Letters

[*](Eight citations of this letter by Hermogenes, Aristeides and others may be found in Walz’s Rhetores Graeci. It is also cited by Harpocration and by Antiatticista in Bekker’s Anecdota. It seems to have been known also to Photius and to the author of the Etymologicum Magnum. References to all of these will be found in the footnotes. In spite of these evidences of authenticity the majority of editors reject the letter. By Blass it is defended and of all six letters it certainly has the strongest case.) Demosthenes to the Council and the Assembly sends greeting.

I sent you the previous letter about matters that concern myself, stating what steps I thought in justice ought to be taken by you; in regard to these you will take favorable action when it seems good to you. The message I now address to you I should not like you to overlook or to hear it in a spirit of contentiousness, but with due regard to the justness of it. For it happens that, although sojourning in an out-of-the-way place, I hear many people censuring you for your treatment of the sons of Lycurgus.

Now I should have sent you the letter merely out of regard for those services that Lycurgus performed during his lifetime, for which you would all, like myself, be in justice grateful if you would but do your duty. For Lycurgus, having taken a post in the financial department of the government[*](Lycurgus managed the finances of Athens efficiently for twelve years (338-326), for one legal term of four years as treasurer and for two terms through others. During this period the income of the State was doubled and a large building program was carried through. In politics Lycurgus was associated with Demosthenes. Though he ranked as one of the ten Attic orators, his style was rather forceful than polished. One speech, Against Leocrates, is extant and his Life in Ps. Plut. Vit. 10 Orat., whose author seems to have made extensive use of the decree in his honor, I.G. 2. 456. Cf. also I.G. 2. 333, 1493-1496.) at the outset of his career and not being at all accustomed to draft documents pertaining to the general affairs of the Greeks and their relations with their allies, only when the majority of those who pretended to be the friends of democracy were deserting you, began to devote himself to the principles of the popular party,

not because from this quarter opportunity was offering to secure gifts and emoluments, since all such prizes were coming from the opposite party,[*](The Macedonians.) nor yet because he observed this policy to be the safer one, since there were many manifest dangers which a man was bound to incur who chose to speak on behalf of the people, but because he was truly democratic and by nature an honest man.

And yet before his very eyes he observed those who might have assisted the cause of the people growing weak with the drift of events and their adversaries gaining strength in every way. None the less for all that, this brave man continued to adhere to such measures as he thought were in the people’s interest and subsequently he continued to perform his duty unfalteringly in word and deed, as was clear to see. As a consequence his surrender was straightway demanded,[*](The surrender of Lycurgus, along with that of Demosthenes and others, was demanded after the fall of Thebes in 335 B.C. Alexander was persuaded by the Athenian orator Demades to relent.) as all men are aware.

Now I would have written this letter, as I said at the outset, for the sake of Lycurgus alone, but over and above that, believing it to be to your interest to know the criticisms being circulated among those who go abroad, I became all the more eager to dispatch the letter. I beg of those who for private reasons were at odds with Lycurgus to endure to hear what in truth and justice may be said in his behalf; for be well assured, men of Athens, that, as things now are, the city is acquiring an evil reputation because of the way his sons have been treated.

For none of the Greeks is ignorant that during the lifetime of Lycurgus you honored him extraordinarily,[*](In addition to offices of trust Lycurgus several times received the honor of a crown and of statues at the public expense.) and, though many charges were brought against him by those who were envious of him, you never found a single charge to be true, and you so trusted him and believed him to be truly democratic beyond all others that you decided many points of justice on the ground that Lycurgus said so, and that sufficed for you. This would certainly not have happened unless it had seemed to you that he was so honest.

Today, therefore, all men, upon hearing that his sons are in prison, while pitying the dead man, sympathize with the children as innocent sufferers, and reproach you bitterly after a manner that I, for one, should not dare to write down for, touching the reports which make me vexed at those who utter them, and which I contradict as best I can, trying to come to your defence, I have written these only to the extent of making it clear to you that many people are blaming you, since I believe it to be to your interest to know this, though to quote their words verbatim I judge would be offensive.

Apart from mere abuse, however, I shall reveal all that certain people say and which I believe it to your advantage to have heard. For, after all, no one has supposed that you laboured under a misunderstanding and deception concerning the truth so far as Lycurgus himself is concerned, for the length of time during which, where subject to scrutiny,[*](There was a board of thirty men at Athens who acted as accountants and auditors. Ten of the thirty were called εὔθυνοι; any official who handled public money could be charges before them with bribery or misappropriation of funds. All accounts were subject to their inspection. Cf. Aristot. Ath. Pol. 48.3-4; Aristot. Ath. Pol. 53.2.) he never was found guilty of any wrong toward you in either thought or deed and the fact that no human being could ever have accused you of indifference to any other action of his naturally eliminate the pretext of ignorance.

So the explanation is left—what all would declare the conduct of vile men—that so long as you have use for each official you seem to be concerned for him but after that feel no obligation; for where else is one to expect that the gratitude due from you to the dead will be shown, when he observes the opposite treatment meted out to his children and his good name, which are the sole concerns of all men when facing death, that it may continue to be well with them?

And assuredly, to appear to do these things for the sake of money is also unworthy of truly honorable men, for it would be clearly inconsistent either with your magnanimity or with your general principles of conduct. For instance, if it were necessary to ransom the children from foreign captors by giving this sum out of the revenues, I believe you would all be eager to do it; but when I observe you reluctant to remit a fine which was imposed because of mere talk and envy, I do not know what judgement I can pass unless it be that you have launched upon a course of utterly bitter and truculent hostility toward the members of the popular party. If this be the case, you have made up your minds to deliberate neither righteously nor in the public interest.

I am amazed if none of you thinks that it is a disgraceful thing for the people of Athens, who are supposed to be superior to all men in understanding and culture and have also maintained here for the unfortunate a common refuge in all ages, to show themselves less considerate than Philip, who, although naturally subject to no correction,

nursed as he was, in licence, still thought that at the moment of his greatest good fortune[*](The battle of Chaeronea, 338 B.C.; the Greeks magnified its importance. Their liberty was lost by degrees, not suddenly.) he ought to be seen acting with the greatest humanity and did not venture to cast into chains the men who had faced him in the battle line, against whom he had staked his all, nor demand to know, Whose sons are they and what are their names?[*](An Athenian citizen was identified by three items: his own name, his father’s name, and his deme.) For unlike some of your orators, as it appears, he did not consider it would be either just or creditable to take the same action against all, but, taking into his reckoning the additional factor of station in life,[*](Antiatticista cites this passage under ἀξία· ἀντὶ τοῦ ἀξίωμα Bekker, 1. p. 77. 17-18. Ἀξία equals Latin dignitas, the degree of distinction possessed by virtue of birth or achievement or both.) he assorted his verdicts accordingly.

You, however, though Athenians and partners in a culture which is thought capable of making even stupid people tolerable, in the first place—and of all your actions this is the most heartless—hold the sons in chains as a penalty for offences which certain parties allege against the father[*](The precise accusation is not known; it seems to have been concerned with the administration of the treasury.); in the next place, you claim this action to be equality before the law, just as if you were inspecting equality in the field of weights or measures and not deliberating about men’s ethical and political principles.

In testing these, if the actions of Lycurgus seem honest and public-spirited and inspired by loyalty, then it is justice that his sons should not only meet with no harm at your hands, but with all the benefits imaginable; yet if his actions seem quite the opposite, he ought to have been punished while he lived, and these children should not thus incur your anger on the ground of charges someone prefers against the father, because for all men death is an end of responsibility for all their offences.

Consequently, if you are going to be so minded that those who have conceived some grudge against those who espouse the cause of the people will not be reconciled even with dead men, but will persist in maintaining their enmity against the children, and if the people, in whose cause every friend of democracy labours, shall remember their gratitude only so long as they can use a man in the flesh and thereafter shall feel no concern, then nothing will be more miserable than to choose the post of champion of the people.

If Moerocles[*](Moerocles was archon in 324 B.C. His surrender had been demanded by Alexander in 335 B.C., which indicates his importance.) replies that this view is too subtle for his understanding, and that, to prevent them from running away, he put them in chains upon his own responsibility, demand of him why in the world he did not see the justice of this proceeding when Taureas, Pataecus, Aristogeiton and himself,[*](Nothing specific is known about these imprisonments, but it need not be assumed that all four men were under sentence at a single time. See next note. Taureas and Pataecus are unknown. For Aristogeiton see the two speeches against him.) though they had been committed to prison, were not only not in chains but would even address the Assembly.

If, on the other hand, he shall say that he was not then archon, he had no right to speak, at any rate according to the laws.[*](If Moerocles ordered the two sons of Lycurgus to be imprisoned but left Taureas, Pataecus and Aristogeiton at liberty, the charge against him is criminal partiality. If he denies that he was archon at the time and so lacked the authority to order these men to be detained in prison, then the minor charge still stands against him of addressing the Assembly while technically a prisoner himself. As a prisoner he would be subject to partial ἀτιμία or diminution of his rights as a citizen.) Accordingly, how can it be equal justice when some men are in office who have no right even to speak and others are in fetters whose father was useful to you in numerous ways?

I certainly cannot figure it out unless you mean to demonstrate this fact officially—that blackguardism, shamelessness and deliberate villainy are strong in the State and enjoy a better prospect of coming off safely, and that, if such men happen to get into a tight place, a way out is discovered, but to elect to live in honesty of principle, sobriety of life and devotion to the people will be hazardous and, if some false step is made, the consequences will be inescapable.

Furthermore, the fact that it is unjust to entertain concerning Lycurgus the opposite opinion to the one you held while he lived, and that justice demands that you should have more regard for the dead than for the living, and all such considerations I shall pass over, for I assume them to be universally agreed upon. Of the children of others, however, whom you recompensed for their fathers’ good services I would gladly see you reminded; for instance, the descendants of Aristeides, Thrasybulus, Archinus and many others.[*](At times the Athenian Assembly bestowed extravagant gifts upon the children of famous men, as may be learned from Plut. Arist. 27. At other times it acted heartlessly, if we may believe Dem. 19.280 ff. Archinus was one of the restorers of democracy in 403 B.C., but the greater share of the credit went to Thrasybulus.)

Not by way of censure have I cited these examples, for so far am I from censuring as to declare it my belief that such repayments are in the highest degree in the interest of the State, because you challenge all men by such conduct to be champions of the people, when they observe that, even if during their own lives envy shall stand in the way of their receiving merited honors, yet their children, at any rate, will be sure to receive their due rewards at your hands.