You must give your earnest attention to these things, and be careful that you are not forced into error. Many a time, O Athenians, instead of it being proved to you that measures were just, they have been extorted from you by the clamour and violence and impudence of the speakers. Let not this happen now: it would not be well. What you have determined to be just, keep in mind and remember until you vote, that you may give your votes conscientiously against evil counsellors. I marvel, when you punish with death those who debase the coin, if you will give ear to persons who render the whole commonwealth false and treacherous. You will not surely! O Jupiter and the gods!

I have nothing more to add, as you seem fully to understand what has been said.

THE ORATION AGAINST MIDIAS.

THE ARGUMENT.

THE cause of this proceeding against Midias was an assault committed on Demosthenes with aggravating circumstances at the Dionysian festival. Demosthenes was Choragus: he had volunteered to take the office, which his tribe (the Pandionian) had not provided any one to fill for two years. In the drawing of lots he got the choice of the best flute-player; and his liberal conduct having been received with much applause by the people, he resolved to exhibit his chorus with becoming splendour, and accordingly he ordered golden crowns and handsome dresses to be prepared for them. Midias, a man of wealth, and an enemy of Demosthenes, with whom he had a quarrel of some standing, vexed to see him acquiring so much credit with the public, insulted and annoyed him in divers ways during the festival, and at last struck him with his fist upon the stage and tore his official dress. For this, on a day specially appointed after the festival for the hearing of such complaints, Demosthenes preferred a charge against Midias before the popular assembly, and procured a vote directing him to be criminally prosecuted. This vote was a sort of true bill found against Midias by the people, affording strong presumptive evidence of his guilt, but yet not conclusive; for the whole question was still to be dealt with by the judicial tribunal to which it was referred. The proceeding itself in the technical language of Athenian law was called Probole: of which some account will be given in Appendix VIII.

Whether the case was ever brought to trial before a jury, is a question not free from doubt. Dionysius, assigning the date of the oration, speaks of it as written only. Eschines, in the oration against Ctesiphon, reproaches his rival with having compromised the affair for thirty minas: nor does Demosthenes contradict him. Plutarch, in his life of Demosthenes, assumes the fact as undoubted, and contends that he settled the dispute not from any wish to spare the defendant, for he was of an unforgiving disposition; not from avarice, for the sum given was too small; but under the apprehension that Midias by his wealth and influence would be too strong for him. Modern writers have generally acquiesced in the view of Plutarch. If it be the true one, we must suppose that it was not forbidden by the Athenian law to accept compensation, and that this was not one of the cases in which the dropping of a prosecution was attended with disfranchisement. (See the Oration, page 548, Orig.) It would appear indeed somewhat strange, if Demosthenes afterwards published a speech, in which he not only exhibits vindictive feelings towards

his opponent, but takes credit to himself for having rejected` all offers of compromise and having brought the defendant to trial as a public offender. There are some grounds however, furnished by the oration itself, for believing that it never was published by Demosthenes, but left by him in an unfinished state. Photius refers to certain critics who were of that opinion. Grote in his history represents that the trial actually took place; that Demosthenes delivered his speech and obtained the verdict of the jury in his favour; but that, before they proceeded to find their second verdict for the penalty, he accepted the moderate fine offered by the defendant, for fear of exasperating the powerful body of friends who came to intercede for him. If this account of the matter were reconcilable with the ancient authorities, (which it can hardly be thought to be however,) one would be glad to adopt it, as it would altogether clear Demosthenes from the charge of having hushed up so gross an affront for a paltry sum of money. A. G. Becker suggests that there were legal doubts as to the character of the offence— whether it were one of a public or a private nature-and therefore Demosthenes, feeling that his ground was not sure, had an additional motive for accepting the terms offered by his opponent. The speech before us, whether actually delivered or only intended to have been delivered, is acknowledged to be the genuine production of Demosthenes; and is a pretty good specimen of forensic eloquence. According to our notions indeed, it is somewhat too rambling and discursive: for the orator not only goes into a long history of wrongs done to him by Midias, independent of that which formed the subject of prosecution, (a course to some extent justifiable, as tending to prove malicious motives on the part of the defendant,) but charges him with injuries done to other men, attacks his general character and the conduct of his whole life. We must bear in mind however, that a very loose practice, both in the speaking and the evidence, was permitted by the Athenian courts. The principal object of the speech is to excite the feelings of the jury against Midias, with a view to increase the measure of his punishment. It was notorious that the assault had been committed. The people who condemned Midias in the assembly had been eye-witnesses of what he had done in the theatre. Demosthenes therefore had no difficulty to prove the main subject of the charge: he labours chiefly to show the malignant purpose of the defendant, and that, in striving to wreak his malice upon a personal enemy, he had committed a crime against the state and her religion. To make this out, he enters minutely into all the circumstances of the case; his own offer to undertake the duties of Choragus, his favourable reception by the people, his preparations for the spectacle: how Midias had immediately commenced a system of insult and annoyance, which he continued throughout the whole time of the festival, until he perpetrated the final outrage by striking him before the assembled spectators. He (Demosthenes) had sought redress in the manner specially provided for such a case by the Athenian law: he had arraigned Midias before the people, considering the offence to be one which merited a public prosecution. It was not a case of one private in

dividual insulted by another, but of a Choragus, a public officer, I whose duties at the festival invested him with a sacred character. He shows by precedents what importance the Athenians attached to the office. To strike such a man while in the performance of his duties, and to tear his official robe, argued a contempt of the commonwealth and her institutions. The festival was a holiday, during which the law forbade the execution even of legal process. If acts otherwise lawful might not be committed at this time, how unpardonable was it to commit an act altogether unlawful. Midias had no manner of excuse. He had received no provocation: he was neither drunk nor in a passion when he struck the blow. That it was an act of premeditated malice was clear from his previous conduct; in particular, from his base attempt to destroy the dresses and crowns which had been sent to the goldsmith, from his blocking up the side entrance to the stage, from his enticing away the trainingmaster of the chorus, from his bribing the umpires, which had caused the Pandionian tribe to lose the prize. Midias had been at enmity with Demosthenes for many years. The quarrel had arisen out of the proceedings of Demosthenes against his guardians, which Midias had attempted to defeat by forcing upon him an exchange of estates with his brother Thrasylochus. The two brothers had rushed into his house, broken the doors, and behaved with brutal insolence, uttering the most indecent language in the presence of his sister, a young girl. For this Demosthenes brought an action against Midias, and recovered damages, of which down to the present time he had never been able to obtain payment. Meanwhile the defendant had never ceased to persecute him in every possible way. Among other things, he had hired a low fellow named Euctemon to prefer an indictment against Demosthenes for desertion of his post, which Euctemon had not ventured to bring to trial, and having failed to prosecute, had suffered the penalty of disfranchisement. But a yet more dreadful plot had been laid for his ruin. A murder had been committed by one Aristarchus, against whom the relatives of the deceased were taking legal proceedings. Midias offered them money to drop their proceedings against Aristarchus and to accuse Demosthenes of the crime. Two of the relations, to whom the money was offered, are called to give their testimony. It was evident from this that Midias would use any means, however nefarious, to be revenged on people who offended him. He had by a base trick procured the disfranchisement of Straton the arbitrator, for no other reason than because he had pronounced his award against him and in favour of Demosthenes. Witnesses are called to prove this; and Straton himself, who being disfranchised was incapable of giving testimony, is produced before the jury to excite their indignation against the defendant for his cruel treatment. There were a multitude of other people in Athens who had suffered grievous wrongs from the defendant. A catalogue of these is read to the court, unaccompanied (as it seems) by any proof. The great body of those whom he had injured had not dared to complain: the few that had complained were not able to obtain redress. The wealth and power of Midias encouraged him to set the laws at defiance. He had a

band of confederates ready to back him in every act of fraud and oppression. By bribing some people, by intimidating others, by an unscrupulous use of the trickeries of pleading and every kind of legal artifice, he had hitherto contrived to escape from justice. The jury had now an opportunity of punishing him for all his misdeeds at once; and they should not let it slip out of their hands. It was dangerous to leave such a man in possession of wealth, which he used only as an instrument for mischief. Midias, besides being oppressive to all men, had rendered himself universally odious by his overbearing insolence. This now, owing to the licence which he had so Long enjoyed, exceeded all bounds. He had the vices of Alcibiades without his courage and abilities. Alcibiades, on account of his mad pranks, intolerable in a free state, had been exiled from Athens, notwithstanding the services that he had rendered her. But Midias had never done any service whatsoever to his country. He was mean, effeminate, and cowardly. By means of his wealth he had got the appointment of Hipparch; yet he was unable to ride through the market-place. He had given proof of what he was in the late Euboean campaign; in which he had contrived to shirk serving with the cavalry who were under his command, and whom he slanderously denounced before the people as being a disgrace to the country. He was master of the Paralus, and had neglected to sail with it in time for an important expedition: and had further abused his trust by robbing the Cyzicenes of five talents, and rendering that people unfriendly to Athens. The honours which had been conferred upon him only increased his arrogance and presumption. The only instance, in which he had shown any appearance of liberality, was when he gave a trireme to the state: but if the circumstances were looked at, it would be seen that his motive was a base one. It was after the news had been brought of the army being in danger at Tamynæ, and the council ordered that all the remainder of the cavalry should be sent to theirassistance: Midias, to escape going out with them, volunteered to be a trierarch, by which he knew he would incur no personal danger. It was clear therefore that the people owed him no favour: he had nothing to set off against his evil deeds. When any misfortunes happened to the people, his practice was to exult over them. He never showed any pity to others, and therefore he deserved none. Even the vote of censure passed against him in the assembly had not made him in the least more humble: he had taken pains to show that he was not afraid of it, and to exhibit as bold a front as ever. The jury should give effect to the popular judgment expressed at the time of the offence; for nothing had happened since to cause any change in their feelings. He (Demosthenes) had been strongly urged to go on with the prosecution, and on no account to abandon it: he had resisted all the offers made to him by the friends of Midias and all their menaces, and was determined to press the case to conviction for the sake of public justice. Such a course was the more imperative on account of the number of foreigners who had witnessed the outrage; in whose estimation the dignity of the commonwealth would be lowered, if it appeared that such things could be done at Athens with impunity. He rebukes Eubulus and others