Page:History of Greece Vol VIII.djvu/275

 CONDEMNATION OF THERAMENE3. 253 Thousand shall be condemned without your vote ; but that any man not included in that list may be condemned by the Thirty. Now I take upon me, with the concurrence of all my colleagues, to strike this Theramenes out of that list ; and we, by our author- ity, condemn him to death." Though Theramenes had already been twice concerned in put- ling down the democracy, yet such was the habit of all Athenians to look for protection from constitutional forms, that he probably accounted himself safe under the favorable verdict of the senate, an 1 was not prepared for the monstrous and despotic sentence, which he now heard from his enemy. He sprang at once to the senatorial hearth, the altar and sanctuary in the interior of the senate-house, and exclaimed : " I too, senators, stand as your suppliant, asking only for bare justice. Let it be not in the power of Kritias to strike out me or any other man whom he chooses ; let my sentence as well as yours be passed according to the law which these Thirty have themselves prepared. I know but too well, that this altar will be of no avail to me as a defence ; but I shall at least make it plain, that these men are as impious towards the gods as they are nefarious towards men. As for you, worthy senators, I wonder that you will not stand forward foi your own personal safety ; since you must be well aware, that your own names may be struck out of the Three Thousand just as easily as mine." But the senate remained passive and stupefied by fear, in spite of these moving words, which perhaps were not perfectly heard, since it could not be the design of Kritias to permit his enemy to speak a second time. It was probably while Theramenes was yet speaking, that the loud voice of the herald was heard, calling the Eleven to come forward and take him into custody. The Eleven advanced into the senate, headed by their brutal chief Satyrus, and followed by their usual attendants. They went straight up to the altar, from whence Satyrus, aided by the attend- ants, dragged him by main force, while Kritias said to them . " We hand over to you this man Theramenes, condemned accord- ing to the law. Seize him, carry him off to prison, and there do the needful." Upon this, Theramenes was dragged out of the senate-house and carried in custody through the market-place, exclaiming with a loud voice against 'he atrocious treatment