Page:History of Greece Vol XI.djvu/218

 192 HISTORY OF GREECE. his favor tended so strongly to turn his head, and when no contra- diction or censure against him was tolerated. Two persons, Laphystius and Demaenetus, called by the obnox- ious names of sycophants and demagogues, were bold enough to try the experiment. The former required him to give bail in a lawsuit ; the latter, in a public discourse, censured various parts of his military campaigns. The public indignation against both these men was vehement ; yet there can be little doubt that La- phystius applied to Timoleon a legal process applicable univer- sally to every citizen : what may have been the pertinence of the censures of Demrcnetus, we are unable to say. However, Timo- leon availed himself of the well-meant impatience of the people to protect him either from legal process or from censure, only to administer to them a serious and valuable lesson. Protesting against all interruption to the legal process of Laphystius, he pro- claimed emphatically that this was the precise purpose for which he had so long labored, and combated in order that every Syra- cusan citizen might be enabled to appeal to the laws and exercise freely his legal rights. And while he thought it unnecessary to rebut in detail the objections taken against his previous general- ship, he publicly declared his gratitude to the gods, for having granted his prayer that he might witness all Syracusans in posses- sion of full liberty of speech. 1 We obtain little from the biographers of Timoleon, except a few incidents, striking, impressive, and somewhat theatrical, like those just recounted. But what is really important is, the tone and temper which these incidents reveal, both in Timoleon and in the Syracusan people. To see him unperverted by a career of superhuman success, retaining the same hearty convictions with which he had started from Corinth ; renouncing power, the most ardent of all aspirations with a Greek politician, and de- scending to a private station, in spite of every external induce- ment to the contrary ; resisting the temptation to impose his own will upon the people, and respecting their free speech and public vote in a manner which made it imperatively necessary for every ons else to follow his example ; foregoing command, and content- Ing himself with advice when his opinion was asked tt this 1 Plnta-di, Timoleon, 37 ; Cornelius Nepos, Timoleon, c. 5.