History of the Peloponnesian War

Ath.

On this point you, as well as others, may learn by actual experience, and not remain ignorant, that from no single siege did the Athenians ever yet retreat through fear of others.

But it strikes us, that though you said you would consult for the safety of your country, you have in all this long discussion advanced nothing which men might trust to for thinking that they would be saved; but your strongest points depend on hope and futurity, while your present resources are too scanty, compared with those at present opposed to you, to give you a chance of escape. And so you afford proof of great folly in your views, if you do not even yet, after allowing us to retire, adopt some counsel more prudent than this.

For you surely will not betake yourselves to that shame, which in dangers that are disgraceful, because foreseen, destroys men more than any thing else. For in the case of many men, though they foresee all the time what they are running into, the thing which is called disgrace, by the influence of a seducing name, allures them on, enslaved as they are to the word, in fact to fall wilfully into irretrievable disasters, and to incur a shame more shameful as the attendant on folly than on fortune.

Against this then you, if you take good advice, will be on your guard; and will not consider it discreditable to submit to the most powerful state, when it offers you fair terms, namely, that you should become tributary allies, with the enjoyment of your own country; and when a choice of war or safety is given you, to avoid choosing through animosity what is worse for you. For whatever men do not yield to their equals, while they keep on good terms with their superiors, and are moderate to their inferiors, they would be most successful.

Consider then, even after we have retired; and reflect again and again, that it is for your country that you are consulting, [*]( The construction of this sentence, according to the common reading, is abandoned as desperate by all the editors. Göller and Bloomfield substitute ἴστε for ἔσται; but Poppo protests strongly against the change. With due deference to such authorities, I would venture to ask, whether the text, as it stands, may not be explained by supposing δουλεύεσθαι to be understood with ἔσται—the infinitive being suggested by the indicative at the end of the antecedent clause—and referring ἣν not to πατρίδος as has been done hitherto, but to βουλήν. ἐς μίαν would then stand without its substantive, as it does Horm. Il. 2. 379, though in a different sense. Or, if that be considered a difficulty, it would perhaps be nothing inconsistent with the frequently careless style of Thucydides to suppose a confusion of two expressions, so that both ἥν and μίαν should be left in concord with βουλήν The sense of the passage would certainly be more natural, and the construction easier, if ἧς could be substituted for ἥν: but as MSS. afford no authority for the change, and as it does not appear absolutely necessary, it might be considered rash to adopt it.) which you can do but for one country, and for once, whether it prove successful or unsuccessful.