Page:Plutarch's Lives (Clough, v.5, 1865).djvu/27

 DEMOSTHENES. 19 the only man who appeared, his counsel to them being alliance with the Thebans. And having in other ways encom'aged the people, and, as his manner was, raised their spirits up with hopes, he, with some others, was sent ambassador to Thebes. To oppose him, as Marsyas says, Philip also sent thither his envoys, Amyntas and Clear- chus, two Macedonians, besides Daochus, a Thessalian, and Thrasydaeus. Now the Thebans, in their consulta- tions, were well enough aware what suited best with their own interest, but every one had before his eyes the terrors of war, and their losses in the Phocian troubles were still recent : but such was the force and power of the orator, fanning up, as Theopompus says, their cour- age, and firing their emulation, that casting away every thought of prudence, fear, or obligation, in a sort of divine possession, they chose the path of honor, to which his words invited them. And tliis success, thus accom- plished by an orator, was thought to be so glorious and of such consequence, that Philip immediately sent heralds to treat and petition for a peace : all Greece was aroused, and up in arms to help. And the commanders-in-chief, not only of Attica, but of Boeotia, applied themselves to Demosthenes, and observed his directions. He managed all the assemblies of the Thebans, no less than those of the Athenians ; he was beloved both by the one and by the other, and exercised the same supreme authority with both ; and that not by unfair means, or without just cause, as Theopompus professes, but indeed it was no more than was due to his merit. But there was, it should seem, some divinely-ordered fortune, commissioned, in the revolution of things, to put a period at this time to the liberty of Greece, which op- posed and thwarted all their actions, and by many signs foretold what should happen. Such were the sad predic-