If we admitted the truth of what would be your best possible answer, namely, that all you do is for honor and renown, I wonder what puts it into your head, that you ought from such motives to exert yourself and undergo toil and danger, while you advise the state to give up exertion and remain idle.
Demosthenes challenges the self-serving motives of certain individuals, questioning why they pursue personal honor through effort while advising the state to remain idle.
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There is the insult too, and the disgrace of the thing, worse than any damage to right-thinking men.
Because, I conceive, measuring his calculations by ambition, by his desire of universal empire, without regard to peace, quiet, or justice, he saw plainly, that to a people of our character and principles nothing could he offer or give…
For I have been taught both by hearsay and experience, that most of your advantages have escaped you, from unwillingness to do your duty, not from ignorance.
True, when a confederacy subsists by good-will, and all parties to the war have a common interest, men are willing to co-operate and bear hardships and persevere.
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