Aeschines

In the archonship of Chaerondas, on the sixth day of Elaphebolion, Aeschines, son of Atrometus, of Cothocidae, indicted Ctesiphon, son of Leosthenes, of Anaphlystus, before the Archon for a breach of the constitution, in that he proposed an unconstitutional decree, to wit, that Demosthenes, son of Demosthenes, of Paeania should be crowned with a golden crown, and that proclamation should be made i …

Among many advantages which Aeschines holds over me in this contention, there are two, men of Athens, of great moment.

If then Aeschines had confined his charges to the matters alleged in the prosecution, I should have immediately addressed my defence to the resolution of the Council;

If, then, I can establish by clear proofs that the reports of the defendant, Aeschines, were entirely untruthful, and that he prevented the Assembly from hearing the truth from me;

Never would you have consented to add to the treaty by afterthought the words and to his posterity, but for your confidence in the promises alleged by Aeschines.

but, by way of preface, I will first remind you of what doubtless most of you remember,—of the party with which Aeschines at first ranged himself in politics, and of the speeches which he thought fit to make in opposition to Philip.

In order, then, that he may lose his confidence, and that you may be instructed in advance, and that I may reply, in the presence of the jury, Demosthenes, and of all the other citizens who are standing there outside the bar, and of all the other Greeks who have taken the trouble to listen to this case—and I see that not a few are here, more in fact than have ever attended a public trial within th …

For it is obviously incumbent upon me, the complainant, to show this to you, that the praise given to Demosthenes is false, and that he never began to speak what was best, nor now continues to do what is good for the people.

I could wish, indeed, fellow citizens, that the Senate of Five Hundred and the assemblies of the people were properly conducted by those who preside over them, and the laws enforced which Solon enacted to secure orderly conduct on the part of public speakers;

But what he is guilty of having done after he had reached years of discretion, when he was already a youth, and knew the laws of the state, that I will make the object of my accusation, and to that I call uponyou to give serious attention.

I have never, fellow citizens, brought indictment against any Athenian, nor vexed any man when he was rendering account of his office;

and knowing that he was liable to the accusations that you heard read a moment ago by the clerk of the court, I instituted this suit, challenging him to official scrutiny.

Come forward, then, Demosthenes, to this platform while I have the floor, and mention the name of any city of Hellas you choose from which you say the ambassadors had at that time arrived.

remembering also the arts and devices of my accuser, and the cruelty of the man who, speaking to men who are under oath to give equal hearing to both parties, had the effrontery to urge you not to listen to the voice of the defendant.

On our return, then, after we had rendered to the senate a brief report of our mission and had delivered the letter from Philip, Demosthenes praised us to his colleagues in the senate, and he swore by Hestia, goddess of the senate, that he congratulated the city on having sent such men on the embassy, men who in honesty and eloquence were worthy of the state.

Is it in Nephelococcygia that all the wealth of Theogenes and most of Aeschines' is?

— Mine, says another, has flown towards tragic poetry on the wings of his imagination.

Why, I am an accuser of the islands, an informer.

Diogenes of Sinope, having been cast out of his fatherland, in nothing differing from the very meanest of men, came to Athens, and found there still many of the companions of Socrates—Plato, that is, and Aristippus and Aeschines and Antisthenes and Euclides the Megarian;

Only I would not counsel you to read these for the most part, but Hyperides rather and Aeschines.

Then Lycius, who commanded the squadron of Greek cavalry, and Aeschines, commander of the battalion of peltasts that was with Cheirisophus, upon seeing the enemy in full flight set off in pursuit, while the rest of the Greek troops shouted to them not to fall behind, but to follow the fugitives right up to the mountain.

Then the peltasts of the Arcadian division, who were commanded by Aeschines the Acarnanian, getting the idea that the enemy were in flight, set up a shout and began to run;

'Does he gladly visit that place where Demosthenes and Aeschines were wont to contend with each other?

11] Aeschines the Athenian, a most eloquent man, when as a young man he had acted tragedies, took up public affairs;

And so Aeschines inveighs against Demosthenes because he sacrificed victims on the seventh day after his daughter's death.

When the indictment was called, someone filed an affidavit for postponement, declaring that Demosthenes was ill—Demosthenes, who was going about and abusing Aeschines.

It is observed in one of the speeches of Aeschines, that Philip, though at war with the Amphipolitans, could not lawfully take possession of Amphipolis, as a conquest, it being a city, which belonged to the Athenians.

Now Eupolis left two daughters, one who is the present claimant and the wife of Pronapes, and another whom Aeschines of Lusia married and who is dead, but left a son Thrasybulus, who is now of full age.

then there is Lysanias the Sphettian, father of Aeschines, who is here;

Of native Athenians there was this Apollodorus, and Critobulus and his father, and Hermogenes and Epiganes and Aeschines and Antisthenes;

1 When all were offering Socrates many gifts, each according to his means, Aeschines, a poor disciple, said:

When, however, the Thirty began to consider how they might become free to do just as they pleased with the state, their first act was to send Aeschines and Aristoteles to Lacedaemon and persuade Lysander to help them to secure the sending of a Lacedaemonian garrison, to remain until, as they said, they could put the scoundrels out of the way and establish their government;

And this oligarchy came into being in the way hereafter described — it was voted by the people to choose thirty men to frame the ancient laws into a constitution under which to conduct the government.