History of the Peloponnesian War

And we prove it from what these men state to our prejudice, and what you, in your too great alarm, suspect; [*]( Hermocrates had endeavoured to excite the jealousy of the Camarinaeans, by telling them, that the Athenians did but pretend to aid the Leontines, while their real object was the subjugation of all Sicily. 'Such language,' says Euphemus, 'may possibly beguile you for the moment; but when you come to act, you will follow your real interests.' —Arnold.) knowing that those who through fear are suspicious, though pleased at the moment by the charms of oratory, yet afterwards attend to their real interests in what they undertake.

For we have said that we hold our dominion there under the influence of fear, and that for the same reason we are come to put the states here on a safe footing, in concert with our friends; and not to enslave them, but rather to prevent their being so treated.

"And let no one suppose that we are interesting ourselves in you without any connexion existing between us; since he must know that through your being preserved, and resisting the Syracusans, (being not too weak to do so,) we should be less readily hurt by their sending a force to the Peloponnesians.

In this way, then, you are connected with us in the greatest degree; and on this account too it is reasonable that we should reinstate the Leontines, not as subjects, like their kinsmen in Euboea, but in as powerful a condition as possible; that from their own country, living as they do close to these men's borders, they may in our behalf be annoying to them.

For in Greece we are by ourselves able to cope with our enemies; and the Chalcidians, after whose subjugation the orator says that we are inconsistently giving liberty to those here, are advantageous to us by being without any armament, and only paying us money; but the people here, both the Leontines and our other friends, by being left as independent as possible.