must, I conceive, happen something of this kind occasionally. Shall we therefore make a law prohibiting the council and the people hereafter from passing bills and decrees? I scarcely think so. We ought not to be deprived of a right, in the exercise of which we have been deceived; rather should we be instructed how to avoid such error, and pass a law, not taking away our power, but giving the means of punishing those who deceive us.

On the Navy Boards (354 B. C.). It appears to me, O Athenians, that the men who praise your ancestors adopt a flattering language, not a course beneficial to the people whom they eulogize. For attempting to speak on subjects which no man can fully reach by words they carry away the reputation of clever speakers themselves, but cause the glory of those ancients to fall below its estimation in the minds of the hearers. For my part, I consider the highest praise of our ancestors to be the length of time which has elapsed during which no other men have been able to excel the pattern of their deeds. I will myself endeavour to show in what way, according to my judgment, your preparations may most conveniently be made. For thus it is. Though all of us who intend to speak should prove ourselves capital orators, your affairs, I am certain, would prosper none the more; but if any person whomsoever came forward, and could show and convince you what kind and what amount of force will be serviceable to the state, and from what resources it should be provided, all our present apprehensions would be removed. This will I endeavour to do, as far as I am able, first briefly informing you what my opinion is concerning our relations with the king.

BODY

The first Philippic (351 B. c.). First, I say, you must not despond, Athenians, under your present circumstances,

wretched as they are; for that which is worst in them as regards the past is best for the future. What do I mean? That your affairs are amiss, men of Athens, because you do nothing which is needful; if, notwithstanding you performed your duties, it were the same, there would be no hope of amendment.

Consider, next, what you know by report, and men of experience remember, how vast a power the Lacedaemonians had not long ago, yet how nobly and becomingly you consulted the dignity of Athens, and undertook the war against them for the rights of Greece. Why do I mention this? To show and convince you, Athenians, that nothing, if you take precaution, is to be feared; nothing, if you are negligent goes as you desire. Take for examples the strength of the Lacedaemonians then, which you overcame by attention to your duties, and the insolence of this man now, by which through neglect of our interest we are confounded. But if any among you, Athenians, deem Philip hard to be conquered, looking at the magnitude of his existing power, and the loss by us of all our strongholds, they reason rightly, but should reflect, that once we held Pydna and Potidaea and Methone and all the region round about as our own, and many of the nations now leagued with him were independent and free, and preferred our friendship to his. Had Philip then taken it into his head that it was difficult to contend with Athens, when she had so many fortresses to infest his country, and he was destitute of allies, nothing that he has accomplished would he have undertaken, and never would he have acquired so large a dominion. But he saw well, Athenians, that all these places are the open prizes of war, that the possessions of the absent naturally belong to the present, those of the remiss to them that will venture and toil. Acting on such principle, he has won everything and keeps it, either by way of conquest or by friendly attach

ment and alliance; for all men will side with and respect those whom they see prepared and willing to make proper exertion. If you, Athenians, will adopt this principle now, though you did not before, and every man, where he can and ought to give his service to the state, be ready to give it without excuse, the wealthy to contribute, the able-bodied to enlist; in a word, plainly, if you will become your own masters, and cease each expecting to do nothing himself while his neighbour does everything for him, you shall then with Heaven's permission recover your own, and get back what has been frittered away, and chastise Philip. Do not imagine that his empire is everlastingly secured to him as a god. There are who hate and envy him, Athenians, even among those that seem most friendly; and all feelings that are in other men belong, we may assume, to his confederates. But now they are all cowed, having no refuge through your tardiness and indolence, which I say you must abandon forthwith. For you see, Athenians, the case, to what pitch of arrogance the man has advanced who leaves you not even the choice of action or inaction, but threatens and uses (they say) outrageous language; and, unable to rest in possession of his conquests, continually widens their circle and, while we dally and delay, throws his net all around us. When, then, Athenians, when will you act as becomes you? In what event? In that of necessity, I suppose. And how should we regard the events happening now? Methinks to freemen the strongest necessity is the disgrace of their condition. Or tell me, do you like walking about and asking one another, Is there any news? Why, could there be greater news than a man of Macedonia subduing Athenians, and directing the affairs of Greece? Is Philip dead? No, but he is sick. And what matters it to you? Should anything befall this man you will soon create another Philip if you attend to business thus. For

even he has been exalted not so much by his own strength as by our negligence. And, again, should anything happen to him; should fortune, which still takes better care of us than we of ourselves, be good enough to accomplish this, observe that, being on the spot, you would step in while things were in confusion and manage them as you pleased; but as you are, though occasion offered Amphipolis, you would not be in a position to accept it, with neither forces nor counsels at hand.

However, as to the importance of a general zeal in the discharge of duty, believing you are convinced and satisfied, I say no more.

On the Liberty of the Rhodians (351 B. C.). One of the events for which I consider you should be thankful to the gods is that a people, who to gratify their own insolence went to war with you not long ago, now place their hopes of safety in you alone. Well may we be rejoiced at the present crisis, for if your measures thereupon be wisely taken the result will be that the calumnies of those who traduce our country you will practically and with credit and honour refute. The Chians, Byzantines, and Rhodians accused us of a design to oppress them, and therefore combined to make the last war against us. It will turn out that Mausolus, who contrived and instigated these proceedings, pretending to be a friend of the Rhodians, has deprived them of their liberty; the Chians and Byzantines, who called them allies, have not aided them in misfortune, while you, whom they dreaded, are the only people who have wrought their deliverance. And this being seen by all the world, you will cause the people in every state to regard your friendship as the token of their security; nor can there be a greater blessing for you than thus to obtain from all men a voluntary attachment and confidence.

I marvel to see the same persons advising you to oppose

the king on behalf of the Egyptians, and afraid of him in the matter of the Rhodian people. All men know that the latter are Greeks, the former a portion of his subjects. And I think some of you remember that when you were debating about the king's business I first came forward and advised - nay, I was the only one, or one of two, that gave such counsel—that your prudent course in my opinion was not to allege your quarrel with the king as the excuse for your arming, but to arm against your existing enemies, and defend yourselves against him also if he attempted to injure you. Nor did I offer this advice without obtaining your approval, for you agreed with me. Well, then, my reasoning of today is consistent with the argument on that occasion; for, would the king take me to his counsels, I should advise him as I advise you, in defense of his own possessions to make war upon any Greeks that opposed him, but not to think of claiming dominions to which he had no manner of title. If now it be your general determination, Athenians, to surrender to the king all places that he gets possession of, whether by surprise or by deluding certain of the inhabitants, you have determined, in my judgment, unwisely; but if in the cause of justice you esteem it your duty either to make war, if needful, or to suffer any extremity, in the first place, there will be the less necessity for such trials, in proportion as you are resolved to meet them; and, secondly, you will manifest a spirit that becomes you.

That I suggest nothing new in urging you to liberate the Rhodians, that you will do nothing new in following my counsel, will appear if I remind you of certain measures that succeeded. Once, O Athenians, you sent Timotheus out to assist Ariobarzanes, annexing to the decree “that he was not to infringe your treaty with the king." Timotheus, seeing Ariobarzanes had openly revolted from the king, and