Antidosis

Most of you are, I suppose, astonished at what I am saying, and think that in praising him I am condemning Athens, since he, after having captured so many cities and having never lost a single one, was tried for treason, and again when he submitted his reports, and Iphicrates took upon himself the responsibility for the conduct of the campaign and Menestheus accounted for the moneys expended upon it, they, on the one hand, were acquitted, while Timotheus was fined a larger sum than anyone in the past had ever been condemned to pay.[*](In the campaign against Byzantium, which was aided by the Chians and their allies (357 B.C.), a conflict arose between Chares and the other commanders of the Athenian fleet, Timotheus, Iphicrates, and Menestheus, Iphicrates' son. Chares persisted in carrying out a plan of attack which had been agreed upon but which the others abandoned on account of a storm. Unsupported in this, he was defeated. Returning to Athens, he then charged his colleagues with treason and corruption. In the trial Iphicrates shouldered the responsibility for the campaign, and Menestheus gave a full accounting for the receipts and expenditures. They were acquitted, while Timotheus, never popular with the demos, was fined 100 talents. See § 101, note. Isocrates' version of the facts is generally accepted. See Grote, History, vol. xi. pp. 30 ff.)

The fact is, however, that I desire to stand up for Athens also. It is true that if you consider the actions of the city by the standard of pure justice, no one of you can avoid the conclusion that her treatment of Timotheus was cruel and abominable; but if you make allowance for the ignorance which possesses all mankind, for the feelings of envy that are aroused in us, and, furthermore, for the confusion and turmoil in which we live, you will find that nothing of what has been done has come about without a reason nor does the cause lie outside our human weakness, but that Timotheus, also, has been responsible in some degree for the mistaken judgements passed upon him.

For while he was no anti-democrat nor a misanthrope, nor arrogant, nor possessed of any such defect of character, yet because of his proud bearing—an advantage to the office of a general but out of place in dealing with men from day to day—everyone attributed to him the faults which I have named; for he was by nature as inept in courting the favor of men as he was gifted in handling affairs.