To this point are the affairs of Athens brought, that the more fully and clearly one convicts Philip of violating the peace with you, and plotting against the whole of Greece, the more difficult it becomes to advise you how to act.
From a speech to the Athenian assembly, lamenting the difficulty of political action despite clear evidence of Philip's aggression.
Share
More from Demosthenes
For this reason he will show us no mercy, if he get us into his power: and therefore you must make up your minds, that the struggle will be one for life and death.
Such is the truth, spoken with perfect freedom, purely from good-will and for the best: not a speech fraught with flattery and mischief and deceit, to earn money for the speaker, and to put the commonwealth into the hands of our enemies.
He is convinced, you will not submit to be slaves; if you were inclined, you would not know how, having been accustomed to command: you will be able, should occasion offer, to give him more trouble than any people in the world.
But I suppose, you inherit a reputation from your father and grandfather, which it were disgraceful in your own person to extinguish, whereas the ancestry of the state was ignoble and mean.
Other voices in this conversation
