Thesauros Literature Oratory κατὰ Μειδίου περὶ τοῦ Κονδύλου

κατὰ Μειδίου περὶ τοῦ Κονδύλου

κατὰ Μειδίου περὶ τοῦ Κονδύλου Demosthenes
153 If, men of Athens, public service consists in saying to you at all the meetings of the Assembly and on every possible occasion, We are the men who perform the public services; we are those who advance your tax-money; we are the capitalists—if that is all it means, then I confess that Meidias has shown himself the most distinguished citizen of Athens; for he bores us at every Assembly by these tasteless and tactless boasts.
154 But if you want to find out how he really performs his services, I will tell you; and please mark with what fairness I shall test him, for I will compare him with myself. This man, Athenians, who is about fifty years old or only a trifle less, has not performed more public services than I, who am only two and thirty. Moreover I, as soon as I had reached man’s estate, undertook the trierarchy in the days when only two shared the duty, and when we paid all the expenses from our own purses and provided the crews ourselves.
155 Meidias, when he was of my present age, had not yet begun to perform services; he has only put his hand to the task since you made twelve hundred citizens joint contributors, from whom such men as Meidias exact a talent and then contract for the equipment of the war-galley at the same price. After this the State provides the crews and furnishes the tackle; so that some of them succeed in really spending nothing at all and by pretending to have performed one public service enjoy exemption from the rest.

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