53
For the powers of the city and the pride of Greece were still at their height, and fortune favoured the people. But now every element of value in the political world has been ostracized and the cities’ hamstrings removed men’s lives have inclined to relaxation and luxury, the means of concord are no longer there, and the hopes of our friends have proved vain.
54
War, like a cloud, was threatening Europe from every quarter, suppressing my right to speak my mind in the assembly and taking away all power of free and noble utterance.
55
Examine the truth in the light of events and do not give more weight to false charges than to accepted facts.
56
. . . by the course of events proclaims the fire of war. This letter of Alexander’s broke my purpose.Perhaps Alexander’s letter demanding triremes from Athens (see Plut. Phoc. 21). This letter, embracing war in characters of ink, almost seized me by the hand and roused me. It travelled through my thoughts and did not let me rest in peace; for the danger was at our gates.
57
My diplomacy and the clamor that greeted it combined to set the city on the watch, saved Attica from being swamped from every side as by a wave and turned the army in Boeotia against the Persians.After the fall of Thebes in 335 B.C.
58
Fear of war, like darkness, does not present the same aspect when it confronts us as when it has been averted.
