Against Leocrates (50-54)

For at the very moment when they passed away her lot was changed to servitude. With the bodies of these men was buried the freedom of every other Greek, and thus they proved it to the world that they were fighting for no private ends but facing danger for our common liberty. I therefore say without misgiving that their lives have been a laurel wreath for Athens.

They had good reason for their conduct,[*] since you, Athenians, alone among Greeks know how to honor valiant men. In other cities, you will find, it is the athletes who have their statues in the market place, whereas in yours it is victorious generals and the slayers of the tyrants: men whose like it is hard to find though we search the whole of Greece for but a few, whereas the winners of contests for a wreath have come from many places and can easily be seen. It is then only right, since you pay the highest honors to your benefactors, that you should also punish with the utmost rigor those who dishonor and betray their country.

You should bear in mind, gentlemen, that it is not even in your power, unless you go beyond your rights, to acquit this man Leocrates, since his offence has had judgement passed upon it and a vote of condemnation too. For the council of the Areopagus;—(No one need interrupt me. That council was, in my opinion, the greatest bulwark of the city at the time;)—seized and executed men who then had fled from their country and abandoned it to the enemy. You must not think, gentlemen, that these councillors who are so scrupulous in trying other men for homicide would themselves have taken the life of any citizen unlawfully.

Moreover you condemned Autolycus[*] and punished him because, though he himself had faced the dangers, he was charged with secretly sending his wife and sons away. Yet if you punished him when his only crime was that he had sent away persons useless for war, what should your verdict be on one who, though a man, did not pay his country the price of his nurture? The people also, who looked with horror upon what was taking place, decreed that those who were evading the danger which their country’s defence involved were liable for treason, meriting in their belief the extreme penalty.

When therefore certain actions have been censured by the most impartial council and condemned by you who were the judges appointed by lot, when they have been recognized by the people as demanding the severest punishment, will you give a verdict which opposes all these views? If you do, you will be the most unconscionable of men and will have few indeed ready to risk themselves in your defence.