Demosthenes

“ In every other sphere of life, you believe that the right of free speech ought to be so universally shared by all who are in the city, that you have extended it both to foreigners and to slaves; and one may see many a servant in Athens speaking his mind with greater liberty than is granted to citizens in some other states: but from the sphere of political counsel you have utterly banished this liberty. ”

“ But if you examine the matter aright, you will find that the chief responsibility rests with those whose aim is to win your favour, not to propose what is best. Some of them, men of Athens, so long as they can maintain the conditions which bring them reputation and influence, take no thought for the future [and therefore think that you also should take none] ; while others, by accusing and slandering those who are actively at work, [2] are simply trying to make the city spend its energies in punishing the members of its own body, and so leave Philip free to say and do what he likes. ”

“ For we ourselves and the Spartans, though we could originally allege no injury done by the one people to the other, nevertheless felt bound to go to war on account of the wrongs which we saw the rest suffering. And yet all the offences of the Spartans in those thirty years of power, and of your ancestors in their seventy years, were less, men of Athens, than the wrongs inflicted upon the Greeks by Philip, in the thirteen years, not yet completed, during which he has been to the fore. ”

“ It is the right to act as he pleases --to mutilate and to strip the Hellenic peoples, one by one, to attack and to enslave their cities. 23 For seventy-three years [12] you were the leading people of Hellas, and the Spartans for thirty years save one; [13] and in these last times, after the battle of Leuctra, [14] the Thebans too acquired some power: yet neither to you nor to Thebes nor to Sparta was such a right ever conceded by the Hellenes, as the right to do whatever you pleased. ”

“ For so long as you, though you are the injured party, make no complaint against him, but accuse some of your own body, he would be the most fatuous man on earth if _he_ were to interrupt your strife and contentions with one another--to bid you turn upon himself, and so to cut away the ground from the arguments by which his hirelings put you off, when they tell you that _he_ is not at war with Athens.
15 In God's name, is there a man in his senses who would judge by words, and not by facts, whether another was at peace or at war with him? ”

“ We ourselves, in the first place, must conduct the resistance and make preparation for it--with ships, that is, and money, and soldiers. For though all but ourselves give way and become slaves, we at least must contend for freedom. 71 And when we have made all these preparations ourselves, and let them be seen, then let us call upon the other states for aid, and send envoys to carry our message [in all directions--to the Peloponnese, to Rhodes, to Chios, to the king; for it is not unimportant for his interests either that Philip should be prevented from subjugating the world] ”

“ But if another with weapons in his hands and a large force about him holds out to you the _name_ of peace, while his own acts are acts of war, what course remains open to us but that of resistance? though if you wish to profess peace in the same manner as he, I have no quarrel with you. 9 But if any man's conception of peace is that it is a state in which Philip can master all that intervenes till at last he comes to attack ourselves, such a conception, in the first place, is madness ”

“ May you never find yourselves, men of Athens, in such a position! Yet in any case, it were better to die ten thousand deaths, than to do anything out of servility towards Philip [or to sacrifice any of those who speak for your good] . A noble recompense did the people in Oreus receive, for entrusting themselves to Philip's friends, and thrusting Euphraeus aside! 66 and a noble recompense the democracy of Eretria, for driving away your envoys, and surrendering to Cleitarchus! They are slaves, scourged and butchered! ”

“ They set up a record, that because a man of Zeleia, Arthmius by name, a slave of the King of Persia (for Zeleia is in Asia) , as part of his service to the king, had brought gold, not to Athens, but to the Peloponnese, he should be an enemy of Athens and her allies, he and his house, and that they should be outlaws. 44 And this outlawry is no such disfranchisement as we ordinarily mean by the word. For what would it matter to a man of Zeleia, that he might have no share in the public life of Athens? ”

“ But since there are some who are in so extraordinary a frame of mind that, though he is capturing cities, though many of your possessions are in his hands, and though he is committing aggressions against all men, they still tolerate certain speakers, who constantly assert at your meetings that it is some of _us_ who are provoking the war, it is necessary to be on our guard and come to a right understanding on the matter. 7 For there is a danger lest any one who proposes or advises resistance should find himself accused of having brought about the war. ”

“ And so old-fashioned were the men of that day--nay rather, such true citizens--that no one ever purchased any object from another for money, but their warfare was of a legitimate and open kind. 49 But now, as I am sure you see, most of our losses are the result of treachery, and no issue is decided by open conflict or battle; while you are told that it is not because he leads a column of heavy infantry [23] that Philip can march wherever he chooses, but because he has attached to himself a force of light infantry, cavalry, archers, mercenaries, and similar troops. ”

“ You must also by reasoned judgement and of set purpose come to execrate those who address you in his interest, remembering that it is impossible to master the enemies of the city, until you punish those who are serving them in the city itself. ”

“ Text 1 Many speeches are made, men of Athens, at almost every meeting of the Assembly, with reference to the aggressions which Philip has been committing, ever since he concluded the Peace, not only against yourselves but against all other peoples ”

“ You must guard against him, at the greatest possible distance, both by political measures and by preparations; you must prevent his stirring from home, instead of grappling with him at close quarters in a struggle to the death. 52 For, men of Athens, we have many natural advantages for a war, [25] if we are willing to do our duty. ”

“ A number of men joined forces, with Philip for their paymaster and director, and haled Euphraeus off to prison as a disturber of the peace. 61 Seeing this, the democratic party in Oreus, instead of coming to the rescue of Euphraeus, and beating the other party to death, displayed no anger at all against them, and agreed with a malicious pleasure that Euphraeus deserved his fate. ”

“ But we _have_ to take counsel for the good of all the Hellenes, in view of the grave peril in which they stand. And I wish to tell you on what grounds I am so alarmed at the situation, in order that if my reasoning is correct, you may share my conclusions, and exercise some forethought for yourselves at least, if you are actually unwilling to do so for the Hellenes as a whole ”

“ They may well be content if they can each save themselves. The task is yours. It is the prerogative that your forefathers won, and through many a great peril bequeathed to you. 75 But if each of you is to sit and consult his inclinations, looking for some way by which he may escape any personal action, the first consequence will be that you will never find any one who will act ”

“ Demosthenes now takes the broad ground of Panhellenic policy, and formally proposes to send envoys throughout Greece, to unite all the Greek states against Philip, as well as to send immediate reinforcements and supplies to the Chersonese.
Many critics, ancient and modern, have regarded this as the greatest of all Demosthenes' political orations. The lessons of history (from the speaker's point of view) are repeated and enforced by the citation of instance after instance. The tone of the speech, while less varied than that of the last, is grave and intense. ”

“ As the natural consequence, the Hellenes were a terror to the foreigner, not the foreigner to the Hellenes. It is not so now. Such is not your attitude in these or in other matters. 46 But what is it? [You know it yourselves; for why should I accuse you explicitly on every point? And that of the rest of the Hellenes is like your own, and no better; and so I say that the present situation demands our utmost earnestness and good counsel. [22] ] And what counsel? ”

“ The passage (Sec.Sec. 36 ff.) in which the orator contrasts the spirit of Athenian political life in the past with that of his own day is one of the most impressive in all his works, and the nobility of his appeal to the traditional ideals of Athenian policy has been universally recognized even by his most severe critics. ”

“ Philip did, in fact, bring the Macedonian heavy infantry to great perfection for the purposes of a pitched battle, though the decisive action was generally that of the cavalry. But the other troops which Demosthenes names would enable him to execute rapid movements with success. ”