Letters

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.

Is it not absurd, therefore, or rather even disgraceful, toward certain other men to keep alive the goodwill justly due them, in spite of the fact that the times of their usefulness are long past and after this interval you learn of their good deeds by hearsay and have not assumed them from things of which you have been eye-witnesses, but toward Lycurgus, whose political career and death are so recent,