History of the Peloponnesian War

"Wishing then to call you off from this course, I declare to you that the Mytilenaeans have injured you more than any one state ever did.

For I can make allowance for men who have revolted because they could not endure your government, or because they were compelled by their enemies. But for those who inhabited an island with fortifications, and had only to fear our enemies by sea, on which element, too, they were themselves not unprotected against them by a fleet of triremes, and who lived independent, and were honoured in the highest degree by us, and then treated us in this way; what else did those men do than deliberately devise our ruin, and rise up against us, rather than revolt from us, (revolt, at least, is the part of those who are subject to some violent treatment,) and seek to ruin us by siding with our bitterest enemies? Yet surely that is more intolerable than if they waged war against you by themselves for the acquisition of power.

Again, neither were the calamities of their neighbours, who had already revolted from us and been subdued, a warning to them; nor did the good fortune they enjoyed make them loath to come into trouble; but being over-confident with regard to the future, and having formed hopes beyond their power, though less than their desire, they declared war, having determined to prefer might to right; for at a time when they thought they should overcome us, they attacked us, though they were not being wronged.

But success is wont to make those states insolent to which it comes most unexpected and with the shortest notice; whereas the good fortune which is according to men's calculation is generally more steady than when it comes beyond their expectation so to say, they more easily drive off adversity than they preserve prosperity.

The Mytilenaeans, then, ought all along to have been honoured by us on the same footing as the rest, and in that case they would not have come to such a pitch of insolence; for in other instances, as well as theirs, man is naturally inclined to despise those who court him and respect those who do not stoop to him.

But let them even now be punished as their crime deserves; and let not the guilt attach to the aristocracy, while you acquit the commons. For at any rate they all alike attacked you; since they might have come over to us, and so have been now in possession of their city again. Thinking, how ever, the chance they ran with the aristocracy to be the safer, they joined them in revolting. And now consider;

if you attach the same penalties to those of the allies who were compelled by their enemies to revolt, and to those who did it voluntarily, which of them, think you, will not revolt on any slight pretext, when he either gains his liberation, if he succeed, or incurs no extreme suffering, if he fail?

And so we shall presently have to risk both our money and our lives against each separate state. And if we are successful, by taking possession of a ruined city, you will hereafter be deprived of all. future revenue from it—in which our strength consists; while if we fail, we shall have fresh enemies in addition to those we have already; and during the time that we ought to be opposing our present foes, we shall be engaged in hostilities with our own allies.