Free man and slave
idea · 2 works · 2 mentions · 2 anchored passages
free man · servitude · slave · slavery · slaves · enslavement
in the texts
Fourth Philippic
The moral-political contrast between free civic action and servile compulsion.
But what any free man would call necessity is not merely present now, but is long ago past, and from the necessity that constrains a slave we must surely pray to be delivered.
Therefore, as the Greeks in every city are divided into these two parties—the one desiring neither to rule others by force nor to be slaves to any man, but to enjoy liberty and equality under a free constitution;
If so, there is nothing left but slavery, for there is no other alternative.
On the Chersonese
The contrast between civic freedom and subjection that frames the stakes of resisting Philip.
But what any free man would call necessity is not merely present now, but is long ago past, and from the necessity that constrains a slave we must surely pray to be delivered.
For if you have the guarantee of some god, since no mere mortal could be a satisfactory surety for such an event that if you remain inactive and abandon everything, Philip will not in the end march against yourselves, by Zeus and all the other gods, it would be disgraceful and unworthy of you and of the resources of your city and the record of your ancestors to abandon all the other Greeks to ensl …
If so, there is nothing left but slavery;