Letters

You, however, though Athenians and partners in a culture which is thought capable of making even stupid people tolerable, in the first place—and of all your actions this is the most heartless—hold the sons in chains as a penalty for offences which certain parties allege against the father[*](The precise accusation is not known; it seems to have been concerned with the administration of the treasury.); in the next place, you claim this action to be equality before the law, just as if you were inspecting equality in the field of weights or measures and not deliberating about men’s ethical and political principles.

In testing these, if the actions of Lycurgus seem honest and public-spirited and inspired by loyalty, then it is justice that his sons should not only meet with no harm at your hands, but with all the benefits imaginable; yet if his actions seem quite the opposite, he ought to have been punished while he lived, and these children should not thus incur your anger on the ground of charges someone prefers against the father, because for all men death is an end of responsibility for all their offences.

Consequently, if you are going to be so minded that those who have conceived some grudge against those who espouse the cause of the people will not be reconciled even with dead men, but will persist in maintaining their enmity against the children, and if the people, in whose cause every friend of democracy labours, shall remember their gratitude only so long as they can use a man in the flesh and thereafter shall feel no concern, then nothing will be more miserable than to choose the post of champion of the people.

If Moerocles[*](Moerocles was archon in 324 B.C. His surrender had been demanded by Alexander in 335 B.C., which indicates his importance.) replies that this view is too subtle for his understanding, and that, to prevent them from running away, he put them in chains upon his own responsibility, demand of him why in the world he did not see the justice of this proceeding when Taureas, Pataecus, Aristogeiton and himself,[*](Nothing specific is known about these imprisonments, but it need not be assumed that all four men were under sentence at a single time. See next note. Taureas and Pataecus are unknown. For Aristogeiton see the two speeches against him.) though they had been committed to prison, were not only not in chains but would even address the Assembly.

If, on the other hand, he shall say that he was not then archon, he had no right to speak, at any rate according to the laws.[*](If Moerocles ordered the two sons of Lycurgus to be imprisoned but left Taureas, Pataecus and Aristogeiton at liberty, the charge against him is criminal partiality. If he denies that he was archon at the time and so lacked the authority to order these men to be detained in prison, then the minor charge still stands against him of addressing the Assembly while technically a prisoner himself. As a prisoner he would be subject to partial ἀτιμία or diminution of his rights as a citizen.) Accordingly, how can it be equal justice when some men are in office who have no right even to speak and others are in fetters whose father was useful to you in numerous ways?

I certainly cannot figure it out unless you mean to demonstrate this fact officially—that blackguardism, shamelessness and deliberate villainy are strong in the State and enjoy a better prospect of coming off safely, and that, if such men happen to get into a tight place, a way out is discovered, but to elect to live in honesty of principle, sobriety of life and devotion to the people will be hazardous and, if some false step is made, the consequences will be inescapable.