Chapter LXXXVII

Chapter LXXXVII

FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE SACRED WAR TO THAT OF THE OLYNTHIAN WAR.

It has been recounted in the preceding chapter, how Philip, during the continuance of the Social War, aggrandized himself in Macedonia and Thrace at the expense of Athens, by the acquisition of Amphipolis, Pydna, and Potidæa—the two last actually taken from her, the first captured only under false assurances held out to her while he was besieging it: how he had farther strengthened himself by enlisting Olynthus both as an ally of his own, and as an enemy of the Athenians. He had thus begun the war against Athens, usually spoken of as the war about Amphipolis, which lasted without any formal peace for twelve years. The resistance opposed by Athens to these his first aggressions had been faint and ineffective—partly owing to embarrassments. But the Social War had not yet terminated, when new embarrassments and complications, of a far more formidable nature, sprang up elsewhere—known by the name of the Sacred War, rending the very entrails of the Hellenic world, and profitable only to the indefatigable aggressor in Macedonia.

The Amphiktyonic assembly, which we shall now find exalted into an inauspicious notoriety, was an Hellenic institution ancient and venerable, but rarely invested with practical efficiency. Though political by occasion, it was religious in its main purpose, associated with the worship of Apollo at Delphi and of Dêmêtêr at Thermopylæ. Its assemblies were held twice annually—in spring at Delphi, in autumn at Thermopylæ; while in every fourth year it presided at the celebration of the great Pythian festival near Delphi, or appointed persons to preside in its name. It consisted of deputies called Hieromnemones and Pylagoræ, sent by the twelve ancient nations or fractions of the Hellenic name, who were recognized as its constituent body: Thessalians, Bœotians, Dorians, Ionians, Perrhæbians, Magnêtes, Lokrians, Œtæans or Ænianes, Achæans, Malians, Phokians, Dolopes. These were the twelve nations, sole partners in the Amphiktyonic sacred rites and meetings: each nation, small and great alike, having two votes in the decision and no more; and each city, small and great alike, contributing equally to make up the two votes of that nation to which it belonged. Thus Sparta counted only as one of the various communities forming the Dorian nation: Athens, in like manner in the Ionian, not superior in rank to Erythræ or Priênê.[509]

[509] Æschines, De Fals. Legat. p. 280. c. 36. For particulars respecting the Amphiktyonic assembly see the treatise of Tittman, Ueber den Amphiktyonischen Bund, p. 37, 45, seqq.

That during the preceding century, the Amphiktyonic assembly had meddled rarely, and had never meddled to any important purpose, in the political affairs of Greece—is proved by the fact that it is not once mentioned either in the history of Thucydides, or in the Hellenica of Xenophon. But after the humiliation of Sparta at Leuktra, this great religious convocation of the Hellenic world, after long torpor, began to meet for the despatch of business. Unfortunately its manifestations of activity were for the most part abusive and mischievous. Probably not long after the battle of Leuktra, though we do not know the precise year—the Thebans exhibited before the Amphiktyons an accusation against Sparta, for having treacherously seized the Kadmeia (the citadel of Thebes) in a period of profound peace. Sentence of condemnation was pronounced against her,[510] together with a fine of five hundred talents, doubled after a certain interval of non-payment. The act here put in accusation was indisputably a gross political wrong; and a pretence, though a very slight pretence, for bringing political wrong under cognizance of the Amphiktyons, might be found in the tenor of the old oath taken by each included city.[511] Still, every one knew that for generations past, the assembly had taken no actual cognizance of political wrong; so that both trial and sentence were alike glaring departures from understood Grecian custom—proving only the humiliation of Sparta and the insolence of Thebes. The Spartans of course did not submit to pay, nor were there any means of enforcement against them. No practical effect followed therefore, except (probably) the exclusion of Sparta from the Amphiktyonic assembly—as well as from the Delphian temple and the Pythian games. Indirectly, however, the example was most pernicious, as demonstrating that the authority of a Pan-hellenic convocation, venerable from its religious antiquity; could be abused to satisfy the political antipathies of a single leading state.

[510] Diodor. xvi. 23-29; Justin, viii. 1.

[511] Æschines, De Fals. Leg. p. 279. c. 35.

In the year 357 B. C., a second attempt was made by Thebes to employ the authority of the Amphiktyonic assembly as a means of crushing her neighbors the Phokians. The latter had been, from old time, border-enemies of the Thebans, Lokrians, and Thessalians. Until the battle of Leuktra, they had fought as allies of Sparta against Thebes, but had submitted to Thebes after that battle, and had continued to be her allies, though less and less cordial, until the battle of Mantinea and the death of Epaminondas.[512] Since that time, the old antipathy appears to have been rekindled, especially on the part of Thebes. Irritated against the Phokians probably as having broken off from a sworn alliance, she determined to raise against them an accusation in the Amphiktyonic assembly. As to the substantive ground of accusation, we find different statements. According to one witness, they were accused of having cultivated some portion of the Kirrhæan plain, consecrated from of old to Apollo; according to another, they were charged with an aggressive invasion of Bœotia; while, according to a third, the war was caused by their having carried off Theano, a married Theban woman. Pausanias confesses that he cannot distinctly make out what was the allegation against them.[513] Assisted by the antipathy of the Thessalians and Lokrians, not less vehement than her own, Thebes had no difficulty in obtaining sentence of condemnation against the Phokians. A fine was imposed upon them; of what amount we are not told, but so heavy as to be far beyond their means of payment.

[512] Compare Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 5, 23, and vii. 5, 4. About the feud of the Thessalians and Phokians, see Herodot. vii. 176, viii. 27; Æschines, De Fals. Leg. p. 289. c. 43—of the Lokrians and Phokians, Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 5, 3; Pausanias, iii. 9, 4.

[513] Diodor. xvi. 23; Justin, viii. 1; Pausanias, x. 2, 1; Duris ap. Athenæum, xiii. p. 560. Justin says, “Causa et origo hujus mali, Thebani fuere; qui cum rerum potirentur, secundam fortunam imbecillo animo ferentes, victos armis Lacedæmonios et Phocenses, quasi parva supplicia cædibus et rapinis luissent, apud commune Græciæ concilium superbe accusaverunt Lacedæmoniis crimini datum, quod arcem Thebanam induciarum tempore occupassent; Phocensibus, quod Bœotiam depopulati essent; prorsus quasi post arma et bellum locum legibus reliquissent.”

It was thus that the Thebans, who had never been able to attach to themselves a powerful confederacy such as that which formerly held its meetings at Sparta, supplied the deficiency by abusing their ascendency in the Amphiktyonic assembly to procure vengeance upon political enemies. A certain time was allowed for liquidating the fine, which the Phokians had neither means nor inclination to do. Complaint of the fact was then made at the next meeting of the Amphiktyons, when a decisive resolution was adopted, and engraven along with the rest on a column in the Delphian temple, to expropriate the recusant Phokians, and consecrate all their territory to Apollo—as Kirrha with its fertile plain had been treated two centuries before. It became necessary, at the same time, for the maintenance of consistency and equal dealing, to revive the mention of the previous fine still remaining unpaid by the Lacedæmonians; against whom it was proposed to pass a vote of something like excommunication.

Such impending dangers, likely to be soon realized under the instigation of Thebes, excited a resolute spirit of resistance among the Phokians. A wealthy and leading citizen of the Phokian town Ledon, named Philomelus son of Theotimus, stood forward as the head of this sentiment, setting himself energetically to organize means for the preservation of Phokian liberty as well as property. Among his assembled countrymen, he protested against the gross injustice of the recent sentence, amercing them in an enormous sum exceeding their means; when the strip of land, where they were alleged to have trespassed on the property of the god, was at best narrow and insignificant. Nothing was left, now, to avert from them utter ruin, except a bold front and an obstinate resistance, which he (Philomelus) would pledge himself to conduct with success, if they would intrust him with full powers. The Phokians (he contended) were the original and legitimate administrators of the Delphian temple—a privilege of which they had been wrongfully dispossessed by the Amphiktyonic assembly and the Delphians. “Let us reply to our enemies (he urged) by re-asserting our lost rights and seizing the temple; we shall obtain support and countenance from many Grecian states, whose interest is the same as our own, to resist the unjust decrees of the Amphiktyons.[514] Our enemies the Thebans (he added) are plotting the seizure of the temple for themselves, through the corrupt connivance of an Amphiktyonic majority: let us anticipate and prevent their injustice.”[515]

[514] Diodor. xvi. 23, 24; Pausanias, x. 2, 1.

[515] That this design, imputed to the Thebans, was a part of the case made out by the Phokians for themselves, we may feel assured from the passage in Demosthenes, Fals. Leg. p. 347. s. 22. Demosthenes charges Æschines with having made false promises and statements to the Athenian assembly, on returning from his embassy in 346 B. C. Æschines told the Athenians (so Demosthenes affirms) that he had persuaded Philip to act altogether in the interest and policy of Athens; that the Athenians would very presently see Thebes besieged by Philip, and the Bœotian towns restored; and furthermore, τῷ θεῷ δὲ τὰ χρήματα εἰσπραττόμενα, οὐ παρὰ Φωκέων, ἀλλὰ παρὰ ~Θηβαίων τῶν βουλευσάντων τὴν κατάληψιν τοῦ ἱεροῦ~ διδάσκειν γὰρ αὐτὸς ἔφη τὸν Φίλιππον ὅτι οὐδὲν ἧττον ~ἠσεβήκασιν οἱ βεβουλευκότες τῶν ταῖς χερσὶ πραξάντων~, καὶ διὰ ταῦτα χρήμαθ᾽ ἑαυτῷ τοὺς Θηβαίους ἐπικεκηρυχέναι.

How far Æschines really promised to the Athenians that which Demosthenes here alleges him to have promised—is a matter to be investigated when we arrive at the transactions of the year 346 B. C. But it seems to me clear that the imputation (true or false) against the Thebans, of having been themselves in conspiracy to seize the temple, must have emanated first from the Phokians, as part of the justification of their own proceedings. If the Thebans ever conceived such an idea, it must have been before the actual occupation of the temple by the Phokians, if they were falsely charged with conceiving it, the false charge would also be preferred at the time. Demosthenes would hardly invent it twelve years after the Phokian occupation.

Here a new question was raised, respecting the right of presidency over the most venerated sanctuary in Greece; a question fraught with ruin to the peace of the Hellenic world. The claim of the Phokians was not a mere fiction, but founded on an ancient reality, and doubtless believed by themselves to be just. Delphi and its inhabitants were originally a portion of the Phokian name. In the Homeric Catalogue, which Philomelus emphatically cited, it stands enumerated among the Phokians commanded by Schedius and Epistrophus, under the name of the “rocky Pytho,”—a name still applied to it by Herodotus.[516] The Delphians had acquired sufficient force to sever themselves from their Phokian brethren—to stand out as a community by themselves—and to assume the lucrative privilege of administering the temple as their own peculiar. Their severance had been first brought about, and their pretensions as administrators espoused by Sparta,[517] upon whose powerful interest they mainly depended. But the Phokians had never ceased to press their claim, and so far was the dispute from being settled against them, even in 450 B. C., that they then had in their hands the actual administration. The Spartans despatched an army for the express purpose of taking it away from them and transferring it to the Delphians; but very shortly afterwards, when the Spartan forces had retired, the Athenians marched thither, and dispossessed the Delphians,[518] restoring the temple to the Phokians. This contest went by the name of the Sacred War. At that time the Athenians were masters of most parts of Bœotia, as well as of Megara and Pegæ; and had they continued so, the Phokians would probably have been sustained in their administration of the holy place; the rights of the Delphians on one side, against those of the Phokians on the other, being then obviously dependent on the comparative strength of Athens and Sparta. But presently evil days came upon Athens, so that she lost all her inland possessions north of Attica, and could no longer uphold her allies in Phokis. The Phokians now in fact passed into allies of Sparta, and were forced to relinquish their temple-management to the Delphians; who were confirmed in it by a formal article of the peace of Nikias in 421 B. C.,[519] and retained it without question, under the recognized Hellenic supremacy of Sparta, down to the battle of Leuktra. Even then, too, it continued undisturbed; since Thebes was nowise inclined to favor the claim of her enemies the Phokians, but was on the contrary glad to be assisted in crushing them by their rivals the Delphians, who, as managers of the temple, could materially contribute to a severe sentence of the Amphiktyonic assembly.

[516] Herodot. i. 54.

[517] Strabo, ix. p. 423.

[518] Thucyd. i. 12.

[519] Thucyd. v. 18.

We see thus that the claim now advanced by Philomelus was not fictitious, but genuine, and felt by himself as well as by other Phokians to be the recovery of an ancient privilege, lost only through superior force.[520] His views being heartily embraced by his countrymen, he was nominated general with full powers. It was his first measure to go to Sparta, upon whose aid he counted, in consequence of the heavy fine which still stood imposed upon her by the Amphiktyonic sentence. He explained his views privately to king Archidamus, engaging, if the Phokians should become masters of the temple, to erase the sentence and fine from the column of record. Archidamus did not dare to promise him public countenance or support; the rather, as Sparta had always been the chief supporter of the Delphian presidency (as against the Phokian) over the temple. But in secret he warmly encouraged the scheme; furnishing a sum of fifteen talents, besides a few mercenary soldiers, towards its execution. With this aid Philomelus returned home, provided an equal sum of fifteen talents from his own purse, and collected a body of peltasts, Phokians as well as strangers. He then executed his design against Delphi, attacking suddenly both the town and the temple, and capturing them, as it would appear, with little opposition. To the alarmed Delphians, generally, he promised security and good treatment; but he put to death the members of the Gens (or Clan) called Thrakidæ, and seized their property: these men constituted one among several holy Gentes, leading conductors of the political and religious agency of the place.[521] It is probable, that when thus suddenly assailed, they had sent to solicit aid from their neighbors, the Lokrians of Amphissa; for Philomelus was scarcely in possession of Delphi, when these latter marched up to the rescue. He defeated them however with serious loss, and compelled them to return home.

[520] Justin (viii. 1) takes no notice of this first position of the Phokians in regard to the temple of Delphi. He treats them as if they had been despoilers of the temple even at first; “velut deo irascentes.”

[521] Diodor. xvi. 24. Hesychius (v. Λαφριάδαι) mentions another phratry or gens at Delphi, called Laphriadæ. See Wilhelm Götte, Das Delphische Orakel, p. 83. Leipsic, 1839.

It is stated by Pausanias, that the Phokians were bent upon dealing with Delphi and its inhabitants in the harshest manner; intending to kill all the men of military age, to sell the remaining population as slaves, and to raze the whole town to the ground. Archidamus, king of Sparta, (according to Pausanias) induced the Phokians to abandon this resolution (Pausan. iii. 10, 4).

At what moment the Phokians ever determined on this step—or, indeed, whether they ever really determined on it—we cannot feel any certainty. Nor can we decide confidently, whether Pausanias borrowed the statement from Theopompus, whom he quotes a little before.

Thus completely successful in his first attempt, Philomelus lost no time in announcing solemnly and formally his real purpose. He proclaimed that he had come only to resume for the Phokians their ancient rights as administrators; that the treasures of the temple should be safe and respected as before; that no impiety or illegality of any kind should be tolerated; and that the temple and its oracle would be opened, as heretofore, for visitors, sacrificers, and inquirers. At the same time, well aware that his Lokrian enemies at Amphissa were very near, he erected a wall to protect the town and temple, which appears to have been hitherto undefended,—especially its western side. He further increased his levies of troops. While the Phokians, inspirited with this first advantage, obeyed his call in considerable numbers, he also attracted new mercenaries from abroad by the offer of higher pay. He was presently at the head of five thousand men, strong enough to hold a difficult post like Delphi against all immediate attack. But being still anxious to appease Grecian sentiment and avert hostility, he despatched envoys to all the principal states,—not merely to Sparta and Athens, but also to his enemy Thebes. His envoys were instructed to offer solemn assurances, that the Phokians had taken Delphi simply to reclaim their paternal right of presidency, against past wrongful usurpation; that they were prepared to give any security required by the Hellenic body, for strict preservation of the valuables in the temple, and to exhibit and verify all, by weight and number, before examiners; that conscious of their own rectitude of purpose, they did not hesitate to entreat positive support against their enemies, or at any rate, neutrality.[522] The answers sent to Philomelus were not all of the same tenor. On this memorable event, the sentiments of the Grecian world were painfully divided. While Athens, Sparta, the Peloponnesian Achæans and some other states in Peloponnesus, recognized the possession of the Phokians, and agreed to assist them in retaining it,—the Thebans and Thessalians declared strenuously against them, supported by all the states north of Bœotia, Lokrians, Dorians, Ænianes, Phthiot-Achæans, Magnêtes, Perrhæbians, Athamânes, and Dolopes. Several of these last were dependents of the Thessalians, and followed their example; many of them moreover belonging to the Amphiktyonic constituency, must have taken part in the votes of condemnation just rescinded by the Phokians.

[522] Didorus xvi. 27. Ὁμοίως δὲ καὶ πρὸς τὰς ἄλλας τὰς ἐπισημοτάτας τῶν κατὰ τὴν Ἑλλάδα πόλεων ἀπέστειλεν, ἀπολογούμενος, ὅτι κατείληπται τοὺς Δελφοὺς, οὐ τοῖς ἱεροῖς χρήμασιν ἐπιβουλεύων, ἀλλὰ τῆς τοῦ ἱεροῦ προστασίας ἀμφισβητῶν· εἶναι γὰρ Φωκέων αὐτὴν ἰδίαν ἐν τοῖς παλαιοῖς χρόνοις ἀποδεδειγμένην. Τῶν δὲ χρημάτων τὸν λόγον ἔφη πᾶσι τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἀποδώσειν, καὶ τόν τε σταθμὸν καὶ τὸν ἀριθμὸν τῶν ἀναθημάτων ἕτοιμος εἶναι παραδιδόναι τοῖς βουλομένοις ἐξετάζειν. Ἠξίου δὲ, ἄν τις δι᾽ ἐχθρὰν ἢ φθόνον πολέμῃ Φωκεῦσι, μάλιστα μὲν ξυμμαχεῖν, εἰ δὲ μή γε, τὴν ἡσυχίαν ἄγειν.

In reference to the engagement taken by Philomelus, that he would exhibit and verify, before any general Hellenic examiners, all the valuable property in the Delphian temple, by weight and number of articles—the reader will find interesting matter of comparison in the Attic Inscriptions. No. 137-142, vol. i. of Boeckh’s Corpus Inscriptt. Græcarum—with Boeckh’s valuable commentary. These are the records of the numerous gold and silver donatives, preserved in the Parthenon, handed over by the treasurers of the goddess annually appointed, to their successors at the end of the year, from one Panathenaic festival to the next. The weight of each article is formally recorded, and the new articles received each year (ἐπέτεια) are specified. Where an article is transferred without being weighed (ἄσταθμον), the fact is noticed. That the precious donatives in the Delphian temple also, were carefully weighed, we may judge by the statement of Herodotus, that the golden lion dedicated by Krœsus had lost a fraction of its weight in the conflagration of the building (Herodot. i. 50).

Pausanias (x. 2, 1) does not advert to the difference between the first and the second part of the proceedings of Philomelus; first, the seizure of the temple, without any spoliation of the treasure, but simply upon the plea that the Phokians had the best right to administer its affairs; next, the seizure of the treasure and donatives of the temple—which he came to afterwards, when he found it necessary for defence.

We may clearly see that it was not at first the intention of Philomelus or his Phokian comrades to lay hands on the property of the Delphian temple; and Philomelus, while taking pains to set himself right in the eyes of Greece, tried to keep the prophetic agency of the temple in its ordinary working, so as to meet the exigencies of sacrificers and inquirers as before. He required the Pythian priestess to mount the tripod, submit herself to the prophetic inspiration, and pronounce the word thus put into her mouth, as usual. But the priestess,—chosen by the Delphians, and probably herself a member of one among the sacred Delphian Gentes,—obstinately refused to obey him; especially as the first question which he addressed concerned his own usurpation, and his chances of success against enemies. On his injunctions, that she should prophesy according to the traditional rites,—she replied that these rites were precisely what he had just overthrown; upon which he laid hold of her, and attempted to place her on the tripod by force. Subdued and frightened for her own personal safety, the priestess exclaimed involuntarily, that he might do what he chose. Philomelus gladly took this as an answer, favorable to his purpose. He caused it to be put in writing and proclaimed, as an oracle from the god, sanctioning and licensing his designs. He convened a special meeting of his partisans and the Delphians generally, wherein appeal was made to this encouraging answer, as warranting full confidence with reference to the impending war. So it was construed by all around, and confirmatory evidence was derived from farther signs and omens occurring at the moment.[523] It is probable, however, that Philomelus took care for the future to name a new priestess, more favorable to his interest, and disposed to deliver oracular answers under the new administrators in the same manner as under the old.

[523] Diodor. xvi. 25, 26, 27.

Though so large a portion of the Grecian name had thus declared war against the Phokians, yet none at first appear to have made hostile movements, except the Lokrians, with whom Philomelus was fully competent to deal. He found himself strong enough to overrun and plunder their territory, engaging in some indecisive skirmishes. At first the Lokrians would not even give up the bodies of his slain soldiers for burial, alleging that sacrilegious men were condemned by the general custom of Greece to be cast out without sepulture. Nor did they desist from their refusal until he threatened retaliation towards the bodies of their own slain.[524] So bitter was the exasperation arising out of this deplorable war throughout the Hellenic world! Even against the Lokrians alone, however, Philomelus soon found himself in want of money, for the payment of his soldiers,—native Phokians as well as mercenary strangers. Accordingly, while he still adhered to his pledge to respect the temple property, he did not think himself precluded from levying a forced contribution on the properties of his enemies, the wealthy Delphian citizens; and his arms were soon crowned with a brilliant success against the Lokrians, in a battle fought near the Rocks called Phædriades; a craggy and difficult locality so close to Delphi, that the Lokrians must evidently have been the aggressors, marching up with a view to relieve the town. They were defeated with great loss, both in slain and in prisoners; several of them only escaping the spear of the enemy by casting themselves to certain death down the precipitous cliffs.[525]

[524] Diodor. xvi. 25.

[525] Diodor. xvi. 28.

This victory, while imparting courage to the Phokians, proved the signal for fresh exertions among their numerous enemies. The loud complaints of the defeated Lokrians raised universal sympathy; and the Thebans, now pressed by fear, as well as animated by hatred, of the Phokians, put themselves at the head of the movement. Sending round envoys to the Thessalians and the other Amphiktyonic states, they invoked aid and urged the necessity of mustering a common force,—“to assist the god,”—to vindicate the judicial dignity of the Amphiktyonic assembly,—and to put down the sacrilegious Phokians.[526] It appears that a special meeting of the assembly itself was convened; probably at Thermopylæ, since Delphi was in possession of the enemy. Decided resolutions were here taken to form an Amphiktyonic army of execution; accompanied by severe sentences of fine and other punishments, against the Phokian leaders, by name Philomelus and Onomarchus,—perhaps brothers, but at least joint commanders, together with others.[527]

[526] Diodor. xvi. 28. ψηφισαμένων δὲ τῶν Ἀμφικτυόνων τὸν πρὸς Φωκεῖς πόλεμον, πολλὴ ταραχὴ καὶ διάστασις ἦν καθ᾽ ὅλην τὴν Ἑλλάδα. Οἱ μὲν γὰρ ἔκριναν βοηθεῖν τῷ θεῷ, καὶ τοὺς Φωκεῖς, ὡς ἱεροσύλους, κολάζειν· οἱ δὲ πρὸς τὴν τῶν Φωκέων βοήθειαν ἀπέκλιναν.

[527] Diodor. xvi. 32. about Onomarchus—πολλαῖς γὰρ καὶ μεγάλαις δίκαις ὑπὸ τῶν Ἀμφικτυόνων ἦν καταδεδικασμένος ὁμοίως τοῖς ἄλλοις, etc.

Onomarchus is denominated the colleague of Philomelus, cap. 31, and his brother, cap. 61.

The perils of the Phokians now became imminent. Their own unaided strength was nowise sufficient to resist the confederacy about to arm in defence of the Amphiktyonic assembly;[528] nor does it appear that either Athens or Sparta had as yet given them anything more than promises and encouragement. Their only chance of effective resistance lay in the levy of a large mercenary force; for which purpose neither their own funds, nor any farther aid derivable from private confiscation, could be made adequate. There remained no other resource except to employ the treasures and valuables in the Delphian temple, upon which accordingly Philomelus now laid hands. He did so, however, as his previous conduct evinced, with sincere reluctance, probably with various professions at first of borrowing only a given sum, destined to meet the actual emergency, and intended to be repaid as soon as safety should be provided for.[529] But whatever may have been his intentions at the outset, all such reserves or limits, or obligations to repay, were speedily forgotten in practice. When the feeling which protected the fund was broken through, it was as easy to take much as little, and the claimants became more numerous and importunate; besides which the exigencies of the war never ceased, and the implacable repugnance raised by the spoliation amidst half of the Grecian world, left to the Phokians no security except under the protection of a continued mercenary force.[530] Nor were Philomelus and his successors satisfied without also enriching their friends and adorning their wives or favorites.

[528] Even in 374 B. C., three years before the battle of Leuktra, the Phokians had been unable to defend themselves against Thebes without aid from Sparta (Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 1, 1).

[529] Diodor. xvi. 30. ἠναγκάζετο (Philomelus) τοῖς ἱεροῖς ἀναθήμασιν ἐπιβαλεῖν τὰς χεῖρας καὶ συλᾷν τὸ μαντεῖον. A similar proposition had been started by the Corinthian envoys in the congress at Sparta, shortly before the Peloponnesian war; they suggested as one of their ways and means the borrowing from the treasures of Delphi and Olympia, to be afterwards repaid (Thucyd. i. 121). Perikles made the like proposition in the Athenian assembly; “for purposes of security,” the property of the temples might be employed to defray the cost of war, subject to the obligation of replacing the whole afterwards (χρησαμένους τε ἐπὶ σωτηρίᾳ ἔφη χρῆναι μὴ ἐλάσσω ἀντικαταστῆσαι πάλιν, Thucyd. ii. 13). After the disaster before Syracuse, and during the years of struggle intervening before the close of the war, the Athenians were driven by financial distress to appropriate to public purposes many of the rich donatives in the Parthenon, which they were never afterwards able to replace. Of this abstraction, proof is found in the Inscriptions published by Boeckh, Corp. Inscript. No. 137-142, which contain the official records of the successive Boards of Treasurers of Athênê. It is stated in an instructive recent Dissertation, by J. L. Ussing (De Parthenone ejusque partibus Disputatio, p. 3. Copenhagen, 1849), “Multæ in arce Athenarum inventæ sunt tabulæ Quæstorum Minervæ, in quibus quotannis inscribebant, quænam vasa aurea aliæque res pretiosæ in æde Minervæ dedicata extarent. Harum longe maxima pars ante Euclidem archontem scripta est...: Nec tamen una tabula templi dona continebat universa, sed separatim quæ in Pronao, quæ in Hecatompedo, quæ in Parthenone (the part of the temple specially so called), servabantur, separatim suis quæque lapidibus consignata erant. Singulari quadam fortuna contigit, ut inde ab anno 434 B. C., ad 407 B. C., tam multa fragmenta tabularum servata sint, ut hos donorum catalogos aliquatenus restituere possimus. In quo etiam ad historiam illius temporis pertinet, quod florentibus Athenarum rebus opes Deæ semper augeri, fractis autem bello Siculo, inde ab anno 412 B. C., eas paulatim deminui videmus.... Urgente pecuniæ inopia Athenienses ad Deam confugiebant, et jam ante annum 406 B. C., pleraque Pronai dona ablata esse videmus. Proximis annis sine dubio nec Hecatompedo nec Parthenoni pepercerunt; nec mirum est, post bellum Peloponnesiacum ex antiquis illis donis fere nulla comparere.”

[530] Theopompus, Frag. 182, ed. Didot; Athenæ. xiii. p. 605, vi. p. 232; Ephorus, Frag. 155, ed. Didot; Diodor. xvi. 64.

Availing himself of the large resources of the temple, Philomelus raised the pay of his troops to a sum half as large again as before, and issued proclamations inviting new levies at the same rate. Through such tempting offers he was speedily enabled to muster a force, horse and foot together, said to amount to 10,000 men; chiefly, as we are told, men of peculiarly wicked and reckless character, since no pious Greek would enlist in such a service. With these he attacked the Lokrians, who were however now assisted by the Thebans from one side, and by the Thessalians with their circumjacent allies from the other. Philomelus gained successive advantages against both of them, and conceived increased hopes from a reinforcement of 1500 Achæans who came to him from Peloponnesus. The war assumed a peculiarly ferocious character; for the Thebans,[531] confident in their superior force and chance of success, even though the Delphian treasure was employed against them, began by putting to death all their prisoners, as sacrilegious men standing condemned by the Amphiktyonic assembly. This so exasperated the troops of Philomelus, that they constrained him to retaliate upon the Bœotian prisoners. For some time such rigorous inflictions were continued on both sides, until at length the Thebans felt compelled to desist, and Philomelus followed their example. The war lasted a while with indecisive results, the Thebans and their allies being greatly superior in number. But presently Philomelus incautiously exposed himself to attack in an unfavorable position, near the town of Neon, amidst embarrassing woods and rocks. He was here defeated with severe loss, and his army dispersed; himself receiving several wounds, and fighting with desperate bravery, until farther resistance became impossible. He then tried to escape, but found himself driven to the brink of a precipice, where he could only avoid the tortures of captivity by leaping down and perishing. The remnant of his vanquished army was rallied at some distance by Onomarchus.[532]

[531] Isokrates, Orat. v. (ad Philippum) s. 60. τελευτῶντες δὲ πρὸς Φωκέας πόλεμον ἐξήνεγκαν (the Thebans), ὡς τῶν τε πόλεων ἐν ὀλίγῳ χρόνῳ κρατήσοντες, τόν τε τόπον ἅπαντα τὸν περιέχοντα κατασχήσοντες, τῶν τε χρημάτων τῶν ἐν Δελφοῖς περιγενησόμενοι ταῖς ἐκ τῶν ἰδίων δαπάναις.

[532] Diodor. xvi. 31; Pausan. x. 2, 1. The dates and duration of these events are only known to us in a loose and superficial manner from the narrative of Diodorus.

The Thebans and their allies, instead of pressing the important victory recently gained over Philomelus, seem to have supposed that the Phokians would now disperse or submit of their own accord, and accordingly returned home. Their remissness gave time to Onomarchus to reorganize his dispirited countrymen. Convening at Delphi a general assembly of Phokians and allies, he strenuously exhorted them to persevere in the projects, and avenge the death, of their late general. He found, however, no inconsiderable amount of opposition; for many of the Phokians—noway prepared for the struggle in which they now found themselves embarked, and themselves ashamed of the spoliation of the temple—were anxious by some accommodation to put themselves again within the pale of Hellenic religious sentiment. Onomarchus doubtless replied, and with too good reason, that peace was unattainable upon any terms short of absolute ruin; and that there was no course open except to maintain their ground as they stood, by renewed efforts of force. But even if the necessities of the case had been less imperative, he would have been able to overbear all opposition of his own countrymen through the numerous mercenary strangers, now in Phokis and present at the assembly under the name of allies.[533] In fact, so irresistible was his ascendency by means of this large paid force under his command, that both Demosthenes and Æschines[534] denominate him (as well as his predecessor and his successor) not general, but despot, of the Phokians. The soldiers were not less anxious than Onomarchus to prosecute the war, and to employ the yet unexhausted wealth of the temple in every way conducive to ultimate success. In this sense the assembly decreed, naming Onomarchus general with full powers for carrying the decree into effect.

[533] Diodor. xvi. 32. Οἱ δὲ Φωκεῖς—ἐπανῆλθον εἰς Δελφοὺς καὶ συνελθόντες ~μετὰ τῶν συμμάχων~ εἰς κοινὴν ἐκκλησίαν, ἐβουλεύοντο περὶ τοῦ πολέμου.

[534] Æschines, Fals. Leg. p. 286. c. 41. τῶν ἐν Φωκεῦσι τυράννων, etc. Demosthen. cont. Aristokrat. p. 661. s. 147. Φαύλλος ὁ Φωκεὺς ἤ τις ἄλλος δυναστὴς, etc.

His energetic measures presently retrieved the Phokian cause. Employing the temple-funds still more profusely than Philomelus, he invited fresh soldiers from all quarters, and found himself, after some time, at the head of a larger army than before. The temple exhibited many donatives, not only of gold and silver, but also of brass and iron. While Onomarchus melted the precious metals and coined them into money, he at the same time turned the brass and iron into arms;[535] so that he was enabled to equip both his own soldiers disarmed in the recent defeat, and a class of volunteers poorer than the ordinary self-armed mercenaries. Besides paying soldiers, he scattered everywhere presents or bribes to gain influential partisans in the cities favorable to his cause; probably Athens and Sparta first of all. We are told that the Spartan king Archidamus, with his wife Deïnicha, were among the recipients; indeed the same corrupt participation was imputed, by the statement of the hostile-minded Messenians,[536] to the Spartan ephors and senate. Even among enemies, Onomarchus employed his gold with effect, contriving thus to gain or neutralize a portion of the Thessalians; among them the powerful despots of Pheræ, whom we afterwards find allied to him. Thus was the great Delphian treasure turned to account in every way; and the unscrupulous Phokian despot strengthened his hands yet farther, by seizing such of his fellow-countrymen as had been prominent in opposition to his views, putting them to death, and confiscating their property.[537]

[535] Diodor. xvi. 33. The numerous iron spits, dedicated by the courtezan Rhodôpis at Delphi, may probably have been applied to this military purpose. Herodotus (ii. 135) saw them at Delphi; in the time of Plutarch, the guide of the Temple only showed the place in which they had once stood (Plutarch, De Pythiæ Oraculis, p. 400).

[536] Theopompus, Frag. 255, ed. Didot; Pausanias, iii. 10, 2; iv. 5, 1. As Archidamus is said to have furnished fifteen talents privately to Philomelus (Diodor. xvi. 24), he may, perhaps, have received now repayment out of the temple property.

[537] Diodor. xvi. 33.

Through such combination of profuse allurement, corruption, and violence, the tide began to turn again in favor of the Phokians. Onomarchus found himself shortly at the head of a formidable army, which he marched forth from Delphi, and subdued successively the Lokrians of Amphissa, the Epiknemidian Lokrians, and the neighboring territory of Doris. He carried his conquests even as far as the vicinity of Thermopylæ; capturing Thronium, one of the towns which commanded that important pass, and reducing its inhabitants to slavery. It is probable that he also took Nikæa and Alpônus—two other valuable positions near Thermopylæ, which we know to have been in the power of the Phokians until the moment immediately preceding their ruin—since we find him henceforward master of Thermopylæ, and speedily opening his communications with Thessaly.[538] Besides this extension of dominion to the north and east of Phokis, Onomarchus also invaded Bœotia. The Thebans, now deprived of their northern allies, did not at first meet him in the field, so that he was enabled to capture Orchomenus. But when he proceeded to attack Chæroneia, they made an effective effort to relieve the place. They brought out their forces, and defeated him, in an action not very decisive, yet sufficient to constrain him to retire into Phokis.

[538] Diodor. xvi. 33. His account of the operations of Onomarchus is, as usual, very meagre—εἰς δὲ τὴν πολεμίαν ἐμβαλὼν, Θρόνιον μὲν ἐκπολιορκήσας ἐξηνδραποδίσατο, Ἀμφισσεῖς δὲ καταπληξάμενος, τὰς δ᾽ ἐν Δωριεῦσι πόλεις πορθήσας, τὴν χώραν αὐτῶν ἐδῄωσεν.

That Thronium, with Alpônus and Nikæa, were the three places which commanded the pass of Thermopylæ—and that all the three were in possession of the Phokians immediately before they were conquered by Philip of Macedon in 346 B. C.—we know from Æschines, Fals. Leg. p. 286. c. 41.

... πρέσβεις πρὸς ὑμᾶς (the Athenians) ἦλθον ἐκ Φωκέων, βοηθεῖν αὑτοῖς κελεύοντες, καὶ ἐπαγγελλόμενοι παραδώσειν Ἀλπωνὸν καὶ Θρόνιον καὶ Νίκαιαν, τὰ τῶν παρόδων τῶν εἰς Πύλας χωρία κύρια.

In order to conquer Thronium, Onomarchus must have marched through and mastered the Epiknemidian Lokrians; and though no place except Thronium is specified by Diodorus, it seems plain that Onomarchus can not have conquered Thronium alone.

Probably the Thebans were at this time much pressed, and prevented from acting effectively against the Phokians, by want of money. We know at least that in the midst of the Phokian war they hired out a force of 5000 hoplites commanded by Pammenes, to Artabazus the revolted Phrygian satrap. Here Pammenes with his soldiers acquired some renown, gaining two important victories over the Persians.[539] The Thebans, it would seem, having no fleet and no maritime dependencies, were less afraid of giving offence to the Great King than Athens had been, when she interdicted Chares from aiding Artabazus, and acquiesced in the unfavorable pacification which terminated the Social War. How long Pammenes and the Thebans remained in Asia, we are not informed. But in spite of the victories gained by them, Artabazus was not long able to maintain himself against the Persian arms. Three years afterwards, we hear of him and his brother-in-law Memnon as expelled from Asia, and as exiles residing with Philip of Macedon.[540]

[539] Diodor. xvi. 34.

[540] Diodor. xvi. 52.

While Pammenes was serving under Artabazus, the Athenian general Chares recaptured Sestos in the Hellespont, which appears to have revolted from Athens during the Social War. He treated the captive Sestians with rigor; putting to death the men of military age, and selling the remainder as slaves.[541] This was an important acquisition for Athens, as a condition of security in the Chersonese as well as of preponderance in the Hellespont.

[541] Diodor. xvi. 34.

Alarmed at the successes of Chares in the Hellespont, the Thracian prince Kersobleptes now entered on an intrigue with Pammenes in Asia, and with Philip of Macedon (who was on the coast of Thrace, attacking Abdêra and Maroneia), for the purpose of checking the progress of the Athenian arms. Philip appears to have made a forward movement, and to have menaced the possessions of Athens in the Chersonese; but his access thither was forbidden by Amadokus, another prince of Thrace, master of the intermediate territory, as well as by the presence of Chares with his fleet off the Thracian coast.[542] Apollonides of Kardia was the agent of Kersobleptes; who however finding his schemes abortive, and intimidated by the presence of Chares, came to terms with Athens, and surrendered to her the portion of the Chersonese which still remained to him, with the exception of Kardia. The Athenians sent to the Chersonese a farther detachment of Kleruchs or out-settlers, for whom considerable room must have been made as well by the depopulation of Sestos, as by the recent cession from Kersobleptes.[543] It was in the ensuing year (352 B. C.) that the Athenians also despatched a fresh batch of 2000 citizens as settlers to Samos, in addition to those who had been sent thither thirteen years before.[544]

[542] Polyænus, iv. 2, 22, seems to belong to this juncture.

[543] We derive what is here stated from the comparison of two passages, put together as well as the uncertainty of their tenor admits, Diodor. xvi. 34, with Demosth. cont. Aristokrat. p. 681. s. 219 (s. 183, in Weber’s edition, whose note ought to be consulted). Demosthenes says, Φιλίππου γὰρ εἰς Μαρώνειαν ἐλθόντος ἔπεμψε (Kersobleptes) πρὸς αὐτὸν Ἀπολλωνίδην, πίστεις δοὺς ἐκείνῳ καὶ Παμμένει· καὶ εἰ μὴ κρατῶν τῆς χώρας Ἀμάδοκος ἀπεῖπε Φιλίππῳ μὴ ἐπιβαίνειν, οὐδὲν ἂν ἦν ἐν μέσῳ πολεμεῖν ἡμᾶς πρὸς Καρδιανοὺς ἤδη καὶ Κερσοβλέπτην. Καὶ ὅτι ταῦτ᾽ ἀληθῆ λέγω, λαβὲ τὴν Χάρητος ἐπιστολήν.

The mention of Pammenes, as being within reach of communication with Kersobleptes—the mention of Chares as being at the Chersonese, and sending home despatches—and the notice of Philip as being at Maroneia—all conspire to connect this passage with the year 353-352 B. C., and with the facts referred to that year by Diodorus, xvi. 34. There is an interval of five years between the presence of Chares here alluded to, and the presence of Chares noticed before in the same oration, p. 678. s. 206, immediately after the successful expedition to Eubœa in 358 B. C. During these five years, Kersobleptes had acted in a hostile manner towards Athens in the neighborhood of the Chersonese (p. 680. s. 214), and also towards the two rival Thracian princes, friends of Athens. At the same time Sestos had again revolted; the forces of Athens being engaged in the Social War, from 358 to 355 B. C. In 353 B. C. Chares is at the Hellespont, recovers Sestos, and again defeats the intrigues of Kersobleptes, who makes cession to Athens of a portion of territory which he still held in the Chersonese. Diodorus ascribes this cession of Kersobleptes to the motive of aversion towards Philip and good-will towards the Athenians. Possibly these may have been the motives pretended by Kersobleptes, to whom a certain party at Athens gave credit for more favorable dispositions than the Demosthenic oration against Aristokrates recognizes—as we may see from that oration itself. But I rather apprehend that Diodorus, in describing Kersobleptes as hostile to Philip, and friendly to Athens, has applied to the year 353 B. C. a state of relations which did not become true until a later date, nearer to the time when peace was made between Philip and the Athenians in 346 B. C.

[544] Dionysius, Hal. Judic. de Dinarcho, p. 664; Strabo. xiv. p. 638.

The mention of Philip as attacking Maroneia and menacing the Thracian Chersonese, shows the indefatigable activity of that prince and the steady enlargement of his power. In 358 B. C., he had taken Amphipolis; before 355 B. C., he had captured Pydna and Potidæa, founded the new town of Philippi, and opened for himself the resource of the adjoining auriferous region; he had established relations with Thessaly, assisting the great family of the Aleuadæ at Larissa in their struggle against Lykophron and Peitholaus, the despots of Pheræ:[545] he had farther again chastised the interior tribes bordering on Macedonia, Thracians. Pæonians, and Illyrians, who were never long at rest, and who had combined to regain their independence.[546] It appears to have been in 354-353 B. C., that he attacked Methônê, the last remaining possession of Athens on the Macedonian coast. Situated on the Thermaic Gulf, Methônê was doubtless a convenient station for Athenian privateers to intercept trading vessels, not merely to and from Macedonian ports, but also from Olynthus and Potidæa; so that the Olynthians, then in alliance with Philip against Athens, would be glad to see it pass into his power, and may perhaps have lent him their aid. He pressed the siege of the place with his usual vigor, employing all the engines and means of assault then known; while the besieged on their side were not less resolute in the defence. They repelled his attacks for so long a time, that news of the danger of the place reached Athens, and ample time was afforded for sending relief, had the Athenians been ready and vigorous in their movement. But unfortunately they had not even now learnt experience from the loss of Pydna and Potidæa. Either the Etesian winds usual in summer, or the storms of winter, both which circumstances were taken into account by Philip in adjusting the season of his enterprises[547]—or (which is more probable) the aversion of the Athenian respectable citizens to personal service on shipboard, and their slackness even in pecuniary payment—caused so much delay in preparations, that the expedition sent out did not reach Methônê until too late.[548] The Methonæans, having gallantly held out until all their means were exhausted, were at length compelled to surrender. Diodorus tells us that Philip granted terms so far lenient as to allow them to depart with the clothes on their backs.[549] But this can hardly be accurate, since we know that there were Athenian citizens among them sold as slaves, some of whom were ransomed by Demosthenes with his own money.[550]

[545] Diodor. xvi, 14. This passage relates to the year 357-356 B. C., and possibly Philip may have begun to meddle in the Thessalian party-disputes even as early as that year; but his effective interference comes two or three years later. See the general order of Philip’s aggressions indicated by Demosthenes, Olynth. i. p. 12. s. 13.

[546] Diodor. xvi. 22.

[547] See a striking passage in Demosthenes, Philipp. i. p. 48. s. 35. There was another place called Methônê—the Thracian Methônê—situated in the Chalkidic or Thracian peninsula, near Olynthus and Apollonia—of which we shall hear presently.

[548] Demosthenes, Philipp. i. p. 50. s. 40; Olynth. i. p. 11. s. 9.

[549] Diodorus (xvi. 31-34) mentions the capture of Methônê by Philip twice, in two successive years: first, in 354-353 B. C.; again, more copiously, in 353-352 B. C. In my judgment, the earlier of the two dates is the more probable. In 353-352 B. C., Philip carried on his war in Thrace, near Abdera and Maroneia—and also his war against Onomarchus in Thessaly; which transactions seem enough to fill up the time. From the language of Demosthenes (Olynth. i. p. 12. s. 13), we see that Philip did not attack Thessaly until after the capture of Methônê. Diodorus as well as Strabo (vii. p. 330), and Justin (vii. 6) state that Philip was wounded and lost the sight of one eye in this siege. But this seems to have happened afterwards, near the Thracian Methônê.

Compare Justin, vii. 6; Polyænus, iv. 2. 15. Under the year 354-353 B. C., Diodorus mentions not only the capture of Methônê by Philip, but also the capture of Pagæ. Παγὰς δὲ χειρωσάμενος, ἠνάγκασεν ὑποταγῆναι. Pagæ is unknown, anywhere near Macedonia and Thessaly. Wesseling and Mr. Clinton suppose Pagasæ in Thessaly to be meant. But it seems to me impossible that Philip, who had no considerable power at sea, can have taken Pagasæ, before his wars in Thessaly, and before he had become master of Pheræ, which events did not occur until one year or two years afterwards. Pagasæ is the port of Pheræ, and Lykophron the despot of Pheræ was still powerful and unconquered. If, therefore, the word intended by Diodorus be Παγασὰς instead of Παγὰς, I think the matter of fact asserted cannot be correct.

[550] This fact is mentioned in the public vote of gratitude passed by the Athenian people to Demosthenes (Plutarch, Vitæ X. Orat. p. 851).

Being now master of the last port possessed by Athens in the Thermaic Gulf—an acquisition of great importance, which had never before[551] belonged to the Macedonian kings—Philip was enabled to extend his military operations to the neighborhood of the Thracian Chersonese on the one side, and to that of Thermopylæ on the other. How he threatened the Chersonese, has been already related; and his campaign in Thessaly was yet more important. That country was, as usual, torn by intestine disputes. Lykophron the despot of Pheræ possessed the greatest sway; while the Aleuadæ of Larissa, too weak to contend against him with their own forces, invited assistance from Philip; who entered Thessaly with a powerful army. Such a reinforcement so completely altered the balance of Thessalian power, that Lykophron in his turn was compelled to entreat aid from Onomarchus and the Phokians.

[551] Thucyd. vi. 7. Μεθώνην τὴν ὅμορον Μακεδονίᾳ, etc.

So strong were the Phokians now, that they were more than a match for the Thebans with their other hostile neighbors, and had means to spare for combating Philip in Thessaly. As their force consisted of a large body of mercenaries, whom they were constrained for security to retain in pay—to keep them employed beyond the border was a point not undesirable. Hence they readily entered upon the Thessalian campaign. At this moment they counted, in the comparative assessment of Hellenic forces, as an item of first-rate magnitude. They were hailed both by Athenians and Spartans as the natural enemy and counterpoise of Thebes, alike odious to both. While the Phokians maintained their actual power, Athens could manage her foreign policy abroad, and Sparta her designs in Peloponnesus, with diminished apprehensions of being counterworked by Thebes. Both Athens and Sparta had at first supported the Phokians against unjust persecution by Thebes and abuse of Amphiktyonic jurisdiction, before the spoliation of the Delphian temple was consummated or even anticipated. And though, when that spoliation actually occurred, it was doubtless viewed with reprobation among Athenians, accustomed to unlimited freedom of public discussion—as well as at Sparta, in so far as it became known amidst the habitual secrecy of public affairs—nevertheless political interests so far prevailed, that the Phokians (perhaps in part by aid of bribery) were still countenanced, though not much assisted, as useful rivals to Thebes.[552] To restrain “the Leuktric insolence of the Thebans,”[553] and to see the Bœotian towns Orchomenus, Thespiæ, Platæa, restored to their pristine autonomy, was an object of paramount desire with each of the two ancient heads of Greece. So far both Athens and Sparta felt in unison. But Sparta cherished a farther hope—in which Athens by no means concurred—to avail herself of the embarrassments of Thebes for the purpose of breaking up Megalopolis and Messênê, and recovering her former Peloponnesian dominion. These two new Peloponnesian cities, erected by Epaminondas on the frontier of Laconia, had been hitherto upheld against Sparta by the certainty of Theban interference if they were menaced. But so little did Thebes seem in a condition to interfere, while Onomarchus and the Phokians were triumphant in 353-352 B. C., that the Megalopolitans despatched envoys to Athens to entreat protection and alliance, while the Spartans on their side sent to oppose the petition.

[552] Such is the description of Athenian feeling, as it then stood, given by Demosthenes twenty-four years afterwards in the Oration De Coronâ, p. 230. s. 21.

Τοῦ γὰρ Φωκικοῦ συστάντος πολέμου, πρῶτον μὲν ὑμεῖς οὕτω διέκεισθε, ὥστε Φωκέας μὲν βούλεσθαι σωθῆναι, καίπερ οὐ δίκαια ποιοῦντας ὁρῶντες, Θηβαίοις δ᾽ ὁτιοῦν ἂν ἐφησθῆναι παθοῦσιν, οὐκ ἀλόγως οὐδ᾽ ἀδίκως αὐτοῖς ὀργιζόμενοι, etc.

[553] Diodor. xvi. 58. Βουλόμενος τὰ Λευκτρικὰ φρονήματα συστεῖλαι τῶν Βοιωτῶν, etc., an expression used in reference to Philip a few years afterwards, but more animated and emphatic than we usually find in Diodorus, who, perhaps, borrowed it from Theopompus.

It is on occasion of the political debates in Athens during the years 354 and 353 B. C., that we first have before us the Athenian Demosthenes, as adviser of his countrymen in the public assembly. His first discourse of public advice was delivered in 354-353 B. C., on an alarm of approaching war with Persia; his second, in 353-352 B. C., was intended to point out the policy proper for Athens in dealing with the Spartan and Megalopolitan envoys.

A few words must here be said about this eminent man, who forms the principal ornament of the declining Hellenic world. He was about twenty-seven years old; being born, according to what seems the most probable among contradictory accounts, in 382-381 B. C.[554] His father, named also Demosthenes, was a citizen of considerable property, and of a character so unimpeachable that even Æschines says nothing against him; his mother Kleobulê was one of the two daughters and coheiresses of a citizen named Gylon,[555] an Athenian exile, who, having become rich as a proprietor of land and exporter of corn in Bosphorus, sent his two daughters to Athens; where, possessing handsome dowries, they married two Athenian citizens—Demochares and the elder Demosthenes. The latter was a man of considerable wealth, and carried on two distinct manufactories; one of swords or knives, employing thirty-two slaves—the other, of couches or beds, employing twenty. In the new schedule of citizens and of taxable property, introduced in the archonship of Nausinikus (378 B. C.), the elder Demosthenes was enrolled among the richest class, the leaders of Symmories. But he died about 375 B. C., leaving his son Demosthenes seven years old, with a younger daughter about five years of age. The boy and his large paternal property were confided to the care of three guardians named under his father’s will. These guardians—though the father, in hopes of ensuring their fidelity, had bequeathed to them considerable legacies, away from his own son, and though all of them were rich men as well as family connections and friends—administered the property with such negligence and dishonesty, that only a sum comparatively small was left, when they came to render account to their ward. At the age of sixteen years complete, Demosthenes attained his civil majority, and became entitled by the Athenian law to the administration of his own property. During his minority, his guardians had continued to enrol him among the wealthiest class (as his father had ranked before), and to pay the increased rate of direct taxation chargeable upon that class; but the real sum handed over to him by his guardians was too small to justify such a position. Though his father had died worth fourteen talents,—which would be diminished by the sums bequeathed as legacies, but ought to have been increased in greater proportion by the interest on the property for the ten years of minority, had it been properly administered—the sum paid to young Demosthenes on his majority was less than two talents, while the guardians not only gave in dishonest accounts, but professed not to be able to produce the father’s will. After repeated complaints and remonstrances, he brought a judicial action against one of them—Aphobus, and obtained a verdict carrying damages to the amount of ten talents. Payment however was still evaded by the debtor. Five speeches remain delivered by Demosthenes, three against Aphobus, two against Onêtor, brother-in-law of Aphobus. At the date of the latest oration, Demosthenes had still received nothing; nor do we know how much he ultimately realized, though it would seem that the difficulties thrown in his way were such as to compel him to forego the greater part of the claim. Nor is it certain whether he ever brought the actions, of which he speaks as intended, against the other two guardians Demophon and Therippides.[556]

[554] The birth-year of Demosthenes is matter of notorious controversy. No one of the statements respecting it rests upon evidence thoroughly convincing.

The question has been examined with much care and ability both by Mr. Clinton (Fasti Hellen. Appen. xx.) and by Dr. Thirlwall (Histor. G. vol. v. Appen. i. p. 485 seq.); by Böhnecke (Forschungen, p. 1-94) more copiously than cautiously, but still with much instruction; also by K. F. Hermann (De Anno Natali Demosthenis), and many other critics.

In adopting the year Olymp. 99. 3 (the archonship of Evander, 382-381 B. C.), I agree with the conclusion of Mr. Clinton and of K. F. Hermann; differing from Dr. Thirlwall, who prefers the previous year (Olymp. 99. 2)—and from Böhnecke, who vindicates the year affirmed by Dionysius (Olymp. 99. 4).

Mr. Clinton fixes the first month of Olymp. 99. 3, as the month in which Demosthenes was born. This appears to me greater precision than the evidence warrants.

[555] Plutarch, Demosth. c. 4; Æschines adv. Ktesiph. p. 78. c. 57; Demosth. cont. Aphob. B. p. 835. According to Æschines, Gylon was put on his trial for having betrayed Nymphæum to the enemy; but not appearing, was sentenced to death in his absence, and became an exile. He then went to Bosphorus (Pantikapæum), obtained the favor of the king (probably Satyrus—see Mr. Clinton’s Appendix on the kings of Bosphorus—Fasti Hellenic. Append. xiii, p. 282), together with the grant of a district called Kepi, and married the daughter of a rich man there; by whom he had two daughters. In after-days, he sent these two daughters to Athens, where one of them, Kleobulê, was married to the elder Demosthenes. Æschines has probably exaggerated the gravity of the sentence against Gylon, who seems only to have been fined. The guardians of Demosthenes assert no more than that Gylon was fined, and died with the fine unpaid, while Demosthenes asserts that the fine was paid.

Upon the facts here stated by Æschines, a few explanatory remarks will be useful. Demosthenes being born 382-381 B. C., this would probably throw the birth of his mother Kleobulê to some period near the close of the Peloponnesian war, 405-404 B. C. We see, therefore, that the establishment of Gylon in the kingdom of Bosphorus, and his nuptial connection there formed, must have taken place during the closing years of the Peloponnesian war; between 412 B. C. (the year after the Athenian catastrophe at Syracuse) and 405 B. C.

These were years of great misfortune to Athens. After the disaster at Syracuse, she could no longer maintain ascendency over, or grant protection to, a distant tributary like Nymphæum in the Tauric Chersonese. It was therefore natural that the Athenian citizens there settled, engaged probably in the export trade of corn to Athens, should seek security by making the best bargain they could with the neighboring kings of Bosphorus. In this transaction Gylon seems to have stood conspicuously forward, gaining both favor and profit to himself. And when, after the close of the war, the corn-trade again became comparatively unimpeded, he was in a situation to carry it on upon a large and lucrative scale. Another example of Greeks who gained favor, held office, and made fortunes, under Satyrus in the Bosphorus, is given in the Oratio (xvii.) Trapezitica of Isokrates, s. 3, 14. Compare also the case of Mantitheus the Athenian (Lysias pro Mantitheo, Or. xvi. s. 4), who was sent by his father to reside with Satyrus for some time, before the close of the Peloponnesian war; which shows that Satyrus was at that time, when Nymphæum was probably placed under his protection, in friendly relations with Athens.

I may remark that the woman whom Gylon married, though Æschines calls her a Scythian woman, may be supposed more probably to have been the daughter of some Greek (not an Athenian) resident in Bosphorus.

[556] Demosth. cont. Onetor. ii. p. 880. κεκομισμένον μηδ᾽ ὁτιοῦν, καὶ ταῦτ᾽ ἐθέλοντα ποιεῖν ὑμῖν αὐτοῖς, εἴτι τῶν δεόντων ἐβούλεσθε πράττειν.

That he ultimately got much less than he was entitled to, appears from his own statement in the oration against Meidias, p. 540.

See Westermann, De Litibus quas Demosthenes oravit ipse, cap. i. p. 15, 16.

Plutarch (Vit. X Oratt. p. 844) says that he voluntarily refrained from enforcing the judgment obtained. I do not clearly understand what is meant by Æschines (cont. Ktesiph. p. 78), when he designates Demosthenes as τὰ πατρῷα καταγελάστως προέμενος.

Demosthenes received during his youth the ordinary grammatical and rhetorical education of a wealthy Athenian. Even as a boy, he is said to have manifested extraordinary appetite and interest for rhetorical exercise. By earnest entreaty, he prevailed on his tutors to conduct him to hear Kallistratus, one of the ablest speakers in Athens, delivering an harangue in the Dikastery on the matter of Oropus.[557] This harangue, producing a profound impression upon Demosthenes, stimulated his fondness for rhetorical studies. Still more was the passion excited, when on attaining his majority, he found himself cheated of most of his paternal property, and constrained to claim his rights by a suit at law against his guardians. Being obliged, according to Athenian practice, to plead his own cause personally, he was made to feel keenly the helpless condition of an incompetent speaker, and the necessity of acquiring oratorical power, not simply as an instrument of ambition, but even as a means of individual defence and safety.[558] It appears also that he was, from childhood, of sickly constitution and feeble muscular frame; so that partly from his own disinclination, partly from the solicitude of his mother, he took little part either as boy or youth in the exercises of the palæstra. His delicate clothing, and somewhat effeminate habits, procured for him as a boy the nickname of Batalus, which remained attached to him most part of his life, and which his enemies tried to connect with degrading imputations.[559] Such comparative bodily disability probably contributed to incite his thirst for mental and rhetorical acquisitions, as the only road to celebrity open. But it at the same time disqualified him from appropriating to himself the full range of a comprehensive Grecian education, as conceived by Plato, Isokrates, and Aristotle; an education applying alike to thought, word, and action—combining bodily strength, endurance, and fearlessness, with an enlarged mental capacity and a power of making it felt by speech. The disproportion between the physical energy, and the mental force, of Demosthenes, beginning in childhood, is recorded and lamented in the inscription placed on his statue after his death.[560]

[557] Plutarch, Demosth. c. 5; Vit. X Orator. p. 844; Hermippus ap. Aul. Gell. iii. 13. Nothing positive can be made out respecting this famous trial; neither the date, nor the exact point in question, nor the manner in which Kallistratus was concerned in it—nor who were his opponents. Many conjectures have been proposed, differing materially one from the other, and all uncertain.

These conjectures are brought together and examined in Rehdantz, Vitæ Iphicratis, Chabriæ, et Timothei, p. 111-114.

In the month of November, 361 B. C., Kallistratus was in exile at Methônê in the Thermaic Gulf. He had been twice condemned to death by the Athenians (Demosth. cont. Polykl. p. 1221). But when these condemnations took place, we do not know.

[558] Plutarch. Demosth. c. 4. Such a view of the necessity of a power of public speaking, is put forward by Kallikles in the Gorgias of Plato, p. 486, 511. c. 90, 142. τὴν ῥητορικὴν τὴν ἐν τοῖς δικαστηρίοις ~διασώζουσαν~, etc. Compare Aristot. Rhetoric, i. 1, 3. Ἄτοπον, εἰ τῷ σώματι μὲν αἰσχρὸν μὴ δύνασθαι ~βοηθεῖν ἑαυτῷ~, λόγῳ δὲ, οὐκ αἰσχρόν· ὃ μᾶλλον ἴδιόν ἐστιν ἀνθρώπου τῆς τοῦ σώματος χρείας.

The comparison of Aristotle is instructive as to the point of view of a free Greek. “If it be disgraceful not to be able to protect yourself by your bodily force, it is equally so not to be able to protect yourself by your powers of speaking; which is in a more peculiar manner the privilege of man.” See also Tacitus, Dialog. de Orator. c. 5.

[559] Plutarch, Demosth. c. 4; Æschines cont. Timarch. p. 17, 18. c. 27, with Scholia, De Fal. Leg. p. 41. c. 31. εἰ γάρ τις σοῦ τὰ κομψὰ ταῦτα χλανίσκια περικλώμενος καὶ τοὺς μαλακοὺς χιτωνίσκους, ἐν οἷς τοὺς κατὰ τῶν φίλων λόγους γράφεις, περιενέγκας, δοίη εἰς τὰς χεῖρας τῶν δικαστῶν, οἶμαι ἂν αὐτοὺς εἴτις μὴ προειπὼν ταῦτα ποιήσειεν, ἀπορήσειν εἴτε γυναικὸς εἴτε ἀνδρὸς εἰλήφασιν ἐσθῆτα. Compare Æsch. Fal. Leg. p. 45.

The foundation of the nickname Batalus is not clear, and was differently understood by different persons; compare also Libanius, Vita Demosth. p. 294, ap Westermann, Scriptores Biographici. But it can hardly have been a very discreditable foundation, since Demosthenes takes the name to himself, De Coronâ, p. 289.

[560] Plutarch, Demosth. c. 30.

Εἴπερ ἴσην ῥώμην γνώμῃ, Δημόσθενες, εἶχες, Οὔποτ᾽ ἂν Ἑλλήνων ἦρξεν Ἄρης Μακεδών.

As a youth of eighteen years of age, Demosthenes found himself with a known and good family position at Athens, being ranked in the class of richest citizens and liable to the performance of liturgies and trierarchy as his father had been before him;[561] yet with a real fortune very inadequate to the outlay expected from him—embarrassed by a legal proceeding against guardians wealthy as well as unscrupulous—and an object of dislike and annoyance from other wealthy men, such as Meidias and his brother Thrasylochus,[562] friends of those guardians. His family position gave him a good introduction to public affairs, for which he proceeded to train himself carefully; first as a writer of speeches for others, next as a speaker in his own person. Plato and Isokrates were both at this moment in full celebrity, visited at Athens by pupils from every part of Greece; Isæus also, who had studied under Isokrates, was in great reputation as a composer of judicial harangues for plaintiffs or defendants in civil causes. Demosthenes put himself under the teaching of Isæus (who is said to have assisted him in composing the speeches against his guardians), and also profited largely by the discourse of Plato, of Isokrates, and others. As an ardent aspirant he would seek instruction from most of the best sources, theoretical as well as practical—writers as well as lecturers.[563] But besides living teachers, there was one of the past generation who contributed largely to his improvement. He studied Thucydides with indefatigable labor and attention; according to one account, he copied the whole history eight times over with his own hand; according to another, he learnt it all by heart, so as to be able to rewrite it from memory when the manuscript was accidentally destroyed. Without minutely criticising these details, we ascertain at least that Thucydides was the object of his peculiar study and imitation. How much the composition of Demosthenes was fashioned by the reading of Thucydides—reproducing the daring, majestic and impressive phraseology, yet without the overstrained brevity and involutions of that great historian—and contriving to blend with it a perspicuity and grace not inferior to Lysias—may be seen illustrated in the elaborate criticism of the rhetor Dionysius.[564]

[561] Position of Demosthenes, πατὴρ τριηραρχικὸς—χρυσέα κρηπὶς, κατὰ Πίνδαρον, etc. (Lucian, Encomium Demosth. vol. iii. p. 499, ed. Reitz.)

[562] See the account given by Demosthenes (cont. Meidiam, p. 539, 540) of the manner in which Meidias and Thrasylochus first began their persecution of him, while the suit against his guardians was still going on. These guardians attempted to get rid of the suit by inducing Thrasylochus to force upon him an exchange of properties (Antidosis), tendered by Thrasylochus, who had just been put down for a trierarchy. If the exchange had been effected, Thrasylochus would have given the guardians a release. Demosthenes could only avoid it by consenting to incur the cost of the trierarchy—20 minæ.

[563] Demosthenes both studied attentively the dialogues, and heard the discourse, of Plato (Cicero, Brutus, 31, 121; Orator. 4, 15; Plutarch, Vit. X Orator. p. 844). Tacitus, Dialog. de Orator. c. 32.

[564] Dionys. Hal. De Thucydide Judicium, p. 944; De Admirab. Vi. Dicend. Demosthen. p. 982, 983.

While thus striking out for himself a bold and original style, Demosthenes had still greater difficulties to overcome in regard to the external requisites of an orator. He was not endowed by nature, like Æschines, with a magnificent voice; nor, like Demades, with a ready flow of vehement improvisation. His thoughts required to be put together by careful preparation; his voice was bad and even lisping—his breath short—his gesticulation ungraceful; moreover he was overawed and embarrassed by the manifestations of the multitude. Such an accumulation of natural impediments were at least equal to those of which Isokrates complains, as having debarred him all his life from addressing the public assembly, and restrained him to a select audience of friends or pupils. The energy and success with which Demosthenes overcame his defects, in such manner as to satisfy a critical assembly like the Athenian, is one of the most memorable circumstances in the general history of self-education. Repeated humiliation and repulse only spurred him on to fresh solitary efforts for improvement. He corrected his defective elocution by speaking with pebbles in his mouth; he prepared himself to overcome the noise of the assembly by declaiming in stormy weather on the sea-shore of Phalerum; he opened his lungs by running, and extended his powers of holding breath by pronouncing sentences in marching up-hill; he sometimes passed two or three months without interruption in a subterranean chamber, practising night and day either in composition or declamation, and shaving one half of his head in order to disqualify himself from going abroad. After several trials without success before the assembly, his courage was on the point of giving way, when Eunomus and other old citizens reassured him by comparing the matter of his speeches to those of Perikles, and exhorting him to persevere a little longer in the correction of his external defects. On another occasion, he was pouring forth his disappointment to Satyrus the actor, who undertook to explain to him the cause, desiring him to repeat in his own way a speech out of Sophokles, which he (Satyrus) proceeded to repeat after him, with suitable accent and delivery. Demosthenes, profoundly struck with the difference, began anew the task of self-improvement; probably taking constant lessons from good models. In his unremitting private practice, he devoted himself especially to acquiring a graceful action, keeping watch on all his movements while declaiming before a tall looking-glass.[565] After pertinacious efforts for several years, he was rewarded at length with complete success. His delivery became full of decision and vehemence, highly popular with the general body of the assembly; though some critics censured his modulation as artificial and out of nature, and savoring of low stage-effect; while others, in the same spirit, condemned his speeches as over-labored and smelling of the lamp.[566]

[565] These and other details are given in Plutarch’s Life of Demosthenes, c. 4, 9. They depend upon good evidence; for he cites Demetrius the Phalerean, who heard them himself from Demosthenes in the latter years of his life. The subterranean chamber where Demosthenes practised, was shown at Athens even in the time of Plutarch.

Cicero (who also refers to Demetrius Phalereus), De Divinat. ii. 46, 96. Libanius, Zosimus, and Photius, give generally the same statements, with some variations.

[566] Plutarch, Demosth. c. 9. Ἐπεὶ τόλμαν γε καὶ θάρσος οἱ λεχθέντες ὑπ᾽ αὐτοῦ λόγοι τῶν γραφέντων μᾶλλον εἶχον· εἴ τι δεῖ πιστεύειν Ἐρατοσθένει καὶ Δημητρίῳ τῷ Φαληρεῖ καὶ τοῖς κωμικοῖς. Ὧν Ἐρατοσθένης μέν φησιν αὑτὸν ἐν τοῖς λόγοις ~πολλαχοῦ γεγονέναι παράβακχον~, ὁ δὲ Φαληρεὺς τὸν ἔμμετρον ἐκεῖνον ὅρκον ὀμόσαι ποτε πρὸς τὸν δῆμον ~ὥσπερ ἐνθουσιῶντα~. Again, c. 11. Τοῖς μὲν οὖν πολλοῖς ὑποκρινόμενος ἤρεσκε θαυμαστῶς, οἱ δὲ χαριέντες ~ταπεινὸν~ ἡγοῦντο καὶ ~ἀγεννὲς αὐτοῦ τὸ πλάσμα καὶ μαλακὸν~, ὧν καὶ Δημήτριος ὁ Φαληρεύς ἐστιν.

This sentence is illustrated by a passage in Quintilian, i. 8. 2. “Sit autem in primis lectio virilis, et cum suavitate quadam gravis: et non quidem prosæ similis—quia carmen est, et se poetæ canere testantur—non tamen in canticum dissoluta, nec plasmate (ut nunc a plerisque fit) effeminata.”

The meaning of plasma, in the technical language of rhetoricians contemporary with Quintilian, seems different from that which it bears in Dionysius, p. 1060-1061. But whether Plutarch has exactly rendered to us what Demetrius Phalereus said of Demosthenes—whether Demetrius spoke of the modulation of Demosthenes as being low and vulgar—I cannot but doubt. Æschines urges very different reproaches against him—overmuch labor and affectation, but combined with bitterness and malignity (adv. Ktesiph. p. 78-86). He denounces the character of Demosthenes as low and vulgar—but not his oratorical delivery. The expression ὥσπερ ἐνθουσιῶν, which Plutarch cites from Demetrius Phalereus, hardly suits well with ταπεινὸν καὶ ἀγεννές.

So great was the importance assigned by Demosthenes himself to these external means of effect, that he is said to have pronounced “Action” to be the first, second, and third requisite for an orator. If we grant this estimate to be correct, with reference to actual hearers, we must recollect that his speeches are, (not less truly than the history of Thucydides), “an everlasting possession rather than a display for momentary effect.” Even among his contemporaries, the effect of the speeches, when read apart from the speaker, was very powerful. There were some who thought that their full excellence could only be thus appreciated;[567] while to the after-world, who know them only by reading, they have been and still are the objects of an admiration reaching its highest pitch in the enthusiastic sentiment of the fastidious rhetor Dionysius.[568] The action of Demosthenes,—consummate as it doubtless was, and highly as he may himself have prized an accomplishment so laboriously earned,—produced its effect only in conjunction with the matter of Demosthenes; his thoughts, sentiments, words, and above all, his sagacity in appreciating and advising on the actual situation. His political wisdom, and his lofty patriotic idéal, are in truth quite as remarkable as his oratory. By what training he attained either the one or the other of these qualities, we are unfortunately not permitted to know. Our informants have little interest in him except as a speaker; they tell us neither what he learned, nor from whom, nor by what companions, or party-associates, his political point of view was formed. But we shall hardly err in supposing that his attentive meditation of Thucydides supplied him, not merely with force and majesty of expression, but also with that conception of Athens in her foretime which he is perpetually impressing on his countrymen,—Athens at the commencement of the Peloponnesian war, in days of exuberant energy, and under the advice of her noblest statesman.

[567] Plutarch, Demosth. c. 11. Αἰσίωνα δέ φησιν Ἕρμιππος, ἐρωτηθέντα περὶ τῶν πάλαι ῥητόρων καὶ τῶν καθ᾽ αὑτὸν, εἰπεῖν, ὡς ἀκούων μὲν ἄν τις ἐθαύμασεν ἐκείνους εὐκόσμως καὶ μεγαλοπρεπῶς τῷ δήμῳ διαλεγομένους, ~ἀναγινωσκόμενοι δὲ οἱ Δημοσθένους λόγοι~ πολὺ τῇ κατασκευῇ καὶ δυνάμει διαφέρουσιν.

[568] Dionys. Hal. De Adm. Vi Dicend. Demosth. p. 1022, a very remarkable passage.

In other respects, we are left in ignorance as to the mental history of Demosthenes. Before he acquired reputation as a public adviser, he was already known as a logographer, or composer of discourses to be delivered either by speakers in the public assembly or by litigants in the Dikastery; for which compositions he was paid, according to usual practice at Athens. He had also pleaded in person before the Dikastery; in support of an accusation preferred by others against a law, proposed by Leptines, for abrogating votes of immunity passed by the city in favor of individuals, and restraining such grants in future. Nothing can be more remarkable, in this speech against Leptines, than the intensity with which the young speaker enforces the necessity of strict and faithful adherence to engagements on the part of the people, in spite of great occasional inconvenience in so doing. It would appear that he was in habitual association with some wealthy youths,—among others, with Apollodorus son of the wealthy banker, Pasion, whom he undertook to instruct in the art of speaking. This we learn from the denunciations of his rival, Æschines;[569] who accuses him of having thus made his way into various wealthy families,—especially where there was an orphan youth and a widowed mother,—using unworthy artifices to defraud and ruin them. How much truth there may be in such imputations, we cannot tell. But Æschines was not unwarranted in applying to his rival the obnoxious appellations of logographer and sophist; appellations all the more disparaging, because Demosthenes belonged to a trierarchic family, of the highest class in point of wealth.[570]

[569] Æschines cont. Timarch. p. 16, 24.

[570] Æschines cont. Timarchum, p. 13, 17, 25, cont. Ktesiphont. p. 78. Περὶ δὲ τὴν καθ᾽ ἡμέραν δίαιταν τίς ἐστιν; Ἐκ τριηράρχου λογογράφος ἀνεφάνη, τὰ πατρῷα καταγελάστως προέμενος, etc.

See also Demosthenes, De Fals. Legat. p. 417-420.

Compare the shame of the rich youth Hippokrates, in the Platonic dialogue called Protagoras, when the idea is broached that he is about to visit Protagoras for the purpose of becoming himself a sophist (Plato, Protagor. p. 154 F, 163 A, cap. 8-19).

It will be proper here to notice another contemporary adviser, who stands in marked antithesis and rivalry to Demosthenes. Phokion was a citizen of small means, son of a pestle-maker. Born about the year 402 B. C., he was about twenty years older than Demosthenes. At what precise time his political importance commenced, we do not know; but he lived to the great age of eighty-four, and was a conspicuous man throughout the last half-century of his life. He becomes known first as a military officer, having served in subordinate command under Chabrias, to whom he was greatly attached, at the battle of Naxos in 376 B. C. He was a man of thorough personal bravery, and considerable talents for command; of hardy and enduring temperament, insensible to cold or fatigue; strictly simple in his habits, and above all, superior to every kind of personal corruption. His abstinence from plunder and peculation, when on naval expeditions, formed an honorable contrast with other Athenian admirals, and procured for him much esteem on the part of the maritime allies. Hence, probably, his surname of Phokion the Good.[571]

[571] Ælian, V. H. iii. 47; Plutarch, Phokion, c. 10; Cornelius Nepos, Phokion, c. 1.

I have already remarked how deep and strong was the hold acquired on the Athenian people, by any public man who once established for himself a character above suspicion on the score of personal corruption. Among Athenian politicians, but too many were not innocent on this point; moreover, even when a man was really innocent, there were often circumstances in his life which rendered more or less of doubt admissible against him; thus Demosthenes,—being known not only as a person of somewhat costly habits, but also as frequenting wealthy houses, and receiving money for speeches composed or rhetoric communicated,—was sure to be accused, justly or unjustly, by his enemies, of having cheated rich clients, and would never obtain unquestioned credit for a high pecuniary independence, even in regard to the public affairs; although he certainly was not corrupt, nor generally believed to be corrupt,—at least during the period which this volume embraces, down to the death of Philip.[572] But Phokion would receive neither money nor gifts from any one,—was notoriously and obviously poor,—went barefoot and without an upper garment even in very cold weather,—had only one female slave to attend on his wife; while he had enjoyed commands sufficient to enrich him if he had chosen. His personal incorruptibility thus stood forth prominently to the public eye; and combined as it was with bravery and fair generalship, procured for him testimonies of confidence greater than those accorded even to Perikles. He was elected no less than forty-five times to the annual office of Stratêgus or General of the city,—that is, one of the Board of Ten so denominated, the greatest executive function at Athens,—and elected too, without having ever on any occasion solicited the office, or even been present at the choice.[573] In all Athenian history, we read of no similar multiplication of distinct appointments and honors to the same individual.

[572] I introduce here this reservation as to time, not as meaning to affirm the contrary with regard to the period after Philip’s death, but as wishing to postpone for the present the consideration of the later charges against Demosthenes—the receipt of money from Persia, and the abstraction from the treasures of Harpalus. I shall examine these points at the proper time.

[573] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 8. Ὁμολογεῖται γὰρ, ὅτι πέντε καὶ τεσσαράκοντα στρατηγίας ἔλαβεν οὐδ᾽ ἅπαξ ἀρχαιρεσίοις παρατυχὼν, ἀλλ᾽ ἀπόντα μεταπεμπομένων αὐτὸν ἀεὶ καὶ χειροτονούντων, ὥστε θαυμάζειν τοὺς οὐκ εὖ φρονοῦντας τὸν δῆμον, ὅτι πλεῖστα τοῦ Φωκίωνος ἀντικρούοντος αὐτῷ καὶ μηδὲν εἰπόντος πώποτε μηδὲ πράξαντος πρὸς χάριν, ὥσπερ ἀξιοῦσι τοὺς βασιλεῖς τοῖς κόλαξι χρῆσθαι μετὰ τὸ κατὰ χειρὸς ὕδωρ, έχρῆτο οὗτος τοῖς μὲν κομψοτέροις καὶ ἱλαροῖς ἐν παιδιᾶς μέρει δημαγωγοῖς, ἐπὶ δὲ τὰς ἀρχὰς ἀεὶ νήφων καὶ σπουδάζων τὸν αὐστηρότατον καὶ φρονιμώτατον ἐκάλει τῶν πολιτῶν καὶ μόνον ἢ μᾶλλον ταῖς βουλήσεσιν αὐτοῦ καὶ ὁρμαῖς ἀντιτασσόμενον.

According to the picture of Athens and her democracy, as usually presented by historians, we are taught to believe that the only road open to honors or political influence, was, by a seductive address, and by courting the people with fine speeches, unworthy flattery, or unmeasured promises. Those who take this view of the Athenian character, will find it difficult to explain the career of Phokion. He was no orator,—from disdain rather than incompetence.[574] Besides receiving a good education, he had profited by the conversation of Plato, as well as of Xenokrates, in the Academy;[575] and we are not surprised that in their school he contracted a contempt for popular oratory, as well as a love for brief, concentrated, pungent reply. Once, when about to speak in public, he was observed to be particularly absorbed in thought. “You seem meditative, Phokion,” said a friend. “Ay, by Zeus,” was the reply; “I am meditating whether I cannot in some way abridge the speech which I am just about to address to the Athenians.” He knew so well, however, on what points to strike, that his telling brevity, strengthened by the weight of character and position, cut through the fine oratory of Demosthenes more effectively than any counter-oratory from men like Æschines. Demosthenes himself greatly feared Phokion as an opponent, and was heard to observe, on seeing him rise to speak, “Here comes the cleaver of my harangues.”[576] Polyeuktus,—himself an orator and a friend of Demosthenes,—drew a distinction highly complimentary to Phokion, by saying, that “Demosthenes was the finest orator, but Phokion the most formidable in speech.”[577] In public policy, in means of political effect, and in personal character,—Phokion was the direct antithesis of Demosthenes; whose warlike eloquence, unwarlike disposition, paid speech-writing, and delicate habits of life, he doubtless alike despised.

[574] Tacit. Dialog. de Clar. Orator. c. 2. “Aper, communi eruditione imbutus, contemnebat potius literas quam nesciebat.”

[575] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 4, 14.

[576] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 5. ἡ τῶν ἐμῶν λόγων κοπὶς πάρεστιν.

[577] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 5. εἰπεῖν—ὅτι ῥήτωρ μὲν ἄριστος εἴη Δημοσθένης, εἰπεῖν δὲ δεινότατος ὁ Φωκίων.

As Phokion had in his nature little of the professed orator, so he had still less of the flatterer. He affected and sustained the character of a blunt soldier, who speaks out his full mind without suppression or ornament, careless whether it be acceptable to hearers or not.[578] His estimate of his countrymen was thoroughly and undisguisedly contemptuous. This is manifest in his whole proceedings; and appears especially in the memorable remark ascribed to him, on an occasion when something that he had said in the public assembly met with peculiar applause. Turning round to a friend, he asked, “Have I not, unconsciously, said something bad?” His manners, moreover, were surly and repulsive, though his disposition is said to have been kind. He had learnt, in the Academy, a sort of Spartan self-suppression and rigor of life.[579] No one ever saw him either laughing, or weeping, or bathing in the public baths.

[578] So Tacitus, after reporting the exact reply of the tribune Subrias Flavius, when examined as an accomplice in the conspiracy against Nero—“Ipsa retuli verba: quia non, ut Senecæ, vulgata erant; nec minus nosci decebat sensus militaris viri incomptos sed validos.”

[579] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 4, 5.

If, then, Phokion attained the unparalleled honor of being chosen forty-five times general, we may be sure that there were other means of reaching it besides the arts of oratory and demagogy. We may indeed ask with surprise, how it was possible for him to attain it, in the face of so many repulsive circumstances, by the mere force of bravery and honesty; especially as he never performed any supereminent service,[580] though on various occasions he conducted himself with credit and ability. The answer to this question may be found in the fact that Phokion, though not a flatterer of the people, went decidedly along with the capital weakness of the people. While despising their judgment, he manifested no greater foresight, as to the public interests and security of Athens, than they did. The Athenian people had doubtless many infirmities and committed many errors; but the worst error of all, during the interval between 360-336 B. C., was their unconquerable repugnance to the efforts, personal and pecuniary, required for prosecuting a hearty war against Philip. Of this aversion to a strenuous foreign policy, Phokion made himself the champion;[581] addressing, in his own vein, sarcastic taunts against those who called for action against Philip, as if they were mere brawlers and cowards, watching for opportunities to enrich themselves at the public expense. Eubulus the orator was among the leading statesmen who formed what may be called the peace-party at Athens, and who continually resisted or discouraged energetic warlike efforts, striving to keep out of sight the idea of Philip as a dangerous enemy. Of this peace-party, there were doubtless some who acted corruptly, in the direct pay of Philip. But many others of them, without any taint of personal corruption, espoused the same policy merely because they found it easier, for the time, to administer the city under peace than under war—because war was burdensome and disagreeable, to themselves as well as to their fellow-citizens—and because they either did not, or would not, look forward to the consequences of inaction. Now it was a great advantage to this peace-party, who wanted a military leader as partner to their civil and rhetorical leaders, to strengthen themselves by a colleague like Phokion; a man not only of unsuspected probity, but peculiarly disinterested in advising peace, since his importance would have been exalted by war.[582] Moreover most of the eminent military leaders had now come to love only the license of war, and to disdain the details of the war-office at home; while Phokion,[583] and he almost alone among them, was content to stay at Athens, and keep up that combination of civil with military efficiency which had been, formerly, habitual. Hence he was sustained, by the peace-party and by the aversion to warlike effort prevalent among the public, in a sort of perpetuity of the strategic functions, without any solicitation or care for personal popularity on his own part.

[580] Cornelius Nepos (Phocion, c. 1) found in his authors no account of the military exploits of Phokion but much about his personal integrity.

[581] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 8. Οὕτω δὲ συντάξας ἑαυτὸν ἐπολιτεύετο μὲν ἀεὶ πρὸς εἰρήνην καὶ ἡσυχίαν, etc.

[582] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 16. See the first repartee there ascribed to Phokion.

[583] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 7.

The influence of Phokion as a public adviser, during the period embraced in this volume, down to the battle of Chæroneia, was eminently mischievous to Athens: all the more mischievous, partly (like that of Nikias) from the respectability of his personal qualities—partly because he espoused and sanctioned the most dangerous infirmity of the Athenian mind. His biographers mislead our judgment by pointing our attention chiefly to the last twenty years of his long life, after the battle of Chæroneia. At that time, when the victorious military force of Macedonia had been fully organized, and that of Greece comparatively prostrated, it might be argued plausibly (I do not say decisively, even then) that submission to Macedonia had become a fatal necessity; and that attempts to resist could only end by converting bad into worse. But the peace-policy of Phokion—which might be called prudence after the accession of Alexander—was ruinously imprudent as well as dishonorable during the reign of Philip. The odds were all against Philip in his early years; they shifted and became more and more in his favor, only because his game was played well, and that of his opponents badly. The superiority of force was at first so much on the side of Athens, that if she had been willing to employ it, she might have made sure of keeping Philip at least within the limits of Macedonia. All depended upon her will; upon the question, whether her citizens were prepared in their own minds to incur the expense and fatigue of a vigorous foreign policy—whether they would handle their pikes, open their purses, and forego the comforts of home, for the maintenance of Grecian and Athenian liberty against a growing, but not as yet irresistible destroyer. To such a sacrifice the Athenians could not bring themselves to submit; and in consequence of that reluctance, they were driven in the end to a much graver and more irreparable sacrifice—the loss of liberty, dignity, and security. Now it was precisely at such a moment, and when such a question was pending, that the influence of the peace-loving Phokion was most ruinous. His anxiety that the citizens should be buried at home in their own sepulchres—his despair, mingled with contempt, of his countrymen and their refined habits—his hatred of the orators who might profit by an increased war-expenditure[584]—all contributed to make him discourage public effort, and await passively the preponderance of the Macedonian arms; thus playing the game of Philip, and siding, though himself incorruptible, with the orators in Philip’s pay.

[584] See the replies of Phokion in Plutarch, Phokion, c. 23.

The love of peace, either in a community or in an individual, usually commands sympathy without farther inquiry, though there are times of growing danger from without, in which the adviser of peace is the worst guide that can be followed. Since the Peloponnesian war, a revolution had been silently going on in Greece, whereby the duties of soldiership had passed to a great degree from citizen militia into the hands of paid mercenaries. The resident citizens generally had become averse to the burden of military service; while on the other hand the miscellaneous aggregate of Greeks willing to carry arms anywhere and looking merely for pay, had greatly augmented. Very differently had the case once stood. The Athenian citizen of 432 B. C.—by concurrent testimony of the eulogist Perikles and of the unfriendly Corinthians—was ever ready to brave the danger, fatigue, and privation, of foreign expeditions, for the glory of Athens. “He accounted it holidaywork to do duty in her service (it is an enemy who speaks[585]); he wasted his body for her as though it had been the body of another.” Embracing with passion the idea of imperial Athens, he knew that she could only be upheld by the energetic efforts of her individual citizens, and that the talk in her public assemblies, though useful as a preliminary to action, was mischievous if allowed as a substitute for action.[586] Such was the Periklean Athenian of 431 B. C. But this energy had been crushed in the disasters closing the Peloponnesian war, and had never again revived. The Demosthenic Athenian of 360 B. C. had as it were grown old. Pugnacity, Pan-hellenic championship, and the love of enterprise, had died within him. He was a quiet, home-keeping, refined citizen, attached to the democratic constitution, and executing with cheerful pride his ordinary city-duties under it; but immersed in industrial or professional pursuits, in domestic comforts, in the impressive manifestations of the public religion, in the atmosphere of discussion and thought, intellectual as well as political. To renounce all this for foreign and continued military service, he considered as a hardship not to be endured, except under the pressure of danger near and immediate. Precautionary exigencies against distant perils, however real, could not be brought home to his feelings; even to pay others for serving in his place, was a duty which he could scarcely be induced to perform.

[585] I have more than once referred to the memorable picture of the Athenian character, in contrast with the Spartan, drawn by the Corinthian envoy at Sparta in 432 B. C. (Thucyd. i. 70, 71). Among the many attributes, indicative of exuberant energy and activity, I select those which were most required, and most found wanting, as the means of keeping back Philip.

1. Παρὰ δύναμιν τολμηταὶ, καὶ παρὰ γνώμην κινδυνευταὶ, καὶ ἐν τοῖς δεινοῖς εὐέλπιδες.

2. Ἄοκνοι πρὸς ὑμᾶς μελλητὰς καὶ ~ἀποδημηταὶ πρὸς ἐνδημοτάτους~ (in opposition to you, Spartans).

3. ~Τοῖς μὲν σώμασιν ἀλλοτριωτάτοις ὑπὲρ τῆς πόλεως χρῶνται~, τῇ γνώμῃ δὲ οἰκειοτάτῃ ἐς τὸ πράσσειν τι ὑπὲρ αὐτῆς, etc.

4. ~Καὶ ταῦτα μετὰ πόνων πάντα καὶ κινδύνων δι᾽ ὅλου τοῦ αἰῶνος μοχθοῦσι~, καὶ ~ἀπολαύουσιν ἐλάχιστα τῶν ὑπαρχόντων~, διὰ τὸ ἀεὶ κτᾶσθαι καὶ μήτε ~ἑορτὴν ἄλλο τι ἡγεῖσθαι ἢ τὸ τὰ δέοντα πρᾶξαι~, ξυμφοράν τε οὐχ ἧσσον ἡσυχίαν ἀπράγμονα ἢ ἀσχολίαν ἐπίπονον, etc.

To the same purpose Perikles expresses himself in his funeral oration of the ensuing year; extolling the vigor and courage of his countrymen, as alike forward and indefatigable—yet as combined also with a love of public discussion, and a taste for all the refinements of peaceful and intellectual life (Thucyd. ii. 40, 41).

[586] Thucyd. ii. 40, 41, 43. τῆς πόλεως δύναμιν καθ᾽ ἡμέραν ἔργῳ θεωμένους καὶ ἐραστὰς γιγνομένους αὐτῆς, καὶ ὅταν ὑμῖν μεγάλη δόξῃ εἶναι, ἐνθυμουμένους ὅτι τολμῶντες καὶ γιγνώσκοντες τὰ δέοντα καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἔργοις αἰσχυνόμενοι ἄνδρες αὐτὰ ἐκτήσαντο, etc.

Compare ii. 63—the last speech of Perikles.

Not merely in Athens, but also among the Peloponnesian allies of Sparta, the resident citizens had contracted the like indisposition to military service. In the year 431 B. C., these Peloponnesians (here too we have the concurrent testimony of Perikles and Archidamus[587]) had been forward for service with their persons, and only backward when asked for money. In 383 B. C., Sparta found them so reluctant to join her standard, especially for operations beyond sea, that she was forced to admit into her confederacy the principle of pecuniary commutation;[588] just as Athens had done (about 460-450 B. C.) with the unwarlike islanders enrolled in her confederacy of Delos.[589]

[587] Thucyd. i. 80, 81, 141.

[588] Xenoph. Hellen. v. 2, 21. The allied cities furnished money instead of men in the expedition of Mnasippus to Korkyra (Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 2, 16).

[589] Thucyd. i. 99.

Amidst this increasing indisposition to citizen military service, the floating, miscellaneous bands who made soldiership a livelihood under any one who would pay them, increased in number from year to year. In 402-401 B. C., when the Cyreian army (the Ten Thousand Greeks) were levied, it had been found difficult to bring so many together; large premiums were given to the chiefs or enlisting agents; the recruits consisted, in great part, of settled men tempted by lucrative promises away from their homes.[590] But active men ready for paid foreign service were perpetually multiplying, from poverty, exile, or love of enterprise[591]; they were put under constant training and greatly improved, by Iphikrates and others, as peltasts or light infantry to serve in conjunction with the citizen force of hoplites. Jason of Pheræ brought together a greater and better trained mercenary force than had ever been seen since the Cyreians in their upward march[592]; the Phokians also in the Sacred War, having command over the Delphian treasures, surrounded themselves with a formidable array of mercenary soldiers. There arose (as in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries in modern Europe) Condottieri like Charidemus and others—generals having mercenary bands under their command, and hiring themselves out to any prince or potentate who would employ and pay them. Of these armed rovers—poor, brave, desperate, and held by no civic ties—Isokrates makes repeated complaint, as one of the most serious misfortunes of Greece.[593] Such wanderers, indeed, usually formed the natural emigrants in new colonial enterprises. But it so happened that few Hellenic colonies were formed during the interval between 400-350 B. C.; in fact, the space open to Hellenic colonization was becoming more circumscribed by the peace of Antalkidas—by the despotism of Dionysius—and by the increase of Lucanians, Bruttians, and the inland powers generally. Isokrates, while extolling the great service formerly rendered to the Hellenic world by Athens, in setting on foot the Ionic emigration, and thus providing new homes for so many unsettled Greeks—insists on the absolute necessity of similar means of emigration in his own day. He urges on Philip to put himself at the head of an Hellenic conquest of Asia Minor, and thus to acquire territory which might furnish settlement to the multitudes of homeless, roving, exiles, who lived by the sword, and disturbed the peace of Greece.[594]

[590] Isokrates, Orat. v. (Philipp.) s. 112. ... ἐν ἐκείνοις δὲ τοῖς χρόνοις οὐκ ἦν ξενικὸν οὐδὲν, ὥστ᾽ ἀναγκαζόμενοι ξενολογεῖν ἐκ τῶν πόλεων, πλέον ἀνήλισκον εἰς τὰς διδομένας τοῖς συλλέγουσι δωρεὰς, ἢ τὴν εἰς τοὺς στρατιώτας μισθοφοράν.

About the liberal rewards of Cyrus to the generals Klearchus, Proxenus, and others, for getting together the army, and to the soldiers themselves also, see Xenoph. Anabas. i. 1, 9; i. 3, 4; iii. 1, 4; vi. 8, 48.

[591] See the mention of the mercenary Greeks in the service of the satrapess Mania in Æolis—of the satraps, Tissaphernes and Pharnabazus, and of the Spartan Agesilaus—Iphikrates and others, Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 1, 13; iii. 3, 15; iv. 2, 5; iv. 3, 15; iv. 4, 14; iv. 8, 35; vii. 5, 10.

Compare Harpokration—Ξενικὸν ἐν Κορίνθῳ—and Demosthenes, Philipp. i. p. 46.

[592] Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 1, 5.

[593] Isokrates pours forth this complaint in many places: in the fourth or Panegyrical Oration (B. C. 380); in the eighth or Oratio de Pace (356 B. C.); in the fifth or Oratio ad Philippum (346 B. C.). The latest of these discourses is delivered in the strongest language. See Orat. Panegyr. s. 195 τοὺς δ᾽ ἐπὶ ξένης μετὰ παιδῶν καὶ γυναικῶν ἀλᾶσθαι, πολλοὺς δὲ δι᾽ ἔνδειαν τῶν καθ᾽ ἡμέραν ἐπικουρεῖν (i. e. to become an ἐπικοῦρος, or paid soldier in foreign service) ἀναγκαζομένους ὑπὲρ τῶν ἐχθρῶν τοῖς φίλοις μαχομένους ἀποθνήσκειν. See also Orat. De Pace (viii.) s. 53, 56, 58; Orat. ad. Philipp. (v.) s. 112. οὕτω γὰρ ἔχει τὰ τῆς Ἑλλάδος, ὥστε ῥᾷον εἶναι συστῆσαι στρατόπεδον μεῖζον καὶ κρεῖττον ἐκ τῶν πλανωμένων ἢ τῶν πολιτευομένων, etc.... also s. 142, 149; Orat. de Permutat. (xv.) s. 122. ἐν τοῖς στρατοπέδοις τοῖς πλανωμένοις κατατετριμμένος, etc. A melancholy picture of the like evils is also presented in the ninth Epistle of Isokrates, to Archidamus, s. 9, 12. Compare Demosth. cont. Aristokrat. p. 665. s. 162.

For an example of a disappointed lover who seeks distraction by taking foreign military service, see Theokritus, xiv. 58.

[594] Isokrates ad Philipp. (v.) s. 142-144. πρὸς δὲ τούτοις κτίσαι πόλεις ἐπὶ τούτῳ τῷ τόπῳ, καὶ κατοικίσαι τοὺς νῦν μὲν πλανωμένους δι᾽ ἔνδειαν τῶν καθ᾽ ἡμέραν καὶ λυμαινομένους οἷς ἂν ἐντύχωσιν. Οὓς εἰ μὴ παύσομεν ἀθροιζομένους, βίον αὐτοῖς ἱκανὸν πορίσαντες, λήσουσιν ἡμᾶς τοσοῦτοι γενόμενοι τὸ πλῆθος, ὥστε μηδὲν ἧττον αὐτοὺς εἶναι φοβεροὺς τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἢ τοῖς βαρβάροις, etc.

This decline of the citizen militia, and growing aversion to personal service, or military exercises—together with the contemporaneous increase of the professional soldiery unmoved by civic obligations—is one of the capital facts of the Demosthenic age. Though not peculiar to Athens, it strikes us more forcibly at Athens, where the spirit of self-imposed individual effort had once been so high wrought—but where also the charm and stimulus[595] of peaceful existence was most diversified, and the activity of industrial pursuit most continuous. It was a fatal severance of the active force of society from political freedom and intelligence breaking up that many-sided combination, of cultivated thought with vigorous deed, which formed the Hellenic idéal—and throwing the defence of Greece upon armed men looking up only to their general or their paymaster. But what made it irreparably fatal, was that just at this moment the Grecian world was thrown upon its defence against Macedonia led by a young prince of indefatigable enterprise; who had imbibed, and was capable even of improving, the best ideas of military organization[596] started by Epaminondas and Iphikrates. Philip (as described by his enemy Demosthenes) possessed all that forward and unconquerable love of action which the Athenians had manifested in 431 B. C., as we know from enemies as well as from friends; while the Macedonian population also retained, amidst rudeness and poverty, that military aptitude and readiness which had dwindled away within the walls of the Grecian cities.

[595] Thucyd. ii. 41 (the funeral harangue of Perikles)—ξυνελών τε λέγω τήν τε πόλιν πᾶσαν τῆς Ἑλλάδος παίδευσιν εἶναι, καὶ καθ᾽ ἕκαστον δοκεῖν ἄν μοι τὸν αὐτὸν ἄνδρα παρ᾽ ἡμῶν ἐπὶ πλεῖστ᾽ ἂν εἴδη καὶ μετὰ χαρίτων μάλιστ᾽ ἂν εὐτραπέλως τὸ σῶμα αὔταρκες παρέχεσθαι.

[596] The remarkable organization of the Macedonian army, with its systematic combination of different arms and sorts of troops—was the work of Philip. Alexander found it ready made to his hands, in the very first months of his reign. It must doubtless have been gradually formed; year after year improved by Philip; and we should be glad to be enabled to trace the steps of his progress. But unfortunately we are left without any information about the military measures of Philip, beyond bare facts and results. Accordingly I am compelled to postpone what is to be said about the Macedonian military organization until the reign of Alexander, about whose operations we have valuable details.

Though as yet neither disciplined nor formidable, they were an excellent raw material for soldiers, in the hands of an organizing genius like Philip. They were still (as their predecessors had been in the time of the first Perdikkas,[597] when the king’s wife baked cakes with her own hand on the hearth), mountain shepherds ill-clothed and ill-housed—eating and drinking from wooden platters and cups—destitute to a great degree, not merely of cities, but of fixed residences.[598] The men of substance were armed with breastplates and made good cavalry; but the infantry were a rabble destitute of order,[599] armed with wicker shields and rusty swords, and contending at disadvantage, though constantly kept on the alert, to repel the inroads of their Illyrian or Thracian neighbors. Among some Macedonian tribes, the man who had never slain an enemy was marked by a degrading badge.[600] These were the men whom Philip on becoming king found under his rule; not good soldiers, but excellent recruits to be formed into soldiers. Poverty, endurance, and bodies inured to toil, were the natural attributes, well appreciated by ancient politicians, of a military population destined to make conquests. Such had been the native Persians, at their first outburst under Cyrus the Great; such were even the Greeks at the invasion of Xerxes, when the Spartan King Demaratus reckoned poverty both as an inmate of Greece, and as a guarantee of Grecian courage.[601]

[597] Herodot. viii. 137.

[598] This poor condition of the Macedonian population at the accession of Philip, is set forth in the striking speech made thirty-six years afterwards by Alexander the Great (in 323 B. C., a few months before his death) to his soldiers, satiated with conquest and plunder, but discontented with his increasing insolence and Orientalism.

Arrian, Exp. Alex. vii. 9. Φίλιππος γὰρ παραλαβὼν ὑμᾶς πλανήτας καὶ ἀπόρους, ἐν διφθέραις τοὺς πολλοὺς νέμοντας ἀνὰ τὰ ὄρη πρόβατα κατὰ ὀλίγα, καὶ περὶ τούτων κακῶς μαχομένους Ἰλλυρίοις καὶ Τριβαλλοῖς καὶ τοῖς ὁμόροις Θρᾳξὶ, χλαμύδας μὲν ὑμῖν ἀντὶ τῶν διφθερῶν φορεῖν ἔδωκε, κατήγαγε δὲ ἐκ τῶν ὀρῶν ἐς τὰ πεδία, etc.

Other points are added in the version given by Quintus Curtius of the same speech (x. 10)—“En tandem! Illyriorum paulo ante et Persarum tributariis, Asia et tot gentium spolia fastidio sunt. Modo sub Philippo seminudis, amicula ex purpura sordent: aurum et argentum oculi ferre non possunt; lignea enim vasa desiderant, et ex cratibus scuta et rubiginem gladiorum.”

[599] Thucydides (ii. 100) recognizes the goodness of the Macedonian cavalry: so also Xenophon, in the Spartan expedition against Olynthus (Hellen. v. 2, 40).

That the infantry were of little military efficiency, we see from the judgment of Brasidas—Thucyd. iv. 26. compare also ii. 100.

See O. Müller’s short tract on the Macedonians, annexed to his History of the Dorians, s. 33.

[600] Aristot. Polit. vii. 2, 6.

[601] Herodot. vii. 102. τῇ Ἑλλάδι πενίη μὲν αἰεί κοτε σύντροφός ἐστι, etc.

About the Persians, Herodot. i. 71; Arrian, v. 4, 13.

Now it was against these rude Macedonians, to whom camp-life presented chances of plunder without any sacrifice, that the industrious and refined Athenian citizen had to go forth and fight, renouncing his trade, family, and festivals; a task the more severe, as the perpetual aggressions and systematized warfare of his new enemies could only be countervailed by an equal continuity of effort on his part. For such personal devotion, combined with the anxieties of preventive vigilance, the Athenians of the Periklean age would have been prepared, but those of the Demosthenic age were not; though their whole freedom and security were in the end found to be at stake.

Without this brief sketch of the great military change in Greece since the Peloponnesian war—the decline of the citizen force and the increase of mercenaries—the reader would scarcely understand either the proceedings of Athens in reference to Philip, or the career of Demosthenes on which we are now about to enter.

Having by assiduous labor acquired for himself these high powers both of speech and of composition, Demosthenes stood forward in 354 B. C. to devote them to the service of the public. His first address to the assembly is not less interesting, objectively, as a memorial of the actual Hellenic political world in that year—than subjectively, as an evidence of his own manner of appreciating its exigencies.[602] At that moment, the predominant apprehension at Athens arose from reports respecting the Great King, who was said to be contemplating measures of hostility against Greece, and against Athens in particular, in consequence of the aid recently lent by the Athenian general Chares to the revolted Persian satrap Artabazus. By this apprehension—which had already, in part, determined the Athenians (a year before) to make peace with their revolted insular allies, and close the Social War—the public mind still continued agitated. A Persian armament of three hundred sail, with a large force of Grecian mercenaries—and an invasion of Greece—was talked of as probable.[603] It appears that Mausôlus, prince or satrap of Karia, who had been the principal agent in inflaming the Social War, still prosecuted hostilities against the islands even after the peace, announcing that he acted in execution of the king’s designs; so that the Athenians sent envoys to remonstrate with him.[604] The Persians seem also to have been collecting inland forces, which were employed some years afterwards in reconquering Egypt, but of which the destination was not at this moment declared. Hence the alarm now prevalent at Athens. It is material to note—as a mark in the tide of events—that few persons as yet entertained apprehensions about Philip of Macedon, though that prince was augmenting steadily his military force as well as his conquests. Nay, Philip afterwards asserted that during this alarm of Persian invasion, he was himself one of the parties invited to assist in the defence of Greece.[605]

[602] The oration De Symmoriis is placed by Dionysius of Halikarnassus in the archonship of Diotimus, 354-353 B. C. (Dionys. Hal. ad Ammæum. p. 724). And it is plainly composed prior to the expedition sent by the Thebans under Pammenês to assist the revolted Artabazus against the Great King; which expedition is placed by Diodorus (xvi. 34) in the ensuing year 353-352 B. C. Whoever will examine the way in which Demosthenes argues, in the Oration De Symmoriis (p. 187. s. 40-42), as to the relations of the Thebans with Persia—will see that he cannot have known anything about assistance given by the Thebans to Artabazus against Persia.

[603] Diodor. xvi. 21.

[604] Demosthenes cont. Timokratem, s. 15; see also the second Argument prefixed to that Oration.

[605] See Epistola Philipp. ap. Demosthen. p. 160. s. 6.

Though the Macedonian power had not yet become obviously formidable, we trace in the present speech of Demosthenes that same Pan-hellenic patriotism which afterwards rendered him so strenuous in blowing the trumpet against Philip. The obligation incumbent upon all Greeks, but upon Athens especially, on account of her traditions and her station, to uphold Hellenic liberty against the foreigner at all cost, is insisted on with an emphasis and dignity worthy of Perikles.[606] But while Demosthenes thus impresses upon his countrymen noble and Pan-hellenic purposes, he does not rest content with eloquent declamation, or negative criticism on the past. His recommendations as to means are positive and explicit; implying an attentive survey and a sagacious appreciation of the surrounding circumstances. While keeping before his countrymen a favorable view of their position, he never promises them success except on condition of earnest and persevering individual efforts, with arms and with money: and he exhausts all his invention in the unpopular task of shaming them, by direct reproach as well as by oblique insinuation, out of that aversion to personal military service, which, for the misfortune of Athens, had become a confirmed habit. Such positive and practical character as to means, always contemplating the full exigencies of a given situation—combined with the constant presentation of Athens as the pledged champion of Grecian freedom, and with appeals to Athenian foretime, not as a patrimony to rest upon, but as an example to imitate—constitute the imperishable charm of these harangues of Demosthenes, not less memorable than their excellence as rhetorical compositions. In the latter merit, indeed, his rival Æschines is less inferior to him than in the former.

[606] Demosthenes, De Symmoriis, p. 179. s. 7. Οὐδὲ γὰρ οὐδ᾽ ἀπ᾽ ἴσης ὁρῶ τοῖς τ᾽ ἄλλοις Ἕλλησι καὶ ὑμῖν περὶ τῶν πρὸς τὸν βασιλέα τὴν βουλὴν οὖσαν—ἀλλ᾽ ἐκείνων μὲν πολλοῖς ἐνδέχεσθαί μοι δοκεῖ τῶν ἰδίᾳ τι συμφερόντων διοικουμένοις τῶν ἄλλων Ἑλλήνων ἀμελῆσαι, ὑμῖν δ᾽ οὐδ᾽ ἀδικουμένοις παρὰ τῶν ἀδικούντων καλόν ἐστι λαβεῖν ταύτην τὴν δίκην, ἐᾶσαί τινας αὐτῶν ὑπὸ τῷ βαρβάρῳ γενέσθαι.

In no one of the speeches of Demosthenes is the spirit of practical wisdom more predominant than in this his earliest known discourse to the public assembly—on the Symmories—delivered by a young man of twenty-seven years of age, who could have had little other teaching except from the decried classes of sophists, rhetors, and actors. While proclaiming the king of Persia as the common and dangerous enemy of the Grecian name, he contends that no evidence of impending Persian attack had yet transpired, sufficiently obvious and glaring to warrant Athens in sending round[607] to invoke a general league of Greeks, as previous speakers had suggested. He deprecates on the one hand any step calculated to provoke the Persian king or bring on a war—and on the other hand, any premature appeal to the Greeks for combination, before they themselves were impressed with a feeling of common danger. Nothing but such common terror could bring about union among the different Hellenic cities; nothing else could silence those standing jealousies and antipathies, which rendered intestine war so frequent, and would probably enable the Persian king to purchase several Greeks for his own allies against the rest.

[607] Demosthen. De Symmor. p. 181. s. 14.

“Let us neither be immoderately afraid of the Great King, nor on the other hand be ourselves the first to begin the war and wrong him—as well on our own account as from the bad feeling and mistrust prevalent among the Greeks around us. If indeed we, with the full and unanimous force of Greece, could attack him unassisted, I should have held that even wrong, done towards him, was no wrong at all. But since this is impossible, I contend that we must take care not to give the king a pretence for enforcing claims of right on behalf of the other Greeks. While we remain quiet, he cannot do any such thing without being mistrusted; but if we have been the first to begin war, he will naturally seem to mean sincere friendship to the others, on account of their aversion to us. Do not, therefore, expose to light the sad distempers of the Hellenic world, by calling together its members when you will not persuade them, and by going to war when you will have no adequate force; but keep the peace, confiding in yourselves, and making full preparation.”[608]

[608] Demosthen. De Symmor. p. 188. s. 42-46. ... Ὥστ᾽ οὔτε φοβεῖσθαί φημι δεῖν πέρα τοῦ μετρίου, οὔθ᾽ ὑπαχθῆναι προτέρους ἐκφέρειν τὸν πόλεμον....

... Τοῦτον ἡμεῖς φοβώμεθα; μηδαμῶς· ἀλλὰ μηδ᾽ ἀδικῶμεν, ~αὐτῶν ἡμῶν ἕνεκα καὶ τῆς τῶν ἄλλων Ἑλλήνων ταραχῆς καὶ ἀπιστίας~· ἐπεὶ εἴ γ᾽ ὁμοθυμαδὸν ἦν μετὰ πάντων ἐπιθέσθαι μόνῳ, οὐδ᾽ ἀδικεῖν ἡμᾶς ἐκεῖνον ἀδίκημ᾽ ἂν ἔθηκα. Ἐπειδὴ δὲ τοῦθ᾽ οὕτως ἔχει, φυλάττεσθαί φημι δεῖν μὴ πρόφασιν δῶμεν βασιλεῖ τοῦ τὰ δίκαια ὑπὲρ τῶν ἄλλων Ἑλλήνων ζητεῖν· ἡσυχίαν μὲν γὰρ ἐχόντων ὑμῶν, ὕποπτος ἂν εἴη τοιοῦτό τι πράττων—πόλεμον δὲ ποιησαμένων προτέρων ~εἰκότως ἂν δοκοίη διὰ τὴν πρὸς ὑμᾶς ἐχθρὰν τοῖς ἄλλοις φίλος~ εἶναι βούλεσθαι. ~Μὴ οὖν ἐξελέγξητε ὡς κακῶς ἔχει τὰ Ἑλληνικὰ, συγκαλοῦντες ὅτ᾽ οὐ πείσετε, καὶ πολεμοῦντες ὅτ᾽ οὐ δυνήσεσθε· ἀλλ᾽ ἔχετε ἡσυχίαν θαῤῥοῦντες καὶ παρασκευαζόμενοι~.

It is this necessity of making preparation, which constitutes the special purpose of Demosthenes in his harangue. He produces an elaborate plan, matured by careful reflection,[609] for improving and extending the classification by Symmories; proposing a more convenient and systematic distribution of the leading citizens as well as of the total financial and nautical means—such as to ensure both the ready equipment of armed force whenever required, and a fair apportionment both of effort and of expense among the citizens. Into the details of this plan of economical reform, which are explained with the precision of an administrator and not with the vagueness of a rhetor, I do not here enter; especially as we do not know that it was actually adopted. But the spirit in which it was proposed deserves all attention, as proclaiming, even at this early day, the home-truth which the orator reiterates in so many subsequent harangues. “In the preparation which I propose to you, Athenians (he says), the first and most important point is, that your minds shall be so set, as that each man individually will be willing and forward in doing his duty. For you see plainly, that of all those matters on which you have determined collectively, and on which each man individually has looked upon the duty of execution as devolving upon himself—not one has ever slipped through your hands; while, on the contrary, whenever, after determination has been taken, you have stood looking at one another, no man intending to do anything himself, but every one throwing the burthen of action upon his neighbor—nothing has ever succeeded. Assuming you, therefore, to be thus disposed and wound up to the proper pitch, I recommend,”[610] etc.

[609] Demosthen. De Symmor. p. 181. s. 17. Τὴν μὲν παρασκευὴν, ὅπως ὡς ἄριστα καὶ τάχιστα γενήσεται, πάνυ πολλὰ πράγματα ἔσχον σκοπῶν.

[610] Demosthenes, De Symmoriis, p. 182. s. 18. Ἔστι τοίνυν πρῶτον μὲν τῆς παρασκευῆς, ὦ ἄνδρες Ἀθηναῖοι, καὶ μέγιστον, οὕτω διακεῖσθαι τὰς γνώμας ὑμᾶς, ὡς ἕκαστον ἕκοντα προθύμως ὅ,τι ἂν δέῃ ποιήσοντα. Ὁρᾶτε γὰρ, ὦ ἄνδρες Ἀθηναῖοι, ~ὅτι, ὅσα μὲν πώποθ᾽ ἅπαντες ὑμεῖς ἠβουλήθητε, καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα τὸ πράττειν αὐτὸς ἕκαστος ἑαυτῷ προσήκειν ἡγήσατο, οὐδὲν πώποθ᾽ ὑμᾶς ἐξέφυγεν~· ὅσα δ᾽ ἠβουλήθητε μὲν, μετὰ ~ταῦτα δ᾽ ἀπεβλέψατε πρὸς ἀλλήλους ὡς αὐτὸς μὲν ἕκαστος οὐ ποιήσων, τὸν δὲ πλησίον πράξοντα~, οὐδὲν πώποθ᾽ ὑμῖν ἐγένετο. Ἐχόντων δ᾽ ~ὑμῶν οὕτω καὶ αρωξυμμένων~, etc.

This is the true Demosthenic vein of exhortation, running with unabated force through the Philippics and Olynthiacs, and striving to revive that conjunction—of which Perikles had boasted as an established fact in the Athenian character[611]—energetic individual action following upon full public debate and collective resolution. How often here, and elsewhere, does the orator denounce the uselessness of voters in the public assembly, even after such votes had been passed—if the citizens individually hung back, and shrunk from the fatigue or the pecuniary burthen indispensable for execution! Demus in the Pnyx (to use, in an altered sense, an Aristophanic comparison)[612] still remained Pan-hellenic and patriotic, when Demus at home had come to think that the city would march safely by itself without any sacrifice on his part, and that he was at liberty to become absorbed in his property, family, religion, and recreations. And so Athens might really have proceeded, in her enjoyment of liberty, wealth, refinement, and individual security—could the Grecian world have been guaranteed against the formidable Macedonian enemy from without.

[611] Thucyd. ii. 39, 40.

[612] Aristophanes, Equit. 750.

It was in the ensuing year, when the alarm respecting Persia had worn off, that the Athenians were called on to discuss the conflicting applications of Sparta and of Megalopolis. The success of the Phokians appeared to be such as to prevent Thebes, especially while her troops, under Pammenes, were absent in Asia, from interfering in Peloponnesus for the protection of Megalopolis. There were even at Athens politicians who confidently predicted the approaching humiliation of Thebes,[613] together with the emancipation and reconstitution of those Bœotian towns which she now held in dependence—Orchomenus, Thespiæ, and Platæa; predictions cordially welcomed by the Miso-Theban sentiment at Athens. To the Spartans, the moment appeared favorable for breaking up Megalopolis and recovering Messênê; in which scheme they hoped to interest not only Athens, but also Elis, Phlius, and some other Peloponnesian states. To Athens they offered aid for the recovery of Orôpus, now and for about twelve years past in the hands of the Thebans; to Elis and Phlius they also tendered assistance for regaining respectively Triphylia and the Trikaranum, from the Arcadians and Argeians.[614] This political combination was warmly espoused by a considerable party at Athens; being recommended not less by aversion to Thebes than by the anxious desire for repossessing the border town of Orôpus. But it was combated by others, and by Demosthenes among the number, who could not be tempted by any bait to acquiesce in the reconstitution of Lacedæmonian power as it had stood before the battle of Leuktra. In the Athenian assembly, the discussion was animated and even angry; the envoys from Megalopolis, as well as those from Sparta on the other side, finding strenuous partisans.[615]

[613] Demosthenes, Orat. pro Megalopolitanis, p. 203. s. 5. p. 210. s. 36. Ἔστι τοίνυν ἔν τινι τοιούτῳ καιρῷ τὰ πράγματα νῦν, εἴ τι δεῖ τοῖς εἰρημένοις πολλάκις παρ᾽ ὑμῖν λόγοις τεκμήρασθαι, ὥστε Θηβαίους μὲν Ὀρχομενοῦ καὶ Θεσπιῶν καὶ Πλαταιῶν οἰκισθεισῶν ἀσθενεῖς γενέσθαι, etc. Ἂν μὲν τοίνυν καταπολεμηθῶσιν οἱ Θηβαῖοι, ὥσπερ αὐτοὺς δεῖ, etc.

Compare Demosthenes cont. Aristokrat. p. 654. s. 120.

[614] Demosthenes pro Megalopol. p. 206. s. 18; compare Xenoph. Hellen. vii. 2, 1-5.

[615] Demosthenes pro Megalopolit. p. 202. s. 1.

Demosthenes strikes a course professedly middle between the two, yet really in favor of defending Megalopolis against Spartan reconquest. We remark in this oration (as in the oration De Symmoriis, a year before) that there is no allusion to Philip; a point to be noticed as evidence of the gradual changes in the Demosthenic point of view. All the arguments urged turn upon Hellenic and Athenian interests, without reference to the likelihood of hostilities from without. In fact, Demosthenes lays down as a position not to be disputed by any one, that for the interest of Athens, both Sparta and Thebes ought to be weak; neither of them in condition to disturb her security;[616]—a position, unfortunately, but too well recognized among all the leading Grecian states in their reciprocal dealings with each other, rendering the Pan-hellenic aggregate comparatively defenceless against Philip or any skilful aggressor from without. While, however, affirming a general maxim, in itself questionable and perilous, Demosthenes deduces from it nothing but judicious consequences. In regard to Sparta, he insists only on keeping her in statu quo, and maintaining inviolate against her the independence of Megalopolis and Messênê. He will not be prevailed upon to surrender to her these two cities, even by the seductive prospect of assistance to Athens in recovering Orôpus, and in reviving the autonomy of the Bœotian cities. At that moment the prevalent disposition among the Athenian public was antipathy against Thebes, combined with a certain sympathy in favor of Sparta, whom they had aided at the battle of Mantineia against the Megalopolitans.[617] Though himself sharing this sentiment,[618] Demosthenes will not suffer his countrymen to be misled by it. He recommends that Athens shall herself take up the Theban policy in regard to Megalopolis and Messênê, so as to protect these two cities against Sparta; the rather, as by such a proceeding the Thebans will be excluded from Peloponnesus, and their general influence narrowed. He even goes so far as to say, that if Sparta should succeed in reconquering Megalopolis and Messênê, Athens must again become the ally of the Thebans to restrain her farther aggrandizement.[619]

[616] Demosthen. pro Megalop. p. 203. s. 5, 6. Compare a similar sentiment, Demosthenes cont. Aristokrat. p. 654. s. 120.

[617] Demosthen. pro Megalop. p. 203. s. 7, 9. p. 207. s. 22.

[618] See Demosthen. cont. Leptinem, p. 489. s. 172 (delivered 355 B. C.) and Olynthiac i. p. 16. s. 27.

[619] Demosthenes pro Megalopol. p. 207. s. 24.

As far as we make out from imperfect information, it seems that the views of Demosthenes did not prevail, and that the Athenians declined to undertake the protection of Megalopolis against Sparta; since we presently find the Thebans continuing to afford that protection, as they had done before. The aggressive schemes of Sparta appear to have been broached at the moment when the Phokians under Onomarchus were so decidedly superior to Thebes as to place that city in some embarrassment. But the superiority of the Phokians was soon lessened by their collision with a more formidable enemy—Philip of Macedon.

That prince had been already partially interfering in Thessalian affairs,[620] at the instigation of Eudikus and Simus, chiefs of the Aleuadæ of Larissa, against Lykophron the despot of Pheræ. But his recent acquisition of Methônê left him more at liberty to extend his conquests southward, and to bring a larger force to bear on the dissensions of Thessaly. In that country, the great cities were,[621] as usual, contending for supremacy, and holding in subjection the smaller by means of garrisons; while Lykophron of Pheræ was exerting himself to regain that ascendency over the whole, which had once been possessed by Jason and Alexander. Philip now marched into the country and attacked him so vigorously as to constrain him to invoke aid from the Phokians. Onomarchus, at that time victorious over the Thebans and master as far as Thermopylæ, was interested in checking the farther progress of Philip southward and extending his own ascendency. He sent into Thessaly a force of seven thousand men, under his brother Phayllus, to sustain Lykophron. But Phayllus failed altogether; being defeated and driven out of Thessaly by Philip, so that Lykophron of Pheræ was in greater danger than ever. Upon this, Onomarchus went himself thither with the full force of Phokians and foreign mercenaries. An obstinate, and seemingly a protracted contest now took place, in the course of which he was at first decidedly victorious. He defeated Philip in two battles, with such severe loss that the Macedonian army was withdrawn from Thessaly, while Lykophron with his Phokian allies remained masters of the country.[622]

[620] Diodor. xvi. 14; Demosthenes, De Coronâ, p. 241. s. 60. Harpokration v. Σίμος.

[621] Isokrates, Orat. viii. (De Pace) s. 143, 144.

[622] Diodor. xvi. 35.

This great success of the Phokian arms was followed up by farther victory in Bœotia. Onomarchus renewed his invasion of that territory, defeated the Thebans in battle, and made himself master of Koroneia, in addition to Orchomenus, which he held before.[623] It would seem that the Thebans were at this time deprived of much of their force, which was serving in Asia under Artabazus, and which, perhaps from these very reverses, they presently recalled. The Phokians, on the other hand, were at the height of their power. At this juncture falls, probably, the aggressive combination of the Spartans against Megalopolis, and the debate, before noticed, in the Athenian assembly.

[623] Diodor. xvi. 35.

Philip was for some time in embarrassment from his defeats in Thessaly. His soldiers, discouraged and even mutinous, would hardly consent to remain under his standard. By great pains, and animated exhortation, he at last succeeded in reanimating them. After a certain interval for restoration and reinforcement, he advanced with a fresh army into Thessaly, and resumed his operations against Lykophron; who was obliged again to solicit aid from Onomarchus, and to promise that all Thessaly should henceforward be held under his dependence. Onomarchus accordingly joined him in Thessaly with a large army, said to consist of twenty thousand foot and five hundred cavalry. But he found on this occasion, within the country, more obstinate resistance than before; for the cruel dynasty of Pheræ had probably abused their previous victory by aggravated violence and rapacity, so as to throw into the arms of their enemy a multitude of exiles. On Philip’s coming into Thessaly with a new army, the Thessalians embraced his cause so warmly, that he soon found himself at the head of an army of twenty thousand foot and three thousand horse. Onomarchus met him in the field, somewhere near the southern coast of Thessaly; not diffident of success, as well from his recent victories, as from the neighborhood of an Athenian fleet under Chares, coöperating with him. Here a battle was joined, and obstinately contested between the two armies, nearly equal in numbers of infantry. Philip exalted the courage of his soldiers by decorating them with laurel wreaths,[624] as crusaders in the service of the god against the despoilers of the Delphian temple; while the Thessalians also, forming the best cavalry in Greece and fighting with earnest valor, gave decisive advantage to his cause. The defeat of the forces of Onomarchus and Lykophron was complete. Six thousand of them are said to have been slain, and three thousand to have been taken prisoners; the remainder escaped either by flight, or by throwing away their arms, and swimming off to the Athenian ships. Onomarchus himself perished. According to one account, he was slain by his own mercenaries, provoked by his cowardice: according to another account, he was drowned—being carried into the sea by an unruly horse, and trying to escape to the ships. Philip caused his dead body to be crucified, and drowned all the prisoners as men guilty of sacrilege.[625]

[624] This fact is mentioned by Justin (vii. 2), and seems likely to be true, from the severity with which Philip, after his victory, treated the Phokian prisoners. But the farther statement of Justin is not likely to be true—that the Phokians, on beholding the insignia of the god, threw away their arms and fled without resistance.

[625] Diodor. xvi. 55; Pausan. x. 2, 3; Philo Judæus apud Eusebium Præp. Evang. viii. p. 392. Diodorus states that Chares with the Athenian fleet was sailing by, accidentally. But this seems highly improbable. It cannot but be supposed that he was destined to coöperate with the Phokians.

This victory procured for Philip great renown as the avenger of the Delphian god—and became an important step in his career of aggrandizement. It not only terminated the power of the Phokians north of Thermopylæ, but also finally crushed the powerful dynasty of Pheræ in Thessaly. Philip laid siege to that city, upon which Lykophron and Peitholaus, surrounded by an adverse population and unable to make any long defence, capitulated, and surrendered it to him; retiring with their mercenaries, two thousand in number, into Phokis.[626] Having obtained possession of Pheræ and proclaimed it a free city, Philip proceeded to besiege the neighboring town of Pagasæ, the most valuable maritime station in Thessaly. How long Pagasæ resisted, we do not know; but long enough to send intimation to Athens, with entreaties for succor. The Athenians, alarmed at the successive conquests of Philip, were well-disposed to keep this important post out of his hands, which their naval power fully enabled them to do. But here again (as in the previous examples of Pydna, Potidæa, and Methônê), the aversion to personal service among the citizens individually—and the impediments as to apportionment of duty or cost, whenever actual outgoing was called for—produced the untoward result, that though an expedition was voted and despatched, it did not arrive in time.[627] Pagasæ surrendered and came into the power of Philip; who fortified and garrisoned it for himself, thus becoming master of the Pagasæan gulf, the great maritime inlet of Thessaly.

[626] Diodor. xvi. 37.

[627] Demosthenes, Philippic i. p. 50. s. 40. Καίτοι, τί δήποτε νομίζετε ... τοὺς ἀποστόλους πάντας ὑμῖν ὑστερίζειν τῶν καιρῶν, τὸν εἰς Μεθώνην, ~τὸν εἰς Παγασὰς~, τὸν εἰς Ποτίδαιαν, etc.

Demosthenes, Olynth. i. p. 11. s. 9. Καὶ πάλιν ἥνικα Πύδνα, Ποτίδαια, Μεθώνη, ~Παγασαί—πολιορκούμενα ἀπηγγέλλετο~, εἰ τότε τούτων ἑνὶ τῷ πρώτῳ προθύμως καὶ ὡς προσῆκεν ἐβοηθήσαμεν αὐτοὶ, etc.

The first Philippic was delivered in 352-351 B. C., which proves that Philip’s capture of Pagasæ cannot have been later than that year. Nor can it have been earlier than his capture of Pheræ—as I have before remarked in reference to the passage of Diodorus (xvi. 31), where it seems to be placed in 354-353 B. C.; if Παγὰς is to be taken for Παγασάς.

I apprehend that the first campaign of Philip in Thessaly against the Phokians, wherein he was beaten and driven out by Onomarchus, may be placed in the summer of 353 B. C. The second entrance into Thessaly, with the defeat and death of Onomarchus, belongs to the early spring of 352 B. C. The capture of Pheræ and Pagasæ comes immediately afterwards; then the expedition of Philip to Thermopylæ, where his progress was arrested by the Athenians comes about Midsummer 352 B. C.

Philip was probably occupied for a certain time in making good his dominion over Thessaly. But as soon as sufficient precautions had been taken for this purpose, he sought to push his advantage over the Phokians by invading them in their own territory. He marched to Thermopylæ, still proclaiming as his aim the liberation of the Delphian temple and the punishment of its sacrilegious robbers; while he at the same time conciliated the favor of the Thessalians by promising to restore to them the Pylæa, or half-yearly Amphiktyonic festival at Thermopylæ, which the Phokians had discontinued.[628] The Phokians, though masters of this almost inexpugnable pass, seemed to have been so much disheartened by their recent defeat, and the death of Onomarchus, that they felt unable to maintain it long. The news of such a danger, transmitted to Athens, excited extraordinary agitation. The importance of defending Thermopylæ—and of prohibiting the victorious king of Macedon from coming to coöperate with the Thebans on the southern side of it,[629] not merely against the Phokians, but probably also against Attica—were so powerfully felt, that the usual hesitations and delay of the Athenians in respect to military expeditions were overcome. Chiefly from this cause—but partly also, we may suppose, from the vexatious disappointment recently incurred in the attempt to relieve Pagasæ—an Athenian armament under Nausikles (not less than five thousand foot and four hundred horse, according to Diodorus[630]) was fitted out with not less vigor and celerity than had been displayed against the Thebans in Eubœa, seven years before. Athenian citizens shook off their lethargy, and promptly volunteered. They reached Thermopylæ in good time, placing the pass in such a condition of defence that Philip did not attack it at all. Often afterwards does Demosthenes,[631] in combating the general remissness of his countrymen when military exigencies arose, remind them of this unwonted act of energetic movement, crowned with complete effect. With little or no loss, the Athenians succeeded in guarding both themselves and their allies against a very menacing contingency, simply by the promptitude of their action. The cost of the armament altogether was more than two hundred talents; and from the stress which Demosthenes lays on that portion of the expense which was defrayed by the soldiers privately and individually,[632] we may gather that these soldiers (as in the Sicilian expedition under Nikias[633]) were in considerable proportion opulent citizens. Among a portion of the Grecian public, however, the Athenians incurred obloquy as accomplices in the Phokian sacrilege, and enemies of the Delphian god.[634]

[628] Demosthenes, De Pace, p. 62. s. 23; Philippic ii. p. 71. s. 24; De Fals. Legat. p. 443. s. 365.

[629] Demosthenes, De Fals. Leg. p. 367. s. 94. p. 446. s. 375. Τίς γὰρ οὐκ οἶδεν ὑμῶν ὅτι τῷ Φωκέων πολέμῳ καὶ τῷ κυρίους εἶναι Πυλῶν Φωκέας, ἥ τε ἀπὸ Θηβαίων ἄδεια ὑπῆρχεν ἡμῖν, καὶ τὸ μηδέποτ᾽ ἐλθεῖν ἂν εἰς Πελοπόννησον μηδ᾽ εἰς Εὔβοιαν Φίλιππον μηδὲ Θηβαίους;

[630] Diodor. xvi. 37, 38.

[631] Demosthenes, Philippic i. p. 44. s. 20; De Coronâ, p. 236. s. 40; De Fals. Leg. p. 444. s. 366.

[632] Demosthenes, De Fals. Leg. p. 367. s. 95.

[633] Thucyd. vi. 31.

[634] Justin, vii. 2. His rhetorical exaggerations ought not to make us reject the expression of this opinion against Athens, as a real fact.

But though Philip was thus kept out of Southern Greece, and the Phokians enabled to reorganize themselves against Thebes, yet in Thessaly and without the straits of Thermopylæ, Macedonian ascendency was henceforward an uncontested fact. Before we follow his subsequent proceedings, however, it will be convenient to turn to events both in Phokis and in Peloponnesus.

In the depressed condition of the Phokians after the defeat of Onomarchus, they obtained reinforcement not only from Athens, but also from Sparta (one thousand men), and from the Peloponnesian Achæans (two thousand men[635]). Phayllus, the successor (by some called brother) of Onomarchus, put himself again in a condition of defence. He had recourse a third time to that yet unexhausted store—the Delphian treasures and valuables. He despoiled the temple to a greater extent than Philomelus, and not less than Onomarchus; incurring aggravated odium from the fact, that he could not now supply himself without laying hands on offerings of conspicuous magnificence and antiquity, which his two predecessors had spared. It was thus that the splendid golden donatives of the Lydian king Krœsus were now melted down and turned into money; one hundred and seventeen bricks or ingots of gold, most of them weighing two talents each; three hundred and sixty golden goblets, together with a female statue three cubits high, and a lion, of the same metal—said to have weighed in the aggregate thirty talents.[636] The abstraction of such ornaments, striking and venerable in the eyes of the numerous visitors of the temple, was doubtless deeply felt among the Grecian public. And the indignation was aggravated by the fact that beautiful youths or women, favorites of Onomarchus or Phayllus, received some of the most precious gifts, and wore the most noted ornaments, which had decorated the temple—even the necklaces of Helen and Eriphylê. One woman, a flute-player named Bromias, not only received from Phayllus a silver cup and a golden wreath (the former dedicated in the temple by the Phokæans, the latter by the Peparethians), but was also introduced by him, in his capacity of superintendent of the Pythian festival, to contend for the prize in playing the sacred Hymn. As the competitors for such prize had always been men, the assembled crowd so loudly resented the novelty, that Bromias was obliged to withdraw.[637] Moreover profuse largesses, and flagrant malversation, became more notorious than ever.[638] The Phokian leaders displayed with ostentation their newly-acquired wealth, and either imported for the first time bought slaves, or at least greatly multiplied the pre-existing number. It had before been the practice in Phokis, we are told, for the wealthy men to be served by the poor youthful freemen of the country; and complaints arose among the latter class that their daily bread was thus taken away.[639]

[635] Demosthenes (Fals. Leg. p. 443) affirms that no one else except Athens assisted or rescued the Phokians in this emergency. But Diodorus (xvi. 37) mentions succors from the other allies also; and there seems no ground for disbelieving him. The boast of Demosthenes, however, that Athens single-handed saved the Phokians, is not incorrect as to the main fact, though overstated in the expression. For the Athenians, commanding a naval force, and on this rare occasion rapid in their movements, reached Thermopylæ in time to arrest the progress of Philip, and before the Peloponnesian troops could arrive. The Athenian expedition to Thermopylæ seems to have occurred about May 352 B. C.—as far as we can make out the chronology of the time.

[636] Diodor. xvi. 56. The account of these donatives of Krœsus may be read in Herodotus (i. 50, 51), who saw them at Delphi. As to the exact weight and number, there is some discrepancy between him and Diodorus; moreover the text of Herodotus himself is not free from obscurity.

[637] Theopomp. Fragm. 182, 183; Phylarchus, Frag. 60, ed. Didot; Anaximenes and Ephorus ap. Athenæum, vi. p. 231, 232. The Pythian games here alluded to must have been those celebrated in August or September 350 B. C. It would seem therefore that Phayllus survived over that period.

[638] Diodor. xvi. 56, 57. The story annexed about Iphikrates and the ships of Dionysius of Syracuse—a story which, at all events, comes quite out of its chronological place—appears to me not worthy of credit, in the manner in which Diodorus here gives it. The squadron of Dionysius, which Iphikrates captured on the coast of Korkyra, was coming to the aid and at the request of the Lacedæmonians, then at war with Athens (Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 2, 33). It was therefore a fair capture for an Athenian general, together with all on board. If, amidst the cargo, there happened to be presents intended for Olympia and Delphi, these, as being on board of ships of war, would follow the fate of the other persons and things along with them. They would not be considered as the property of the god until they had been actually dedicated in his temple. Nor would the person sending them be entitled to invoke the privilege of a consecrated cargo unless he divested it of hostile accompaniment. The letter of complaint to the Athenians, which Diodorus gives as having been sent by Dionysius, seems to me neither genuine nor even plausible.

[639] Timæus, Fragm. 67, ed. Didot; ap. Athenæum, vi. p. 264-272.

Notwithstanding the indignation excited by these proceedings not only throughout Greece, but even in Phokis itself,—Phayllus carried his point of levying a fresh army of mercenaries, and of purchasing new alliances among the smaller cities. Both Athens and Sparta profited more or less by the distribution; though the cost of the Athenian expedition to Thermopylæ, which rescued the Phokians from destruction, seems clearly to have been paid by the Athenians themselves.[640] Phayllus carried on war for some time against both the Bœotians and Lokrians. He is represented by Diodorus to have lost several battles. But it is certain that the general result was not unfavorable to him; that he kept possession of Orchomenus in Bœotia; and that his power remained without substantial diminution.[641]

[640] Diodor. xvi. 57: compare Demosthen. Fals. Leg. p. 367.

[641] Diodor. xvi. 37, 38.

The stress of war seems, for the time, to have been transferred to Peloponnesus, whither a portion both of the Phokian and Theban troops went to coöperate. The Lacedæmonians had at length opened their campaign against Megalopolis, of which I have already spoken as having been debated before the Athenian public assembly. Their plan seems to have been formed some months before, when Onomarchus was at the maximum of his power, and when Thebes was supposed to be in danger; but it was not executed until after his defeat and death, when the Phokians, depressed for the time, were rescued only by the prompt interference of Athens,—and when the Thebans had their hands comparatively free. Moreover, the Theban division which had been sent into Asia under Pammenes a year or two before, to assist Artabazus, may now be presumed to have returned; especially as we know that no very long time afterwards, Artabazus appears as completely defeated by the Persian troops,—expelled from Asia, and constrained to take refuge, together with his brother-in-law Memnon, under the protection of Philip.[642] The Megalopolitans had sent envoys to entreat aid from Athens, under the apprehension that Thebes would not be in a condition to assist them. It may be doubted whether Athens would have granted their prayer, in spite of the advice of Demosthenes,—but the Thebans had now again become strong enough to uphold with their own force their natural allies in Peloponnesus.

[642] Diodor. xvi. 52.

Accordingly, when the Lacedæmonian army under king Archidamus invaded the Megalopolitan territory, a competent force was soon brought together to oppose them; furnished partly by the Argeians,—who had been engaged during the preceding year in a border warfare with Sparta, and had experienced a partial defeat at Orneæ,[643]—partly by the Sikyonians and Messenians, who came in full muster. Besides this, the forces on both sides from Bœotia and Phokis were transferred to Peloponnesus. The Thebans sent four thousand foot, and five hundred horse, under Kephision, to the aid of Megalopolis; while the Spartans not only recalled their own troops from Phokis, but also procured three thousand of the mercenaries in the service of Phayllus, and one hundred and fifty Thessalian horse from Likophron, the expelled despot of Pheræ. Archidamus received his reinforcements, and got together his aggregate forces earlier than the enemy. He advanced first into Arcadia, where he posted himself near Mantinea, thus cutting off the Argeians from Megalopolis; he next invaded the territory of Argos, attacked Orneæ, and defeated the Argeians in a partial action. Presently the Thebans arrived, and effected a junction with their Argeian and Arcadian allies. The united force was greatly superior in number to the Lacedæmonians; but such superiority was counterbalanced by the bad discipline of the Thebans, who had sadly declined on this point during the interval of ten years since the death of Epaminondas. A battle ensued, partially advantageous to the Lacedæmonians; while the Argeians and Arcadians chose to go home to their neighboring cities. The Lacedæmonians also, having ravaged a portion of Arcadia, and stormed the Arcadian town of Helissus, presently recrossed their own frontier and returned to Sparta. They left, however, a division in Arcadia under Anaxander, who, engaging with the Thebans near Telphusa, was worsted with great loss and made prisoner. In two other battles, also, the Thebans were successively victorious; in a third, they were vanquished by the Lacedæmonians. With such balanced and undecided success was the war carried on until, at length, the Lacedæmonians proposed and concluded peace with Megalopolis. Either formally, or by implication, they were forced to recognize the autonomy of that city; thus abandoning, for the time at least, their aggressive purposes, which Demosthenes had combated and sought to frustrate before the Athenian assembly. The Thebans on their side returned home, having accomplished their object of protecting Megalopolis and Messênê; and we may presume that the Phokian allies of Sparta were sent home also.[644]

[643] Diodor. xvi. 34.

[644] Diodor. xvi. 39.

The war between the Bœotians and Phokians had doubtless slackened during this episode in Peloponnesus; but it still went on in a series of partial actions, on the river Kephissus, at Koroneia, at Abæ in Phokis, and near the Lokrian town of Naryx. For the most part, the Phokians are said to have been worsted; and their commander, Phayllus, presently died of a painful disease,—the suitable punishment (in the point of view of a Grecian historian[645]) for his sacrilegious deeds. He left as his successor Phalækus, a young man, son of Onomarchus, under the guardianship and advice of an experienced friend named Mnaseas. But Mnaseas was soon surprised at night, defeated, and slain, by the Thebans while Phalækus, left to his own resources, was defeated in two battles near Chæroneia, and was unable to hinder his enemies from ravaging a large part of the Phokian territory.[646]

[645] Diodor. xvi. 38.

[646] Diodor. xvi. 38, 39.

We know the successive incidents of this ten years’ Sacred War only from the meagre annals of Diodorus,—whose warm sympathy in favor of the religious side of the question seems to betray him into exaggeration of the victories of the Thebans, or at least into some omission of counterbalancing reverses. For in spite of these successive victories, the Phokians were noway put down, but remained in possession of the Bœotian town of Orchomenus; moreover, the Thebans became so tired out and impoverished by the war, that they confined themselves presently to desultory incursions and skirmishes.[647] Their losses fell wholly upon their own citizens and their own funds; while the Phokians fought with foreign mercenaries and with the treasures of the temple.[648] The increasing poverty of the Thebans even induced them to send an embassy to the Persian king, entreating pecuniary aid; which drew from him a present of three hundred talents. As he was at this time organizing a fresh expedition on an immense scale, for the reconquest of Phenicia and Egypt, after more than one preceding failure, he required Grecian soldiers as much as the Greeks required his money. Hence we shall see presently that the Thebans were able to send him an equivalent.

[647] Diodor. xvi. 40. ἐπὶ δὲ τούτων, Θηβαῖοι κάμνοντες τῷ πρὸς Φωκεῖς πολέμῳ, καὶ χρημάτων ἀπορούμενοι, πρέσβεις ἐξέπεμψαν πρὸς τὸν τῶν Περσῶν βασιλέα.... Τοῖς δὲ Βοιωτοῖς καὶ τοῖς Φωκεῦσιν ἀκροβολισμοὶ μὲν καὶ χώρας καταδρομαὶ συνέστησαν, πράξεις δὲ κατὰ τοῦτον τὸν ἐνιαυτὸν (351-350 B. C.—according to the chronology of Diodorus) οὐ συνετελέσθησαν.

[648] Isokrates, Orat. v. (ad Philipp.) s. 61.

In the war just recounted on the Laconian and Arcadian frontier, the Athenians had taken no part. Their struggle with Philip had been becoming from month to month more serious and embarrassing. By occupying in time the defensible pass of Thermopylæ, they had indeed prevented him both from crushing the Phokians and from meddling with the Southern states of Greece. But the final battle wherein he had defeated Onomarchus, had materially increased both his power and his military reputation. The numbers on both sides were very great; the result was decisive, and ruinous to the vanquished; moreover, we cannot doubt that the Macedonian phalanx, with the other military improvements and manœuvres which Philip had been gradually organizing since his accession, was now exhibited in formidable efficiency. The King of Macedon had become the ascendent soldier and potentate, hanging on the skirts of the Grecian world, exciting fears or hopes, or both at once, in every city throughout its limits. In the first Philippic of Demosthenes, and in his oration against Aristokrates, (delivered between midsummer 352 B. C. and midsummer 351 B. C.), we discern evident marks of the terrors which Philip had come to inspire, within a year after his repulse from Thermopylæ, to reflecting Grecian politicians. “It is impossible for Athens (says the orator[649]) to provide any land-force competent to contend in the field against that of Philip.”

[649] Demosthenes, Philippic i. p. 46. s. 26. (352-351 B. C.)

Compare Philippic iii. p. 124. s. 63.

The reputation of his generalship and his indefatigable activity was already everywhere felt; as well as that of the officers and soldiers, partly native Macedonians, partly chosen Greeks, whom he had assembled round him,[650]—especially the lochages or front-rank men of the phalanx and the hypaspistæ. Moreover, the excellent cavalry of Thessaly became embodied from henceforward as an element in the Macedonian army; since Philip had acquired unbounded ascendency in that country, from his expulsion of the Pheræan despots and their auxiliaries the Phokians. The philo-Macedonian party in the Thessalian cities had constituted him federal chief (or in some sort Tagus) of the country, not only enrolling their cavalry in his armies, but also placing at his disposal the customs and market-dues, which formed a standing common fund for supporting the Thessalian collective administration.[651] The financial means of Philip, for payment of his foreign troops, and prosecution of his military enterprises, were thus materially increased.

[650] Demosthenes, Olynth. ii. p. 23. s. 17. (delivered in 350 B. C.) ... Οἱ δὲ δὴ περὶ αὐτὸν ὄντες ξένοι καὶ πεζέταιροι δόξαν μὲν καὶ ἔχουσιν ὡς εἰσὶ θαυμαστοὶ καὶ συγκεκροτημένοι τὰ τοῦ πολέμου, etc.

[651] Demosthenes cont. Aristokrat. p. 657. s. 133 (352-351 B. C.); also Demosthen. Olynth. i. p. 15. s. 23. (349 B. C.) ἤκουον δ᾽ ἔγωγέ τινων ὡς ~οὐδὲ~ τοὺς λιμένας καὶ τὰς ἀγορὰς ~ἔτι δώσοιεν~ αὐτῷ καρποῦσθαι· τὰ γὰρ κοινὰ τὰ Θετταλῶν ἀπὸ τούτων δέοι διοικεῖν, οὐ Φίλιππον λαμβάνειν· εἰ δὲ τούτων ἀποστερηθήσεται τῶν χρημάτων, εἰς στενὸν κομιδῇ τὰ τῆς τροφῆς τοῖς ξένοις αὐτῷ καταστήσεται.

But besides his irresistible land-force, Philip had now become master of no inconsiderable naval power also. During the early years of the war, though he had taken not only Amphipolis, but also all the Athenian possessions on the Macedonian coast, yet the exports from his territory had been interrupted by the naval force of Athens, so as to lessen seriously the produce of his export duties.[652] But he had now contrived to get together a sufficient number of armed ships and privateers, if not to ward off such damage from himself, at least to retaliate it upon Athens. Her navy, indeed, was still incomparably superior, but the languor and remissness of her citizens refused to bring it out with efficiency; while Philip had opened for himself a new avenue to maritime power by his acquisition of Pheræ and Pagasæ, and by establishing his ascendency over the Magnêtes and their territory, round the eastern border of the Pagasæan Gulf. That gulf (now known by the name of Volo), is still the great inlet and outlet for Thessalian trade; the eastern coast of Thessaly, along the line of Mount Pelion, being craggy and harborless.[653] The naval force belonging to Pheræ and its seaport Pagasæ, was very considerable, and had been so even from the times of the despots, Jason and Alexander;[654] at one moment painfully felt even by Athens. All these ships now passed into the service of Philip, together with the dues on export and import levied round the Pagasæan Gulf; the command of which he farther secured by erecting suitable fortifications on the Magnesian shore, and by placing a garrison in Pagasæ.[655] Such additional naval means, combined with what he already possessed at Amphipolis and elsewhere, made him speedily annoying, if not formidable, to Athens, even at sea. His triremes showed themselves everywhere, probably in small and rapidly moving squadrons. He levied large contributions on the insular allies of Athens, and paid the costs of war greatly out of the capture of merchant vessels in the Ægean. His squadrons made incursions on the Athenian islands of Lemnos and Imbros, carrying off several Athenian citizens as prisoners. They even stretched southward as far as Geræstus, the southern promontory of Eubœa, where they not only fell in with and captured a lucrative squadron of corn-ships, but also insulted the coast of Attica itself in the opposite bay of Marathon, towing off as a prize one of the sacred triremes.[656] Such was the mischief successfully inflicted by the flying squadrons of Philip, though Athens had probably a considerable number of cruisers at sea, and certainly a far superior number of ships at home in Peiræus. Her commerce, and even her coasts, were disturbed and endangered; her insular allies suffered yet more. Eubœa especially, the nearest and most important of all her allies, separated only by a narrow strait from the Pagasæan Gulf and the southern coast of Phthiotis, was now within the immediate reach not only of Philip’s marauding vessels, but also of his political intrigues.

[652] Demosthenes cont. Aristokrat. p. 657. s. 131-133 (352-351 B. C.); compare Isokrates, Orat. v. (ad Philipp. s. 5.)

[653] Xenoph. Hellen. v. 4, 56; Hermippus ap. Athenæum, i. p. 27. About the lucrative commerce in the Gulf, in reference to Demetrias and Thebæ Phthiotides, see Livy, xxxix. 25.

[654] Demosthenes cont. Polykl. p. 1207; De Coronâ Trierarchicâ, p. 1230; Diodor. xv. 95; Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 1, 11.

[655] Demosthenes, Olynth. i. p. 15. s. 23. Καὶ γὰρ Παγασὰς ἀπαιτεῖν αὐτόν εἰσιν ἐψηφισμένοι (the Thessalians re-demand the place from Philip), καὶ Μαγνησίαν κεκωλύκασι τειχίζειν. In Olynth. ii. p. 21. s. 11. it stands—καὶ γὰρ νῦν εἰσὶν ἐψηφισμένοι Παγασὰς ἀπαιτεῖν, καὶ περὶ Μαγνησίας λόγους ποιεῖσθαι. I take the latter expression to state the fact with more strict precision; the Thessalians passed a vote to remonstrate with Philip; it is not probable that they actually hindered him. And if he afterwards “gave to them Magnesia,” as we are told in a later oration delivered 344 B. C. (Philippic ii. p. 71. s. 24), he probably gave it with reserve of the fortified posts to himself; since we know that his ascendency over Thessaly was not only not relaxed, but became more violent and compressive.

The value which the Macedonian kings always continued to set, from this time forward, upon Magnesia and the recess of the Pagasæan Gulf, is shown in the foundation of the city of Demetrias in that important position, by Demetrius Poliorketes, about sixty years afterwards. Demetrias, Chalkis, and Corinth came to be considered the most commanding positions in Greece.

This fine bay, with the fertile territory lying on its shores under Mount Pelion, are well described by colonel Leake, Travels in Northern Greece, vol. iv. ch. 41. p. 373 seqq. I doubt whether either Ulpian (ad Demosthen. Olynth. i. p. 24) or colonel Leake (p. 381) are borne out in supposing that there was any town called Magnesia on the shores of the Gulf. None such is mentioned either by Strabo or by Skylax; and I apprehend that the passages above cited from Demosthenes mean Magnesia the region inhabited by the Magnetes; as in Demosthenes cont. Neæram. p. 1382. s. 141.

[656] Demosthenes, Philippic i. p. 46. s. 25. δεῖ γὰρ, ἔχοντος ἐκείνου ναυτικὸν, καὶ ταχειῶν τριηρῶν ἡμῖν, ὅπως ἀσφαλῶς ἡ δύναμις πλέῃ.—p. 49. s. 38. Πρῶτον μὲν, τὸν μέγιστον τῶν ἐκείνου πόρων ἀφαιρήσεσθε· ἔστι δ᾽ οὗτος τίς; ἀπὸ τῶν ὑμετέρων ὑμῖν πολεμεῖ συμμάχων, ἄγων καὶ φέρων τοὺς πλέοντας τὴν θάλασσαν. Ἔπειτα, τί πρὸς τούτῳ; τοῦ πάσχειν αὐτοὶ κακῶς ἔξω γενήσεσθε, οὐχ ὥσπερ τὸν παρελθόντα χρόνον εἰς Λῆμνον καὶ Ἴμβρον ἐμβαλὼν αἰχμαλώτους πολίτας ὑμετέρους ᾤχετ᾽ ἄγων, πρὸς τῷ Γεραιστῷ τὰ πλοῖα συλλαβὼν ἀμύθητα χρήματ᾽ ἐξέλεξε, τὰ τελευταῖα εἰς Μαραθῶνα ἀπέβη, καὶ τὴν ἱερὰν ἀπὸ τῆς χώρας ᾤχετ᾽ ἔχων τριήρη, etc.

We can hardly be certain that the Sacred Trireme thus taken was either the Paralus or the Salaminia; there may have been other sacred triremes besides these two.

It was thus that the war against Philip turned more and more to the disgrace and disadvantage of the Athenians. Though they had begun it in the hope of punishing him for his duplicity in appropriating Amphipolis, they had been themselves the losers by the capture of Pydna, Potidæa, Methônê, etc.; and they were now thrown upon the defensive, without security for their maritime allies, their commerce, or their coasts.[657] The intelligence of these various losses and insults endured at sea, in spite of indisputable maritime preponderance, called forth at Athens acrimonious complaints against the generals of the state, and exaggerated outbursts of enmity against Philip.[658] That prince, having spent a few months, after his repulse from Thermopylæ, in Thessaly, and having so far established his ascendency over that country that he could leave the completion of the task to his officers, pushed with his characteristic activity into Thrace. He there took part in the disputes between various native princes, expelling some, confirming or installing others, and extending his own dominion at the cost of all.[659] Among these princes were probably Kersobleptes, and Amadokus; for Philip carried his aggressions to the immediate neighborhood of the Thracian Chersonese.

[657] Demosthenes, Philippic i. p. 52. s. 49. ὁρῶν τὴν μὲν ἀρχὴν τοῦ πολέμου γεγενημένην ὑπὲρ τοῦ τιμωρήσασθαι Φίλιππον, τὴν δὲ τελευτὴν οὖσαν ἤδη ὑπὲρ τοῦ μὴ παθεῖν κακῶς ὑπὸ Φιλίππου. (Between Midsummer 352 and Midsummer 351 B. C.)

[658] Demosthenes cont. Aristokrat. p. 660. s. 144. p. 656. s. 130. Ἀλλ᾽ ὁ μάλιστα δοκῶν νῦν ἡμῖν ἐχθρὸς εἶναι Φίλιππος οὑτοσί, etc. (this harangue also between Midsummer 352 and Midsummer 351 B. C.)

[659] Demosthenes, Olynth. i. p. 13. s. 13.

In November, 352 B. C., intelligence reached Athens, that he was in Thrace besieging Heræon Teichos; a place so near to the Chersonese,[660] that the Athenian possessions and colonists in that peninsula were threatened with considerable danger. So great was the alarm and excitement caused by this news, that a vote was immediately passed in the public assembly to equip a fleet of forty triremes,—to man it with Athenian citizens, all persons up to the age of forty-five being made liable to serve on the expedition,—and to raise sixty talents by a direct property tax. At first active steps were taken to accelerate the armament. But before the difficulties of detail could be surmounted,—before it could be determined, amidst the general aversion to personal service, what citizens should go abroad, and how the burthen of trierarchy should be distributed,—fresh messengers arrived from the Chersonese, reporting first that Philip had fallen sick, next that he was actually dead.[661] The last-mentioned report proved false; but the sickness of Philip was an actual fact, and seems to have been severe enough to cause a temporary suspension of his military operations. Though the opportunity became thus only the more favorable for attacking Philip, yet the Athenians, no longer spurred on by the fear of farther immediate danger, relapsed into their former languor, and renounced or postponed their intended armament. After passing the whole ensuing summer in inaction, they could only be prevailed upon, in the month of September 351, to despatch to Thrace a feeble force under the mercenary chief Charidemus; ten triremes, without any soldiers aboard, and with no more than five talents in money.[662]

[660] Demosthenes, Olynth. iii. p. 29. s. 5 (delivered in the latter half of 350 B. C.)

... ἀπηγγέλθη Φίλιππος ὑμῖν ἐν Θρᾴκῃ, τρίτον ἢ τέταρτον ἔτος τουτὶ, Ἡραῖον τεῖχος πολιορκῶν, τότε τοίνυν μὴν μὲν ἦν Μαιμακτηριὼν, etc.

This Thracian expedition of Philip (alluded to also in Demosthenes, Olynth. i. p. 13. s. 13) stands fixed to the date of November 352 B. C., on reasonably good grounds.

That the town or fortress called Ἡραῖον Τεῖχος was near to the Chersonese, cannot be doubted. The commentators identify it with Ἡραῖον, mentioned by Herodotus (iv. 90) as being near Perinthus. But this hypothesis is open to much doubt. Ἡραῖον Τεῖχος is not quite the same as Ἡραῖον; nor was the latter place very near to the Chersonese; nor would Philip be yet in a condition to provoke or menace so powerful a city as Perinthus—though he did so ten years afterwards. (Diodor. xvi. 74).

I cannot think that we know where Ἡραῖον Τεῖχος was situated; except that it was in Thrace, and near the Chersonese.

[661] Demosthenes, Olynth. iii. p. 29, 30. ὡς γὰρ ἠγγέλθη Φίλιππος ἀσθενῶν ἢ τεθνεὼς (ἦλθε γὰρ ἀμφότερα), etc. These reports of the sickness and death of Philip in Thrace are alluded to in the first Philippic, p. 43. s. 14. The expedition of Philip threatening the Chersonese, and the vote passed by the Athenians when they first heard of this expedition, are also alluded to in the first Philippic, p. 44. s. 20. p. 51. s. 46. καὶ ὑμεῖς, ἂν ἐν Χεῤῥονήσῳ πύθησθε Φίλιππον, ἐκεῖσε βοηθεῖν ψηφίζεσθε, etc. When Philip was besieging Ἡραῖον Τεῖχος, he was said to be ἐν Χεῤῥονήσῳ.

[662] Demosthenes, Olynth. iii. p. 30. s. 6.

At this time Charidemus was at the height of his popularity. It was supposed that he could raise and maintain a mercenary band by his own ingenuity and valor. His friends confidently averred, before the Athenian assembly, that he was the only man capable of putting down Philip, and conquering Amphipolis.[663] One of these partisans, Aristokrates, even went so far as to propose that a vote should be passed ensuring inviolability to his person, and enacting that any one who killed him should be seized wherever found in the territory of Athens or her allies. This proposition was attacked judicially by an accuser named Euthykles, who borrowed a memorable discourse from the pen of Demosthenes.

[663] Demosthenes cont. Aristokrat. p. 625. s. 14. p. 682, 683. This oration, delivered between Midsummer 352 and Midsummer 351 B. C., seems to have been prior to November 352 B. C., when the news reached Athens that Philip was besieging Ἡραῖον Τεῖχος.

It was thus that the real sickness, and reported death, of Philip which ought to have operated as a stimulus to the Athenians by exposing to them their enemy during a moment of peculiar weakness, proved rather an opiate exaggerating their chronic lethargy, and cheating them into a belief that no farther efforts were needed. That belief appears to have been proclaimed by the leading, best-known, and senior speakers, those who gave the tone to the public assembly, and who were principally relied upon for advice. These men,—probably Eubulus at their head, and Phokion, so constantly named as general, along with him,—either did not feel, or could not bring themselves to proclaim, the painful necessity of personal military service and increased taxation. Though repeated debates took place on the insults offered to Athens in her maritime dignity, and on the sufferings of those allies to whom she owed protection,—combined with accusations against the generals, and complaints of the inefficiency of such mercenary foreigners as Athens took into commission but never paid,—still, the recognized public advisers shrank from appeal to the dormant patriotism or personal endurance of the citizens. The serious, but indispensable, duty which they thus omitted, was performed for them by a younger competitor, far beneath them in established footing and influence,—Demosthenes, now about thirty years old,—in an harangue, known as the first Philippic.

We have already had before us this aspiring man, as a public adviser in the assembly. In his first parliamentary harangue two years before,[664] he had begun to inculcate on his countrymen the general lesson of energy and self-reliance, and to remind them of that which the comfort, activity, and peaceful refinement of Athenian life, had a constant tendency to put out of sight:—That the City, as a whole, could not maintain her security and dignity against enemies, unless each citizen individually, besides his home-duties, were prepared to take his fair share, readily and without evasion, of the hardship and cost of personal service abroad.[665] But he had then been called upon to deal (in his discourse De Symmoriis) only with the contingency of Persian hostilities—possible indeed, yet neither near nor declared; he now renews the same exhortation under more pressing exigencies. He has to protect interests already suffering, and to repel dishonorable insults, becoming from month to month more frequent, from an indefatigable enemy. Successive assemblies have been occupied with complaints from sufferers, amidst a sentiment of unwonted chagrin and helplessness among the public—yet with no material comfort from the leading and established speakers; who content themselves with inveighing against the negligence of the mercenaries—taken into service by Athens but never paid—and with threatening to impeach the generals. The assembly, wearied by repetition of topics promising no improvement for the future, is convoked, probably to hear some farther instance of damage committed by the Macedonian cruisers, when Demosthenes, breaking through the common formalities of precedence, rises first to address them.

[664] I adopt the date accepted by most critics, on the authority of Dionysius of Halikarnassus, to the first Philippic; the archonship of Aristodemus 352-351 B. C. It belongs, I think, to the latter half of that year.

The statements of Dionysius bearing on this oration have been much called in question; to a certain extent, with good reason, in what he states about the sixth Philippic (ad Ammæum, p. 736). What he calls the sixth, is in reality the fifth in his own enumeration, coming next after the first Philippic and the three Olynthiacs. To the Oratio De Pace, which is properly the sixth in his enumeration, he assigns no ordinal number whatever. What is still more perplexing—he gives as the initial words of what he calls the sixth Philippic, certain words which occur in the middle of the first Philippic, immediately after the financial scheme read by Demosthenes to the people, the words, Ἃ μὲν ἡμεῖς, ὦ ἄνδρες Ἀθηναῖοι, δεδυνήμεθα εὑρεῖν ταῦτ᾽ ἐστίν (Philipp. i. p. 48). If this were correct, we should have to divide the first Philippic into two parts, and recognize the latter part (after the words ἃ μὲν ἡμεῖς) as a separate and later oration. Some critics, among them Dr. Thirlwall, agree so far with Dionysius as to separate the latter part from the former, and to view it as a portion of some later oration. I follow the more common opinion, accepting the oration as one. There is a confusion, either in the text or the affirmations, of Dionysius, which has never yet been, perhaps cannot be, satisfactorily cleared up.

Böhnecke (in his Forschungen auf dem Gebiete der Attischen Redner, p. 222 seq.) has gone into a full and elaborate examination of the first Philippic and all the controversy respecting it. He rejects the statement of Dionysius altogether. He considers that the oration as it stands now is one whole, but delivered three years later than Dionysius asserts: not in 351 B. C., but in the Spring of 348 B. C., after the three Olynthiacs, and a little before the fall of Olynthus. He notices various chronological points (in my judgment none of them proving his point) tending to show that the harangue cannot have been delivered so early as 351 B. C. But I think the difficulty of supposing that the oration was spoken at so late a period of the Olynthian war, and yet that nothing is said in it about that war, and next to nothing about Olynthus itself—is greater than any of those difficulties which Böhnecke tries to make good against the earlier date.

[665] Demosthenes, De Symmor. p. 182. s. 18.

It had once been the practice at Athens, that the herald formally proclaimed, when a public assembly was opened—“Who among the citizens above fifty years old wishes to speak? and after them, which of the other citizens in his turn?”[666] Though this old proclamation had fallen into disuse, the habit still remained, that speakers of advanced age and experience rose first after the debate had been opened by the presiding magistrates. But the relations of Athens with Philip had been so often discussed, that all these men had already delivered their sentiments and exhausted their recommendations. “Had their recommendations been good, you need not have been now debating the same topic over again”[667]—says Demosthenes, as an apology for standing forward out of his turn to produce his own views.

[666] Æschines cont. Ktesiphont. p. 366.

[667] Demosthen. Philipp. i. init. ... Εἰ μὲν περὶ καινοῦ τινὸς πράγματος προὐτίθετο λέγειν, ἐπισχὼν ἂν ἕως ~οἱ πλεῖστοι τῶν εἰωθότων~ γνώμην ἀπεφῄναντο ... ἐπειδὴ δὲ περὶ ὧν πολλάκις εἰρήκασιν οὗτοι πρότερον συμβαίνει καὶ νυνὶ σκοπεῖν, ~ἡγοῦμαι καὶ πρῶτος ἀναστὰς~ εἰκότως ἂν συγγνώμης τυγχάνειν· εἰ γὰρ ἐκ τοῦ παρεληλυθότος χρόνου τὰ δέοντα οὗτοι συνεβούλευσαν, οὐδὲν ἂν ὑμᾶς νῦν ἔδει βουλεύεσθαι.

His views indeed were so new, so independent of party-sympathies or antipathies, and so plain-spoken in comments on the past as well as in demands for the future—that they would hardly have been proposed except by a speaker instinct with the ideal of the Periklean foretime, familiar to him from his study of Thucydides. In explicit language, Demosthenes throws the blame of the public misfortunes, not simply on the past advisers and generals of the people, but also on the people themselves.[668] It is from this proclaimed fact that he starts, as his main ground of hope for future improvement. Athens contended formerly with honor against the Lacedæmonians; and now also, she will exchange disgrace for victory in her war against Philip, if her citizens individually will shake off their past inertness and negligence, each of them henceforward becoming ready to undertake his full share of personal duty in the common cause. Athens had undergone enough humiliation, and more than enough, to teach her this lesson. She might learn it farther from her enemy Philip himself, who had raised himself from small beginnings, and heaped losses as well as shame upon her, mainly by his own personal energy, perseverance, and ability; while the Athenian citizens had been hitherto so backward as individuals, and so unprepared as a public, that even if a lucky turn of fortune were to hand over to them Amphipolis, they would be in no condition to seize it.[669] Should the rumor prove true, that this Philip were dead, they would soon make for themselves another Philip equally troublesome.

[668] Demosthenes, Philippic i. p. 40, 41. Ὅτι ~οὐδὲν τῶν δεόντων ποιούντων~ ὑμῶν κακῶς τὰ πράγματα ἔχει· ἐπεί τοι, εἰ πάνθ᾽ ἃ προσῆκε πραττόντων οὕτως εἶχεν, οὐδ᾽ ἂν ἐλπὶς ἦν αὐτὰ βελτίω γενέσθαι, etc. Again, p. 42. Ἂν τοίνυν καὶ ὑμεῖς ἐπὶ τῆς τοιαύτης ἐθελήσητε γενέσθαι γνώμης νῦν, ~ἐπειδήπερ οὐ πρότερον~, ... καὶ παύσησθε αὐτὸς μὲν οὐδὲν ἕκαστος ποιήσειν ἐλπίζων, τὸν δὲ πλησίον πάνθ᾽ ὑπὲρ αὐτοῦ πράξειν, etc.

Compare the previous harangue, De Symmoriis, p. 182. s. 18.

[669] Demosthenes, Philippic i. p. 43. s. 15. ὡς δὲ νῦν ἔχετε, οὐδὲ διδόντων τῶν καιρῶν Ἀμφίπολιν δέξασθαι δύναισθ᾽ ἄν, ἀπηρτημένοι καὶ ταῖς παρασκευαῖς καὶ ταῖς γνώμαις.

After thus severely commenting on the past apathy of the citizens, and insisting upon a change of disposition as indispensable, Demosthenes proceeds to specify the particular acts whereby such change ought to be manifested. He entreats them not to be startled by the novelty of his plan, but to hear him patiently to the end. It is the result of his own meditations; other citizens may have better to propose; if they have, he shall not be found to stand in their way. What is past, cannot be helped; nor is extemporaneous speech the best way of providing remedies for a difficult future.[670]

[670] Demosthenes, Philip. i. p. 44. ... ἐπειδὰν ἅπαντα ἀκούσητε, κρίνατε—μὴ πρότερον προλαμβάνετε· μηδ᾽ ἂν ἐξ ἀρχῆς ~δοκῶ τινὶ καινὴν παρασκευὴν~ λέγειν, ἀναβάλλειν με τὰ πράγματα ἡγείσθω· οὐ γὰρ οἱ ταχὺ καὶ τήμερον εἰπόντες μάλιστα εἰς δέον λέγουσιν, etc.

... Οἶμαι τοίνυν ἐγὼ ταῦτα λέγειν ἔχειν, μὴ κωλύων εἴ τις ἄλλος ἐπαγγέλλεταί τι.

This deprecatory tone deserves notice, and the difficulty which the speaker anticipates in obtaining a hearing.

He advises first, that a fleet of fifty triremes shall be immediately put in readiness; that the citizens shall firmly resolve to serve in person on board, whenever the occasion may require, and that triremes and other vessels shall be specially fitted out for half of the horsemen of the city, who shall serve personally also. This force is to be kept ready to sail at a moment’s notice, and to meet Philip in any of his sudden out-marches—to Chersonesus, to Thermopylæ, to Olynthus, etc.[671]

[671] Demosthenes, Philipp. i. p. 44, 45.

Secondly, that a farther permanent force shall be set on foot immediately, to take the aggressive, and carry on active continuous warfare against Philip, by harassing him in various points of his own country. Two thousand infantry, and two hundred horse, will be sufficient; but it is essential that one-fourth part—five hundred of the former and fifty of the latter—shall be citizens of Athens. The remainder are to be foreign mercenaries; ten swift sailing war triremes are also to be provided to protect the transports against the naval force of Philip. The citizens are to serve by relays, relieving each other; every one for a time fixed beforehand, yet none for a very long time.[672] The orator then proceeds to calculate the cost of such a standing force for one year. He assigns to each seaman, and to each foot soldier, ten drachmæ per month, or two oboli per day; to each horseman, thirty drachmæ per month, or one drachma (six oboli) per day. No difference is made between the Athenian citizen and the foreigner. The sum here assigned is not full pay, but simply the cost of each man’s maintenance. At the same time, Demosthenes pledges himself, that if thus much be furnished by the state, the remainder of a full pay (or as much again) will be made up by what the soldiers will themselves acquire in the war; and that too, without wrong done to allies or neutral Greeks. The total annual cost thus incurred will be ninety-two talents (= about £22,000.) He does not give any estimate of the probable cost of his other armament, of fifty triremes; which are to be equipped and ready at a moment’s notice for emergencies, but not sent out on permanent service.

[672] Demosthenes, Philipp. i. p. 45, 46.

His next task is, to provide ways and means for meeting such additional cost of ninety-two talents. Here he produces and reads to the assembly, a special financial scheme, drawn up in writing. Not being actually embodied in the speech, the scheme has been unfortunately lost; though its contents would help us materially to appreciate the views of Demosthenes.[673] It must have been more or less complicated in its details; not a simple proposition for an eisphora or property-tax, which would have been announced in a sentence of the orator’s speech.

[673] Demosthen. Philipp. i. p. 48, 49. Ἃ δ᾽ ὑπάρξαι δεῖ παρ᾽ ὑμῶν, ταῦτ᾽ ἐστὶν ἁγὼ γέγραφα.

Assuming the money, the ships, and the armament for permanent service, to be provided, Demosthenes proposes that a formal law be passed, making such permanent service peremptory; the general in command being held responsible for the efficient employment of the force.[674] The islands, the maritime allies, and the commerce of the Ægean would then become secure; while the profits of Philip from his captures at sea would be arrested.[675] The quarters of the armament might be established, during winter or bad weather, in Skiathos, Thasos, Lemnos, or other adjoining islands, from whence they could act at all times against Philip on his own coast; while from Athens it was difficult to arrive thither either during the prevalence of the Etesian winds or during winter—the seasons usually selected by Philip for his aggressions.[676]

[674] Demosthen. Philipp. i. p. 49. s. 37.

[675] Demosthen. Philipp. i. p. 49. s. 38, 39.

[676] Demosthenes, Philipp. i. p. 48, 49. “The obstinacy and violence of the Etesian winds, in July and August, are well known to those who have had to struggle with them in the Ægean during that season” (Colonel Leake, Travels in Northern Greece, vol. iv. ch. 42. p. 426).

The Etesian winds, blowing from the north, made it difficult to reach Macedonia from Athens.

Compare Demosthenes, De Rebus Chersonesi, p. 93. s. 14.

The aggregate means of Athens (Demosthenes affirmed) in men, money, ships, hoplites, horsemen, were greater than could be found anywhere else. But hitherto they had never been properly employed. The Athenians, like awkward pugilists, waited for Philip to strike, and then put up their hand to follow his blow. They never sought to look him in the face—nor to be ready with a good defensive system beforehand—nor to anticipate him in offensive operations.[677] While their religious festivals, the Panathenaic, Dionysiac, and others, were not only celebrated with costly splendor, but prearranged with the most careful pains, so that nothing was ever wanting in detail at the moment of execution—their military force was left without organization or predetermined system. Whenever any new encroachment of Philip was made known, nothing was found ready to meet it; fresh decrees were to be voted, modified, and put in execution, for each special occasion; the time for action was wasted in preparation, and before a force could be placed on shipboard, the moment for execution had passed.[678] This practice of waiting for Philip to act offensively, and then sending aid to the point attacked, was ruinous; the war must be carried on by a standing force put in motion beforehand.[679]

[677] Demosthen. Philipp. i. p. 51. s. 46. ... ὑμεῖς δὲ, πλείστην δύναμιν ἁπάντων ἔχοντες, τριηρεῖς, ὁπλίτας, ἱππέας, χρημάτων πρόσοδον, τούτων μὲν μέχρι τῆς τήμερον ἡμέρας οὐδενὶ πώποτε εἰς δέον τι κέχρησθε.

[678] Demosthen. Philipp. i. p. 50. ἐν δὲ τοῖς περὶ τοῦ πολέμου ἄτακτα, ἀδιόρθωτα, ἀόριστα, ἅπαντα. Τοιγαροῦν ἅμα ἀκηκόαμέν τι καὶ τριηράρχους καθίσταμεν, καὶ τούτοις ἀντιδόσεις ποιούμεθα καὶ περὶ χρημάτων πόρου σκοποῦμεν, etc.

[679] Demosthen. Philipp. i. p. 48, 49. δεῖ—μὴ βοηθείαις πολεμεῖν (ὑστεριοῦμεν γὰρ ἁπάντων) ἀλλὰ παρασκευῇ συνεχεῖ καὶ δυνάμει.

Compare his Oration De Rebus Chersonesi, p. 92. s. 11.

To provide and pay such a standing force, is one of the main points in the project of Demosthenes. The absolute necessity that it shall consist, in large proportion at least, of citizens, is another. To this latter point he reverts again and again, insisting that the foreign mercenaries—sent out to make their pay where or how they could, and unaccompanied by Athenian citizens—were at best useless and untrustworthy. They did more mischief to friends and allies, who were terrified at the very tidings of their approach—than to the enemy.[680] The general, unprovided with funds to pay them, was compelled to follow them wheresoever they chose to go, disregarding his orders received from the city. To try him afterwards for that which he could not help, was unprofitable disgrace. But if the troops were regularly paid; if, besides, a considerable proportion of them were Athenian citizens, themselves interested in success, and inspectors of all that was done; then the general would be found willing and able to attack the enemy with vigor—and might be held to a rigorous accountability, if he did not. Such was the only way in which the formidable and ever-growing force of their enemy Philip could be successfully combated. As matters now stood, the inefficiency of Athenian operations was so ridiculous, that men might be tempted to doubt whether Athens was really in earnest. Her chief military officers—her ten generals, ten taxiarchs, ten phylarchs, and two hipparchs, annually chosen—were busied only in the affairs of the city and in the showy religious processions. They left the real business of war to a foreign general named Menelaus.[681] Such a system was disgraceful. The honor of Athens ought to be maintained by her own citizens, both as generals and as soldiers.

[680] Demosthenes, Philippic i. p. 46. s. 28. ἐξ οὗ δ᾽ αὐτὰ καθ᾽ αὑτὰ τὰ ξενικὰ ὑμῖν στρατεύεται, τοὺς φίλους νικᾷ καὶ τοὺς συμμάχους, οἱ δ᾽ ἐχθροὶ μείζους τοῦ δέοντος γεγόνασι· καὶ παρακύψαντα ἐπὶ τὸν τῆς πόλεως πόλεμον, πρὸς Ἀρτάβαζον καὶ πανταχοῖ μᾶλλον οἴχεται πλέοντα, ὁ δὲ στρατηγὸς ἀκολουθεῖ, εἰκότως· οὐ γὰρ ἔστιν ἄρχειν μὴ διδόντα μισθόν. Τί οὖν κελεύω; τὰς προφάσεις ἀφελεῖν καὶ τοῦ στρατηγοῦ καὶ τῶν στρατιωτῶν, μισθὸν πορίσαντας καὶ στρατιώτας οἰκείους ὥσπερ ἐπόπτας τῶν στρατηγουμένων παρακαταστήσαντας, etc.

... p 53. s. 51. καὶ οἱ μὲν ἐχθροὶ καταγελῶσιν, οἱ δὲ σύμμαχοι τεθνᾶσι τῷ δέει τοὺς τοιούτους ἀποστόλους, etc.

[681] Demosthen. Philipp. i. p. 47. ἐπεὶ νῦν γε γέλως ἔσθ᾽ ὡς χρώμεθα τοῖς πράγμασι.

Such are the principal features in the discourse called the First Philippic; the earliest public harangue delivered by Demosthenes to the Athenian assembly, in reference to the war with Philip. It is not merely a splendid piece of oratory, emphatic and forcible in its appeal to the emotions; bringing the audience by many different roads, to the main conviction which the orator seeks to impress; profoundly animated with genuine Pan-hellenic patriotism, and with the dignity of that free Grecian world now threatened by a monarch from without. It has other merits besides, not less important in themselves, and lying more immediately within the scope of the historian. We find Demosthenes, yet only thirty years old—young in political life—and thirteen years before the battle of Chæroneia—taking accurate measure of the political relations between Athens and Philip; examining those relations during the past, pointing out how they had become every year more unfavorable, and foretelling the dangerous contingencies of the future, unless better precautions were taken; exposing with courageous frankness not only the past mismanagement of public men, but also those defective dispositions of the people themselves wherein such management had its root; lastly, after fault found, adventuring on his own responsibility to propose specific measures of correction, and urging upon reluctant citizens a painful imposition of personal hardship as well as of taxation. We shall find him insisting on the same obligation, irksome alike to the leading politicians and to the people,[682] throughout all the Olynthiacs and Philippics. We note his warnings given at this early day, when timely prevention would have been easily practicable; and his superiority to elder politicians like Eubulus and Phokion, in prudent appreciation, in foresight, and in courage of speaking out unpalatable truths. More than twenty years after this period, when Athens had lost the game and was in her phase of humiliation, Demosthenes (in repelling the charges of those who imputed her misfortune to his bad advice) measures the real extent to which a political statesman is properly responsible. The first of all things is—“To see events in their beginnings—to discern tendencies beforehand, and proclaim them beforehand to others—to abridge as much as possible the rubs, impediments, jealousies, and tardy movements, inseparable from the march of a free city—and to infuse among the citizens harmony, friendly feelings, and zeal for the performance of their duties.”[683] The first Philippic is alone sufficient to prove, how justly Demosthenes lays claim to the merit of having “seen events in their beginnings” and given timely warning to his countrymen. It will also go to show, along with other proofs hereafter to be seen, that he was not less honest and judicious in his attempts to fulfil the remaining portion of the statesman’s duty—that of working up his countrymen to unanimous and resolute enterprise; to the pitch requisite not merely for speaking and voting, but for acting and suffering, against the public enemy.

[682] Demosthenes, Philippic i. p. 54 s. 58. Ἐγὼ μὲν οὖν οὔτ᾽ ἄλλοτε πώποτε πρὸς χάριν εἱλόμην λέγειν, ὅ,τι ἂν μὴ καὶ συνοίσειν πεπεισμένος ὦ, νῦν τε ἃ γιγνώσκω πάνθ᾽ ἁπλῶς, οὐδὲν ὑποστειλάμενος, πεπαῤῥησίασμαι. Ἐβουλόμην δ᾽ ἄν, ὥσπερ ὅτι ὑμῖν συμφέρει τὰ βέλτιστα ἀκούειν οἶδα, οὕτως εἰδέναι συνοῖσον καὶ τῷ τὰ βέλτιστα εἰπόντι· πολλῷ γὰρ ἂν ἥδιον εἶπον. Νῦν δ᾽ ἐπ᾽ ἀδήλοις οὖσι τοῖς ἀπὸ τούτων ἐμαυτῷ γενησομένοις, ὅμως ἐπὶ τῷ συνοίσειν ὑμῖν, ἂν πράξητε, ταῦτα πεπεῖσθαι λέγειν αἱροῦμαι.

[683] Demosthenes, De Coronâ, p. 308. s. 306. Ἀλλὰ μὴν ὧν γ᾽ ἂν ὁ ῥήτωρ ὑπεύθυνος εἴη, πᾶσαν ἐξέτασιν λάμβανε· οὐ παραιτοῦμαι. Τίνα οὖν ἐστὶ ταῦτα; Ἰδεῖν τὰ πράγματα ἀρχόμενα, καὶ προαισθέσθαι καὶ προειπεῖν τοῖς ἄλλοις. Ταῦτα πέπρακταί μοι. Καὶ ἔτι τὰς ἑκασταχοῦ βραδυτῆτας, ὄκνους, ἀγνοίας, φιλονεικίας, ἃ πολιτικὰ ταῖς πόλεσι πρόσεστιν ἁπάσαις καὶ ἀναγκαῖα ἁμαρτήματα, ταῦθ᾽ ὡς εἰς ἐλάχιστα συστεῖλαι, καὶ τοὐνάντιον εἰς ὁμόνοιαν καὶ φιλίαν καὶ τοῦ τὰ δέοντα ποιεῖν ὁρμὴν προτρέψαι.

We know neither the actual course, nor the concluding vote, of this debate, wherein Demosthenes took a part so unexpectedly prominent. But we know that neither of the two positive measures which he recommends was carried into effect. The working armament was not sent out, nor was the home-force, destined to be held in reserve for instant movement in case of emergency, ever got ready. It was not until the following month of September (the oration being delivered some time in the first half of 351 B. C.), that any actual force was sent against Philip; and even then nothing more was done than to send the mercenary chief Charidemus to the Chersonese, with ten triremes, and five talents in money, but no soldiers.[684] Nor is there any probability that Demosthenes even obtained a favorable vote of the assembly; though strong votes against Philip were often passed without being ever put in execution afterwards.[685]

[684] Demosthenes, Olynth. iii. p. 29. s. 5.

[685] Demosthenes, Philipp. i. p. 48. s. 34; Olynth. ii. p. 21. s. 12; Olynth. iii. p. 29. s. 5. p. 32. s. 16; De Rhodiorum Libertate, p. 190. s. 1. And not merely votes against Philip, but against others also, remained either unexecuted or inadequately executed (Demosthenes, De Republicâ Ordinandâ, p. 175, 176).

Demosthenes was doubtless opposed by those senior statesmen whose duty it would have been to come forward themselves with the same propositions assuming the necessity to be undeniable. But what ground was taken in opposing him, we do not know. There existed at that time in Athens a certain party or section who undervalued Philip as an enemy not really formidable—far less formidable than the Persian king.[686] The reports of Persian force and preparation, prevalent two years before when Demosthenes delivered his harangue on the Symmories, seem still to have continued, and may partly explain the inaction again Philip. Such reports would be magnified, or fabricated, by another Athenian party much more dangerous; in communication with, and probably paid by, Philip himself. To this party Demosthenes makes his earliest allusion in the first Philippic,[687] and reverts to them on many occasions afterwards. We may be very certain that there were Athenian citizens serving as Philip’s secret agents, though we cannot assign their names. It would be not less his interest to purchase such auxiliaries, than to employ paid spies in his operations of war:[688] while the prevalent political antipathies at Athens, coupled with the laxity of public morality in individuals, would render it perfectly practicable to obtain suitable instruments. That not only at Athens, but also at Amphipolis, Potidæa, Olynthus and elsewhere, Philip achieved his successes, partly by purchasing corrupt partisans among the leaders of his enemies—is an assertion so intrinsically probable, that we may readily believe it, though advanced chiefly by unfriendly witnesses. Such corruption alone, indeed, would not have availed him, but it was eminently useful when combined with well-employed force and military genius.

[686] Demosthen. De Rhodior. Libertat. p. 197. s. 31. ὁρῶ δ᾽ ~ὑμῶν ἐνίους~ Φιλίππου μὲν ὡς ἄρ᾽ οὐδενὸς ἀξίου πολλάκις ὀλιγωροῦντας, βασιλέα δ᾽ ὡς ἰσχυρὸν ἐχθρὸν οἷς ἂν προέληται φοβουμένους. Εἰ δὲ ~τὸν μὲν ὡς φαῦλον οὐκ ἀμυνούμεθα~, τῷ δὲ ὡς φοβερῷ πάνθ᾽ ὑπείξομεν, πρὸς τίνας παραταξόμεθα;

This oration was delivered in 351-350 B. C.; a few months after the first Philippic.

[687] Demosthenes, Philipp. i. p. 45. s. 21; Olynthiac ii. p. 19. s. 4.

[688] Compare the advice of the Thebans to Mardonius in 479 B. C.—during the Persian invasion of Greece (Herodot. ix. 2).

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