Athenian jury

Men of Athens, you jurymen are not to judge public and private causes in the same temper.

Gentlemen of the jury, all this long story is intended for you, and for that circle of hearers outside the barrier.

and the jury will see whether I state the case fairly.

Read first the deposition, and then the resolution, to the jury.

It appears to me, men of Athens, that the trials which come before you are affected quite as much by the conditions of the hour as by the facts;

Gentlemen of the jury, I hope that none of you will regard my charges and accusations as too big for the calibre of the defendant, measuring him against the magnitude of the transactions.

Give, therefore, the verdict that is demanded by the longer time, and the truth, and your own knowledge.

When I, fellow citizens, say not a word, you of yourselves shout the name of the acts of which you know he is guilty;

Tell me, fellow citizens, in the name of Zeus and the other gods, when a man has defiled himself with Hegesandrus, does not that man seem to you to have prostituted himself to a prostitute?

Gentlemen of the jury, you have heard from the decrees what were the services for which Epicerdes obtained his immunity.

Therefore, when the damage it will inflict is greater than the benefit it confers, ought it not to be repealed by this court?

Gentlemen of the jury, it is chiefly because I consider that the State will benefit by the repeal of this law, but partly also out of sympathy with the young son of Chabrias, that I have consented to support the plaintiffs to the best of my ability.

The officer shall come in and administer the torture in your presence, gentlemen of the jury, if you so order.

And do you put on airs before these jurymen, as though they did not know that you are the bastard son of Demosthenes the cutler?

And he gave you a sort of reckoning and enumeration of the days during which, while I was making my report on the embassy, the couriers of Phalaecus, the Phocian tyrant, were reporting to him how matters stood in Athens, while the Phocians, putting their trust in me, admitted Philip this side Thermopylae, and surrendered their own cities to him.

After this, are the jury to believe that you did it all for their sakes?

But if you convict, in the first place you will have kept your judicial oath;

If I could see any straightforward defence that he could offer to these charges, I would not make any reference to them;

they will scan each one as he appears, and detect by their looks those who have voted for acquittal.

Or what will you say, Athenians, what will you say, if someone detects and questions those of you who have voted for acquittal?

The help, I suppose, that comes to all defendants alike from the natural temper of the jury, the help that no man on his trial provides for himself, but that each of you brings with him from home to the court—I mean pity, pardon, benevolence.

he deserves to receive an equivalent return from all, if he ever falls into want or distress.

The leniency of your disposition, men of Athens, is a great asset and advantage to all wrongdoers.

An imposing muster of wealthy men, whose prosperity has raised them to apparent importance, will come into court to plead with you.

I beg and entreat and beseech you all to listen with favor to what I have to say.

I think, gentlemen, that, if any adoption was ever made in accordance with the laws, mine was, and no one could ever dare to say that Menecles adopted me in a moment of insanity or under the influence of a woman.

but since the matter has come before you for judgement and you have the sovereign right of decision, come to the aid both of us and of him who is in the other world, and do not allow Menecles, by the gods and deities I beseech you, to be insulted by my opponents, but mindful of the law and of the oath which you have sworn and of the arguments which have been used in support of my plea, pass in acc …

Justice towards you, Athenians, and reverence for the gods, shall mark the opening of my speech against Leocrates, now here on trial;

first the system of law, second the vote of the jury, and third the method of prosecution by which the crimes are handed over to them.

Gentlemen, it is a privilege for the city to have within it those who prosecute transgressors of the law, and I could wish to find among the public an appropriate sense of gratitude.