For the Megalopolitans

Introduction.

In 371 B.C. the Thebans under Epaminondas defeated the Spartans
at Leuctra, and, assisted by Thebes, the Arcadians and Messenians threw off the
Spartan yoke. The former founded Megalopolis as their common centre, the latter
Messene. But after the death of Epaminondas in 362, Thebes was left without a
leader; and when, in 355, she became involved in the 'Sacred War' with the
Phocians, the new Peloponnesian states turned towards Athens, and Messene
received a solemn promise of Athenian assistance, if ever she was attacked by
Sparta. In 353 Thebes was suffering considerably from the Sacred War, and the
Spartans made an ingenious attempt to recover their power, in the form of a
proposal for the restoration of territory to its original owners. This meant
that Athens would recover Oropus, which had been in the hands of Thebes since
366, and had previously been the subject of a long-standing dispute; that
Orchomenus, Thespiae, and Plataeae, which had all been overthrown by Thebes,
would be restored; and that Elis and Phlius would also recover certain lost
possessions. All these states would then be morally bound (so the Spartans
thought) to help Sparta to reconquer Arcadia and Messenia.

On the occasion of this speech (delivered in 353) the Megalopolitans had
appealed to Athens, and an Arcadian and a Spartan embassy had each had an
audience of the Assembly, and had each received strong support from Athenian
speakers. The principal motives of the supporters of Sparta were their hostility
to Thebes, and their desire not to break with the Spartans, whom Athens had
assisted at Mantineia in 362 against the Thebans and Megalopolitans. Demosthenes
supports the Arcadians, and lays great stress on the desirability of maintaining
a balance of power between Sparta and Thebes, so that neither might become too
strong. To allow Sparta to reconquer Arcadia, and, as the next step, Messenia,
would be to render her too formidable; and to reject the proposal of Sparta
would not preclude Athens from recovering Oropus and demanding the restoration
of the Boeotian towns. But the promise of assistance to the Arcadians should be
accompanied by a request for the termination of their alliance with Thebes.

Demosthenes' advice was not followed. In fact Athens was hardly in a position to
risk becoming entangled in a war with Sparta, particularly in view of the danger
to her northern possessions from Philip. She therefore remained neutral, while
the Thebans, relieved from the pressure of the Sacred War owing to the defeat of
the Phocian leader Onomarchus by Philip, were able to send aid to Megalopolis. A
truce between Sparta and Megalopolis was made about 350. It was, however, a
result of the neutrality of Athens, that she was unable, a few years later, to
secure the support of the Arcadians against Philip, whose allies they
subsequently became.

Lord Brougham describes the oration as 'one of extraordinary subtlety and
address in handling delicate topics'; and, after quoting the passage in which
Demosthenes urges the necessity of maintaining a balance of power between rival
states, adds that 'this is precisely the language of modern policy'. At the same
time, the speech has in places a somewhat academic and theoretical air: it is
much occupied with the weighing of hypothetical considerations and obligations
against one another: and though it enunciates some plain and reasonable
political principles, and makes an honest attempt to satisfy those who wished to
help the Arcadians, but at the same time desired to regain ground against
Thebes, it is not always convincing, and the tone is more frankly opportunist
than is usually the case with Demosthenes.

{1} I think, men of Athens, that those who have spoken on the Arcadian side and
those who have spoken on the Spartan, are alike making a mistake. For their
mutual accusations and their attacks upon one another would suggest that they
are not, like yourselves, Athenians, receiving the two embassies, but actually
delegates of the two states. Such attacks it was for the two deputations to
make. The duty of those who claim to advise you here was to discuss the
situation impartially, and to inquire, in an uncontentious spirit, what course
is best in your interests. {2} As it is, if one could alter the fact that they
are known to us, and that they speak the dialect of Attica, I believe that many
would imagine that those on the one side actually were Arcadians, and those on
the other, Spartans. For my part, I see plainly enough the difficulty of
offering the best advice. For you, like them, are deluded, in your desire for
one extreme or the other: and one who endeavours to propose an intermediate
course, which you will not have the patience to understand, will satisfy neither
side and will forfeit the confidence of both. {3} But in spite of this, I shall
prefer, for my own part, to risk being regarded as an idle chatterer (if such is
really to be my lot), rather than to abandon my conviction as to what is best
for Athens, and leave you to the mercy of those who would deceive you. And while
I shall deal with all other points later, by your leave, I shall take for my
starting-point, in explaining the course which I believe to be best, those
principles which are admitted by all.

{4} There can be no possible question that it is to the interest of the city
that both the Spartans and these Thebans should be weak; and the present
situation, if one may judge at all from what has constantly been asserted in
your presence, is such, that if Orchomenus, Thespiae, and Plataeae[n] are re-
established, Thebes becomes weak; and that if the Spartans can reduce Arcadia to
subjection and destroy Megalopolis, Sparta will recover her former strength. {5}
We must, therefore, take care not to allow the Spartans to attain a formidable
degree of strength, before the Thebans have become insignificant, lest there
should take place, unobserved by us, such an increase in the power of Sparta as
would be out of proportion to the decrease in the power of Thebes which our
interests demand. For it is, of course, out of the question that we should
desire merely to substitute the rivalry of Sparta for that of Thebes: that is
not the object upon which we are bent. Our object is rather that neither people
shall be capable of doing us any injury. That is what will best enable us to
live in security.

{6} But, granted that this is what ought to be, still, we are told, it is a
scandalous thing to choose for our allies the men against whom we were arrayed
at Mantineia, and further, to help them against those whose perils we shared
that day. I agree; but I think that we need to insert the condition, 'provided
that the two parties are willing to act rightly.' {7} For if all alike prove
willing to keep the peace, we shall not go to the aid of the Megalopolitans,
since there will be no need to do so; and so there will be no hostility whatever
on our part towards our former comrades in battle. They are already our allies,
as they tell us; and now the Arcadians will become our allies as well. What more
could we desire? {8} But suppose they act wrongfully and think fit to make war.
In that case, if the question before us is whether we are to abandon Megalopolis
to Sparta or not, then I say that, wrong though it is, I will acquiesce in our
permitting this, and declining to oppose our former companions in danger. But if
you all know that, after capturing Megalopolis, they will march against Messene,
let me ask any of those who are now so harshly disposed towards Megalopolis to
say what action he will _then_ advise. No answer will be given. {9} In fact you
all know that, whether they advise it or not, we _must_ then go to the rescue,
both because of the oath which we have sworn to the Messenians, and because our
interests demand the continued existence of that city. Ask yourselves, then, on
which occasion you can most honourably and generously interpose to check the
aggressions of Sparta--in defence of Megalopolis, or in defence of Messene? {10}
On the present occasion it will be understood that you are succouring the
Arcadians, and are anxious that the Peace, which you fought for and risked your
lives to win, may be secure. But if you wait, all the world will see plainly
that it is not in the name of right that you desire the existence of Messene,
but because you are afraid of Sparta. And while we should always seek and do the
right, we should at the same time take good care that what is right shall also
be advantageous.

{11} Now an argument is used by speakers on the other side to the effect that we
ought to attempt to recover Oropus,[n] and that if we make enemies of those who
might come to our assistance against it we shall have no allies. I too say that
we should try to recover Oropus. But the argument that the Spartans will be our
enemies now, if we make alliance with those Arcadians who desire our friendship,
is an argument which no one has less right even to mention, than those who
induced you to help the Spartans when they were in danger. {12} Such was not
their argument, when all the Peloponnesians came to you,[n] entreating you to
support them in their campaign against Sparta, and they persuaded you to reject
the entreaty, with the result that the Peloponnesians took the only remaining
course and applied to Thebes--when they bade you contribute funds and imperil
your lives for the deliverance of the Spartans. Nor, I presume, would you have
been willing to protect them, had they warned you that you must expect no
gratitude for their deliverance, unless, after saving them, you allowed them
once more to do as they pleased and commit fresh aggressions. {13} And further,
however antagonistic it may be to the designs of the Spartans, that we should
make the Arcadians our allies, they are surely bound to feel a gratitude towards
us for saving them when they were in the utmost extremity, which will outweigh
their vexation at our preventing their present wrongdoing. Must they not then
either assist us to recover Oropus, or else be regarded as the basest of
mankind? For, by Heaven, I can see no other alternative.

{14} I am astonished, also, to hear it argued that if we make the Arcadians our
allies, and carry out my advice, it will seem as though Athens were changing her
policy, and were utterly unreliable. I believe that the exact reverse of this is
the case, men of Athens, and I will tell you why. I suppose that no one in the
world can deny that when this city saved the Spartans,[n] and before them the
Thebans,[n] and finally the Euboeans,[n] and subsequently made them her allies,
she had one and the same end always in view. {15} And what was this? It was to
deliver the victims of aggression. And if this is so, it is not we that should
be changing, but those who refuse to adhere to the right; and it will be
manifest that, although circumstances change from time to time with the
ambitious designs of others, Athens does not change.

{16} I believe that the Spartans are playing a very unscrupulous part. At
present they tell us that the Eleans are to recover part of Triphylia,[n] and
the Phliasians, Tricaranum;[n] other Arcadians are to recover their own
possessions, and we ourselves are to recover Oropus--not that they have any
desire to see every state enjoying its own--far from it!-- such generosity on
their part would be late indeed in showing itself. {17} They wish rather to
present the appearance of co-operating with each separate state in the recovery
of the territory that it claims, in order that when they themselves march
against Messene, all may take the field with them, and give them their hearty
assistance, on pain of seeming to act unfairly, in refusing to return an
equivalent for the support which each of them received from Sparta in regard to
their own several claims. {18} My own view is that, even without the tacit
surrender of some of the Arcadians to Sparta, we can recover Oropus, aided not
only by the Spartans, if they are ready to act honourably, but by all who
disapprove of allowing Thebes to retain what is not her own. But even if it were
made quite plain to us, that without allowing Sparta to subdue the Peloponnese,
we should not be able to take Oropus, I should still think it preferable, if I
may dare to say so, to let Oropus go, rather than sacrifice Messene and the
Peloponnese to Sparta. For our quarrel with them would not, I believe, be
confined to this; since--I will not say what occurs to me; but there are many
risks which we should run.

{19} But, to pass on, it is a monstrous thing to use the hostile actions which,
they say, the Megalopolitans committed against us, under the influence of
Thebes, as a ground of accusation against them to-day; and, when they wish to be
friends and so atone for their action by doing us good, to look askance at them,
to seek for some way of avoiding their friendship, to refuse to recognize that
in proportion to the zeal which my opponents can prove the Megalopolitans to
have shown in supporting Thebes will be the resentment to which my opponents
themselves will deservedly be exposed, for depriving the city of such allies as
these, when they have appealed to you before appealing to Thebes. {20} Such a
policy is surely the policy of men who wish to make the Arcadians for the second
time the allies of others. And so far as one can forecast the future by
calculation, I am sure, and I believe that most of you will agree with me, that
if the Spartans take Megalopolis, Messene will be in peril; and if they take
Messene also, then I predict that we shall find ourselves allies of Thebes.[n]
{21} It is a far more honourable, a far better, course that we should ourselves
take over the Theban confederacy,[n] refusing to leave the field open to the
cupidity of the Spartans, than that we should be so afraid of protecting the
allies of Thebes, as first to sacrifice them, and then to save Thebes itself;
and, in addition, to be in a state of apprehension for our own safety. {22} For
if the Spartans capture Megalopolis and become a great power once more, the
prospect, as I conceive it, is not one which this city can view without alarm.
For I can see that even now they are determining to go to war, not to prevent
any evil which threatens them, but to recover their own ancient power: and what
their aims were when they possessed that power, you, I think, know[n] perhaps
better than I, and with that knowledge may well be alarmed.

{23} Now I should be glad if the speakers who profess their hatred for Thebes on
the one side, or for Sparta on the other, would tell me if their professed
hatred is based on consideration for you and your interests, or whether the one
party hates Thebes from an interest in Sparta, and the other Sparta from an
interest in Thebes. If the latter is the case, you should not listen to either,
but treat them as insane: but if the former, why this inordinate exaltation of
one side or the other? {24} For it is possible, perfectly possible, to humiliate
Thebes without rendering Sparta powerful. Indeed, it is by far the easier
course; and I will try to tell you how it can be done. We all know that, however
unwilling men may be to do what is right, yet up to a certain point they are
ashamed not to do so, and that they withstand wrongdoers openly, particularly if
there are any who receive damage through the wrong done: and we shall find that
what ruins everything and is the source of all evil is the unwillingness to do
what is right without reserve. {25} Now in order that no such obstacle may stand
in the way of the humiliation of Thebes, let us demand the re-establishment of
Thespiae, Orchomenus, and Plataeae, co-operating with their citizens ourselves,
and requiring others to do so; for the principle of refusing to allow ancient
cities to lie desolate is a right and honourable one. But let us at the same
time decline to abandon Megalopolis and Messene to the aggressors, or to suffer
the destruction of existing and inhabited cities, on the pretext of restoring
Plataeae and Thespiae. {26} Then, if our policy is made plain to all, there is
no one who will not wish to terminate the Thebans' occupation of territory not
their own. But if it is not, not only will our designs be opposed by the
Arcadians, in the belief that the restoration of these towns carries with it
their own ruin, but we shall have troubles without end. For, honestly, where can
we expect to reach an end, when we permit the annihilation of existing cities,
and require the restoration of those that have been annihilated?

{27} It is demanded by those whose speeches display the strongest appearance of
fairness, that the Megalopolitans shall take down the pillars[n] which
commemorate their alliance with Thebes, if they are to be trustworthy allies of
Athens. The Megalopolitans reply that for them it is not pillars, but interest,
that creates friendship; and that it is those who help them, that they consider
to be their allies. Well, that may be their attitude. Nevertheless, my own view
is, roughly speaking, this:--I say that we should simultaneously require the
Megalopolitans to take down the pillars, and the Spartans to keep the peace: and
that in the event of either side refusing to fulfil our request, we should at
once take the part of those who are willing to fulfil it. {28} For if the
Megalopolitans obtain peace, and yet adhere to the Theban alliance, it will be
clear to all that they prefer the grasping policy of Thebes to that which is
right. If, on the other hand, Megalopolis makes alliance frankly with us, and
the Spartans then refuse to keep the peace, it will surely be clear to all that
what the Spartans desire so eagerly is not the re-establishment of Thespiae, but
an opportunity of subduing the Peloponnese while the Thebans are involved in the
war.[n] {29} And I am surprised to find that there are some who are alarmed at
the prospect of the enemies of Sparta becoming allies of Thebes, and yet see
nothing to fear in the subjugation of these enemies by Sparta herself; whereas
the experience of the past can teach us that the Thebans always use such allies
against Sparta, while, when Sparta had them, she used to use them against us.

{30} There is another point which I think you should consider. Suppose that you
reject the overtures of the Megalopolitans. If they are annihilated and
dispersed, Sparta can recover her power at once. If they actually survive--for
things have happened before now beyond all hope--they will quite rightly be the
firm allies of Thebes. But suppose you receive them. Then the immediate result,
so far as they are concerned, is that they are saved by you: and as to the
future, let us now transfer our calculation of possible risks to the case of the
Thebans and Spartans. {31} If the Thebans are crushed, as they ought to be, the
Spartans will not be unduly powerful, for they will always have these Arcadians
at their doors to hold them in check. But if the Thebans actually recover and
survive the attack, they will at least be weaker; for the Arcadians will have
become our allies, and will owe their preservation to us. Thus on every ground
it is to our interest not to sacrifice the Arcadians, nor to let them think that
their deliverance, if they are really saved, is due to themselves, or to any
other people than you.

{32} And now, men of Athens, I solemnly declare that what I have said has been
prompted by no personal feeling, friendly or hostile, towards either side. I
have told you only what I believe to be expedient for you; and I exhort you not
to sacrifice the people of Megalopolis, and to make it your rule, never to
sacrifice a smaller power to a greater.

Notes

FOR THE MEGALOPOLITANS

Sec. 4. _Plataeae_ (which had been overthrown by the enemies of Athens in the
course of the Peloponnesian War, but rebuilt, with the aid of Sparta, in
378) was destroyed by Thebes in 373-372. About the same time Thebes
destroyed Thespiae, which, like Plataeae, was well-disposed towards
Athens; and in 370 the Thebans massacred the male population of
Orchomenus, and sold the women and children into slavery.

Sec. 11. _Oropus_ had sometimes belonged to Thebes and sometimes to Athens.
In 366 it was taken from Athens by Themison, tyrant of Eretria (exactly
opposite Oropus, on the coast of Euboea), and placed in the hands of
Thebes until the ownership should be decided. Thebes retained it until it
was restored to Athens by Philip in 338.

Sec. 12. _when all the Peloponnesians, &c_. The reference seems to be to the
year 370, shortly after the battle of Leuctra, when the Peloponnesian
States sought the protection of Athens against Sparta, and, being refused,
became allies of Thebes (Diodorus xv. 62). In 369 Athens made an alliance
with Sparta.

Sec. 14. _saved the Spartans_. See last note. Athens also assisted the
Spartans at Mantineia in 362.

_the Thebans_. In 378 and the following years Athens assisted Thebes
against the Spartans under Agesilaus and Cleombrotus.

_the Euboeans_. In 358 or 357 Euboea succeeded in obtaining freedom from
the domination of Thebes by the aid of Athenian troops under Timotheus.

Sec. 16. _Triphylia_, a district between Elis and Messenia, was the subject
of a long-standing dispute between the Eleans and the Arcadians, and seems
to have been in the hands of the latter since (about) 368.

_Tricaranum_, a fortress in the territory of Phlius, had been seized by
the Argives in 369, and used as a centre from which incursions were made
into Phliasian territory.

Sec. 20. _allies of Thebes_: in order to preserve the balance of power
between Thebes and Sparta.

Sec. 21. _the Theban confederacy_. The reference is particularly to the
Arcadian allies of Thebes, but the wider expression perhaps suggests a
general policy of a more ambitious kind.

Sec. 22. _you, I think, know_. He refers to the older members of the
Assembly, who would remember the tyrannical conduct of Sparta during the
period of her supremacy (the first quarter of the fourth century B.C.).

Sec. 27. _pillars_. The terms of an alliance were usually recorded upon
pillars erected by each State on some site fixed by agreement or custom.

Sec. 28. _in the war_: i.e. the 'Sacred War', against the Phocians.