DEMOSTHENES, the greatest orator of Greece, and indeed of the ancient world, was a native of Athens. The date of his birth is doubtful. Fynes Clinton assigns it to the year 382 B.C.; Thirlwall and other good authorities, to the year 385 u.c. His father, a wealthy manufacturerer, died early, leaving his fortune and children to the care of three guardians, who cruelly abused their trust. As soon as D. came of age, he resolved to prosecute at law these unfaithful stewards. He gained his case, taut much of the property had been already squandered, and he only recovered enough to save him i from poverty. His success in this and some other civil causes fixed his resolution to devote himself to public life; and he set himself to master the law and politics of his country with a labor and perseverance almost without a parallel. His first care was to conquer the physical disadvantages under which he labored. His health was naturally feeble, his voice harsh and tuneless, and his action ungraceful. To strengthen his lungs, he used to climb steep hills, reciting as he went, or declaim on the shores of the sea in stormy weather. To improve his delivery, he took instructions from Satp'us the actor, and did not even disdain to study effects before a mirror. His feebleness of health he never fairly overcame, but he obviated the defects of his early training by the severest study pursued for months at a time without an interruption.
D. first began to take part in public affairs in the 106th Olympiad, when he was between 27 and 30 years of age. and from that time till his death, his history is the his tory of Athens. The states of Greece were at this time miserably weak and divided, and had recklessly shut their eyes to the dangerous encroachments which Philip of Macedon was even now making on their common liberties. The first period of D.'s pub lic life (extending over ten years from 356 u.c.) was spent in warning his countrymen to abate their mutual jealousies, and unite their forces against the common enemy, whose crafty and grasping policy he exposed so nobly in 352 n.c. in the oration known as the First Philippic. Three years later, Philip became master of Olynthus, the last outpost of Athenian power In the north, which, in a series of splendid harangues—the three Olynthiabs—D. had implored his countrymen to defend. Peace was now necessary for Athens; and D. was among the ambassadors sent to negotiate with the conqueror; but Macedonian gold had done its work, and D., as incorruptible as he was eloquent, saw with despair that Philip was allowed to seize Thermopylae, the key of Greece, and become a member of the Amphictyonic league. The peace lasted for six years, during which Philip's incessant intrigues were exposed and denounced by D. in orations hardly
less remarkable for their political wisdom than for their matchless eloquence. The most important of these were the second, third, and fourth Philippics; and the speeches on the " Misconducted Embassy," and " The Affairs of the Chersonese. When war broke out in 340 u.c., D. introduced several important reforms into the army and navy, and showed such powers of vigorous administration, that Philip was baffled for a time. The struggle was closed in 338 B.c. by the battle of Cbnroneia, which laid Greece prostrate at the feet of the Macedonians. Only once after that event did D. appear on the scene of his previous triumphs. But on that occasion he delivered, in defense of his friend Otesiphon, his oration "For the Crown," which the almost unanimous verdict of critics has pronounced to be the most perfect masterpiece of oratory that ancient or modern times have seen. lEschines, his life-long enemy, against whom this speech was deliv ered, was so overwhelmed by it, that he quitted Athens, and spent the remainder of his life in exile. In 324 B.C., D. was accused of taking part in a revolt against the Mace donian domination, and thrown into prison, whence he escaped, and fled into exile. The death of Alexander the great in the following year brought a gleam of hope and sunshine to the Athenians; and D., recalled from exile, was again at the head of affairs. Once more the power of 2Iacedon prevailed. D. Was demanded up by the conquerors.
Finding escape impossible. the hunted orator sought an asylum in the temple of tune, in the island of Calaurea. Before his pursuers overtook him, he had died, as was generally believed, of poison administered by his own hand. His death took place in 322 B.C.
The personal character of D. is one which it is scarcely possible either to praise or to admire too much. His dauntless bravery, the stainless purity of his public and private life, his splendid and disinterested patriotism, and his services as a statesman and administrator, entitle him to a place among the highest and noblest men of antiquity. On his merits as an orator, it is hardly necessary to dwell. Suffice it to say, that the intelligent of all ages subsequent to his own have, with scarcely a dissentent voice, assigned to him the highest place. Homer is not more.clearly the prince of ancient poets, than is D. the prince of ancient orators.—The best of the earlier editions of I). are those of Taylor and Reiske, both now superseded by the more recent edition of Bekker. His principal orations are translated into English by Leland, and the whole by Kennedy, in 5 vols., for Bolin's Classical Library.