and Corcyraeans, their people and their cities, were all
joined together in a league. But the hardest task was yet behind, left
for Demosthenes, to draw the Thebans into this confederacy with the
rest. Their country bordered next upon Attica, they had great forces for
the war, and at that time they were accounted the best soldiers of all
Greece, but it was no easy matter to make them break with Philip, who
by many good offices, had so lately obliged them in the Phocian war;
especially considering how the subjects of dispute and variance between
the two cities were continually renewed and exasperated by petty
quarrels, arising out of the proximity of their frontiers.

But after Philip, puffed up with his good success at Amphissa, on a
sudden surprised Elatea and possessed himself of Phocis, the Athenians
were in a great consternation, none durst venture to rise up to
speak, all were at a loss, and the whole assembly was in silence and
perplexity. In this extremity of affairs, Demosthenes was the only man
who appeared, his counsel to them being alliance with the Thebans. And
having in other ways encouraged the people, and, as his manner was,
raised their spirits up with hopes, he, with some others was sent
ambassador to Thebes. To oppose him, as Marsyas says, Philip also sent
thither his envoys. Now the Thebans, in their consultations, were well
enough aware what suited best with their own interest, but every one
had before his eye the terrors of war, and their losses in the Phocian
troubles were still recent: but such was the force and power of the
orator, fanning up their courage, and firing their emulation, that,
casting away every thought of prudence, fear, or obligation, in a sort
of divine possession, they chose the path of honor, to which his words
invited them. And this success, thus accomplished by an orator,
was thought to be so glorious and of such consequence, that Philip
immediately sent heralds to treat and petition for a peace: all Greece
was aroused, and up in arms to help. And the commanders-in-chief, not
only of Attica, but of Boeotia, applied themselves to Demosthenes, and
observed his directions. He managed all the assemblies of the Thebans,
no less than those of the Athenians; he was beloved both by the one and
by the other, and exercised the same supreme authority with both; and
that not by unfair means, or without just cause, but it was no more than
was due to his merit.

But there was, it should s