[25]
And, assuredly, if anything had
happened to me,1 he would have been
liable to a charge of murder and the severest of penalties. At any rate the
father of the priestess at Brauron,2
although it was admitted that he had not laid a finger on the deceased, but had
merely urged the one who dealt the blow to keep on striking, was banished by the
court of the Areopagus. And justly; for, if the bystanders, instead of
preventing those who through the influence of drink or anger or any other cause
are undertaking to act lawlessly, are themselves to urge them on, there is no
hope of safety for one who falls in with lawless rascals; he may be sure that he
will be maltreated until they grow weary as was the case with me.
1 A frequent euphemism for, “if my death had ensued.”
2 Brauron was a district on the eastern coast of Attica, where there was a famous shrine of Artemis. It was to this point that Orestes and Iphigeneia were said to have brought the statue of Artemis from the land of the Taurians. The facts regarding the case alluded to are unknown.
Demosthenes. Demosthenes with an English translation by Norman W. DeWitt, Ph.D., and Norman J. DeWitt, Ph.D. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1949.
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