History of the Peloponnesian War

And therefore it were hard that you should now be otherwise minded and withstand your own and the rest of the Grecians' liberty,

not only in that yourselves resist us, but also because others whom I go to will be the less willing to come in, making difficulty because you to whom I came first, having a flourishing city and being esteemed wise, have refused us. For which I shall have no sufficient excuse to plead, but must be thought either to pretend to set up liberty unjustly, or to come weak and without power to maintain you against the Athenians.

And yet against this same army I now have, when I went to encounter the Athenians at Nisaea, though more in number they durst not hazard battle. Nor is it likely that the Athenians will send forth so great a number against you as they had in their fleet there at Nisaea.