The Historians' History of the World 04

Demosthenes calmly awaited the coming of Archias in the temple at Calaurea, well knowing that he would not be sheltered by the sanctity of the place, and prepared for his end. He had dreamed, it is said, the night before, that he was contending with Archias in a tragic part; that the judgment of the spectators was in his favour, but that he lost the prize, because he had not been furnished with the outward requisites of the exhibition—an apt illustration at least of his failure in the real contest, which was the task of his life. When Archias came to the door of the temple with his satellites, he found Demosthenes seated. He at first addressed him in the language of friendly persuasion, to inveigle him out of his retreat, and offered to intercede with Antipater in his behalf.

Demosthenes listened for a time in silence to his bland professions, but at length replied: “Archias, you never won me by your acting, nor will you now by your promises.” When the player found that he was detected, he flung away the mask, and threatened in earnest. “Now,” said Demosthenes, “you speak from the Macedonian tripod; before you were only acting: wait a little, till I have written a letter to my friends at home.” And he took a roll, as to write, and as was his wont, when he was engaged in composition, put the end of the reed to his mouth, and bit it; he then covered his face with his robe, and bowed his head. According to another report, he was seen to take something out of a piece of linen, and put it into his mouth; the Thracians imagined that it was gold. In one way or other, he had swallowed a poison which he had kept for this use. When he had remained some time in this attitude the barbarians, thinking that he was lingering through fear, began to taunt him with cowardice; and Archias, going up to him, urged him to rise, and repeated his offers of mediation.

Demosthenes now felt the poison in his veins; he uncovered his face, rose, and fixing his eyes on the dissembler, said, “It is time for you, Archias, to finish the part of Creon, and to cast my body to the dogs. I quit thy sanctuary, Poseidon, still breathing; though Antipater, and the Macedonians, have not spared even it from pollution.” So saying, he moved with faltering step towards the door, but had scarcely passed the altar, when he fell with a groan, and breathed his last.

His end would undoubtedly have been more truly heroic, though not in the sight of his own generation, if he had braved the insults and torture which awaited him. But he must not be judged by a view of life which had never been presented to him; according to his own, it must have seemed base to submit to the enemy whom he had hitherto defied, for the sake of a few days more of ignominious wretchedness. And even on the principles of a higher philosophy he might think that the gods, who were not able to protect him, had discharged him from their service, and permitted him to withdraw from a post which he could no longer defend.

The ancients saw the finger of Heaven in the fate of the vile instruments of his destruction. That of Demades will be afterwards related; Archias ended his days in extreme indigence, under the weight of universal contempt. It was later before Athens was permitted to do justice to the services of her great citizen, who indeed had never lost her esteem. The time at length came when his nephew Demochares might safely propose a decree, by which the honours of the prytaneum and of the foremost seat at public spectacles, were granted to his descendants, and a bronze statue was erected in the agora to himself. It bore an inscription, corresponding in its import to the dream which he was said to have had at Calaurea: “Had but the strength of thy arm, Demosthenes, equalled thy spirit, never would Greece have sunk under the foreigner’s yoke.” The statue itself was believed in Plutarch’s time to have confirmed the general persuasion of his innocence as to the only charge which ever threw a shade on the purity of his political character.[42] The honours paid to his memory were not confined to Athens. A monument was erected to him in the sanctuary where he died, and both at Calaurea and in other parts of Greece he continued, down to the age of Hadrian and probably as long as the memory of the past survived there, to receive marks of public reverence approaching to the worship of a hero.b

THE DEATH OF DEMOSTHENES

GROTE’S ESTIMATE OF DEMOSTHENES