Demosthenes, Against Meidias (oration 21)

Demosthenes, the orator, is said to have had to conquer an originally ineffective vocal delivery. After years of private law practice, he delivered the first of his three Philippics against Philip of Macedon in 351 B.C. He saw danger to Athens in the tyrannical expansion of the Macedonian state, but his passionate and compelling exhortations did not save the Greeks from defeat at Chaeronea in 338 B.C. Exiled in 324 B.C., he was recalled after the death of Alexander the Great in 323 B.C. Again, he tried to organize the Greek resistance but failed and was forced to flee when Athens was taken. He took poison to avoid capture. His speeches are characterized by deep sincerity, prodigious power of verbal suggestion, and intricate structure.