Page:History of Greece Vol XI.djvu/513

 ADVICE OF DEMOSTHENES. 437 blame, and you will at least stand un : mpeached on the score of honor as well as of policy." 1 The recommendation of Demosthenes, alike wise and generous, was embodied in a decree and adopted by the Athenians without opposition. 2 Neither ^Eschines, nor any one else, said a word 1 D^mosth. De Corona, p. 286, 287 ; Diodor. xvi. 84. I have given the rabitnnce, in brief, of what Demosthenes represents himself to have said. Demusthenes, De Corona, p. 289, 290. It bears date on the 16th of the month Skirrophorion (June), under the archonship of Nausikles. This archon is a wrong or pseud-eponymous archon : and the document, to say nothing of its verbosity, implies that Athens was now about to pass out of pacific relations with Philip, and to begin war against him which is con trary to the real fact. There also appear inserted, a few pages before, in the same speech (p. 282), four other documents, purporting to relate to the time immediately preceding the capture of Elateia by Philip. 1. A decree of the Athenians, dated in the month Elaphebolion of the archon Heropythus. 2. Another decree, in the month Munychion of the same archon. 3. An answer ad- dressed by Philip to the Athenians. 4. An answer addressed by Philip to the Thebans. Here again, the archon called Heropythus is a wrong and unknown archon. Such manifest error of date would alone be enough to preclude me from trusting the document as genuine. Droysen is right, in my judgment, in rejecting all these five documents as spurious. The answer of Philip to the Athenians is adapted to the two decrees of the Athenians, and cannot be genuine if they are spurious. These decrees, too, like that dated in Skirrophorion, are not consistent with the true relations between Athens and Philip. They imply that she was at peace with him, and that hostilities were first undertaken against him by her after his occupation of Elateia ; whereas open war had been prevailing between them for more than a year, ever since the summer of 340 B. c., and the maritime operations against him in the Propontis. That the war was going on without interruption during all this period that Philip could not get near to Athens to strike a blow at her and close the war, except by bringing the Thebans and Thessalians into cooperation with him and that for the attainment of this last purpose, he caused the Am- phissian war to be kindled, through the corrupt agency of jEschines is the express statement of Demosthenes, De Corona, p. 275, 276 Hence I find it impossible to believe in the authenticity either of the four docu- ments here quoted, or of this supposed very long decree of the Athenians, on forming their alliance with Thebes, bearing date on the 16th of the month Skirrophorion, and cited De Corona, p. 289. I will add, that the two decrees which we read in p. 282, profess themselves as having been
 * This decree, or a document claiming to be such, is given verbatim in