Tyrannicida

Do, in the name of the gods, make a full enquiry, if you like, from beginning to end, and see whether anything that affects the law has been left undone, and whether any qualification is wanting that a tyrant-slayer ought to have. In the first place, one must have at the outset a will that is valiant, patriotic, disposed to run risks for the common weal, and ready to purchase by its own extinction the deliverance of the people. Then did I fall short of that, play the weakling, or, my purpose formed, shrink from any of the risks that lay ahead? You cannot say so. Then confine your attention for a moment to this

But as things are, that is not what I say; no, I climbed the acropolis, I put myself in peril, I accomplished untold labours before I slew the young man. For you must not suppose that the affair was so easy and simple—to pass a guard, to overpower men-at-arms, to rout so many by myself; no, this is quite the mightiest obstacle in the slaying of a tyrant, and the principal of its achievements. For of course it is not the tyrant himself that is mighty and impregnable and indomitable, but what guards and maintains his tyranny; if anyone conquers all this, he has attained complete success, and what remains is trivial. Of course the approach to the tyrants would not have been open to me if I had not overpowered all the guards and henchmen about them, conquering all these to begin with. I add nothing further, but once more confine myself to this point: I overpowered the outposts, conquered the bodyguards, rendered the tyrant unprotected, unarmed, defenceless. Does it seem to you that I deserve honour for that, or do you further demand of me the shedding of his blood?

But even if you require bloodshed, that is not wanting either, and I am not unstained with blood; on the contrary, I have done a great and valiant deed in that I slew a young man in the fullness of his strength, terrible to all, through whom that other was unassailed by plots, on whom alone he relied, who sufficed him instead of many guardsmen. Then am I not deserving of a reward, man? Am I to be devoid of honours for such deeds? What if I had killed a bodyguard, or some henchman of the tyrant, or a valued slave? Would not even this have seemed a great thing, to go up and slay one of the tyrant’s friends in the midst of the citadel, in the midst of arms? But as it is, look at the slain man himself! He was a tyrant’s son, nay more, a harsher tyrant, an inexorable despot, a more cruel chastiser, a more violent oppressor; what is most important, he was heir and successor to everything, and capable of prolonging vastly the duration of our misery.