History of the Peloponnesian War

But if you mean to deliberate wisely, make not your reckoning by the reports of these men but by that which wise men and men of great experience, such as I hold the Athenians to be, are likely to do.

For it is not probable that, leaving the Peloponnesians and the war there not yet surely ended, they should willingly come hither to a new war no less the former, seeing, in my opinion, they may be glad that we invade not them, so many and so great cities as we are.