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If the Olynthians are not instantly succoured, and with your utmost efforts, you become assistants to Philip, and serve him more effectually than he can help himself. It is not, surely, necessary to warn you, that votes alone can be of no consequence.
Or, when Lamachus, the Myrinaean, had written a panegyric upon king Philip and Alexander, in which he uttered many things in reproach of the Thebans and Olynthians, and at the Olympic Games recited it publicly, how was it, that he, rising up, and recounting historically and demonstratively what benefits and advantages all Greece had received from the Thebans and Chalcidians, and on the contrary, what mischiefs the flatterers of the Macedonians had brought upon it, so turned the minds of all that were present that the sophist, in alarm at the outcry against him, secretly made his way out of the assembly?
What can be the reason perhaps you wonder why the Olynthians and Eretrians and Orites were more indulgent to Philip's advocates than to their own? The same which operates with you. They who advise for the best can not always gratify their audience, though they would; for the safety of the state must be attended to: their opponents by the very counsel which is agreeable advance Philip's interest.
'But so favoured by Nature, why has not your race produced great poets, great orators, great writers? 'Favoured by Nature and by Nature's God, we produced the lyre of David; we gave you Isaiah and Ezekiel; they are our Olynthians, our Philippics. Favoured by Nature we still remain: but in exact proportion as we have been favoured by Nature we have been persecuted by Man.
Yea, and it is disgraceful to exclaim on any occurrence, when it is too late, "Who would have expected it? However this or that should have been done, the other left undone." Many things could the Olynthians mention now, which, if foreseen at the time would have prevented their destruction. Many could the Orites mention, many the Phocians, and each of the ruined states.
Ye, men of Messene, said I, how do ye think the Olynthians would have brooked to hear any thing against Philip at those times, when he surrendered to them Anthemus, which all former kings of Macedonia claimed, when he cast out the Athenian colonists and gave them Potidaea, taking on himself your enmity, and giving them the land to enjoy?
On the capture of the town he handed it over to the Olynthians. Plutarch relates that the capture of Potidaea was accompanied with three other fortunate events in the life of Philip, namely, the prize gained by his chariot at the Olympic games, a victory of his general Parmenio over the Illyrians, and the birth of his son Alexander. These events happened in B.C. 356.
Finally he spared the Olynthians, who appointed Lasthenes to command their horse, and expelled Apollonides! It is folly and cowardice to cherish such hopes, and, while you take evil counsel and shirk every duty, and even listen to those who plead for your enemies, to think you inhabit a city of such magnitude, that you can not suffer any serious misfortune.
Having ordered matters at Pherae, Pagasae, Magnesia, every where exactly as he pleased, he departed for Thrace; where, after displacing some kings and establishing others, he fell sick; again recovering, he lapsed not into indolence, but instantly attacked the Olynthians. Why, it may be said, do you mention all this now?
This division of opinion rendered the operations of the Athenians for the aid of the Olynthians languid and desultory. Town after town of the confederacy fell before Philip; and in 347 Olynthus itself was taken. The whole of the Chalcidian peninsula thus became a Macedonian province.
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