with Athens, when she had so many fortresses to infest his country, and
he was destitute of allies, nothing that he has accomplished would he
have undertaken, and never would he have acquired so large a dominion.
But he saw well, Athenians, that all these places are the open prizes of
war, that the possessions of the absent naturally belong to the present,
those of the remiss to them that will venture and toil. Acting on such
principle, he has won every thing and keeps it, either by way of
conquest, or by friendly attachment and alliance; for all men will side
with and respect those, whom they see prepared and willing to make
proper exertion. If you, Athenians, will adopt this principle now,
though you did not before, and every man, where he can and ought to give
his service to the, state, be ready to give it without excuse, the
wealthy to contribute, the able-bodied to enlist; in a word, plainly, if
you will become your own masters, and cease each expecting to do nothing
himself, while his neighbor does every thing for him, you shall then
with heaven's permission recover your own, and get back what has been
frittered away, and chastise Philip. Do not imagine, that his empire is
everlastingly secured to him as a god. There are who hate and fear and
envy him, Athenians, even among those that seem most friendly; and all
feelings that are in other men belong, we may assume, to his
confederates. But now they are all cowed, having no refuge through your
tardiness and indolence, which I say you must abandon forthwith. For you
see, Athenians, the case, to what pitch of arrogance the man has
advanced, who leaves you not even the choice of action or inaction, but
threatens and uses (they say) outrageous language, and, unable to rest
in possession of his conquests, continually widens their circle, and,
while we dally and delay, throws his net all around us. When then,
Athenians, when will ye act as becomes you? In what event? In that of
necessity, I suppose. And how should we regard the events happening now?
Methinks, to freemen the strongest necessity is the disgrace of their