| Demosthenes, Speeches (English) (XML Header) [genre: prose; rhetoric] [word count] [lemma count] [Dem.]. | ||
| <<Dem. 13.20 | Dem. 13.30 (Greek) | >>Dem. 14.1 |
13.26But reflect on what might be named as the outstanding achievements of your ancestors and of yourselves, if haply the comparison may yet enable you to become your own masters. For five and forty years note they commanded the willing obedience of the Greeks; more than ten thousand talents did they accumulate in our Acropolis; many honorable trophies for victories on sea and on land did they erect, in which even yet we take a pride. Yet remember that they erected them, not that we might wonder as we gaze at them, but that we might also imitate the virtues of the dedicators.
13.27Thus did our ancestors; but as for us, who have gained, as you all see, a clear field, consider whether we can match them. Have we not wasted more than fifteen hundred talents on the needy communities of Greece ? note Have we not squandered our private estates, our public funds, and the contributions of our allies? Have not the allies gained in war been lost in the peace?
13.28But, it may be said, in these respects alone things were better then than now, but in other respects worse. Far from it; but let us examine any instance you please. The buildings which they left behind them to adorn our city—temples, harbors, and their accessories—were so great and so fair that we who come after must despair of ever surpassing them; the Propylaea yonder, the docks, the porticoes and the rest, with which they beautified the city that they have bequeathed to us.
13.29But the private houses of those who rose to power were so modest and so in accordance with the style of our constitution that the homes of their famous men, of Themistocles and Cimon and Aristides, as any of you can see that knows them, are not a whit more splendid than those of their neighbors.
13.30But today, men of Athens , while our public works are confined to the provision of roads and fountains, whitewash and balderdash (and I blame, not those who introduced these improvements—far from it!—but you, if you imagine that these are all that is required of you), private individuals, who control any of the State-funds, have some of them reared private houses, not merely finer than the majority, but more stately than our public edifices, and others have purchased and cultivated estates more vast than they ever dreamed of before.
13.31The cause of all this change is that then the people controlled and dispensed everything, and the rest were well content to accept at their hand honor and authority and reward; but now, on the contrary, the politicians hold the purse-strings and manage everything, while the people are in the position of lackeys and hangers-on, and you are content to accept whatever your masters dole out to you.
Peloponnese .
13.33That, Athenians, was all very noble and right and worthy of our city; but the resultant action was simply of no account. So your hostility is expressed in your decrees, but action is beyond your control. Your decrees accord with the traditions of Athens , but your powers bear no relation to your decrees.
13.34I, however, would advise you—do not be angry with me—either to humble yourselves and be content to mind your own affairs, or else to get ready a more powerful force. If I felt sure that you were Siphnians or Cythnians note or people of that sort, I should counsel you to be less proud, but since you are Athenians, I urge you to get your force ready. For it would be a disgrace, men of Athens , a disgrace to desert that post of honor which your ancestors bequeathed to you.
13.35But besides it is no longer in your power, even if you wished it, to hold aloof from Greek affairs. For you have many exploits to your credit from the earliest times, and it would be disgraceful to abandon the friends you have, while it is impossible to trust your enemies and allow them to grow powerful. In short, you stand in the same position as your statesmen stand to you—they cannot retire when they would; for you are definitely involved in the politics of Greece .
13.32Such, in consequence, is the state of our public affairs that if anyone read out your resolutions and then went on to describe your performances, not a soul would believe that the same men were responsible for the one and for the other. Take for instance the decrees that you passed against the accursed Megarians, note when they appropriated the sacred demesne, that you should march out and prevent it and forbid it; in favour of the Phliasians, when they were exiled the other day, that you should help them and not give them up to their murderers, and should call for volunteers from the
13.36This, Athenians, is the sum of all that I have said. Your orators never make you either bad men or good, but you make them whichever you choose; for it is not you that aim at what they wish for, but they who aim at whatever they think you desire. You therefore must start with a noble ambition and all will be well, for then no orator will give you base counsel, or else he will gain nothing by it, having no one to take him at his word.
| Demosthenes, Speeches (English) (XML Header) [genre: prose; rhetoric] [word count] [lemma count] [Dem.]. | ||
| <<Dem. 13.20 | Dem. 13.30 (Greek) | >>Dem. 14.1 |
