Greek Texts & Translations

1.128Your city was not alone in dealing thus with traitors. The Spartans were the same. Please do not think me tedious, gentlemen, if I allude often to these men. We shall be well advised to take examples of just conduct from a city which has good laws, and so be surer that each of you will give a just verdict in keeping with his oath. The Spartans, you remember, caught their king Pausanias trying to betray Greece to the Persians. He escaped in time into the temple of the Brazen House, but they walled up the door, took off the roof and mounted guard in a circle round it, remaining at their posts until they had starved him to death 1.129and made his punishment a proof to all that even divine assistance is not vouchsafed to traitors. ^note And it is right that it should not be; for impiety towards the gods is the first crime by which they show their wickedness, since they deprive them of their traditional cults. But I have yet to give you the best illustration of the prevailing practice at Sparta. They passed a law, covering all who refused to risk their lives for their country, which expressly stated that they should be put to death. Thus the punishment which they laid down was the very fate which traitors most fear; survival after war was to be subject to a scrutiny which might involve disgrace and death. Let me convince you that what I have said can be proved and that my examples are genuine. Produce the law for them.The Law of the Spartans

1.130See what an admirable law this is, gentlemen, and how expedient it would be for other peoples too besides the Spartans. The fear of one's own community is a strong thing and will compel men to face danger against an enemy; no one will forsake his country in times of peril when he sees that a traitor is punished with death. No one will turn coward when his city needs him, if he knows that the punishment in store for him is this. For death is the one fitting penalty for cowardice; since, when men know that there are two alternative dangers of which they must face one, they will choose to meet the enemy far rather than stand out against the law and their fellow citizens.

1.131Leocrates is much more deserving of death than deserters from the army. They return to the city ready to defend it or to meet disaster in company with their fellow citizens, while he fled from his country and provided for his own safety, not daring to protect his hearth and home. He alone of men has betrayed even the natural ties of kinship and blood which the unthinking beasts themselves hold dearest and most sacred. 1.132Birds at least, which by nature are best fitted for a swift escape, can be seen accepting death in defence of their brood. Hence the words of the old poets: Nor does the wild fowl let another's brood
Be laid within the nest that she has built.
unknownBut the cowardice of Leocrates has so passed all bounds that he left his country to the enemy. 1.133That is why no city let him reside within it as an alien. He was naturally expelled more quickly than a murderer. Exiles for murder who move into another city do not meet with enmity among their hosts; but what city could admit Leocrates? One who refused to help his own country would indeed be likely to face danger for another's! Such men are bad, whether as citizens, guests, or personal friends; for they will enjoy the advantages offered by the state but will not consent to assist it too, in times of difficulty. 1.134Consider: he is hated and expelled by those without a reason to resent him; what treatment should he get from you who have had the utmost provocation? Should it not be the extreme penalty? Indeed, gentlemen, if there were any punishment worse than death, Leocrates of all the traitors that have ever been would most deserve to undergo it. For other traitors are punished, though, when they are caught, their crime has yet to be committed. The defendant, alone of all men, by deserting the city, has, at the time of his trial, accomplished what he undertook to do.

1.135I am amazed at the advocates who are going to defend him. Whatever justification, I wonder, will they find for his acquittal? Will it be his friendship with themselves? In my own view they are not entitled to indulgence but deserve to die for daring to be intimate with him. Though their attitude was not obvious, before Leocrates acted as he did, it is clear to everyone now, since they maintain their friendship with him, that they uphold the same principles as he does and should therefore far rather be required to plead their own defence than be allowed to win your pardon for him.