re reconciled. For they did not attack one another out of
malice or enmity, but they were unfortunate. And that such was the fact
we ourselves are witnesses, who are of the same race with them, and
have mutually received and granted forgiveness of what we have done and
suffered. After this there was perfect peace, and the city had rest;
and her feeling was that she forgave the barbarians, who had severely
suffered at her hands and severely retaliated, but that she was
indignant at the ingratitude of the Hellenes, when she remembered how
they had received good from her and returned evil, having made common
cause with the barbarians, depriving her of the ships which had once
been their salvation, and dismantling our walls, which had preserved
their own from falling. She thought that she would no longer defend the
Hellenes, when enslaved either by one another or by the barbarians, and
did accordingly. This was our feeling, while the Lacedaemonians were
thinking that we who were the champions of liberty had fallen, and that
their business was to subject the remaining Hellenes. And why should I
say more? for the events of which I am speaking happened not long ago
and we can all of us remember how the chief peoples of Hellas, Argives
and Boeotians and Corinthians, came to feel the need of us, and, what is
the greatest miracle of all, the Persian king himself was driven to such
extremity as to come round to the opinion, that from this city, of which
he was the destroyer, and from no other, his salvation would proceed.

And if a person desired to bring a deserved accusation against our city,
he would find only one charge which he could justly urge--that she was
too compassionate and too favourable to the weaker side. And in this
instance she was not able to hold out or keep her resolution of refusing
aid to her injurers when they were being enslaved, but she was softened,
and did in fact send out aid, and delivered the Hellenes from slavery,
and they were free until they afterwards enslaved themselves. Whereas,
to the great king she refused to give the assistance of the state, for
she could not forget the trophies of Marathon and Salamis and Plataea;
but she allowed exiles and volunteers to assist him, and they were his
salvation. And she herself, when she was compelled, entered into the
war, and built walls and ships, and fought with the Lacedaemonians on
behalf of the Parians. Now the king fearing this city and wanting to
stan