248 SPEECH OF ALCIBIADES [y against myself, lest through suspicion of me you should , , «■ a; turn a deaf ear to considerations of / must offer explana- tions. I uanied to public interest. My ancestors in con- scrveyott, but you tvere sequence of some misunderstanding 7aKtcT1"ast!adc. renounced the office of Lacedaemon- tnagogue but an heredi- ian proxenus ; I myself resumed it, tary leader of the state ^nd did you many good offices, especi- as a whole. Democracy, n r • r t-. , however liable to abuse, ^^^y ^^^er your misfortune at Pylos. was our natural form My anxiety to Serve you never ceased, of govcrymient, and we ^^^^ ^^hen you Were making peace with could not change tt. . , • 1 , , Athens you negotiated through my enemies, thereby conferring power on them, and bringing dishonour upon me«. And if I then turned to the Man- tineans and Argives and opposed you in that or in any other way, you were rightly served, and any one who while the wound was recent may have been unduly exas- perated against me should now take another and a truer view. Or, again, if any one thought the worse of me because I was inclined to the people, let him acknowledge that here too there is no real ground of offi^nce. Any power adverse to despotism is called democracy, and my family have always retained the leadership of the people in their hands because we have been the persistent enemies of tyrants. Living too under a popular government, how could we avoid in a great degree conforming to circum- stances? However, we did our best to observe political moderation amid the prevailing licence. But there were demagogues, as there always have been, who led the people into evil ways, and it was they who drove me out**. Whereas we were the leaders of the state as a whole <", and not of a part only ; it was our view that all ought to combine in maintaining that form of government which had been inherited by us, and under which the city enjoyed the greatest freedom and glory. Of course, like all sensible men, we knew only too well what democracy ' Cp- V. 43. b Cp. viii. 65 med. <= Cp. -i. 39 init.
