244
That you may understand how far more numerous are your accusers than those of Timarchus, observe this. He was not known even to all his neighbors; but there is not a man in Greece or in foreign parts who does not aver that you ambassadors made gain of your embassy. If rumor is true, the rumor of the multitude is against you; and for the veracity, and even the divinity, of rumor, and for the wisdom of the poet who composed these verses, we have your own assurance.
245
After these heroics he naturally proceeds to collect and declaim some iambic poetry, for instance: Whoso delights to walk with wicked men, Of him I ask not, for I know him such As are the men whose converse pleases him. Unknown Then follows the passage about the man who frequented cockpits, and consorted with Pittalacus, and so forth; do you not know what his character is? Well, Aeschines, your iambics shall now serve my turn for an observation about you. I shall be speaking with the propriety of the Tragic Muse, when I say to the jury: Whoso delights to walk (especially on an embassy) with Philocrates, of him I ask not, for I know him well—to have taken bribes, as Philocrates did, who made confession.
246
Well, when he tries to insult other people by calling them speech-makers and charlatans, he shall be shown to be open to the same reproach. For those iambics come from the Phoenix of Euripides. That play was never acted by Theodorus or Aristodemus, for whom Aeschines commonly took the inferior parts; Molon however produced it, and perhaps some other players of the old school. But Sophocles’ Antigone was frequently acted by Theodorus, and also by Aristodemus; and in that play there are some iambic lines, admirably and most instructively composed. That passage Aeschines omitted to quote, though he has often spoken the lines, and knows them by heart;
