The book of the ancient Greeks: An introduction to the history and civilization of Greece from the coming of the Greeks to the conquest of Corinth by Rome in 146 B.C.
John Stuart Mill · en
day did not look for an orator or a general who would enable them
to live in happy servitude; they cared not to live at all, unless
they might live in freedom. For everyone of them felt that he
had come into being, not for his father and his mother alone, but
also for his country. And wherein lies the difference? He who
thinks he was born for his parents alone awaits the death which
destiny assigns him in the course of nature: but he who thinks
that he was born for his country also will be willing to die,
that he may not see her in bondage, and will look upon the
outrages and the indignities that he must needs bear in a city
that is in bondage as more to be dreaded than death.
Now were I attempting to argue that _I_ had induced you to show a
spirit worthy of your forefathers, there is not a man who might
not rebuke me with good reason. But, in fact, I am declaring
that such principles as these are your own; I am showing that
_before_ my time the city displayed this spirit, though I claim
that I, too, have had some share, as your servant, in carrying
{342} out your policy in detail. But in denouncing the policy as
a whole, in bidding you be harsh with me, as one who has brought
terrors and dangers upon the city, the prosecutor, in his
eagerness to deprive me of my distinction at the present moment,
is trying to rob you of praises that will last throughout all
time. For if you condemn the defendant on the ground that my
policy was not for the best, men will think that your own
judgment has been wrong, and that it was not through the
unkindness of fortune that you suffered what befell you. But it
cannot, it cannot be that you were wrong, men of Athens, when you
took upon you the struggle for freedom and deliverance. No! by
those who at Marathon bore the brunt of the peril--our
forefathers. No! by those who at Plataea drew up their
battle-line, by those who at Salamis, by those who off Artemisium
fought the fight at sea, by the many who lie in the sepulchres
where the People laid them, brave men, all alike deemed worthy by
their country, Aeschines, of the same honour and the same
obsequies--not the successful or the victorious alone! And she
acted justly. For all these have done that which it was the duty
of brave men to do; but their fortune has been that which Heaven
assigned to each.[7]
III. ALEXANDER THE GREAT