Think of Your Own Punishment

Epistles of Phalaris, III: To Tyrrhenus

“If it is necessary that those who have done something unlawful should suffer hardship for the remainder of their life, as you have suggested to the Aegestaeans by bringing it into their heads to refer the judgment of my actions to the divine, then what sort of hopes should you have for yourself, who have committed all of your crimes under no compulsion, but rather by your own design?”

Τυρσηνῷ.
Εἰ τοὺς μετ’ ἀνάγκης τι πράξαντας τῶν μὴ νομίμων χαλεπὰς ἔχειν δεῖ περὶ τοῦ μέλλοντος βίου τὰς προσδοκίας, ὡς ὑπέφαινες Αἰγεσταίοις, εἰς τὴν τοῦ δαιμονίου πρόνοιαν ἀναφέρων τὰ περὶ ἐμοῦ, τίνας ἐχρῆν ἐλπίδας ἔχειν σὲ περὶ σεαυτοῦ, τὸν μὴ μετ’ ἀνάγκης μηδὲν ὧν παρανενόμηκας, μετὰ γνώμης δὲ ἅπαντα ἠσεβηκότα;