No More Learning

Demosthenes himself, in his old age, told a younger
orator, Demetrius of Phalerum, how he had mastered
the defects of an indistinct pronunciation by
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? SPEECHES AGAINST APHOBUS, ETC. xvii
reciting long passages with pebbles in his mouth,
and how he had trained his voice by declaiming
when he was out of breath, either with running, or
with walking up a steep ascent (c. 11). On another
occasion, in his early days, when he had failed to
win the ear of the Assembly, and was going home
disconcerted, he was met by the actor Satyrus who
drew his attention to the weak points in his delivery,
and made him see by his own rehearsal the vast
importance of action. In complete seclusion he
daily devoted himself to the improvement of his
delivery (c. 7). He also gave himself constant
practice in writing down, rearranging and repeating
arguments suggested in conversation with others,
changing and modifying the form of expression in
every possible way. This laborious method gave
rise to an impression that he had no great natural
aptitude for speaking, and there is no doubt as to
his general reluctance to speak without due pre-
meditation (0. 8), although, on the few occasions when
he broke this rule, he did so with the most brilliant
success. His usual reserve, and his indifference to
any distinction that might be attained by these
sudden outbursts of unpremeditated speech, were,
no less than his style and delivery, inspired by a
desire to follow in the footsteps of Pericles (c. 9).
His own delivery was much admired in the popular
Assembly, though cultivated people, like Demetrius,
considered it inelegant and unmanly, while one of
his own contemporaries contrasted his artificial
manner and his forced pathos with the reserve and
the self-possession of older speakers who discoursed
with the multitude in a stately and magnificent
way; admitting, however, that his speeches, when
read, appeared far superior to those of others in
b
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? xviii SPEECH ON THE TRIERARC'HIO' GROWN
point of construction and in force (0. 11 ? ? 3, 4).
While Pericles was the orator's great exemplar, he
also owed much to the historical associations by
which he was surrounded. To the future statesman
the monuments of art that crowned the Acropolis
were eloquent memorials of the greatness of Athens
in the Periclean age. He was also much indebted
to the literature of his country. With the published
masterpieces of Isocrates he was undoubtedly familiar,
and their influence may be traced in some of the
smoother and more flowing portions of the Philippics. 1
To Thucydides his debt was still deeper, as may be
seen not only in the matter of some of his speeches,
but also in the style of all. He resembles Thucydides
in his brevity, conciseness and energy, in his
occasional harshness and roughness, and his power of
arousing the emotions, though he is certainly no
slavish follower of the historian's manner, nor does
he emulate his archaic and unfamiliar diction, or his
anacoluthic constructions, or his far too frequent
obscurity. 2
Next to the speeches against his guardians, the
earliest extant speech delivered by the orator himself
mp1 1. 0;, appears to be that On the Trierarchic
1222121395 Crown (Or. 51). In 359 B. C. Demo-
- 359 no sthenes went to the Hellespont as trier-
arch under Cephisodotus, and it was probably in the
same year that he delivered this speech. He here
claims the crown promised to the trierarch who was
the first to have his ship ready for sea. It is the
1 OZ. 3 ? ? ~23--9. Blass Attischc Beredsamlceit In i 892 notices
the Isocratean use of the Plural of abstract words, such as
repiouaia. and eziropla in Dem. 3 ? 33, 5 ? 8.
2 Dionysius Hal. Time. 53, 55. Blass Le. 87 f2. Cp. Introd.
to Cicero's Orato'r pp. xxiv--xxix.
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? AGAINST SPUDIAS, C'ALLIOLES, CONON xix
only extant speech delivered by Demosthenes before
the Council of the Five Hundred. 1
Before embarking on his public career, he devoted
much of his time to the not unprofitable profession
of a Ao-yoypdqtos, or writer of speeches to be delivered
by litigants on either side in the law-courts of
Athens. The earliest place among these 'Private
Speeches' has been assigned, on grounds of style, to
the speech Against Spudias on a ques-
tion of dowry (Or. 41) and to that ? 11522? "
Against Callicles in a claim for damages KGKKi'EMG
caused by cutting off an alleged water-
. s-
course (Or. 55). The speech Against
Conon in a case of assault and battery is sometimes
ascribed to this period (Or. 54). 2
A second period of the orator's career opens
with the close of the Social War in 355. At the
beginning of this period stands the KM-'Avspm
speech Against Androtion (Or. 22), TWWS 355 "-
written for one Diodorus, attacking as illegal Andro-
tion's proposal to confer a golden crown on the out-
going Council in spite of the fact that in its year of
office it had added no new ships to the navy. The
importance to Athens of an effective navy is here
emphasised by an appeal to the experience of the
past; and, although large portions of the speech
are solely concerned with points of law, the closing
passage 67--7 8) has the same lofty tone that is
attained in the great deliberative speeches of subse-
quent years. In particular, the fine allusion to
"the former achievements' of Athens, and to 'the
splendour of the sacred edifices raised to commemorate
1 Blass m i 2422 f. _
2 ASchaefer Dem. and swim Zeit iii B 251. Clinton sug-
gests 341 no. Op. Select Private Oratiorts ii3 pp. lxiii, 242.
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? xx AGAINST ANDROTION, AGAINST LEPTJNES
them, yonder Propylaea, the Parthenon, the porticos
and arsenals ' (22 ? 76) is repeated three years later
in the speech Against Aristocrates (23 207), and
finds an echo six years later in the Third Olgnthiae :--
The public works (of our forefathers) are edifices and
ornaments of such beauty and grandeur, in temples and
in dedicated offerings, that posterity has no power to
surpass them (3 ? 25).
To the followmg year, 354, belongs the first
speech delivered by Demosthenes himself in a forensic
Mb; Ayn-TL cause of public interest, the speech
"I" 354 "- Against the Law of Leptines (Or. 20).
The law in question abolished the hereditary privi-
leges bestowed on public benefactors and made it illegal
to grant such privileges for the future. Demosthenes
attacks this law as unconstitutional, inexpedient, and
dishonourable, as involving a breach of public faith
and a slur on the good name of Athens. The tone
of the speech, delivered (it will be remembered) by
the orator himself, as contrasted with the scathing
invective directed against the life of Androtion in a
speech written for another, is marked by a studious
moderation, and even by courtesy towards the orator's
opponents. He here appears as 'a sound constitu-
tional lawyer, or rather a sagacious politician, warning
his countrymen against the dangers of an unwise
measure of legislation. ' 1 He dwells in glowing
terms on the exploits of the Athenian commanders,
Conon 68--74) and Chabrias 75-86) ; and he
refers, for the first time, to Philip of Macedon, to his
capture of Pydna (in 357) and Poteidaea (in 356), and
1 CRKennedy Dem. against Leptines etc. p. 235. Cp. Introd.
to Leptines p. xxxviii.
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? ON THE S Y MM ORIES xxi
to the bounties which were the source of his influence
over his adherents 61, 63).
To the latter part of the same year belongs the
first deliberative, or parliamentary, speech of Demo-
sthenes that has come down to us,-- mp, my
the speech 0n the Symmories, which erup- OpLGW
is also the first of his three Hellenic B'c'
orations (Or. 14). The debate is on war with Persia,
and the orator seizes the opportunity to lay down some
leading principles of foreign policy and to propose a
measure for the reform of the navy. The proposal is
connected with the recent application to the trier-
archy of the system of 'symmories' already applied
to the war-tax. 1 It aims at ensuring greater prompti-
tude in naval preparations by means of a better
organisation, by breaking up the larger boards into
smaller groups, and by assigning to each group a
corresponding portion of the fleet and its proper
share of the funds. 2 The reform is introduced in
terms that form a forecast of the tone of the
Philtmaies.
The first and foremost point in our preparations is
for every citizen to be willing and eager to do his duty.
Whenever you have all had a common wish and every
man has thereupon deemed that its accomplishment
depended on himself, nothing has ever escaped you. On
the other hand, whenever you have wished only, and
then looked at one another, each expecting to be idle,
while his neighbour did the work, nothing has ever come
to pass (14 15).
Though actual foes of Athens in Greece, as
contrasted with contingent enemies such as Persia,
1 See note on 2 ? 29 l. 270.
2 14 ? ? 16--23 ; Butcher's Demosthenes pp. 37 f.
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? xxii A GA INS T TIM OGRA TES
are vaguely indicated, there is no real reference to
Philip 11). For the present, the orator seems
hardly conscious of the distant cloud that is destined
ere long to darken the Hellenic horizon.
In the following year the client for whom
Demosthenes had composed the speech Against
mm Androtion, secured his services for a
TLpoxpd'rovg similar speech Against Timocrates.
353 B'c' Androtion had been acquitted, but he
had since been required to refund certain public
moneys which he had embezzled, and, in default, he
was liable to imprisonment as a debtor to the State.
In the interest of Androtion and others in the same
position, Timocrates proposed and carrieda measure for
extending the period during which payment of public
debts might be made, and for this measure he was
indicted by Diodorus. Large portions of the speech
are almost identical with that Against Androtion,
many of the arguments are merely verbal and
technical, some of them even captions and sophistical.
A higher level, however, is reached in the appeal to
the public interests which would be imperilled if the
State were prevented from enforcing payment of its
dues.
Even without such a law as this, we might congratulate
ourselves if we could meet the sudden emergencies of war ;
but, with it, supposing you should be summoned to arms
in your own defence, do you suppose that the enemy will
await the dilatory subterfuges of miscreants at home?
(? ? 94--5). The defendant has deluded you into passing
a law which not merely opens but actually destroys our
prison-house, and makes our courts of justice useless (? 209).
It is the laws that are the morals of the State (? 210).
It is the laws that preserve and consolidate all our
advantages 216).
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? FOR THE MEGALOPOLITANS xxiii
To the same year belongs the second of the three
Hellenic orations. The new city of Megalopolis had
been created by Epaminondas by a union of the
scattered villages of the Arcadian league, and at this
moment the pressure of the Phocian war (355--346
B. C. ) prevented Thebes from being able to protect it.
Sparta seized the opportunity to propose a general
restoration of ancient rights, the restitution of Oropus
to Athens, and of Messene to Sparta, and the
dissolution of Megalopolis. Being thus threatened
by Sparta, and unable to obtain help from Thebes,
Megalopolis sent for aid to Athens. In the speech
For the Megalopolitans (Or. 16) Demo- {ma Me a_
sthenes in the main supported their Ao-rgohvrve? v
plea, insisting on the maintenance of the 3 B'c'
balance of power between Thebes and Sparta, point-
ing to his country's traditional policy of protecting the
oppressed, and urging finally that it would be a grave
mistake to drive the Arcadians to seek help else-
where. We have no direct information as to the
vote taken at the close of the debate ; but we know
that war ensued between Sparta and Megalopolis, and
that Athens remained neutral. We know above all
that, when the Arcadians were once more in distress,
taught perhaps by their present experience, they
applied for aid (and not in vain)--not to Athens but
to the king of Macedon.
It may here be convenient to mention the third
of the Hellenic orations, that On the Liberty of the
Rhodians (Or. 15). It resembles the m 1 . r s
speech For the Megalopolitans in so far as iazfigzve? sg'
1t 1s a reply to an appeal for aid against 351 1w-
oppression ; it resembles that On the Symmories in its
attitude towards the power of Persia. The death of
Maussolus, prince of Caria, and the succession of
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? xxiv ON THE LIBERTY OF THE RHODIANS
Artemisia prompted the democrats who had been
exiled from Rhodes to ask Athens to release them
from subjection to Caria. Rhodes had revolted
from Athens in the Social \Var (357--355 B. C.
);
but Demosthenes urged his audience to forgive and
forget the past, and generously to aid the cause of
democracy against oligarchy, of freedom against
oppression. He denounces as deserters those of
the politicians of Athens who form the oligarchical
faction 33), while, with regard to foreign foes,
he says of the king of Persia and the king of
Macedonia:
There are some, I observe, who often despise Philip,
as a person of no account, while they dread the king of
Persia as a powerful enemy to any that he chooses.
Well, if we are to refrain from resisting the former
because he is contemptible, while we yield everything to
the latter because he is formidable, against whom are we
to take the field, 0 Athenians? (15 ? 24).
The date of the speech is uncertain. If, with
Diodorus (xvi 36), we place the death of Maussolus
in 353 B. C. , it falls in the same year as the Megalo-
politan speech and two years before the First Philippic
(351 13. 0. ) If, with Pliny (xxxvi 30, 47), we place
the death in 351 and follow Dionysius in assigning
the speech to 351--50, it falls a few months later
than the First Philippic. The tone of the reference
to Philip in the speech For the Rhodians is different
from that of the first speech against Philip; and, if
the later date is accepted, we are forced to assume
that the impression produced by the First Philippic
had already passed away, and that Philip's temporary
inaction had relieved Athens from any immediate
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? AGAINST ARISTOC'RA TES xxv
apprehension. 1 The speech For the ledians had prob
ably no immediate, certainly no permanent result:
a few years later (346 13. 0. ) Rhodes was still under
the power of the successor of Artemisia (5 25).
As a forensic speech of the same period as those
against Androtion and Timocrates we have the
speech Against Aristocrates (Or. 23). "UNA"
It is written for the opponent of a siren d'rovg
proposal carried in the Council declaring 35 "'c'
the person of Charidemus to be inviolable and any
one who killed him to be an outlaw from the dominions
of Athens and her allies. Charidemus was a com-
mander of mercenaries now in the service of the
Thracian chieftain Cersobleptes, and the privileges
proposed on his behalf were inspired by the hope
of his aiding Athens to recover Amphipolis. The
speech composed by Demosthenes denounces the
proposal as illegal and inexpedient, and Charidemus
as an unprincipled adventurer who was undeserving
of such a distinction (see note on 3 5). Towards
the close, it dwells on the honours cautiously con-
ferred by Athens on her benefactors in the past, and
compares them with those so lavishly granted by her
in recent times. The contrast between the splendour
of the mansions now occupied by leading statesmen
with the pcttiness and paltriness of the public build-
ings of the day (23 206--8) is repeated at a
future time in the Third Olgnthiae (3 25--9).
Again, it is in this speech that, towards the close of
a warning against faithless friendships, we find the
first public avowal of Philip as the acknowledged
enemy Of Athens :--6 ,uaiMo-"ra. viiv fipiv e? XngS ci'wu
1 351--50 13. 0. is the date preferred by ASchaefer i 4872, and
Blass m i 3052. Reasons in favour of 353 are urged in Butcher's
Dem. pp. 43 f.
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? xxvi PHILIP THE ENEMY OF ATHENS
doxdw 'I'L'Aunros oirroo't (23 121). \Vhat Philip
had done for Olynthus and the return he had received
are here described. Philip had delivered Poteidaea
to the Olynthians ' after he had expended large sums
in the war with you, when he had taken and might
have held it himself ,- yet the Olynthians trust him
so little now, that they have made friends of you,
who they know would most gladly kill both Philip's
friends and Philip himself, and they promise to make
you their allies also' 107--9). Philip is afterwards
pointed out as an obvious example of reckless ambition.
I need not ask, men of Athens, if you know of that
Macedonian, Philip. Though it was more desirable for
him to receive the revenues of all Macedonia in peace
than those of Amphipolis with peril, and to be connected
with yourselves as his hereditary allies than with the
faithless Thessalians, he has chosen to make small profits
and to have treacherous friends and to incur danger in
preference to living in security. Prosperity and prudence
do not go together: many, by aiming at greater things,
often lose what they have already (? ? 111--3).
The speech Against Aristocrates failed in its
immediate purpose. In the following year Chari-
demus was still in the service of Athens; for, in
the autumn of 351 B. C. , he was sent on a mission
to the Thracian Chersonesus. Philip had invaded
Thrace twelve months before, and the rival princes,
Amadocus and Cersobleptes, had submitted to his
control. 1 Henceforth, it was no longer against
petty Thracian princes that Athens had to protect
the Chersonesus, but against the ever growing and
increasing might of Macedonia.
Having briefly traced the career of Demosthenes
1 ASchaefer i 446 f2.
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? MACEDONIA BEFORE THE REIGN OF PHILIP xxvii
down to the time when he first appeared as the
opponent of Philip in the First Philippic, we now
turn to a retrospective view of the rise and progress
of the Macedonian power.
II Macedonia. before the reign of Philip
The name of Macedonia was originally confined
to the inland district between the rivers Lydias
and Haliacmon ; but, even before the Geography of
accession of Philip, Macedonia had mamma-
gradually extended itself, until its limit to the south
was Thessaly, to the north Paeonia, to the west
Illyria and the northern continuation of the range of
Pindus, while to the east it successively reached the
Axius and the Strymon. The mountain-ranges
stretching eastward from Pindus divide the country
into a series of deep valleys encircled by lofty
heights and admitting of very slight communication
with one another. These successive valleys are
known as the districts of Orestis and Elimia, both
traversed by the Haliacmon ; that of the Eordaei near
the source of the Lydias ; that of Lyncestis near the
rise of the Erigon ; and lastly the valley of the Axius
which receives the Erigon in the earlier part of its
course, and, after flowing through the vast upland
plain of Pelagonia, bursts through a ravine now
known as the Iron Gate, and ultimately falls into
the bay of Therma, near the outlet of the united
streams of the Lydias and Haliacmon. While
Macedonia in itself is thus pre-eminently a highland
region remote from the sea, and difficult of access
owing to its mountain-ranges, the inaccessibility
caused by its mountains is in part corrected by its
rivers. All of these find their way into the same
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? xxviii GEOGRAPHY 0F IIIA OEDONIA
part of the bay of Therma and thus connect the
inland districts with the sea. But the upper region
was the home of the Macedonians proper, the
' highlanders ' as their name appears to imply,1 while
very different tribes dwelt below on the fringe of
coast which derived its name of Emathia from the
sand of the shore (ii/1. 11609). Emathia extends from
Pieria in the SW. , and, after passing the early
settlements of the Bottiaei, ends in the NE, near the
head of the bay, at the hot springs which lend their
name to the ancient town of Therma. Pieria was
the legendary home of the Muses and was also one
of the haunts of Dionysus, while Bottiaea had received
from Crete the worship of Apollo. The coast was
afterwards colonised by traders from Euboea, and,
between Pieria and Bottiaea, there was founded the
Eretrian colony of Methone.
But, while the coast-land of Emathia had close
affinities with Hellas in its climate and its vegetation
and in its nearness to the sea, the upland districts
became more and more secluded from Hellenic
civilisation. Yet an intimate connexion had once
subsisted between the Macedonians and the original
Hellenic stock. The Dorians themselves, says
Herodotus (i 56, viii 43), had once been 'Mace-
donians,' and the Doric and Aeolic dialects are
represented in the scanty remains of the Macedonian
tongue. 2 But, down to the time of Alexander the
Great, the language was hardly intelligible to the
Hellenes,3 who accordingly regarded as 'barbarians '4
1 Otto Abel Makcdonim 'vor Kb'm'g Philip}; 1847 p. 97.
= Abel pp. 116--8.
3 Curtius vi 9, 35 ; cp. Pausan. iv 29 ? 3.
4 Thnc. iv 124, 2; 125, 1 ; 126, 3; Dem. 3 ? ? 16, 24;
9 ? 31; 19 ? 305, 327; Isocr. 5 ? 107 f.
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? ANCIENT CAPITALS, ARGOS AND AEGAE xxix'
a nation which had probably belonged to the same
original stock but represented a type of civilisation
which had been arrested at an early stage of develop-
ment. 1 In contrast to the Macedonians the Illyrians
were really barbarians, and it is probably from the
latter that the modern Albanians are descended. 2
The Hellenic settlements on the coast of Emathia
were in themselves incapable of effecting 'the
Hellenisation of the Macedonian highlands. Hellenic
influence reached them by a distant route through
the Heracleidae of Argos, who possibly followed in
the track of the Corinthian settlers in Illyria on the
shores of the Adriatic, and thence travelled eastward
into Macedonia. This branch of the Heracleidae
claimed descent from Temenus of Argos ; 3 their first
settlement was in the mountainous region of Orestis
near the source of the Haliacmon; their chief place
bore the same name as their former home in Argos,
and gave its name in turn to the Macedonian dynasty
of the Argeadae. 4
From Argos on the Haliacmon the Macedonian
capital was transferred at an early date to Aegae,
which stands in a fine and healthy situation below
the source of the Lydias. From the lofty site of
Aegae a long ridge of wooded cliff, with frequent
waterfalls tumbling down its face, commands a
splendid view of green woodland, and, beyond the
woodland, a vast undulating plain extending toward
the sea and enclosed by snow-clad mountains. 5 To
1 Abel pp. 115--22, Hatzidakis 1897, O. Hoffmann 1906.
2 ib. p. 84, Curtius Hist. of Greece v 17; cp. Thuc. iv 127.
3 Herod. viii 137, ix 45, Thuc. ii 99, 3, v 80, Isocr. 5 ? 32.
4 Curtius Hist. of Greece v 12--22, Helm Hist. of Greece iii 0. 14.
5 E. Lear Journals of a Landscape Painter in Albania and
Illyria, View of Vodhena (the ancient Aegae or Edesaa), opp.
p. 37.
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? xxx PYDNA AND PELLA; GHALC'IDIGE
the south is the mighty mass of Olympus rising nearly
10,000 feet above the sea ; between Olympus and the
coast is the district of Pieria, with the frontier town
of Dium; to the north of Dium is Methone, and
between the two, but nearer to Methone, is Pydna,
the future seaport of Alexander I. Thirty miles to
the east, midway between Aegae and Therma, and
fifteen miles from the sea, rise amid the marshes the
low hills which mark the site of Pella, the future
capital of Archelaus, the metropolis of Philip and the
birth-place of Alexander the Great. To the right of
a line fifty miles long, stretching from Aegae to
Therma, is the general direction of the Lydias, and,
in the same line as the latter, the view extends
beyond the bay to the dimly visible coast of the
western portion of Chalcidice. Of the three penin-
sulas of Chalcidice, which project like a trident into
the northern Aegean, the nearest, Pallene, is joined
to the mainland by a narrow isthmus on which stands
a city of Poseidon, the Corinthian colony of Poteidaea.
A few miles to the NE. of this is Olynthus, near
the head of the bay of Torone. Beyond that bay is
the peninsula of Sithonia with its lofty and broken
mountains; and beyond a second bay the peninsula
of Acte rising in undulations from the site of the
canal of Xerxes until it forms a central ridge 4000
feet in height, and finally ends in the vast conical
peak of Athos, more than 6000 feet above the sea. '
Chalcidice, with its deep bays and long peninsulas,
resembles the south of the Peloponnesus, and is
in fact a second Hellas on a smaller scale in the
northern Aegean; hence its attractiveness to the
Hellenic colonists from Chalcis and Corinth. East
1 Tozer Geography of Greece pp. 200--6, Islands of the Aegean
p. 279.
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? ALEXANDER I xxxi
of Chalcidice is the bay which derives its name
from the Strymon. That Thracian river, shortly
after flowing through Lake Prasias, reaches a point
where, at the distance of only three miles from the
sea, it washes on three sides the commanding site of
the Athenian colony of Amphipolis. 1 Amphipolis is
ninety miles due east of Aegae; and about twelve
miles south of a line drawn from Aegae to Amphipolis
is Therma, fifty miles distant from both.
The three foremost kings of Macedonia before the
time of Philip were Alexander I, Perdiccas II and
Archelaus. The first of these, whose Alexander I,
personality is almost as attractive as M454 1W
that of his namesake, Alexander the Great, was,
at the time of the Persian invasion, compelled to
surrender to Xerxes. But he was thorough] y Hellenic
at heart, and gained thereby the distinctive title of
Alexander the Philhellene. 2 He it was who, in the
year 480, warned the Greeks against the peril of
occupying the pass of Tempe (Herod. vii 173).
Trusted by Greeks and Persians alike, he was sent in
the following year as a Persian envoy to Athens;
and, after the battle of Plataea, he openly declared
himself the enemy of Persia. When Mycenae was
destroyed by Argos in 468, most of the exiled
Mycenaeans found refuge with him. (Paus. vii 25).
He made good his right to be allowed to compete as
a Greek at the Olympic games, in which he ran a dead-
heat with the winner of the foot-race (Herod. v 22),
and he was also the theme of an encomium by Pindar. 3
1 Dnruy Htstoire ates Grecs iii 198, Vac des Tut'st
d'Amph'Lymlc's.
2 Schol. Thuc. i 57, Harp. s. v. , Dio Chrys. Or. 2 p. 25 M.
3 Fragm. 121 [86] 6M3th one?