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280 GREEK LITERATURE.

against Timarchus, and by showing that the moral character of his ac­cuser was such that he had no right to speak before the people. The speech in which JEschines attacked Timarchus is still extant. Timarchus was condemned, and ^Eschines gained a brilliant triumph. As we know little more of the matter than what is contained in the two speeches of ^Eschines and his accuser, as they have come down to us, we have not the means of forming a proper judgment of the innocence or guilt of J3s-chines. His simple, clear, and persuasive statement, however, of his own case proves his great abilities ; and, contrasted with the somewhat confused speech of his accuser, leaves a favorable impression of the jus­tice of his defence.

^Eschines and Demosthenes at length were at the head of the two par­ties, into which not only Athens, but all Greece, was divided, and their political enmity created and nourished personal hatred. This enmity came to a head in B.C. 343, when Demosthenes charged JSschines with having been bribed, and having betrayed the interests of his country dur­ing the second embassy to Philip. This charge of Demosthenes (ir€pl tto.-pcwr/?6(rj8e/as) was not spoken, but published as a memorial, and ^Eschines answered it in a similar memorial on the embassy, which was likewise published, and in the composition of which he is said to have been assist­ed by his friend Eubulus.1 The result of these mutual attacks is un­known, but there is no doubt that a severe shock was given to the popu­larity of JEschines. At the time he wrote his memorial we gain a glimpse into his private life. Some years before that occurrence he had married a daughter of Philodemus, a man of high respectability in his tribe of Pse-ania, and in B.C. 343 he was father of three little children.2

The last great event in the public life of ^Eschines was his prosecution of Ctesiphon. It seems that after the battle of Chaeronea, in B.C. 338, the enemies of Demosthenes made the misfortune of that day a handle for attacking him; but, notwithstanding the bribes which JEschines had re­ceived from Antipater for this purpose, the pure and unstained patriotism of Demosthenes was so generally recognized, that he received the honor­able charge of delivering the funeral oration over those who had fallen at Chaeronea. Acting upon this same idea, therefore, Ctesiphon proposed that Demosthenes should be rewarded for the services he had done to his country with a golden crown in the theatre, at the great Dionysia. JEs-chines availed himself of the illegal form in which this reward was pro­posed to be given to bring a charge against Ctesiphon on that ground. But he did not prosecute the matter till eight years later, that is, in B.C. 330, when, after the death of Philip, and the victories of Alexander, po­litical affairs had assumed a different aspect in Greece. After having commenced the prosecution against Ctesiphon, he is said to have gone for some time to Macedonia. What induced him to drop the prosecution of Ctesiphon, and to take it up again eight years afterward, are questions which can only be answered by conjectures. The speech in which he accused Ctesiphon in B.C. 330, and which is still extant, is so skillfully managed, that, if he had succeeded, he would have totally destroyed all

1 Demosth., Defals. Leg., p. 337. 2 Msch., De fals. Leg., p. 52.