[22]
But if, after all, there is any human being who might
rightly lay a charge concerning the issue of that battle, he would with good
reason advance it against those of the Thebans who were appointed to this
command,1 nor could anyone rightly lay blame upon the rank
and file of either the Thebans or ourselves. Those men, receiving command of a
military force that would neither brook defeat nor make excuse and had an
emulous zest for glory, made the right use of none of these.
1 Philip seems to have deceived the Athenians by a feigned retreat while throwing his strongest troops against the Thebans. This stratagem broke the line and decided the battle. The Theban general Theagenes and his colleagues seem to have been no more to blame than the rest.
Demosthenes. Demosthenes with an English translation by Norman W. DeWitt, Ph.D., and Norman J. DeWitt, Ph.D. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1949.
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