Against Leptines

See what strong evidence we have of this. In the first place, you alone of all mankind publicly pronounce over your dead funeral orations, in which you extol the deeds of the brave. Such, however, is the practice of men who admire bravery, not of men who envy the honors that bravery wins. Next, you have from time immemorial given the richest rewards to those who win crowns in the athletic games; nor, because such honors are necessarily confined to a few, have you grudged or stinted the honors of the victors on that account. Beside these notable instances, no one, I think, has ever surpassed our State in generosity; such a superabundance of rewards has she heaped on those who serve her well.

All these, men of Athens, are proofs of justice, of virtue, of magnanimity. Then do not now destroy the very qualities on which throughout its history our city’s reputation is founded; do not, in order that Leptines may vent his spite on men whom he dislikes, rob both yourselves and your city of the fair fame that has been yours in every age; do not suppose that anything else is at stake in this trial save the honor of Athens, whether it is to stand unimpaired as of old, or to pass into neglect and degradation.

But of all the astonishing features of Leptines’ law, what astonishes me most is his ignorance of the fact that just as a man who assigns heavy penalties for offences would be unlikely to have contemplated an offence himself, so one who abolishes the rewards for benefactions will not himself be likely to have contemplated a good deed. Now if, as is just possible, he did not know this, he will at once confess it by allowing you to repeal the law which embodies his own error, but if he shows himself obstinate and eager to ratify the law, I for one cannot praise him, though I refrain from censure.

Then be not stubborn, Leptines; do not insist on a course which will not add to your own reputation or that of your supporters, especially as this trial no longer endangers you. For owing to the death of the father of Apsephion here, Bathippus, who indicted Leptines when he was still liable, the legal period has elapsed, and now our whole concern is with the law, and its proposer runs no risk.[*](See Introduction p. 489.)

I am told, however, that you assert that three distinct persons indicted you before Apsephion, but dropped the action. Well, if your complaint against them is that they did not endanger you, you must be fonder of danger than other people, but if you bring it forward as a proof of the justice of your proposals, you are doing a very silly thing. For how is your law improved by the fact that one of those who indicted you died before he could come into court, or was induced by you to drop the charge, or even was simply suborned by you? But I am ashamed even to suggest such things.

There are advocates appointed to defend the law, and very able speakers they are; Leodamas of Acharnae, Aristophon of Hazenia, Cephisodotus of Ceramicus, and Dinias of Herchia.[*](These were the four advocates nominated by the people, with Leptines as a fifth, to defend the law. Aristophon, the best known, was the leading Athenian statesman before the rise of Eubulus. He was now nearly eighty years old, and could boast that he had been 75 times defendant in a γραφὴ παρανόμων and had always acquitted.) Let me tell you, then, how you may reasonably retort upon them, and do you consider whether the retort is fair.[*](Demosthenes suggests that the personal record of the advocates should lead the jury to reject their arguments.) Take Leodamas first. It was he who impeached the grant to Chabrias,[*](See Dem. 20.77.) which included among other things the gift of immunity, and when his case came before you, he lost it.

Now the laws forbid the same man to be tried twice on the same issue, be it a civil action, a scrutiny, a contested claim, or anything else of the sort. But quite apart from all this, it would be a most absurd result if on the first occasion the services of Chabrias outweighed the arguments of Leodamas, but when to his services were added those of all the other benefactors, then the combined effect should be weaker than the arguments.

To Aristophon I think I could raise many sound objections. He obtained his grant, which included immunity, by your votes. I find no fault with that, for it is right that you should have it in your power to bestow what is yours on anyone you please. But I do suggest that it is unfair that he should raise no objection when he was going to receive it himself, but when it has been given to others, he should take offence and urge you to withdraw it.

Moreover it was Aristophon who proposed to pay Gelarchus five talents for sums advanced to the democrats in the Piraeus[*](See Dem. 20.11. Gelarchus is not otherwise known. There were, apparently, no witnesses to his gift.); and he was right. Then, my friend, if you recommended the repayment of unattested sums on the ground of service done to the people, you must not advise the revocation of grants for services which the people themselves attested by inscriptions in the temples, and which are indeed known to all men. You must not exhibit yourself as at the same time proposing that debts ought to be paid, and urging that a man should be deprived of what he has won at the hands of the people.

Next, I have this much to say to Cephisodotus. As an orator, men of Athens, he is inferior to none. Then it would be far more honorable to use his talents for the chastisement of evil-doers than for the injury of those who deserve well. If he must make enemies, I suggest that they should be those who injure the people, not those who benefit them.

Then as to Dinias. Perhaps he will tell you of the war-galleys he has equipped and of his other public services. For my part, though Dinias has proved himself a valuable servant of the public, as I sincerely believe, I would urge him rather to claim from you some reward for himself than to tell you to take back rewards previously given to others; for a man gives a surer proof of excellence by claiming a reward for his own services than by grudging others the rewards they have received for theirs.

But the most effective retort is one which applies to all the commissioners alike. Each one of them has often before served as commissioner for some business or other. Now you have a very sound law—not, of course, directed against these men, but framed to prevent any commissioner from using his opportunity for profit or blackmail—that no one, elected by the people, be permitted to serve as commissioner more than once.

Surely those who are going to advocate a law and urge its necessity ought to show themselves ready to obey existing laws; otherwise it is absurd for them to defend one law as commissioners and violate another themselves. Take and read the law which I cite.

[The law is read]

That, Athenians, is both an old and a sound law,[*](But it seems to have become obsolete, for sound reasons.) which the commissioners will be careful not to violate, if they are wise.

I have still a few things to say to you before I sit down. For you ought, in my opinion, men of Athens, to be anxious for the utmost possible efficiency of our laws, but especially of those on which depends the strength or weakness of our State. And which are they? They are those which assign rewards to those who do good and punishments to those who do evil. For in truth, if from fear of legal penalties all men shunned wrongdoing, and if from ambition for the rewards of good service all chose the path of duty, what prevents our city from being great and all our citizens honest, with not a rogue among them?

Now the law of Leptines, Athenians, does harm not only by abolishing the rewards of good service and so rendering fruitless the good intentions of those who are ambitious for honor, but also by leaving our city under the serious reproach of imbecility. For you are of course aware that for each grave offence a single penalty is provided by the law, which says explicitly that at any trial there shall be not more than one assessment of penalty, whichever the court imposes, whether a personal punishment or a fine, but not both.

But Leptines has used a different measure and says that if anyone claims a return from you, he shall be disfranchised, and his property shall be confiscated. There you have two penalties. The process shall be by laying information or by summary arrest; and if he be convicted, he shall be liable under the law which provides for the case of a man holding office while in debt to the treasury. Death is what he means, for such is the punishment in that case. Why, here are three penalties Is it not monstrously hard, Athenians, if it proves more serious in your courts to ask for a return for good service than to be convicted of some heinous crime?

Men of Athens, this law, so dishonorable, so unsound, so suggestive of envy and spite and—I spare you the rest. Those are the sort of things that the framer of the law seems to favor, but you must not imitate them nor display sentiments unworthy of yourselves. I ask you in Heaven’s name, what should we all most earnestly deprecate? What do all our laws most carefully guard against? What but those vengeful murders against which our specially appointed protector is the Council of the Areopagus?

Now Draco, in this group of laws, marked the terrible wickedness of homicide by banning the offender from the lustral water, the libations, the loving-cup, the sacrifices and the market-place; he enumerated everything that he thought likely to deter the offender; but he never robbed him of his claim to justice; he defined the circumstances that make homicide justifiable and proclaimed the accused in such case free from taint. If, then, your laws can justify homicide, is this fellow’s law to forbid any claim, even a just one, to recompense? Not so, men of Athens!

Do not let it appear that you have been more diligent to prevent any of your benefactors from winning a recompense than to suppress murder in your city. Rather, recalling the occasions on which you have repaid the services rendered you, and remembering the inscription of Demophantus, already referred to by Phormio, on which it stands written and confirmed by oath that whoso shall suffer in defence of the democracy shall receive the same reward as Harmodius and Aristogiton, vote for the repeal of this law; for if you do not, it is impossible for you to observe your oaths.

And besides all this, observe a further point. That law cannot be a sound one which deals with the past and the future in the same way. None, says this law, shall be immune save and except the descendants of Harmodius and Aristogiton. Good! Nor shall anyone in future be granted immunity. What! not even if other such benefactors arise, Leptines? If you found fault with the past, can it be that you also foresaw the future?