To Philip (136-140)

But more important than all that I have said is the truth that wealth and positions of power often fall into the hands of our foes, whereas the good will of our fellow countrymen and the other rewards which I have mentioned are possessions to which none can fall heir but our own children, and they alone. I could not, therefore, respect myself if I failed to advance these motives in urging you to make this expedition and wage war and brave its perils.

You will best resolve upon this question if you feel that you are summoned to this task, not by my words only, but by your forefathers, by the cowardice of the Persians, and by all who have won great fame and attained the rank of demigods because of their campaigns against the barbarians, and, most of all, by the present opportunity, which finds you in the possession of greater power than has any of those who dwell in Europe, and finds him against whom you are to make war more cordially hated and despised by the world at large than was ever any king before him.

I should have given much to be able to blend into one all the speeches I have delivered on this question; for the present discourse would then appear more worthy of its theme. But, as things are, it devolves upon you to search out and consider, from all my speeches, the arguments which bear upon and urge you to this war; for so you will best resolve upon the matter.

Now I am not unaware that many of the Hellenes look upon the King’s power as invincible.[*] Yet one may well marvel at them if they really believe that the power which was subdued to the will of a mere barbarian—an ill-bred[*] barbarian at that—and collected in the cause of slavery, could not be scattered by a man of the blood of Hellas, of ripe experience in warfare, in the cause of freedom—and that too although they know that while it is in all cases difficult to construct a thing, to destroy it is, comparatively, an easy task.

Bear in mind that the men whom the world most admires and honors are those who unite in themselves the abilities of the statesman and the general. When, therefore, you see the renown which even in a single city is bestowed on men who possess these gifts, what manner of eulogies must you expect to hear spoken of you, when among all the Hellenes you shall stand forth as a statesman who has worked for the good of Hellas, and as a general who has overthrown the barbarians?