in very truth an atrocious thing), should she have looked on, while all
that she saw would happen, if no one prevented it--all that she realized,
it seems, at a distance--was actually taking place? {64} Nay, I should be
glad to ask to-day the severest critic of my actions, which party he would
have desired the city to join--the party which shares the responsibility
for the misery and disgrace which has fallen upon the Hellenes (the party
of the Thessalians and their supporters, one may call it), or the party
which looked on while these calamities were taking place, in the hope of
gaining some advantage for themselves--in which we should place the
Arcadians and Messenians and Argives. {65} But even of these, many--nay,
all--have in the end fared worse than we. For if Philip had departed
immediately after his victory, and gone his way; if afterwards he had
remained at peace, and had given no trouble whatever to any of his own
allies or of the other Hellenes; then there would have been some ground
for blaming and accusing those who had opposed his plans. But if he has
stripped them all alike of their dignity, their paramountcy, and their
independence--nay, even of their free constitutions,[n] wherever he could
do so--can it be denied that the policy which you adopted on my advice was
the most glorious policy possible?

{66} But I return to my former point. What was it fitting for the city to
do, Aeschines, when she saw Philip establishing for himself a despotic
sway over the Hellenes? What language should have been used, what measures
proposed, by the adviser of the people at Athens (for that it was at
Athens makes the utmost difference), when I knew that from the very first,
up to the day when I myself ascended the platform, my country had always
contended for pre-eminence, honour, and glory, and in the cause of honour,
and for the interests of all, had sacrificed more money and lives than any
other Hellenic people had spent for their private ends: {67} when I saw
that Philip himself, with whom our conflict lay, for the sake of empire