Pyrrhus

Plutarch

Plutarch. Plutarch's Lives, Vol. IX. Perrin, Bernadotte, translator. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1920.

However, because Demetrius had easily and speedily driven Pyrrhus out of the country, he did not leave him to his own devices, but now that he had determined to undertake a great enterprise and to recover his father’s realm with a hundred thousand soldiers and five hundred ships, he did not wish to have collisions with Pyrrhus, nor yet to leave behind in him an enterprising and troublesome neighbour for the Macedonians. He wished, rather, since he had no time to wage war against Pyrrhus, to come to terms and make peace with him, and then turn his arms against the other kings.

But after an agreement had been made between them for these reasons, the purpose of Demetrius became apparent, as well as the magnitude of his preparations, and the kings, in alarm, kept sending to Pyrrhus messengers and letters,[*](Cf. the Demetrius, xliv. 1.) expressing their amazement that he should let slip his own opportunity for making war and wait for Demetrius to seize his; and that when he was able to drive Demetrius out of Macedonia, since he was now much occupied and disturbed, he should await the time when his adversary, at his leisure and after he had become great, could wage a decisive struggle with him for the sanctuaries and tombs of the Molosian land, an adversary who had just robbed him of Corcyra, and his wife besides.