[314]
for, while they placed the trial of the greatest crimes in the hands of a single one of the courts,1 against the sycophants they instituted indictments before the Thesmothetae, impeachments before the Senate, and plaints before the General Assembly, believing that those who plied this trade exceeded all other forms of villainy; for other criminals, at any rate, try to keep their evil-doing under cover,
1 For example, a charge of deliberate murder could come only before the Court of the Areopagus. A charge against the sycophants, on the other hand, could be brought before the Thesmothetae (see 237, note), who prepared the case for trial before a Heliastic Court, in which case the charge was termed γραφή(indictment); or before the Senate of the Five Hundred, in which case the charge was called εἰσαγγελία(impeachment); or before the General Assembly, in which case the charge was termed προβολή(plaint). See Lipsius, Das attische Recht pp. 176 ff. This was, however, true of so many crimes that the point of Isocrates is rather rhetorical.