadum, petens ut societatem cum Thebanis et Argivis facerent, contraque Callistratus, Atheniensium legatus, qui eloquentia omnes eo praestabat tempore, postularet ut potius amicitiam sequerentur Atticorum, et in oratione sua multa invectus esset in Thebanos et Argivos in eisque hoc posuisset, §6.2animum advertere debere Arcades, quales utraque civitas cives procreasset, ex quibus de ceteris possent iudicare: Argivos enim fuisse Orestem et Alcmeonem matricidas, Thebis Oedipum natum, qui, cum patrem suum interfecisset, ex matre liberos procreasset:
When the same man had come to the assembly of the Arcadians, asking that they make an alliance with the Thebans and Argives, and on the other hand Callistratus, the ambassador of the Athenians, who at that time excelled everyone in eloquence, demanded that they rather pursue the friendship of the Attics, and in his speech had uttered many invectives against the Thebans and Argives, and in their case had asserted this: that the Arcadians ought to direct their attention to what kind of citizens each city had produced, from whom they could judge concerning the rest; for the matricides Orestes and Alcmaeon had been Argives, and Oedipus was born at Thebes, who, when he had killed his own father, had begotten children by his mother.
§6.3huic in respondendo Epaminondas, cum de ceteris perorasset, postquam ad illa duo opprobria pervenit, admirari se dixit stultitiam rhetoris Attici, qui non animadverterit, innocentes illos natos domi, scelere admisso cum patria essent expulsi, receptos esse ab Atheniensibus.
In replying to him, Epaminondas, when he had finished speaking on the other matters, after he came to those two reproaches, said that he wondered at the stupidity of the Attic rhetorician, who had not noticed that those men, born innocent at home, when they had been expelled from their country after committing their crime, were received by the Athenians.
§6.4sed maxime eius eloquentia eluxit Spartae legati ante pugnam Leuctricam.
But his eloquence shone forth most of all at Sparta, as an ambassador, before the battle of Leuctra.
quo cum omnium sociorum convenissent legati, coram frequentissimo conventu sic Lacedaemoniorum tyrannidem coarguit, ut non minus illa oratione opes eorum concusserit quam Leuctrica pugna.
When the ambassadors of all the allies had assembled there, in the presence of a very crowded assembly he so exposed the tyranny of the Lacedaemonians that he shook their power no less by that speech than by the battle of Leuctra.
tum enim perfecit, quod post apparuit, ut auxilio sociorum privarentur.
For he then brought it about, which appeared afterwards, that they were deprived of the assistance of their allies.