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Thoas opened the proceedings by giving a report of his negotiations. He was followed by Menippus, who asserted that the best thing for all the peoples of Greece and Asia would have been for Antiochus to have intervened whilst Philip's power was still unimpaired, everyone would then have kept what belonged to him, and everything would not have been completely at the mercy of Rome. "Even now," he continued, "if only you resolutely carry out the designs you have formed, he will be able with the help of the gods and the assistance of the Aetolians to restore the fortunes of Greece, drooping though they are, to their old place in the world. That, however, must rest on liberty, and a liberty which stands in its own strength and is not dependent on the will of another." The Athenians, who had received permission to speak their minds after the king's delegate, made no allusion to the king, but simply reminded the Aetolians of their alliance with Rome and the services which T. Quinctius had rendered to the whole of Greece. They warned them against wrecking that friendship by hasty and precipitate action; bold and hot-headed counsels were attractive at first sight, difficult to put into practice, disastrous in their results. The Roman envoys and Quinctius himself were not far away, it would be better to discuss the question at issue in friendly debate than to throw Europe and Asia into a deadly struggle of arms.
