DEMOSTHENES
pleased; and far from opposing or impeding his designs, would be ready at his command to fight on his side. From the same persuasion he now heaps his favors on the Messenians and Argians. And this reflects the greatest luster on you, my countrymen; for by these proceedings you are declared the only invariable assertors of the rights of Greece—the only persons whom no private attachment, no views of interest, can seduce from their affection to the Greeks.
And that it is with reason he entertains these sentiments of you, and sentiments so different of the Thebans and the Argians, he may be convinced, not from the present only, but from a review of former times; for he must have been informed, I presume he cannot but have heard, that your ancestors, when, by submitting to the king, they might have purchased the sovereignty of Greece, not only scorned to listen when Alexander, this man's ancestor, was made the messenger of such terms, but chose to abandon their city, encountered every possible difficulty, and after all this performed such exploits as men are ever eager to recite, yet with the just force and dignity' no man could ever express; and therefore it becomes me to be silent on this subject; for in reality their actions are superior to the power of words. As to the ancestors of the Thebans and the Argians, the one, he knows, fought for the barbarian; the others did not oppose him. He knew, then, that both these
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