Against Leptines

Further, even if this difficulty were not likely to arise, I cannot think that it is well to bring the State into this dilemma, that it must either put all citizens on an equality with its greatest benefactors, or to avoid this must treat some with ingratitude. Now as for great benefactions, it is not well that you should have many opportunities of receiving them, nor is it perhaps easy for an individual to confer them;

but the humbler duties to which one can rise in time of peace and in the civil sphere—loyalty, justice, zeal and the like—it is, in my opinion, both well and necessary that they should be rewarded. Grants ought, therefore, to be so apportioned that each man may receive from the people the exact reward that he deserves.

And then again, with regard to what he will say about leaving their honors to those who have received them, some would have a perfectly plain and straightforward answer, when they claim their right to all their rewards, because they were granted for the same service, but the others will reply that the man who says that he leaves them anything is mocking them.[*](Some have received other rewards together with immunity; the others immunity alone.) For if a man has been thought to deserve immunity and has received that from you as his sole reward, be he foreigner or citizen, what reward has he left, Leptines, if that is taken from him? None whatever! Then you have no right to rob some because you arraign the worthlessness of the others, or to rob one class of their sole reward because you say that you are going to leave the other class something.

To put it plainly, the danger is not that of doing a greater or less injustice to one member of the whole body, but that of rendering precarious the honors with which we reward men’s services, nor is immunity the main topic of my speech, but the evil precedent which this law will establish, so that there will be no security for the nation’s gifts.

Again, the most unscrupulous argument that they have framed, as they think, to persuade you to withdraw the immunities, is one which I had better explain for fear you should be their innocent dupes. They are going to claim that all such payments are religious dues, and that of course it is monstrous that anyone should be exempt from the dues of religion. For my part, I see no unfairness in such exemption, if the people have bestowed it; the really monstrous thing is the course which they propose, if that is to be their argument.

For if by appealing to the name of the gods they try to justify a robbery which they cannot justify otherwise, will not that be most impious and monstrous conduct? In my opinion, whenever a man appeals solemnly to the gods, his conduct ought to be clearly such as would not appear base even if supported only by human authority. Now that there is a difference between exemption from religious duties and exemption from public services, and that the defendants are trying to deceive you by transferring the name of public services to religious acts, I shall adduce Leptines himself as my witness.

For the first clause of the law says Leptines proposed that, to the end that the wealthiest citizens may perform the public services, none shall be immune save and except the descendants of Harmodius and Aristogiton. But if immunity from religious duties were the same as immunity from public services, what was the object of that clause? For immunity from religious duties has never been granted even to the persons here named. To prove that this is so, please take and read the copy of the inscription and then the beginning of the law of Leptines.

[The copy of the inscription is read]

You hear the copy of the inscription, men of Athens, ordering them to be immune, save from religious duties. Now read the beginning of the law of Leptines.

[The law is read

Good; stop there. After the words to the end that the wealthiest citizens may perform the public services, he added no one shall be immune save and except, the descendants of Harmodius and Aristogiton. Why so, if to pay for a religious rite is to perform a public service? For if that is his meaning, his own drafting will be found to contradict the inscription.

Now I should like to put a question to Leptines. When you say that the public services come under the head of religious dues, in what, according to you, did the immunity consist, which our ancestors then granted and you now leave untouched? For by the old laws they are not immune from all the special war-taxes or from the equipment of war-galleys; and they enjoy no immunity from the state services, since they are included in the religious duties.

And yet the inscription says that they shall be immune. From what? From the tax on resident aliens, since nothing else is left? Of course not. It is from the regularly recurring services, as the inscription shows, as your law further specifies, and as all history witnesses. During all that length of time no tribe has ever ventured to nominate one of these descendants as chorus-master, and no one nominated has ever ventured to challenge them to an exchange of property. If Leptines dares to deny it, you must pay no heed to him.

Again,[*](They assert that many aliens have received immunity; he challenges them to produce the decrees conferring it. He admits that many undeserving aliens have been made proxenoi (in the honorary sense explained in note on Dem. 20.60), but this distinction does not confer immunity.) perhaps they will say in their haphazard[*](Literally, trailing the robe; hence slovenly, slipshod.) style that some citizens, by claiming to be Megarians and Messenians,[*](There is no record of any general exemption granted to these two peoples. If Weil’s conjecture is right, translate certain M. and M., by claiming to be Friends of the State.) at once gain immunity, whole crowds at a time, to say nothing of slaves and jailbirds like Lycidas and Dionysius; such are the examples they select. When they hold such language, deal with them thus. Tell them, if they are speaking the truth, to produce the decrees which contain these men’s immunity; for no one in your city enjoys immunity unless granted by some decree or law.

Many such men, however, have been proclaimed Friends of the State here at the instance of your politicians Lycidas, for example. But it is one thing to be a Friend of the State and another to enjoy immunity. Be not misled by them. Because slaves, like Lycidas and Dionysius and perhaps one other, were made Friends of the State by men who are readily bribed to propose such decrees, they must not try to take away the gifts that you have justly bestowed on men of a different class—mentorious, freeborn, munificent benefactors.

On this principle, what a gross insult it would be to Chabrias, if politicians of that stamp, not content with making his slave, Lycidas, a Friend of your State, should make the slave an excuse for taking back rewards conferred on the master, and that on a false plea! For neither Lycidas nor anyone else enjoys immunity as a Friend of the State, unless such immurity has been expressly conferred by the people. The men in question have not received it; I defy the defendants to prove it. If they have the effrontery to assert it, they will be acting dishonorably.

I now come to speak of a matter about which I feel bound, Athenians, to warn you most seriously. For even if one could admit the truth of all that Leptines will say in praise of his law, it would be impossible under any circumstances to wipe out one disgrace which his law, if ratified, will bring upon our city. To what do I refer? To the reputation of having cheated our benefactors.

Now I think you would all agree that this is a distinct disgrace; how much worse in you than in others, hear me explain. You have an ancient law, one held in great respect, that if anyone deceives the people by false promises, he shall be brought to trial, and if convicted shall be punished with death. And are you not then ashamed, Athenians, to find yourselves doing the very thing for which you punish other men with death? Nay, but in everything it is right to take heed against doing whatever seems or is dishonorable, but especially in cases where a man is seen to be indignant with others. For there is no room left even for hesitation in avoiding acts which a man’s own judgement has already condemned.

Then there is another precaution that you must take—to do nothing as a community which you would shun as individuals. Not a man among you would take away from another his own personal gifts, nor even dream of doing so. Then do not so in your public capacity, but tell the official defenders[*](The advocates named in Dem. 20.146.) of this law that

if they say that any of the recipients of these rewards is undeserving, or holds them under false pretences, or is open to any other charge, they should indict him under the amended law which we are now proposing, either when we have carried it through, as we guarantee and assert that we will, or when they have themselves carried it, that is, as soon as the legislative commission has been appointed.[*](At the beginning of the next year (July).) But each defender of this law, it seems, has a personal enemy, whether Diophantus or Eubulus or someone else.[*](The official defenders have their personal enemies, who have received immunity and whom it would be natural for them to indict. This they do not venture to do, but try, by this sweeping law, to deprive all, good and bad alike, of their privileges.)

If they hang back and refuse to take this step, then consider, men of Athens, whether it is to your credit that you should be known to have taken away from your benefactors what not one of these men ventures to take from his personal enemy, and that you should pass a law to rob collectively of their rewards men who have served you well and whom no one dreams of indicting, when the handful of unworthy recipients, if there are any, could be dealt with just as effectively, if these men would impeach them and bring them to trial one by one. For it passes my comprehension how the present arrangement can consort with your honor and your dignity.

Again, we must not deviate from this principle, that it was fair to investigate their merits at the time of conferring the reward, when none of these men opposed the vote, but after that to let the reward stand, unless you have received any subsequent wrong at their hands. If they allege that (for they cannot prove it), it must be shown that the men were punished at the time of the alleged wrongs. But if you ratify this law, though no such wrong was committed, it will seem that you have taken away their reward because you were envious, not because you found them rascals.

Every reproach, I might almost say, should be avoided, but this above all, men of Athens. Why? Because in every way envy is the mark of a vicious nature, and the man who is subject to it has no claim whatever to consideration. Moreover there is no reproach more alien to our city than the appearance of envy, averse as she is from all that is disgraceful.