History of the Peloponnesian War

As for the Athenians, so long as the army was in the neighbourhood of Eleusis and the Thriasian plain, they had some hope of its not advancing nearer; remembering the case of Pleistoanax, the son of Pausanias, the king of the Lacedaemonians, when with a Peloponnesian army he made an inroad into Attica, as far as Eleusis and Thria, fourteen years before this war, and retired again without advancing any further (for which reason indeed he was banished from Sparta, as he was thought to have been bribed to make the retreat).

When, however, they saw the army at Acharnae, only sixty stades from the city, they considered it no longer bearable, and, as was natural, when their land was being ravaged before their eyes—a thing which the younger men had never yet seen, nor even the elder, except in the Persian wars—it was thought a great indignity, and all of them, especially the young men, determined to go out against them, and not to put up with it.

They met therefore in knots and were in a state of great dissension, some urging them to go out, others dissuading them from it. Prophets too were repeating all kinds of oracles, to which [*]( The construction seems to be, that the finite verb ὤργηντο is in sense repeated: ' which they were eager to listen to, as each was eager: which they were severally eager to listen to.' He adds ὡς ἕκαστος ὤργητο, because different persons ran to listen to different prophecies, each choosing those which encouraged his own opinions or feelings. —Arnold.) they eagerly listened, as they were severally disposed. The Acharnians especially, thinking that no considerable part of the Athenian forces was in their ranks, urged them to march out, while their land was being ravaged. Nay, in every way the city was excited; and they were angry with Pericles, and remembered none of the advice which he had before given them, but abused him for not leading them out, as their general; and they regarded him as the author of all that they were suffering.