This text is part of:
§ 35-37 So before the storm breaks I wish to make you realise who was responsible for the loss of Thermopylae and the destruction of the Phocians, events which have given Philip command of the approach to southern Greece, so that you have now to consider home defence rather than foreign policy (35). For if you had not then been beguiled, Philip could never have threatened you sertously; he must either have given up his ambition or faced a war as dangerous as before (36). I have said enough to remind you of the real culprits. I pray heaven to avert the peril which would most clearly prove my charges; for I would rather have the guilty escape than involve all in their fall (37). συνίσταται, ‘is gathering’; the metaphor is from a storm, as may be safely inferred from the following words. The crash of the thunder is not yet so loud but that we can hear one another speak. In Dem. 18. 62 τοῦ συνισταμένου καὶ φυομένου κακοῦ, the figure seems rather to be taken from the gathering of morbid humours to a head. τίς, direct for indirect. The reference is to Aeschines. τῶν ἔξω πραγμάτων, ‘your interests abroad’; ὑπὲρ, as often, is synonymous with περί. γέγονεν, ‘has come into existence,’ ‘really dates its birth from.’ ἐκείνῃ, the day of the assembly (July 16, 346) at which the Athenians lost their last opportunity of saving Thermopylae and Phocis.
Demosthenes: Philippics I, II, III with Introduction and Notes. Gilbert A. Davies, M.A. 1949. Cambridge University Press.
The National Endowment for the Humanities provided support for entering this text.
