Against Meidias

In what, then, consist his splendor, his public services and his lordly expenditure? I cannot for the life of me see, unless one fixes one’s attention on these facts. He has built at Eleusis a mansion huge enough to overshadow his neighbors; he drives his wife to the Mysteries, or anywhere else that he wishes, with a pair of greys from Sicyon; he swaggers about the market-place with three or four henchmen in attendance, describing beakers and drinking-horns and cups loud enough for the passers-by to hear.

I do not see how the mass of Athenians are benefited by all the wealth that Meidias retains for private luxury and superfluous display; I do see that his insolence, fostered by his wealth, affects many of us ordinary folk. You ought not to show respect and admiration for such things on every occasion, nor judge a man’s public spirit by such tests as these—whether he builds himself a splendid house or keeps many maid-servants or handsome furniture, but whether his splendor and public spirit are displayed in those things in which the majority of you can share. There you will find Meidias absolutely wanting.

But, mark you, he gave us a war-galley! I am sure he will brag about that vessel. I, he will say, presented you with a trireme. Now this is how you must deal with him. If, men of Athens, he gave it from patriotic motives, be duly grateful and pay him the thanks that such a gift deserves. But do not give him a chance to air his insolence; that must not be conceded as the price of any act or deed. If, on the other hand, it is proved that his motive was cowardice and malingering, do not be led astray. How then will you know? This too I will explain. I will tell you the story from the start: it is not a long one.

Voluntary gifts were first introduced at Athens for the expedition to Euboea. Meidias was not one of those volunteers, but I was, and my colleague was Philinus, the son of Nicostratus. There was a second call subsequently for Olynthus. Meidias was not one of those volunteers either. Yet surely the public-spirited man ought to be found at his post on every occasion. We have now these voluntary gifts for the third time, and this time he did make an offer. But how? Though present in the Council when the gifts were being received, he made no offer then.

But when it was announced that the troops at Tamynae were blockaded, and when the Council carried a preliminary decree to dispatch the rest of the cavalry, to which he belonged, then, alarmed at the prospect of this campaign, he came forward with a voluntary gift at the next meeting of the Assembly, even before the Committee could take their seats. What makes it clear, beyond all possibility of doubt, that his motive was not public spirit but the desire to shirk the campaign? His subsequent proceedings.

For in the first place, when it appeared, as the meeting proceeded and speeches were made, that the services of the cavalry were not now required, but that the proposed expedition had fallen through, he never set foot on the ship he had presented, but dispatched a resident alien, the Egyptian Pamphilus, while he himself stayed at home and behaved at the Dionysia in the way that is the matter of the present trial.

Next, when the general, Phocion, summoned the cavalry from Argura to take their turn of service, and the trickery of Meidias was exposed, then this damnable coward quitted that post and hurried to his ship and never went out with the cavalry whom he claimed to command here at home. But if there had been any risk at sea, he would certainly have hastened to land.