Against Eubulides

Since Eubulides has brought many false charges against me, and has uttered slanders which are neither becoming nor just, I shall try, men of the jury, to prove by a true and fair statement that I am entitled to citizenship, and that I have been unworthily treated by this fellow. I beg you all, men of the jury, and implore and beseech you, that in view of the great importance of the present trial and the shame and ruin which conviction entails, you will hear me, as you have heard my opponent, in silence; indeed that you will listen to me with greater goodwill, if possible, than you have listened to him (for it is reasonable to suppose that you are more favorably disposed to those who stand in peril), but, if this cannot be, at least with equal goodwill.

But it so happens, men of the jury, that, although I am of good cheer so far as you are concerned and my right to citizenship and have good hopes of coming through this trial well, yet the occasion alarms me and the temper shown by the state when it has to deal with cases of disfranchisement[*](It would appear that at the time when this speech was delivered there was much agitation in favor of a strict purge of the lists, and that the people had shown much passion in the procedure.); for while many have with justice been expelled from all the demes, we who have been the victims of political rivalry are involved in the prejudice felt toward them and have to combat the charge brought against them, and not merely defend each his own case; so that our alarm is necessarily great.

Nevertheless, despite these disadvantages, I shall at once tell you what I hold to be right and just about these very matters. In my opinion it is your duty to treat with severity those who are proved to be aliens, who without having either won your consent or asked for it, have by stealth and violence come to participate in your religious rites and your common privileges, but to bring help and deliverance to those who have met with misfortune and can prove that they are citizens; for you should consider how pitiful above all others would be the plight of us whose rights have been denied, if, when we might properly sit with you as those exacting the penalty, we should be numbered with those who pay it, and should unjustly be condemned along with them because of the passion which the subject arouses.

I should have thought, men of the jury, that it was fitting for Eubulides, and for all those who are now making accusations in cases of disfranchisement, to state only things of which they have accurate knowledge and to bring forward no hearsay evidence in a trial of this sort. Such a procedure has from time immemorial been recognized as so clearly unjust that the laws do not admit the production of hearsay testimony even in the case of the most trifling charges; and with good reason; for when persons who claim to have sure knowledge have ere now been convicted of falsehood, how can it be right to give credence in matters regarding which even the speaker himself has no knowledge?

And when it is not permitted a man, even when he makes himself responsible, to harm another by evidence which he declares he has heard, how can it be right for you to give credence to one who speaks without responsibility? Since,then, this fellow, who knows the laws, and knows them all too well, has made his charges with injustice and with a view to selfish advantage, I must first tell you of the outrageous treatment which I received among my fellow-demesmen.

I beg of you, men of Athens, not until I have been heard, to take my rejection by the demesmen as a proof that I am not entitled to citizenship, for if you thought that the demesmen would be able to decide all cases with perfect justice, you would not have allowed the appeal to yourselves. As it is, however, because you thought that something of this sort might occur through rivalry and malice and enmity or through some other pretexts, you made your court a place of refuge for those who have been wronged, and through this right action on your part, men of Athens, you have saved all those who have suffered wrong.

First, then, I will explain to you how the purging of the list came to be made at the meeting of the demesmen; for I think it is relevant to the case before you if one shows all the wrongs that one has suffered contrary to your decree, when overwhelmed by political rivalry.

This man Eubulides, men of Athens, as many of you know, indicted the sister of Lacedaemonius for impiety, but did not receive a fifth part of the votes.[*](See note a on Dem. 27.67) It is because in that trial I gave testimony that was true but unfavorable to him that he hates me and makes me the object of his attacks. Being a member of the senate, men of the jury, with power to administer the oath and being custodian of the documents on the basis of which he convened the demesmen, what does he do?

In the first place, after the demesmen had assembled, he wasted the whole day in making speeches and in drawing up resolutions. This was not done by accident, but was a part of his plot against me, in order that the vote regarding me might take place as late in the day as possible; and he accomplished this end. Those of us members of the deme who took the oath numbered seventy-three, and we began voting late in the evening, with the result that, when my name was called, it was already dark;

for my name was about the sixtieth, and I was the last of all those called on that day, when the older members of the deme had gone back to their farms. For since our deme is distant thirty-five stades[*](About four miles.) from the city and most of the demesmen live there, the majority of them had gone home; those who remained were not more than thirty in number; among them, however, were all those suborned by Eubulides.

When my name was called, the fellow jumped up and immediately began to vilify me, speaking at great length and with a loud voice, as he did just now. He produced no witnesses in support of his charges, either a member of the deme or one of the citizens at large, but urged the demesmen to pass a vote of expulsion.

I demanded that the vote be put off until the following day on account of the lateness of the hour and because I had no one present to speak in my behalf, and because the thing had come upon me so suddenly, and also that Eubulides might have the opportunity of making any charges that he pleased, and of producing any witnesses he might have, while I on my part might be able to defend myself before all my fellow-demesmen and to produce my relatives as witnesses; and I agreed to abide by whatever decision they might reach concerning me.

The fellow, however, paid no heed at all to my proposals, but proceeded at once to give ballots to the members of the deme who were present, without allowing me to make any defence or himself giving any convincing proof of his charges. Those who were in league with him then jumped up and gave their votes. It was dark, and they received from him two or three ballots apiece, and put them in the box. Here is a proof of this. Those who voted were not more than thirty in number, but the ballots, when counted, were more than sixty; so that we were all astounded.

To prove that I am stating the truth in this—that the ballots were not given out when all were present and that the ballots outnumbered those who voted—I will bring before you witnesses. It happens that I have at hand no friend of my own or any other Athenian to be my witness regarding these facts since the hour was so late and I had not asked anyone to be present, but I am forced to call as witnesses the very men who have wronged me. I have thereore put in writing for them statements which they will not be able to deny.

(To the clerk.) Read.

The Deposition

Now, men of the jury, if the Halimusians had been deciding on that day the status of all the members of the deme, it would have been reasonable for them to continue voting until late, in order that they might have fulfilled the requirements of your decree before departing to their homes. But, seeing that there were more than twenty of the demesmen left regarding whom they had to vote on the following day, and that the members of the deme had in any case to be convened again, what difficulty was there for Eubulides to order an adjournment until the morrow, and then let the demesmen vote upon my case first?

The reason was, men of the jury, that Eubulides knew very well that, if an opportunity of speaking should be granted me and if all the men of the deme should be present to support me and the ballots honestly given out, those who had leagued themselves with him would be nowhere!

How these people came to form their conspiracy against me I will tell you, if you wish to hear it, as soon as I shall have spoken about my parentage.

In the meantime what do I hold to be just, and what am I prepared to do, men of the jury? To show you that I am an Athenian on both my father’s and my mother’s side, and to produce to prove it witnesses whose veracity you will not question, and to break down the calumnies and the charges brought against me. It will rest with you, when you have heard my statements, if you conclude that I am a citizen and the victim of a conspiracy, to come to my rescue; but if you reach a different conclusion, to act in whatever way your regard for your oaths may bid you. I will begin with this proof.

They have maliciously asserted that my father spoke with a foreign accent. But that he was taken prisoner by the enemy in the course of the Decelean war[*](The latter period of the Peloponnesian war, 413-404 B.C., is often called the Decelean war, because the Lacedaemonians, who had again invaded Attica, occupied the town of Decelea, not far from Athens, and maintained a garrison there.) and was sold into slavery and taken to Leucas, and that he there fell in with Cleander,[*](The modern Leukas, or Santa Maura, off the west coast of Acarnania.) the actor, and was brought back here to his kinsfolk after a long lapse of time—all this they have omitted to state; but just as though it were right that I should be brought to ruin on account of his misfortunes, they have made his foreign accent the basis of a charge against him.

On my part, however, I think that these very facts will more than anything else help me to demonstrate that I am an Athenian.

In the first place, to prove that my father was taken prisoner and was ransomed, I will bring witnesses before you; then, that when he reached home he received from his uncles his share of the property; and furthermore, that neither among the members of the deme nor among those of the clan nor anywhere else did anyone ever accuse him (despite his foreign accent) with being a foreigner.

(To the clerk.) Please take the depositions.

The Depositions

You have heard, then, of my father’s being taken prisoner by the enemy and of the good fortune which brought him back here. To prove now that he was your fellow-citizen, men of the jury (for this you may depend upon as being the veritable truth), I will call as witnesses those of my relatives on my father’s side who are still living.

(To the clerk.) Call first, please, Thucritides and Charisiades; for their father Charisius was brother to my grandfather Thucritides and my grandmother Lysaretê, and uncle to my father (for my father had married his sister born of a different mother).[*](Such marriages were permissible under Athenian law.)