Statement to his son, as quoted in Familiar Quotations 9th Edition (1894) edited by J. Bartlett, p. 723 http://books.google.com/books?id=pus-AAAAYAAJ&pg=PA723 <br class="br">Originally quoted in Plutarch, Themistocles http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0074%3Achapter%3D18%3Asection%3D5 (18.5): (5) Of his son, who lorded it over his mother, and through her over himself, he said, jestingly, that the boy was the most powerful of all the Hellenes; for the Hellenes were commanded by the Athenians, the Athenians by himself, himself by the boy's mother, and the mother by her boy. (Bernadotte Perrin, Ed., via Perseus Project) <br class="br">Original Greek http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0074%3Achapter%3D18%3Asection%3D5: "(5) ποῦ ἂν ἦτε νῦν ὑμεῖς;’ τὸν δὲ υἱὸν ἐντρυφῶντα τῇ μητρὶ καὶ δι᾽ ἐκείνην αὐτῷ σκώπτων ἔλεγε πλεῖστον τῶν Ἑλλήνων δύνασθαι: τοῖς μὲν γὰρ Ἕλλησιν ἐπιτάττειν Ἀθηναίους, Ἀθηναίοις δ᾽ αὐτόν, αὐτῷ δὲ τὴν ἐκείνου μητέρα, τῇ μητρὶ δ᾽ ἐκεῖνον."