The Public Orations of Demosthenes Volume II Part 5

(_To the clerk _) {289} Read him the epitaph which the city resolved to inscribe above them at the public cost; (_to Aeschines_) that even by these very lines, Aeschines, you may know that you are a man dest.i.tute of feeling, a dishonest accuser, an abominable wretch!

_The Inscription_.[n]

These for their country, fighting side by side, By deeds of arms dispelled the foemen's pride.

heir lives they saved not, bidding Death make clear-- Impartial Judge!--their courage or their fear.

For Greece they fought, lest, 'neath the yoke brought low, In thraldom she th' oppressor's scorn should know.

Now in the bosom of their fatherland After their toil they rest--'tis G.o.d's command.

'Tis G.o.d's alone from failure free to live;[n]

Escape from Fate to no man doth He give.

{290} Do you hear, Aeschines [in these very lines], 'Tis G.o.d's alone from failure free to live'? Not to the statesman has he ascribed the power to secure success for those who strive, but to the G.o.ds. Why then, accursed man, do you revile _me_, for our failure, in words which I pray the G.o.ds to turn upon the heads of you and yours?

{291} But, even after all the other lying accusations which he has brought against me, the thing which amazed me most of all, men of Athens, was that when he mentioned what had befallen the city, he did not think of it as a loyal and upright citizen would have thought. He shed no tears; he felt no emotion of sorrow in his heart: he lifted up his voice, he exulted, he strained his throat, evidently in the belief that he was accusing me, though in truth he was giving us an ill.u.s.tration, to his own discredit, of the utter difference between his feelings and those of others, at the painful events which had taken place. {292} But surely one who professes, as Aeschines professes now, to care for the laws and the const.i.tution, ought to show, if nothing else, at least that he feels the same griefs and the same joys as the People, and has not, by his political profession, ranged himself on the side of their opponents. That you have done the latter is manifest today, when you pretend that the blame for everything is mine, and that it is through me that the city was plunged in trouble: though it was not through my statesmanship or my policy, gentlemen, {293} that you began to help the h.e.l.lenes: for were you to grant me this--that it was through me that you had resisted the dominion which was being established over the h.e.l.lenes--you would have granted me a testimonial which all those that you have given to others together could not equal.

But neither would I make such an a.s.sertion; for it would be unjust to you; nor, I am sure, would you concede its truth: and if Aeschines were acting honestly, he would not have been trying to deface and misrepresent the greatest of your glories, in order to satisfy his hatred towards me.

{294} But why do I rebuke him for this, when he has made other lying charges against me, which are more outrageous by far? For when a man charges me--I call Heaven and Earth to witness!--with philippizing, what will he not say? By Heracles and all the G.o.ds, if one had to inquire truthfully, setting aside all calumny and all expression of animosity, who are in reality the men upon whose heads all would naturally and justly lay the blame for what has taken place, you would find that it was those in each city who resemble Aeschines, not those who resemble me. {295} For they, when Philip's power was weak and quite insignificant--when we repeatedly warned and exhorted you and showed you what was best--they, to satisfy their own avarice, sacrificed the interests of the community, each group deceiving and corrupting their own fellow citizens, until they brought them into bondage. Thus the Thessalians were treated by Daochus, Cineas, and Thrasydaeus; the Arcadians by Cercidas, Hieronymus and Eucampidas; the Argives by Myrtis, Teledamus, and Mnaseas; the Eleans by Euxitheus, Cleotimus and Aristaechmus; the Messenians by the sons of the G.o.dforsaken Philiadas--Neon and Thrasylochus; the Sicymians by Aristratus and Epichares; the Corinthians by Deinarchus and Demaretus; the Megareans by Ptoeodorus, Helixus and Perillus; the Thebans by Timolaus, Theogeiton, and Anemoetas; the Euboeans by Hipparchus and Sosistratus. {296} Daylight will fail me before the list of the traitors is complete. All these, men of Athens, are men who pursue the same designs in their own cities, as my opponents pursue among you--abominable men, flatterers, evil spirits, who have hacked the limbs each of his own fatherland, and like boon companions have pledged away their freedom, first to Philip and now to Alexander; men whose measure of happiness is their belly, and their lowest instincts; while as for freedom, and the refusal to acknowledge any man as lord--the standard and rule of good to the h.e.l.lenes of old--they have flung it to the ground.

{297} Of this shameful and notorious conspiracy and wickedness--or rather (to speak with all earnestness, men of Athens), of this treason against the freedom of the h.e.l.lenes--Athens has been guiltless in the eyes of all men, in consequence of my statesmanship, as I have been guiltless in your eyes. And do you then ask me for what merits I count myself worthy to receive honour? I tell you that at a time when every politician in h.e.l.las had been corrupted--beginning with yourself--[firstly by Philip, and now by Alexander], {298} no opportunity that offered, no generous language, no grand promises, no hopes, no fears, nor any other motive, tempted or induced me to betray one jot of what I believed to be the rights and interests of the city; nor, of all the counsel that I have given to my fellow countrymen, up to this day, has any ever been given (as it has by you) with the scales of the mind inclining to the side of gain, but all out of an upright, honest, uncorrupted soul. I have taken the lead in greater affairs than any man of my own time, and my administration has been sound and honest throughout all. {299} That is why I count myself worthy of honour. But as for the fortifications and entrenchments, for which you ridiculed me, I judge them to be deserving, indeed, of grat.i.tude and commendation--a.s.suredly they are so--but I set them far below my own political services. Not with stones, nor with bricks, did I fortify this city. Not such are the works upon which I pride myself most. But would you inquire honestly wherein my fortifications consist? You will find them in munitions of war, in cities, in countries, in harbours, in ships, in horses, and in men ready to defend my fellow countrymen. {300} These are the defences I have set to protect Attica, so far as by human calculation it could be done; and with these I have fortified our whole territory--not the circuit of the Peiraeus or of the city alone. Nor in fact, did _I _prove inferior to Philip in calculations--far from it!--or in preparations for war; but the generals of the confederacy,[n] and their forces, proved inferior to him in fortune. Where are the proofs of these things? They are clear and manifest. I bid you consider them.

{301} What was the duty of a loyal citizen--one who was acting with all forethought and zeal and uprightness for his country's good? Was it not to make Euboea the bulwark of Attica on the side of the sea, and Boeotia on that of the mainland, and on that of the regions towards the Peloponnese, our neighbours[n] in that direction? Was it not to provide for the corn- trade, and to ensure that it should pa.s.s along a continuously friendly coast all the way to the Peiraeus? {302} Was it not to preserve the places which were ours--Proconnesus, the Chersonese, Tenedos--by dispatching expeditions to aid them, and proposing and moving resolutions accordingly; and to secure the friendship and alliance of the rest--Byzantium, Tenedos, Euboea? Was it not to take away the greatest of the resources which the enemy possessed, and to add what was lacking to those of the city? {303} All this has been accomplished by my decrees and by the measures which I have taken; and all these measures, men of Athens, will be found by any one who will examine them without jealousy, to have been correctly planned, and executed with entire honesty: the opportunity for each step was not, you will find, neglected or left unrecognized or thrown away by me, and nothing was left undone, which it was within the power and the reasoning capacity of a single man to effect. But if the might of some Divine Power, or the inferiority of our generals, or the wickedness of those who were betraying your cities, or all these things together, continuously injured our whole cause, until they effected its overthrow, how is Demosthenes at fault? {304} Had there been in each of the cities of h.e.l.las one man, such as I was, as I stood at my own post in your midst-- nay, if all Thessaly and all Arcadia had each had but one man animated by the same spirit as myself--not one h.e.l.lenic people, either beyond or on this side of Thermopylae, would have experienced the evils which they now suffer. {305} All would have been dwelling in liberty and independence, free from all fears, secure and prosperous, each in their own land, rendering thanks for all these great blessings to you and the rest of the Athenian people, through me. But that you may know that in my anxiety to avoid jealousy, I am using language which is far from adequate to the actual facts, (_to the clerk_) read me this; and take and recite the list of the expeditions sent out in accordance with my decrees.

[_The list of expeditions is read]_

{306} These measures, and others like them, Aeschines, were the measures which it was the duty of a loyal and gallant citizen to take. If they were successful, it was certain that we should be indisputably the strongest power, and that with justice as well as in fact: and now that they have resulted otherwise, we are left with at least an honourable name. No man casts reproach either upon the city, or upon the choice which she made: they do but upbraid Fortune, who decided the issue thus. {307} It was not, G.o.d knows, a citizen's duty to abandon his country's interests, to sell his services to her opponents, and cherish the opportunities of the enemy instead of those of his country. Nor was it, on the one hand, to show his malice against the man who had faced the task of proposing and moving measures worthy of the city, and persisting in that intention; while, on the other hand, he remembered and kept his eyes fixed upon any private annoyance which another had caused him: nor was it to maintain a wicked and festering inactivity, as you so often do. {308} a.s.suredly there is an inactivity that is honest and brings good to the State--the inactivity which you,[n] the majority of the citizens, observe in all sincerity. But that is not the inactivity of Aeschines. Far from it! He, on the contrary, retires just when he chooses, from public life (and he often chooses to do so), that he may watch for the moment when you will be sated with the continual speeches of the same adviser, or when fortune has thrown some obstacle in your path, or some other disagreeable event has happened (for in the life of man many things are possible); and then, when such an opportunity comes, suddenly, like a gale of wind, out of his retirement he comes forth an orator, with his voice in training, and his phrases and his sentences collected; and these he strings together lucidly, without pausing for breath, though they bring with them no profit, no accession of anything good, but only calamity to one or another of his fellow citizens, and shame to all alike. {309} Surely, Aeschines, if all this practice and study sprang from an honest heart, resolved to pursue the interests of your country, the fruits of it should have been n.o.ble and honourable and profitable to all--alliances of cities, supplies of funds, opening of ports,[n] enactment of beneficial laws, acts of opposition to our proved enemies. {310} It was for all such services that men looked in bygone days; and the past has offered, to any loyal and gallant citizen, abundant opportunities of displaying them: but nowhere in the ranks of such men will you ever be found to have stood--not first, nor second, nor third, nor fourth, nor fifth, nor sixth, nor in any position whatsoever; at least, not in any matters whereby your country stood to gain. {311} For what alliance has the city gained by negotiations of yours? What a.s.sistance, what fresh access of goodwill or fame? What diplomatic or administrative action of yours has brought new dignity to the city? What department of our home affairs, or our relations with h.e.l.lenic and foreign states, over which you have presided, has shown any improvement? Where are your ships? Where are your munitions of war? Where are your dockyards?

Where are the walls that you have repaired? Where are your cavalry? Where in the world _is_ your sphere of usefulness? What pecuniary a.s.sistance have you ever given, as a good and generous fellow citizen,[n] either to rich or poor? {312} 'But, my good sir, 'you say, 'if I have done none of these things, I have at least given my loyalty and goodwill.' Where? When?

Why, even at a time when all who ever opened their lips upon the platform contributed voluntarily to save the city, till, last of all, Aristonicus gave what he had collected to enable him to regain his civil rights--even then, most iniquitous of men! you never came forward or made any contribution whatever: and a.s.suredly it was not from poverty, when you had inherited more than five talents out of the estate of your father-in-law Philo, and had received two talents subscribed by the leaders of the Naval Boards,[n] for your damaging attack upon my Naval Law.[n] {313} But I will say no more about this, lest by pa.s.sing from subject to subject I should break away from the matter in hand. It is at least plain that your failure to contribute was not due to your poverty, but to your anxiety to do nothing in opposition to those whose interest is the guide of your whole public life. On what occasions, then, do your spirit and your brilliancy show themselves? When something must be done to injure your fellow countrymen--then your voice is most glorious, your memory most perfect; then you are a prince of actors, a Theocrines[n] on the tragic stage!

{314} Again, you have recalled the gallant men of old, and you do well to do so. Yet it is not just, men of Athens, to take advantage of the good feeling which you may be relied upon to entertain towards the dead, in order to examine me before you by their standard, and compare me, who am still living amongst you, with them. {315} Who in all the world does not know that against the living there is always more or less of secret jealousy, while none, not even their enemies, hate the dead any more? And am I, in spite of this law of nature, to be judged and examined to-day by the standard of those who were before me? By no means! It would be neither just nor fair, Aeschines. But let me be compared with yourself, or with any of those who have adopted the same policy as yourself, and are still alive. {316} And consider this also. Which of these alternatives is the more honourable? Which is better for the city?--that the good services done by men of former times--tremendous, nay even beyond all description though they may be--should be made an excuse for exposing to ingrat.i.tude and contumely those that are rendered to the present generation? or that all who act in loyalty should have a share in the honours and the kindness which our fellow citizens dispense? {317} Aye, and (if I must say this after all) the policy and the principles which I have adopted will be found, if rightly viewed, to resemble and to have the same aims as those of the men who in that age received praise; while yours resemble those of the dishonest a.s.sailants of such persons in those days. For in their time also there were obviously persons who disparaged the living and praised the men of old, acting in the same malicious way as yourself. {318} Do you say then, that I am in no way like them? But are you like them, Aeschines?

or your brother? or any other orator of the present day? For my part, I should say, 'None.' Nay, my good sir--to use no other epithet--compare the living with the living, their contemporaries, as men do in every other matter, whether they are comparing poets or choruses or compet.i.tors in the games. {319} Because Philammon was not so powerful as Glaucus of Carystus[n] and some other athletes of former times, he did not leave Olympia uncrowned: but because he fought better than all who entered against him, he was crowned and proclaimed victor. Do you likewise examine me beside the orators of the day--beside yourself, beside any one in the world that you choose. {320} I fear no man's rivalry. For, while the city was still free to choose the best course, and all alike could compete with one another in loyalty to their country, I was found the best adviser of them all. It was by my laws, by my decrees, by my diplomacy, that all was effected. Not one of your party appeared anywhere, unless some insult was to be offered to your fellow countrymen. But when there happened, what I would had never happened--when it was not statesmen that were called to the front, but those who would do the bidding of a master, those who were anxious to earn wages by injuring their country, and to flatter a stranger--then, along with every member of your party, you were found at your post, the grand and resplendent owner of a stud;[n] while I was weak, I confess, yet more loyal to my fellow countrymen than you. {321} Two characteristics, men of Athens, a citizen of a respectable character (for this is perhaps the least invidious phrase that I can apply to myself) must be able to show: when he enjoys authority, he must maintain to the end the policy whose aims are n.o.ble action and the pre-eminence of his country: and at all times and in every phase of fortune he must remain loyal. For this depends upon his own nature; while his power and his influence are determined by external causes. And in me, you will find, this loyalty has persisted unalloyed. For mark this. {322} Not when my surrender was demanded, not when I was called to account before the Amphictyons, not in face either of threats or of promises, not when these accursed men were hounded on against me like wild beasts, have I ever been false to my loyalty towards you. For from the very first, I chose the straight and honest path in public life: I chose to foster the honour, the supremacy, the good name of my country, to seek to enhance them, and to stand or fall with them. {323} I do not walk through the market, cheerful and exultant over the success of strangers, holding out my hand and giving the good tidings to any whom I expect to report my conduct yonder, but shuddering, groaning, bowing myself to the earth, when I hear of the city's good fortune, as do these impious men, who make a mock of the city --not remembering that in so doing they are mocking themselves--while they direct their gaze abroad, and, whenever another has gained success through the failure of the h.e.l.lenes, belaud that state of things, and declare that we must see that it endures for all time.

{324} Never, O all ye G.o.ds, may any of you consent to their desire! If it can be, may you implant even in these men a better mind and heart. But if they are verily beyond all cure, then bring them and them alone to utter and early destruction, by land and sea. And to us who remain, grant the speediest release from the fears that hang over us, and safety that naught can shake!

FOOTNOTES

[1] Some writers suppose that it was at the meeting in the spring of 339.

The evidence is not conclusive, but appears to point to the date given here.

NOTES

ON THE NAVAL BOARDS

-- 1. _who praise your forefathers_. The advocates of war with Persia had doubtless appealed to the memory of Marathon and Salamis, and the old position of Athens as the champion of Greece against Persia.

-- 10, 11. The argument is this: 'If a war with Persia needed a special kind of force, we could not prepare for it without being detected: but as all wars need the same kind of force, our preparations need rouse no suspicion in Persia particularly.'

_acknowledged foes_: i.e. probably Thebes, or the revolted allies of Athens, with whom a disadvantageous peace had, perhaps, just been made. It is not, however, impossible that Philip also is in the orator's mind; for though at the time he was probably engaged in war with the Illyrians and Paeonians, his quarrel with Athens in regard to Amphipolis had not been settled. The Olynthians may also be thought of. (See Introd. to Phil. I and Olynthiacs.)

-- 12. _rhapsodies_. The rhapsodes who went about Greece reciting Homer and other poets had lost the distinction they once enjoyed, and 'rhapsody'

became a synonym for idle declamation.

-- 14. _a bold speech_: i.e. a demand for instant war, helped out by rhetorical praises of the men of old.

-- 16. _unmarried heiresses and orphans_. These would be incapable of discharging the duties of the trierarchy, though their estates were liable for the war-tax. Partners were probably exempted, when none of them possessed so large a share in the common property as would render him liable for trierarchy.

_property outside Attica_. According to the terms made by Athens with her allies when the 'Second Delian League' was formed in 378, Athens undertook that no Athenian should hold property in an allied State. But this condition had been broken, and the multiplication of Athenian estates [Greek: _kl_erhouchiai_] in allied territories had been one of the causes of the war with the allies.

_unable to contribute_: e. g. owing to no longer possessing the estate which he had when the a.s.sessment was made.

-- 17. _to a.s.sociate, &c_. The sections which contained a very rich man were to have poor men included in it, so that the total wealth of every section might be the same, and the distribution of the burden between the sections fair.

-- 18. _the first hundred, &c_. Demosthenes thinks of the fleet as composed, according to need, of 100, 200, or 300 vessels, and treats each hundred as a separate squadron, to be separately divided among the Boards.

_by lot_. In this and other clauses of his proposal, Demosthenes stipulates for the use of the lot ([Greek: _sunkl_er_osai_], [Greek: epikl_erosai]) to avoid all unfair selection. It is only in the distribution of duties among the smaller sections within each Board that a.s.signment by arrangement ([Greek: _apodounai_], a word suggesting distribution according to fitness or convenience) is to be allowed.

-- 19. _taxable capital_ ([Greek: _tim_ema_]). The war-tax and the trierarchic burdens were a.s.sessed on a valuation of the contributor's property. Upon this valuation of his taxable capital he paid the percentage required. (The old view that he was taxed not upon his capital, as valued, but upon a fraction of it varying with his wealth, rests upon an interpretation of pa.s.sages in the Speeches against Aphobus, which is open to grave question.) The total amount of the single valuations was the 'estimated taxable capital of the country' ([Greek: _tim_ema t_es ch_oras_]). This, in the case of the trierarchy, would be the aggregate amount of the valuations of the 1,200 wealthiest men, viz. 6,000 talents.

(Of course the capital taxable for the war-tax would be considerably larger. Even at a time when the prosperity of Attica was much lower, in 378-377 B.C., it was nearly 6,000 talents, according to Polybius, ii. 62.

6.)

-- 20. A tabular statement will make this plain:--

_Persons _Total capital taxable _Ships_. responsible_. for each ship_.

100 12 60 tal.

200 6 30 "

300 4 20 "

The percentage payable on the taxable capital was of course higher, the larger the number of ships required. Each ship appears to have cost on the average a talent to equip. The percentages in the three cases contained in the table would therefore be 1-2/3, 3-1/3, and 5, respectively. (Compare -- 27.)

-- 21. _fittings ... in arrear_. Apparently former trierarchs had not always given back the fittings of their vessels, which had either been provided at the expense of the State, or lent to the trierarchs by the State.

-- 23. _wards_ ([Greek: _trittyes_]). The trittys or ward was one-third of a tribe.

-- 25. _you see ... city_. The a.s.sembly met on the Pnyx, whence there was a view of the Acropolis and of the greater part of the ancient city.

_prophets_. The Athenian populace seems always to have been liable to the influence of soothsayers, who professed to utter oracles from the G.o.ds, particularly when war was threatening. This was so (e. g.) at the time of the Peloponnesian War (Thucyd. ii. 8, v. 26), and the soothsayer is delightfully caricatured by Aristophanes in the _Birds_ and elsewhere.

-- 29. _two hundred ships ... one hundred were Athenian_. In the Speech on the Crown, -- 238, Demosthenes gives the numbers as 300 and 200. Perhaps a transcriber at an early stage in the history of the text accidentally wrote HH (the symbol for 200) instead of HHH, in the case of the first number, and a later scribe then 'corrected' the second number into H instead of HH. The numbers given by Herodotus are 378 and 180, and, for the Persian ships, 1,207.

-- 31. _against Egypt_, which was now in rebellion against Artaxerxes.

Orontas, Satrap of Mysia, was more or less constantly in revolt during this period.

-- 32. _even more certainly_ [Greek: _palai_]: lit. 'long ago'. The transition from temporal to logical priority is paralleled in certain uses of other temporal adverbs, e.g. [Greek: _euthys_] (Aristotle, _Poet_. v), and [Greek: _schol_e_] (of which, as Weil notes, [Greek: _palai_] is the exact opposite).