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the most popular are those based on proportion. Thus, Pericles said that the youth that had perished during the war had disappeared from the State as if the year had lost its springtime.1 Leptines, speaking of the Lacedaemonians, said that he would not let the Athenians stand by and see Greece deprived of one of her eyes. When Chares was eager to have his accounts for the Olynthian war examined, Cephisodotus indignantly exclaimed that, now he had the people by the throat, he was trying to get his accounts examined2; on another occasion also he exhorted the Athenians to set out for Euboea without delay “and provision themselves there, like the decree of Miltiades.3” After the Athenians had made peace with Epidaurus and the maritime cities, Iphicrates indignantly declared “that they had deprived themselves of provisions for the war.”4 Pitholaus called the Paralus5 “the bludgeon of the people,” and Sestos “the corn-chest6 of the Piraeus.” Pericles recommended that Aegina, “the eyesore of the Piraeus,” should be removed. Moerocles, mentioning a very “respectable” person by name, declared that he was as much a scoundrel as himself; for whereas that honest man played the scoundrel at 33 per cent. he himself was satisfied with 10 per cent.7 And the iambic of Anaxandrides,8 on girls who were
slow to marry, “ My daughters are “past the time” of marriage.
” And the saying of Polyeuctus9 upon a certain paralytic named Speusippus, “that he could not keep quiet, although Fortune had bound him in a five-holed pillory of disease.” Cephisodotus called the triremes “parti-colored mills,”10 and [Diogenes] the Cynic used to say that the taverns11 were “the messes” of Attica. Aesion12 used to say that they had “drained” the State into Sicily,13 which is a metaphor and sets the thing before the eyes. His words “so that Greece uttered a cry” are also in a manner a metaphor and a vivid one. And again, as Cephisodotus bade the Athenians take care not to hold their “concourses” too often; and in the same way Isocrates, who spoke of those “who rush together” in the assemblies.14 And as Lysias says in his Funeral Oration, that it was right that Greece should cut her hair at the tomb of those who fell at Salamis, since her freedom was buried along with their valor. If the speaker had said that it was fitting that Greece should weep, her valor being buried with them, it would have been a metaphor and a vivid one,
1 1.7.34.
2 εὔθυνα was the technical term for the examination of accounts to which all public officers had to submit when their term of office expired. Cephisodotus and Chares were both Athenian generals. “Having the people by the throat” may refer to the condition of Athens financially and his unsatisfactory conduct of the war. But the phrase εἰς πνῖγμα τὸν δῆμον ἔχοντα is objected to by Cope, who reads ἀγαγόντα and translates: “that he drove the people into a fit of choking by his attempts to offer his accounts for scrutiny in this way,” i.e. he tried to force his accounts down their throats, and nearly choked them. Another reading suggested is ἄγχοντα （throttling so as to choke）.
3 This may refer to a decree of Miltiades which was so speedily carried out that it became proverbial. The expedition was undertaken to assist Euboea against Thebes.
4 By making peace, Iphicrates said that the Athenians had deprived themselves of the opportunity of attacking and plundering a weak maritime city, and so securing provisions for the war. The word ἐφόδια properly means provisions for a journey and travelling expenses.
5 The Paralus and Salaminia were the two sacred galleys which conveyed state prisoners.
6 It commanded the trade of the Euxine.
7 Moerocles was a contemporary of Demosthenes, and an anti-Macedonian in politics. He seems to have been a money-grubber and was once prosecuted for extortion. The degree of the respectability （or rather, the swindling practices） of each is calculated by their respective profits.
8 Poet of the Middle Comedy: Frag. 68 （Kock, Com. Att. Frag. 2.）. The metaphor in ὑπερήμενοι is from those who failed to keep the term of payment of a fine or debt. Cope translates: “I find （ μοι） the young ladies are . . .”
9 Athenian orator, contemporary of Demosthenes
10 As grinding down the tributary states. They differed from ordinary mills in being gaily painted.
11 Contrasted with the Spartan “messes,” which were of a plain and simple character, at which all the citizens dined together. The tavern orgies, according to Diogenes, represented these at Athens.
12 Athenian orator, opponent of Demosthenes.
13 Referring to the disastrous Sicilian expedition.
14 Isoc. 5.12. Both συνδρομάς and συντρέχοντας refer to the collecting of a mob in a state of excitement.
Aristotle in 23 Volumes, Vol. 22, translated by J. H. Freese. Aristotle. Cambridge and London. Harvard University Press; William Heinemann Ltd. 1926.
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