On the Embassy (266-270)

when, I say, the business had gone so far as that, and corruption had won the day, then, though they numbered more than ten thousand and had a thousand cavalry, though all their neighbors were in alliance with them, though you came to their aid with ten thousand mercenaries, fifty war-galleys, and four thousand of your citizen-force, nothing could save them. Before the war had lasted a year they had lost every town in Chalcidice through treachery, and Philip could no longer pay any attention to the traitors, and hardly knew what to capture first.

He took five hundred horsemen with all their equipment by the treason of their officers—a number beyond all precedent. The perpetrators of that infamy were not put to the blush by the sun that shone on their shame or by the soil of their native land on which they stood, by temples or by sepulchres, by the ignominy that waited on their deeds: such madness, men of Athens, such obliquity, does corruption engender! Therefore it behoves you, you the commonalty of Athens, to keep your senses, to refuse toleration to such practices, and to visit them with public retribution. For indeed it would be monstrous if, after passing so stern a decree of censure upon the men who betrayed the Olynthians, you should have no chastisement for those who repeat their iniquity in your own midst. Read the decree concerning the Olynthians.

(The Decree is read)

Gentlemen of the jury, by the universal judgement of Greeks and barbarians alike, you acted well and righteously in passing this vote of censure upon traitors and reprobates. Therefore, inasmuch as bribe-taking is the forerunner of such treasons, and for the sake of bribes men commit them, whenever, men of Athens, you see any man taking bribes, you may be sure that he is also a traitor. If one man betrays opportunities, another negotiations, another soldiery, each one is making havoc of the business he controls, and all alike deserve your reprobation.

In dealing with them you, men of Athens, and you alone among the nations of the world, can find examples to imitate in your own history, and may emulate in act the forefathers whom you justly commend. For if at the present time you are at peace, and cannot emulate the battles, the campaigns, the hazards of war, in which they won renown, you may at least imitate their sound judgement.

That is wanted in all circumstances; and an honest judgement costs you no more pains and vexation than a vicious judgement. Each of you will sit in this court for just as long a time, whether, by reaching a right decision and giving a right verdict upon this case, he amends the condition of the commonwealth and does credit to his ancestry, or, by a wrong decision, impairs that condition and dishonors that ancestry. What, then, was their judgement in such a case?—Clerk, take this and read it.—For I would have you know that you are treating with indifference offences such as your forefathers once punished with death.

(A Public Inscription is read)