Greek Texts & Translations

25.64And yet, in spite of his performances and his character, he misses no opportunity in the Assembly of bellowing, “I, only I, am your sincere well-wisher. All these others are in a cabal. You are betrayed. My patriotism is all you have left.” I should like to examine the source and origin of this great and wonderful patriotism of his, so that, if it is as he says, you may trust it and benefit by it; but if not, that you may be on your guard. 25.65Because you condemned his father to death and sold his mother when she was found guilty of defrauding her emancipator, do you suppose that that makes him well-disposed to you? By Zeus and all the gods, that is absurd. For if he is well-disposed towards father and mother, and so observes the great law of nature, which is laid down alike for man and beast, that all should love their parents, 25.66then he must clearly be ill-disposed to those who have destroyed them and to their laws and their constitution. But if he has no regard for these things, I should like to know who that sees how he has renounced all affection for his parents, can believe in his pretended zeal for the people; for the man who neglects his parents I regard as unworthy of trust and hateful alike to gods and men. 25.67But I shall be told it is because you condemned him on information laid and twice put him and his brother into prison; it is for this reason that he is your well-wisher. But that too is ridiculous. Or because you disqualified him for the office to which he had been allotted? Or because you found him guilty of a breach of the constitution? Or because you fined him ten talents? Or because you habitually point the finger of scorn at him as the vilest of all men in the world? 25.68Or because, as long as the present laws and constitution stand, he cannot clear himself of these reproaches? Then why is he well-disposed to you? It is because, in his own words, he is impudent. Why is the impudent man so called save because, being lost to a sense of shame, he dares to state what is not, and never will be, true? And that is precisely what the defendant does.

25.69Now there are some facts about the information laid against him which Lycurgus seems to have passed over, but which I had better lay before you; for I think you should examine the defendant and the rights of the present case as carefully as you would scrutinize a private debt. Suppose then that A accused B of owing him money, and B denied it. If the registered terms of the loan were still to be read, or if the pillars which marked the mortgaged property were still standing, you would clearly regard as impudent the man who denied the transaction; but if it was shown that these proofs no longer existed, then you would regard the accuser as impudent. That is natural. 25.70Well, of Aristogeiton's debt to the State the terms still exist, namely the laws under which all defaulters are registered; and the pillar is the wooden table of the law deposited in the temple of the Goddess. Now if these have been destroyed and the debt wiped out, we are talking nonsense, or rather telling lies; but if they are still in existence and will remain valid until he pays his debt, then there is no truth in his plea, but he is committing a serious crime in trying to suppress the rights of the State. 25.71For the point to be argued and decided is not whether all his debts are unpaid, but whether he is still in debt. Otherwise it would be hard on those who are registered for a debt of one drachma, if their indebtedness is to tell against them, because they have done some trifling wrong or even no wrong at all, whereas if a man has committed serious wrongs, he is to regain his civic rights by paying one or two instalments. Moreover, there are three distinct debts registered and forming the ground of the information. Two Aristogeiton has entered in the register; ^note the third he has not registered, but he is prosecuting Aristo of Alopece for malicious entry.

25.72“Yes,” says he, “for he has registered my name as a debtor unjustly.” Of course it is evident that you have a right to satisfaction for this; but then you ought first to give satisfaction and abide by the penalty you have brought on yourself. Or again, for what do you expect to obtain satisfaction? If you are at liberty to do everything that other citizens do, how are you wronged? 25.73I beg the jury in Heaven's name to consider this point also. If he convicts Aristo of malicious intent, what will it mean? His name, of course, will be erased and Aristo's substituted, because that is the law. Good! Then henceforward will this man, whose name has been erased, be a State-debtor, and will the other man, registered as a debtor, retain his full citizenship? That is what follows from the defendant's claim, for if he is not a debtor when his name has been registered, then, when his name has been erased, he will obviously be a debtor. But that is absolutely untrue. No; when his name is erased, then he will be no longer a debtor. In that case the defendant is a debtor now. ^note