 Isocrates says in his defense, “But, I beg of you, consider well whether I appear to you to corrupt the young by my words, or, on the contrary, to inspire them to a life of valor and of dangers endured for their country…” B. Keith Murphy says of Isocrates’s defense, “For Isocrates, it is through rhetoric that we can approximate truth, or at least a consensual truth.A man who is trained in rhetoric is trained in truth, and the creation of that truth through oratory.” 

In the sense that he is defending himself from an onerous charge to perform a liturgy, Isocrates makes a claim that his value to the city was provided through his teaching.He states that as a lifelong teacher, the value of the education that he has provided for students is worth far more than any monetary donation he can give to Athens.