64
I summon as my witnesses, Athenians, the awful goddesses and their abode, the heroes of the land, Athena Polias, and those other gods who have obtained our city and countryside as their home, to show that when the people has consigned to you for punishment one who, against his country's interests, has accepted a part of the imported money,The sense of this passage is clear, though the Greek wording leaves room for doubt. one who has defiled and ruined the city's prosperity and betrayed that country which he claimed to have fortified by his diplomacy,An allusion to some words of Demosthenes in the speech on the Crown (Dem. 18.299).
65
enemies, and those who bear the city ill will, would wish him alive, counting this a disaster for Athens; but all who favor your concerns and hope that with a turn of fortune the city's prospects may improve wish that this man may die and pay the penalty merited by his conduct, and such is the burden of their prayers. I also join in praying the gods to save our country, which I see to be in danger of forfeiting its safety, its women and children, its honor, and every other thing of worth.
66
What shall we say to the bystanders, Athenians, when we come out of the court, if you are deceived, as I pray you may not be, by the wizardry of this man? What will be the feelings of you all, when, on your return, you presume to look upon your fathers' hearths, after acquitting the traitor who first brought into his own home the gold of bribery; after convicting as utterly false, in both its inquiry and its conclusion, the body which all men hold in the greatest awe?
67
What hopes, Athenians,—picture for yourselves,—what hopes shall we have if some danger overtakes the city, when we have made it a safe thing to take bribes against one's country and have robbed of its status the body which kept watch over the city in such times of crisis?
