and another for murder, which Midias immediately got up against him, and of which we hear no more afterwards, not even from his worst enemies.

We are not to judge of such an outrage, nor of the conduct of Demosthenes under it, by our modern standard. Corneille's Cid would not have been appreciated at Athens. They had no idea of the point of honor, in the chivalrous sense of the word. The individuality of the person, the haughtiness of the modern moi, were merged in implicit obedience to the law, and in the paramount duty of the citizen as member of a community. The honor of the Greek was a fanatical patriotism-he, was at all times, and at any sacrifice of his own interests or feelings, to obey the command, to promote the welfare of the state. The pride of the citizen was the humility of the man. It was this ruling passion which Demosthenes, as we have seen, knew so well how to move, and which he did awaken to transports long unfelt, by his Philippics and his Speech on the Crown. But independently of this high and ruling idea of Greek life, the Athenians were a people steeped in profligacy to the very lips, and wholly without shame or sensibility on subjects of honor. This shocking contrast between the exquisite in art, the polite in diction, the sublime in thought, and occasionally the great and heroical in sentiment, and a tone of manners and topics of discourse often the most low, vicious, brutal and cynical, is one of the most striking peculiarities of the ancient Greek world.

This speech against Midias is thus doubly curious, as exhibiting Demosthenes to us in a situation calculated severely to try his character, and as throwing light upon Athenian opinion on a matter of so much importance as the protection of the person. It appears, from a law cited by the orators, that every sort of violence or contumely (69) was rigidly punished, so that an assault and battery was a high crime: even slaves were protected, by a popular action, against outrages of the kind. On this, as on other occasions, the court is addressed as if the degree and even the nature of the punishment were entirely at its discretion. The orator seems to think that death itself would not be too much-but at all events, he demands that the defendant shall be rendered harmless by the forfeiture of the whole estate which at once inspired his insolence and secured its impunity. Not to extend these remarks unnecessarily, we will only add, that

there are passages of great beauty and power in this speech; as for example, the noted one as to the circumstances that aggravate the character of an assault, (§ 21,) and the necessity of protecting, in his person, the security of all. (§ 59.) His argument, on the application of precedents cited by the adversary, or by himself, is extremely discriminating and powerful, sufficiently so, we should think, to come up fully even to Lord Brougham's ideas of "close and sustained argumentation." (§§ 11. 17. 19. 48.)

To do Demosthenes complete justice in this distressing affair, it ought to be mentioned, that it was not an action for damages, but a public prosecution, that he had instituted so that his object was simply to punish the offender, and not to profit by the offence.

But by far the most important of the controversies in which he appeared himself were the memorable ones with Eschines, after Eubulus and Philocrates, and with Phocion, the leader of the Macedonian or Peace party, his mortal enemy, and the first orator of Greece, with the single exception of the great victor himself.

It is a remark applicable in general to the German writers of the present day, and particularly so to M. Westermann, that they treat Eschines just as Demosthenes did; that is, they receive implicitly all the charges made against him by the latter. This is like judging Hannibal by the Roman

accounts of him.

We confess, for our part, that we are disposed, in this contest, to lean a good deal towards Eschines, just as in Homer we involuntarily take sides with Hector against Achilles. He has, for a Greek, a remarkably well-bred, and gentlemanlike tone, a calm self-possession, a quiet dignity, a nice sense of moral propriety, and bating some rather rhetorical passages, his speaking is perfectly Attic. His oration against Timarchus is a beautiful and most effective speech. Unfortunately it turns principally on so revolting a subject, and reveals, in the existing state of morals at Athens, such unutterable abominations, that it would sully the pages of a modern journal to do more than allude to its contents. Otherwise, we have never read a speech in a foreign language which we should feel more tempted to translate. It is particularly remarkable for a sound moral tone, and for a certain delicacy in the manner of dealing with such horrors. The oration in his own defence, when charged by Demos

thenes with malversation in an embassy to Philip, is also an admirable masterpiece; and his third and most celebrated, though unfortunate, effort against Ctesiphon, would probably have been reckoned the perfection of the art, had not Demosthenes totally eclipsed him in his immortal reply. These three speeches are all the remains of Æschines; for although, or rather, perhaps, because a great extemporaneous speaker, he published little. They constitute what is called, in the language of the Greek drama, a Trilogy, -the beginning, the middle, and the end of his mortal combat with his more popular rival. Antiquity expressed its judgment upon them by designating them as the Three Graces. The origin of the feud was the first embassy to Philip to treat of peace. Up to that time Eschines seems to have distinguished himself as much by his opposition to the king, as Demosthenes. After his return, however, from that mission, he changed his course, and in a second embassy sent to conclude a definitive treaty with Macedon, he is charged with having, together with some colleagues equally disaffected or corrupt, purposely delayed the ratification until Philip had accomplished his projects in Phocis and Thrace-projects which the king had very much at heart, since these were the two most vulnerable points of Athens. Eschines seems to have contracted for Demosthenes a strong personal aversion during the first mission, and nothing can be more graphic and bumorous than his account of the behavior of his rival in their journeys as well as at Court. On their return from the last, Demosthenes and Timarchus, in concert, were preparing to impeach him for malversation in office, when schines turned upon one of his adversaries, and striking him down, seems for the time to have silenced, or at least foiled the other. He accused Timarchus of infamous conduct, which, according to Attic law, deprived him of the right of speaking in public. He was convicted, and, it is said, committed suicide in despair. Demosthenes wrote, as did Eschines, a long and labored speech, to be spoken in the impeachment of his rival. Whether they were delivered or not, is still matter of dispute. Some report that Æschines was, in fact, tried, and escaped but by thirty voices-others, that owing to the confusion of the times, the case was indefinitely postponed. M. Westermann suggests rather plausibly, that the prosecution was never even instituted. The argument which he considers as conclusive upon the subject, is one that weighed

very much with Plutarch, namely, that no allusion whatever is made to it by either of the orators in their speeches on the Crown. But this fact may be otherwise explained; and Jerome Wolf well remarks that by the same argument it might be proved that the oration against Timarchus had never been delivered. We think it not improbable, however, that the success of Eschines in the prosecution against this man, and the odium which his notorious and revolting infamy threw upon the whole cause, shook the nerve of Demosthenes, and made him abandon his purpose. If this was so, it is a remarkable instance of the pains which the ancient orators bestowed upon the composition of their harangues on great occasions-unless, indeed, we are to suppose that the suppressed speeches were circulated as political pamphlets. That of Eschines is the more finished production of the two -his rival's is considered as a mere cartoon - but it is a cartoon of Demosthenes.

With regard to the merits of the controversy, the impossibility of arriving at the truth must be apparent to any one who examines the state of the evidence. Contemporary history is perished with Theopompus; and what we find in later writers, such as Plutarch, is manifestly copied, or at any rate more or less deeply colored, from the mutual recriminations of the orators. It follows that we are, after all, referred to the speeches for the solution of the difficulties raised by the speeches. And what do we find in these? Palpable, irreconcilable contradictions, on subjects many of which must have been at that time matter of public notoriety. In the midst of a small society, in reference to events that had but just happened, we see them appealing, with equal confidence, to the testimony of the first men in the state, nay, to public records, affirming and denying, with the most solemn imprecations, things which, one should suppose, the whole assembly must have known as well as any witness. Every allegation necessary either to the attack or the defence is clearly stated, and apparently made out by the most irrefragable proofs; you see them, with all the gravity in the world, bid the clerk read the document, the record, the testimony needed. Poor Wolf (Jerome) is so much annoyed and scandalized by this conflict of asseverations, that he inveighs continually in his annotations against the perfidious art of the orators. In one of them he quotes Lactantius to the same purpose, and heartily joins in the repentance ex

pressed by the Christian Cicero, for having done any thing to promote this science of falsehood and imposture *- to say nothing of that anthology of vituperation, as it has been well expressed, which might be easily culled from these speeches especially those of Demosthenes-bidding defiance to Billingsgate at its worst. M. Westermann assumes that this orator is more to be relied on than his adversary, and this he assumes because he assumes, again, that he was the better man, as he undoubtedly displayed more statesmanship, as well as patriotic devotedness, in his opposition to Philip. But this argument is by no means conclusive. It proves too much. It applies as strongly to Phocion, who voted with Eschines throughout, and who is universally admitted to have been the most upright man of the time, and worthy to be associated with Aristeides. There is one consideration of very great weight in favor of Eschines. The war party was at that time decidedly the strongest at Athens; why did not the impeachment succeed?

As to what M. Westermann (pp. 48-50) considers as a confession of the defendant himself, it is absurd to separate, as he attempts to do, the fact from the intention. Eschines admits that on his return he made some such representations as had been imputed to him; but he resists the inference attempted to be drawn from them that he had betrayed his country. Far from denying, he boldly avows and most eloquently defends his policy in promoting the peace. He draws a frightful picture of the calamitous consequences of the war, the waste of treasure and the dilapidation of the finances, the loss of no less than seventy-five towns, restored to the confederacy by Conon, and of a hundred and fifty ships of war, the resources of the state lavished only on the refuse of all Greece, the corrupt brawlers in the public assemblies, and their worthless dependants, until the city was reduced to the condition of a mere den of pirates, while her mercenary generals, instead of arresting the progress of Philip, becoming daily more formidable, were not even to be found on the theatre of the war, but prosecuted elsewhere, without authority, enterprises of their own against the allies of the republic. In answer to the appeals to the conduct of their ancestors, in the Persian war, he reminds them of the effects of the invasion of Sicily, and of the terrible fruits of + De fals. Legat. § 24.

Ad Esch. de fals. Legat. § 3.