34.31
It was
left to the tyrant to decide whether he would speak first or not, and he began
the discussion in the following speech: "Titus Quinctius and all who are
present: If I could have discovered for myself the reason why you have
declared war against me or actually commenced it, I should have awaited in
silence the issue of my fortunes. But as things are now I cannot control
myself sufficiently to refrain from asking, before I perish, why I am to perish.
If you were what the Carthaginians are reported to be, a people for whom
the honourable observance of treaties possesses no sanctity, I should not be
surprised at your considering it a matter of small moment in what way you
treat me. But when I look at you I see that you are Romans who hold
treaties to be the most solemn of all religious obligations, and fidelity to
allies the most sacred of human duties. When I look at myself I hope I am
still the man who in common with the rest of the Lacedaemonians is bound
to you by an age-long treaty of alliance and who renewed in the recent war
with Philip the personal tie of friendship. But, you say, I have violated and
destroyed it by holding the city of the Argives. How shall I justify this? By
appealing to facts or to the circumstances of the time? As to the facts I have
a double defence, for it was the townsmen themselves who invoked my aid
and put the place in my hands; I did not occupy it by force, I accepted it and
that too when Philip's partisans were in power, not when it was your ally.
The circumstance of time clears me too, because it was when I was actually
holding Argos that the alliance between us was formed, and the stipulation
was not that I should withdraw my garrison from Argos, but only that I
should furnish assistance to you in the war. In this question of Argos I most
certainly have the best of the argument both on the ground of equity and
justice -for I took a city which belonged not to you but to your enemy, not
by force but at the wish of the inhabitants -and also on the strength of your
own admission, for under the terms of peace you left Argos to me.
But however that may be, the title of 'tyrant' and the arbitrary acts
of a tyrant, such as summoning slaves to freedom and settling the
poverty-stricken masses on the land, are alleged against me. As to the title I
can make this reply, whatever my character is I am the same man with whom
you yourself, T. Quinctius, entered into alliance. Then, I remember, you
called me 'king,' now I see that you have dubbed me 'tyrant.' Now, if I had
altered the designation of my rule, I should have to defend my inconsistency;
as you are altering it, you must justify yours. As to my augmenting the civil
population by freeing the slaves and dividing up the land amongst the poor
and needy, I can defend myself against this charge also by pleading the time
at which I did it. Whatever these measures were I had carried them out when
you contracted alliance with me and accepted my assistance in the war with
Philip. But even supposing that I had carried them out to-day, I do not ask
how I could have injured you or disturbed the amity between us, I content
myself with asserting that I have acted in accordance with our ancestral laws
and customs. Do not weigh what is done in Lacedaemon by your own
institutions. There is no necessity for going into details. You select your
cavalry as you do your infantry, according to their assessment; you will have
a few preeminent for their wealth and the mass of the population subject to
them. Our legislator would not have the government in the hands of a small
class such as you designate your senate, nor would he allow any one order to
be preponderant in the State; he believed that an equality of rank and fortune
was necessary in order that there might be a large number of men to bear
arms for their country. I have spoken at greater length, I confess, than is
usual with my countrymen. It could have been put very briefly -I have done
nothing since I formed a league of amity with you which should make you
regret it."
