Philip of Macedon

After his return from Thessaly Philip's views were directed towards Thrace and the Chersonese. It was at this juncture that Demosthenes stepped forwards as the proclaimed opponent of Philip, and delivered the first of those celebrated orations which from their subject have been called "the Philippics." This most famous of all the Grecian orators was born in B.C. 382-381. Having lost his father at the early age of seven, his guardians abused their trust, and defrauded him of the greater part of his paternal inheritance. This misfortune, however, proved one of the causes which tended to make him an orator. Demosthenes, as he advanced towards manhood, perceived with indignation the conduct of his guardians, for which he resolved to make them answerable when the proper opportunity should arrive, by accusing them himself. His first attempt to speak in public proved a failure, and he retired from the bema amidst the hootings and laughter of the citizens. The more judicious and candid among his auditors perceived, however, marks of genius in his speech, and rightly attributed his failure to timidity and want of due preparation. Eunomus, an aged citizen, who met him wandering about the Piraeus in a state of dejection at his ill success, bade him take courage and persevere. Demosthenes now withdrew awhile from public life, and devoted himself perseveringly to remedy his defects. They were such as might be lessened, if not removed, by practice, and consisted chiefly of a weak voice, imperfect articulation, and ungraceful and inappropriate action. He derived much assistance from Satyrus the actor, who exercised him in reciting passages from Sophocles and Euripides. He studied the best rhetorical treatises and orations, and is said to have copied the work of Thucydides with his own hand no fewer than eight times. He shut himself up for two or three months together in a subterranean chamber in order to practise composition and declamation. His perseverance was crowned with success; and he who on the first attempt had descended from the bema amid the ridicule of the crowd, became at last the most perfect orator the world has ever seen.

Demosthenes had established himself as a public speaker before the period which we have now reached; but it is chiefly in connexion with Philip that we are to view him as a statesman as well as an orator. Philip had shown his ambition by the conquest of Thessaly, and by the part he had taken in the Sacred War; and Demosthenes now began to regard him as the enemy of the liberties of Athens and of Greece. In his first "Philippic" Demosthenes tried to rouse his countrymen to energetic measures against this formidable enemy; but his warnings and exhortations produced little effect, for the Athenians were no longer distinguished by the same spirit of enterprise which had characterized them in the days of their supremacy. No important step was taken to curb the growing power of Philip; and it was the danger of Olynthus which first induced the Athenians to prosecute the war with a little more energy. In 350 B.C., Philip having captured a town in Chalcidice, Olynthus began to tremble for her own safety, and sent envoys to Athens to crave assistance. Olynthus was still at the head of thirty-two Greek towns, and the confederacy was a sort of counterpoise to the power of Philip. It was on this occasion that Demosthenes delivered his three Olynthaic orations, in which he warmly advocated an alliance with Olynthus.

William Smith, A Smaller History of Ancient Greece

Phillip of Macedon, B.C. 359-336

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