150
But you dared to speak about my wife’s family also—so shameless you are and so inherently thankless, you that have neither affection nor respect for Philodemus,See Aeschin. 2.152. the father of Philon and Epicrates, the man by whose good offices you were enrolled among the men of your deme, as the elder Paeanians know.Aeschines insinuates that only by some extraordinary favoritism could Demosthenes, with his strain of Scythian blood, ever have been recognized as an Athenian of pure blood, and so enrolled in the citizen-list when he came to manhood. But I am amazed if you dare slander Philon, and that, too, in the presence of the most reputable men of Athens, who, having come in here to render their verdict for the best interest of the state, are thinkingmore about the lives we have lived than what we say.
151
Which think you would they pray heaven to give them, ten thousand hoplites like Philon, so fit in body and so sound of heart, or thrice ten thousand lewd weaklings like you? You try to bring into contempt the good breeding of Epicrates, Philon’s brother; but who ever saw him behaving in an indecent manner, either by day in the Dionysiac procession, as you assert, or by night? For you certainly could never say that he was unobserved, for he was no stranger.