[32]
For what fatal or dangerous act
will he shrink from, men of Athens,—this polluted wretch, infected with hereditary
hatred of democracy? What other man would sooner overthrow the State, if
only—which Heaven forbid!—he should gain the power? Do you
not see that his character and his policy are not guided by reason or by
self-respect, but by recklessness?1 Or rather, his policy
is sheer recklessness. Now that is the very worst quality for its possessor,
terribly dangerous for everyone else, and for the State intolerable. For the
reckless man has lost all control of himself, all hope of rational safety, and
can only be saved, if at all, by some unexpected and incalculable accident.
1 We have no exact equivalent for this Greek word; “moral insanity” has been suggested. Read the 16th Characterof Theophrastus with Jebb's commentary.
Demosthenes. Demosthenes with an English translation by A. T. Murray, Ph.D., LL.D. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1939.
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