In traditional shock cases, this is generally the relieving of pain from injuries or the stopping of blood loss. In an acute stress reaction, this may be pulling a rescuer away from the emergency to calm down, or blocking the sight of an injured friend from a patient.
With this system, Pericles succeeded in keeping the courts full of jurors (Ath. Pol. 27.3), and in giving the people experience in public life. As Athens' ruler, he made the city the first and most important polis of the Greek world, acquiring a resplendent culture and democratic institutions.
Athens in the 4th to 5th century BCE had an extraordinary system of government, whereby all male citizens had equal political rights, freedom of speech, and the opportunity to participate directly in the political arena. This system was democracy. Further, not only did citizens participate in a direct democracy whereby they themselves made the decisions by which they lived, but they also actively served in the institutions that governed them, and so they directly controlled all parts of the political process.