The Public Orations of Demosthenes, vol 2 | Page 9

men are permitted to speak on behalf of the
enemy without fear; because here a man may take bribes, and still
address you with impunity, even when you have been robbed of your
own. In Olynthus it was only safe to take Philip's side when the people
of Olynthus as a whole had shared Philip's favours, and was enjoying
the possession of Poteidaea. {65} In Thessaly it was only safe to take
Philip's side when the Thessalian commons had shared Philip's favours;
for he had expelled the tyrants for them, and restored to them their

Amphictyonic position. In Thebes it was not safe, until he had restored
Boeotia to Thebes and annihilated the Phocians. {66} But at
Athens--though Philip has not only robbed you of Amphipolis and the
territory of the Cardians, but has turned Euboea into a fortress
overlooking your country, and is now on his way to attack
Byzantium--at Athens it is safe to speak in Philip's interest. Aye, and
you know that, of such speakers, some who were poor are rapidly
growing rich; and some who were without name or fame are becoming
famous and distinguished, while you, on the other hand, are becoming
inglorious instead of famous, bankrupt instead of wealthy. For a city's
wealth consists, I imagine, in allies, confidence, loyalty--and of all
these you are bankrupt. {67} And because you are indifferent to these
advantages, and let them drift away from you, he has become
prosperous and powerful, and formidable to all, Hellenes and foreigners
alike; while you are deserted and humbled, with a splendid profusion of
commodities in your market, and a contemptible lack of all those things
with which you should have been provided. But I observe that certain
speakers do not follow the same principles in the advice which they
give you, as they follow for themselves. You, they tell you, ought to
remain quiet, even when you are wronged; but they cannot remain quiet
in your presence, even when no one is wronging them.
{68} But now some one or other comes forward and says, 'Ah, but you
will not move a motion or take any risk. You are a poor-spirited
coward.' Bold, offensive, shameless, I am not, and I trust I may never
be; and yet I think I have more courage than very many of your dashing
statesmen. {69} For one, men of Athens, who overlooks all that the
city's interest demands--who prosecutes, confiscates, gives,
accuses--does so not from any bravery, but because in the popular
character of his speeches and public actions he has a guarantee of his
personal safety, and therefore is bold without risk. But one who in
acting for the best sets himself in many ways against your wishes--who
never speaks to please, but always to advise what is best; one who
chooses a policy in which more issues must be decided by chance than
by calculation, and yet makes himself responsible to you for both--that
is the courageous man, {70} and such is the citizen who is of value to
his country, rather than those who, to gain an ephemeral popularity,
have ruined the supreme interests of the city. So far am I from envying

these men, or thinking them worthy citizens of their country, that if any
one were to ask me to say, what good I had really done to the city,
although, men of Athens, I could tell how often I had been trierarch and
choregus,[n] how I had contributed funds, ransomed prisoners, and
done other like acts of generosity, I would mention none of these things;
{71} I would say only that my policy is not one of measures like
theirs--that although, like others, I could make accusations and shower
favours and confiscate property and do all that my opponents do, I have
never to this day set myself to do any of these things; I have been
influenced neither by gain nor by ambition; but I continue to give the
advice which sets me below many others in your estimation, but which
must make you greater, if you will listen to it; for so much, perhaps, I
may say without offence. {72} Nor, I think, should I be acting fairly as
a citizen, if I devised such political measures as would at once make me
the first man in Athens, and you the last of all peoples. As the measures
of a loyal politician develop, the greatness of his country should
develop with them; and it is the thing which is best, not the thing which
is easiest, that every speaker should advocate. Nature will find the way
to the easiest course unaided. To the best, the words and the guidance
of the loyal citizen must show the way.
{73} I have heard it remarked before now, that though what