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[3]
What is more,
if, in the case of a service1 due to you they think I am going to leave it to
themselves to decide, they are fools. And, perhaps, they both wish and expect it; this I
will not do, but if they will allow me, I shall launch the ship and do my duty; otherwise,
I shall reveal to you the names of those responsible.2
1 Public services required of wealthy citizens at their own expense were called λῃτουργίαι; these are to be distinguished from services to which salaries were attached, ὑπηρεσίαι: see Dem. Ex. 52 and note.
2 Demosthenes, as a member of a group （συντέλεια） responsible for equipping a trireme under the system of Navy-Boards, protests against being assessed more than his equitable share. Apparently, the expenditures were specified in the decrees of the Assembly but the officials were making demands in excess of the specifications. For abuses of the system see Dem. 18.104 and Dem. 21.155. Demosthenes may have been chairman of a Navy-Board at the time; Dem. 21.157.
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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