relative to the acceptance of pay by Sophists.45 In any event, this fact that the Sophists were so ready to be enriched through their lectures is clear evidence that their teaching on wealth was not the negative doctrine of the other Greek philosophers.46 Prodicus seems to have scorned menial labor as morally degrading, though he agreed with Hesiod in his doctrine of the dignity of all work that is noble.47 He emphasized the necessity of labor in the production of material good,48 and, like Democritus, was the forerunner of the Socratics in his insistence upon right use as a criterion of wealth.49 Hippias prided himself on his accomplishment in many arts,50 and thus probably did not share the prejudice of the philosophers against manual labor.
Euripides, though markedly individualistic, like the Sophists, shows traces of the older use of nature to explain the necessity of the state. He draws a parallel between the social order and the order of nature, by which law and government are justified, and the right of the middle class of farmers to rule is upheld.51
He emphasizes the importance of agriculture, and the dignity of the peasant farmer (αὐτουργός), who works his own land, as the stay of the country.52 This latter accords well with his cosmopolitan spirit, which he shares with the Sophists. He opposes the artificial distinctions of birth,53 slavery,54 and the traditional Greek idea of the inferiority of woman.55 His attitude toward wealth is that of the moral philosopher rather than that of the Sophist.56
Thucydides reveals considerable insight into economic problems, though he does not deal with them directly. Roscher declares that the Greek historian contributed as much as any other writer to give him the elements of his science, since he alone, of all Greek writers, did not confuse his economic ideas with ethics.57