bjection by force, rises, as is only natural, and asserts its
independence, it is no sooner reduced than we fancy ourselves obliged
to punish it severely; although the right course with freemen is not to
chastise them rigorously when they do rise, but rigorously to watch them
before they rise, and to prevent their ever entertaining the idea,
and, the insurrection suppressed, to make as few responsible for it as
possible.

"Only consider what a blunder you would commit in doing as Cleon
recommends. As things are at present, in all the cities the people
is your friend, and either does not revolt with the oligarchy, or, if
forced to do so, becomes at once the enemy of the insurgents; so that in
the war with the hostile city you have the masses on your side. But
if you butcher the people of Mitylene, who had nothing to do with
the revolt, and who, as soon as they got arms, of their own motion
surrendered the town, first you will commit the crime of killing your
benefactors; and next you will play directly into the hands of the
higher classes, who when they induce their cities to rise, will
immediately have the people on their side, through your having announced
in advance the same punishment for those who are guilty and for those
who are not. On the contrary, even if they were guilty, you ought to
seem not to notice it, in order to avoid alienating the only class
still friendly to us. In short, I consider it far more useful for the
preservation of our empire voluntarily to put up with injustice, than
to put to death, however justly, those whom it is our interest to keep
alive. As for Cleon's idea that in punishment the claims of justice and
expediency can both be satisfied, facts do not confirm the possibility
of such a combination.

"Confess, therefore, that this is the wisest course, and without
conceding too much either to pity or to indulgence, by neither of which
motives do I any more than Cleon wish you to be influenced, upon the
plain merits of the case before you, be persuaded by me to try calmly
those of the Mitylenians whom Paches sent off as guilty, and to leave
the rest undisturbed. This is at once best for the future, and most
terrible to your enemies at the present moment; inasmuch as good policy
against an adversary is superior to the blind attacks of brute force."

Such were the words of Diodotus. The two opinions thus expressed were
the ones that most directly contradicted each other; and the Athenians,