Now up to this point I am sure that all men would acknowledge that our city has been the author of the greatest number of blessings, and that she should in fairness be entitled to the hegemony. But from this point on some take us to task, urging that after we succeeded to the sovereignty of the sea we brought many evils upon the Hellenes; and, in these speeches of theirs, they cast it in our teeth that we enslaved the Melians and destroyed the people of Scione.The Melan episode is dramatically told by Thucydides v. 84-116. Because the Melians refused to join the Delian Confederacy they were besieged and conquered by the Athenians, 416 B.C. The men of military age were put to the sword and the women and children sold into slavery. Five hundred Athenians were later settled there. Scione revolted from the Confederacy in 423 B.C. Reduced to subjection in 421 B.C., the people suffered the same fate as did the Melians later and their territory was occupied by Plataean refugees (Thuc. 4.120-130). These are blots on the record which Isocrates can at best condone. “Even the gods are not thought to be above reproach,” he says in the Isoc. 12.62-64, where he discusses frankly these sins of the Athenian democracy. Xenophon tells us that when the Athenians found themselves in like case with these conquered peoples after the disaster at Aegospotami they bitterly repented them of this injustice, Xen. Hell. 2.3.

I, however, take the view, in the first place, that it is no sign that we ruled badly if some of those who were at war with us are shown to have been severely disciplined, but that a much clearer proof that we administered the affairs of our allies wisely is seen in the fact that among the states which remained our loyal subjects not one experienced these disasters.

In the second place, if other states had dealt more leniently with the same circumstances, they might reasonably censure us; but since that is not the case, and it is impossible to control so great a multitude of states without disciplining those who offend, does it not follow that we deserve praise because we acted harshly in the fewest possible cases and were yet able to hold our dominion for the greatest length of time?

But I believe that all men are of the opinion that those will prove the best leaders and champions of the Hellenes under whom in the past those who yielded obedience have fared the best. Well, then, it will be found that under our supremacy the private households grew most prosperous and that the commonwealths also became greatest. For we were not jealous of the growing states,In this and the following paragraphs we have a summing up of the spirit of the Athenian hegemony in contrast to that of the Spartan supremacy described in 115 ff. Cf. Isoc. 12.59 ff.

nor did we engender confusion among them by setting up conflicting polities side by side, in order that faction might be arrayed against faction and that both might court our favor. On the contrary, we regarded harmony among our allies as the common boon of all, and therefore we governed all the cities under the same laws, deliberating about them in the spirit of allies, not of masters;

guarding the interests of the whole confederacy but leaving each member of it free to direct its own affairs; supporting the people but making war on despotic powers,tai=s dunastei/ais means simply “powers” in 81, but commonly powers not responsible to the people—oligarchies as here or tyrannies as in 39. considering it an outrage that the many should be subject to the few, that those who were poorer in fortune but not inferior in other respects should be banished from the offices, that, furthermore, in a fatherland which belongs to all in commonA pan-Hellenic sentiment. Cf. 81. some should hold the place of masters, others of aliens,Citizens under oligarchies are without rights; they are like the metics in Athens—residents on sufferance. and that men who are citizens by birthBy fu/sis, nature. Cf. “All men are created equal.” The contrast between nature and convention— fu/sis and no/mos—was a favorite topic of discussion among the sophists. Cf. an echo of it in Isoc. 1.10. should be robbed by law of their share in the government.

It was because we had these objections, and others besides, to oligarchies that we established the same polityA democratic government. Cf. Isoc. 12.54 ff. in the other states as in Athens itself—a polity which I see no need to extol at greater length, since I can tell the truth about it in a word: They continued to live under this regime for seventy years,A round number. So Lys. 2.55. Demosthenes reckons the period of supremacy more accurately at 73 years, 477-404. In Isoc. 12.56 Isocrates reckons it at 65 years—roughly from the Confederacy of Delos to the Athenian disaster in Sicily, which was really the beginning of the end of the Athenian supremacy. and, during this time, they experienced no tyrannies, they were free from the domination of the barbarians, they were untroubled by internal factions, and they were at peace with all the world.

On account of these services it becomes all thinking men to be deeply grateful to us, much rather than to reproach us because of our system of colonization;Allotments of lands to Athenian colonists in Greek territory, as in Scione and Melos. See note on 101. For these “cleruchies,” as they were called, see Gardner and Jevons, pp. 602 ff. for we sent our colonies into the depopulated states for the protection of their territories and not for our own aggrandizement. And here is proof of this: We had in proportion to the number of our citizens a very small territory,The total population including foreign residents and slaves is reckoned at about 500,000; the total area is about 700 square miles. but a very great empire; we possessed twice as many ships of war as all the rest combined,See Thuc. 2.13 and Thuc. 8.79. and these were strong enough to engage double their number; at the very borders of Attica lay Euboea,

which was not only fitted by her situation to command the sea, but also surpassed all the islands in her general resources,Herodotus characterizes Euboea as a “large and prosperous” island, Hdt. 5.31. Cf. Thuc. 8.96. and Euboea lent itself more readily to our control than did our own country besides, while we knew that both among the Hellenes and among the barbarians those are regarded most highly who have driven their neighbors from their homesThis cynical remark points to the Spartan conquest of Messene. and have so secured for themselves a life of affluence and ease, nevertheless, none of these considerations tempted us to wrong the people of the island;