Pericles' Funeral Oration (Thucydides, Book 2, chapters 34-46)
In the same winter the Athenians gave a funeral at the public
cost to those who had first
fallen in this war. It was a custom of their
ancestors, and the manner of it is as follows.
Three days before the ceremony, the bones
of the dead are laid out in a tent which has
been erected; and their friends bring to their
relatives such offerings as they please. In the
funeral procession cypress coffins are borne
in cars, one for each tribe; the bones of the
deceased being placed in the coffin of their
tribe. Among these is carried one empty bier
decked for the missing, that is, for those
whose bodies could not be recovered. Any citizen
or stranger who pleases, joins in the procession:
and the female relatives are there to wail
at the burial. The dead are laid in the public
sepulchre in the Beautiful suburb of the city, in
which those who fall in war are always buried;
with the exception of those slain at
Marathon, who for their singular and extraordinary
valour were interred on the spot where
they fell. After the bodies have been laid
in the earth, a man chosen by the state, of
approved wisdom and eminent reputation, pronounces
over them an appropriate
panegyric; after which all retire. Such is
the manner of the burying; and throughout the
whole of the war, whenever the occasion arose,
the established custom was observed.
Meanwhile these were the first that had fallen,
and Pericles, son of Xanthippus, was
chosen to pronounce their eulogium. When the
proper time arrived, he advanced from the
sepulchre to an elevated platform in order
to be heard by as many of the crowd as
possible, and spoke as follows:
"Most of my predecessors in this place have
commended him who made this speech part
of the law, telling us that it is well that
it should be delivered at the burial of those who fall
in battle. For myself, I should have thought
that the worth which had displayed itself in
deeds would be sufficiently rewarded by honours
also shown by deeds; such as you now
see in this funeral prepared at the people's
cost. And I could have wished that the
reputations of many brave men were not to
be imperilled in the mouth of a single individual,
to stand or fall according as he spoke well
or ill. For it is hard to speak properly upon a
subject where it is even difficult to convince
your hearers that you are speaking the truth.
On the one hand, the friend who is familiar
with every fact of the story may think that some
point has not been set forth with that fullness
which he wishes and knows it to deserve; on
the other, he who is a stranger to the matter
may be led by envy to suspect exaggeration if
he hears anything above his own nature. For
men can endure to hear others praised only
so long as they can severally persuade themselves
of their own ability to equal the actions
recounted: when this point is passed, envy
comes in and with it incredulity. However, since
our ancestors have stamped this custom with
their approval, it becomes my duty to obey
the law and to try to satisfy your several
wishes and opinions as best I may.
"I shall begin with our ancestors: it is both
just and proper that they should have the honour
of the first mention on an occasion like the
present. They dwelt in the country without
break in the succession from generation to
generation, and handed it down free to the
present time by their valour. And if our more
remote ancestors deserve praise, much more
do our own fathers, who added to their inheritance
the empire which we now possess, and
spared no pains to be able to leave their
acquisitions to us of the present generation.
Lastly, there are few parts of our dominions
that have not been augmented by those of us
here, who are still more or less in the vigour
of life; while the mother country has been
furnished by us with everything that can enable
her to depend on her own resources
whether for war or for peace. That part of
our history which tells of the military
achievements which gave us our several possessions,
or of the ready valour with which
either we or our fathers stemmed the tide
of Hellenic or foreign aggression, is a theme too
familiar to my hearers for me to dilate on,
and I shall therefore pass it by. But what was the
road by which we reached our position, what
the form of government under which our
greatness grew, what the national habits out
of which it sprang; these are questions which I
may try to solve before I proceed to my panegyric
upon these men; since I think this to be
a subject upon which on the present occasion
a speaker may properly dwell, and to which
the whole assemblage, whether citizens or
foreigners, may listen with advantage.
"Our constitution does not copy the laws of
neighbouring states; we are rather a pattern to
others than imitators ourselves. Its administration
favours the many instead of the few; this
is why it is called a democracy. If we look
to the laws, they afford equal justice to all in
their private differences; if no social standing,
advancement in public life falls to reputation
for capacity, class considerations not being
allowed to interfere with merit; nor again does
poverty bar the way, if a man is able to serve
the state, he is not hindered by the obscurity
of his condition. The freedom which we enjoy
in our government extends also to our
ordinary life. There, far from exercising
a jealous surveillance over each other, we do not
feel called upon to be angry with our neighbour
for doing what he likes, or even to indulge
in those injurious looks which cannot fail
to be offensive, although they inflict no positive
penalty. But all this ease in our private
relations does not make us lawless as citizens.
Against this fear is our chief safeguard,
teaching us to obey the magistrates and the laws,
particularly such as regard the protection
of the injured, whether they are actually on the
statute book, or belong to that code which,
although unwritten, yet cannot be broken
without acknowledged disgrace.
"Further, we provide plenty of means for the
mind to refresh itself from business. We
celebrate games and sacrifices all the year
round, and the elegance of our private
establishments forms a daily source of pleasure
and helps to banish the spleen; while the
magnitude of our city draws the produce of
the world into our harbour, so that to the
Athenian the fruits of other countries are
as familiar a luxury as those of his own.
"If we turn to our military policy, there also
we differ from our antagonists. We throw open
our city to the world, and never by alien
acts exclude foreigners from any opportunity of
learning or observing, although the eyes of
an enemy may occasionally profit by our
liberality; trusting less in system and policy
than to the native spirit of our citizens; while in
education, where our rivals from their very
cradles by a painful discipline seek after
manliness, at Athens we live exactly as we
please, and yet are just as ready to encounter
every legitimate danger. In proof of this
it may be noticed that the Lacedaemonians do not
invade our country alone, but bring with them
all their confederates; while we Athenians
advance unsupported into the territory of
a neighbour, and fighting upon a foreign soil
usually vanquish with ease men who are defending
their homes. Our united force was
never yet encountered by any enemy, because
we have at once to attend to our marine
and to dispatch our citizens by land upon
a hundred different services; so that, wherever
they engage with some such fraction of our
strength, a success against a detachment is
magnified into a victory over the nation,
and a defeat into a reverse suffered at the hands of
our entire people. And yet if with habits
not of labour but of ease, and courage not of art
but of nature, we are still willing to encounter
danger, we have the double advantage of
escaping the experience of hardships in anticipation
and of facing them in the hour of need
as fearlessly as those who are never free
from them.
"Nor are these the only points in which our
city is worthy of admiration. We cultivate
refinement without extravagance and knowledge
without effeminacy; wealth we employ
more for use than for show, and place the
real disgrace of poverty not in owning to the fact
but in declining the struggle against it.
Our public men have, besides politics, their private
affairs to attend to, and our ordinary citizens,
though occupied with the pursuits of industry,
are still fair judges of public matters; for,
unlike any other nation, regarding him who takes
no part in these duties not as unambitious
but as useless, we Athenians are able to judge at
all events if we cannot originate, and, instead
of looking on discussion as a stumbling-block
in the way of action, we think it an indispensable
preliminary to any wise action at all.
Again, in our enterprises we present the singular
spectacle of daring and deliberation, each
carried to its highest point, and both united
in the same persons; although usually decision
is the fruit of ignorance, hesitation of reflection.
But the palm of courage will surely be
adjudged most justly to those, who best know
the difference between hardship and
pleasure and yet are never tempted to shrink
from danger. In generosity we are equally
singular, acquiring our friends by conferring,
not by receiving, favours. Yet, of course, the
doer of the favour is the firmer friend of
the two, in order by continued kindness to keep
the recipient in his debt; while the debtor
feels less keenly from the very consciousness that
the return he makes will be a payment, not
a free gift. And it is only the Athenians, who,
fearless of consequences, confer their benefits
not from calculations of expediency, but in
the confidence of liberality.
"In short, I say that as a city we are the
school of Hellas, while I doubt if the world can
produce a man who, where he has only himself
to depend upon, is equal to so many
emergencies, and graced by so happy a versatility,
as the Athenian. And that this is no
mere boast thrown out for the occasion, but
plain matter of fact, the power of the state
acquired by these habits proves. For Athens
alone of her contemporaries is found when
tested to be greater than her reputation,
and alone gives no occasion to her assailants to
blush at the antagonist by whom they have
been worsted, or to her subjects to question
her title by merit to rule. Rather, the admiration
of the present and succeeding ages will be
ours, since we have not left our power without
witness, but have shown it by mighty
proofs; and far from needing a Homer for our
panegyrist, or other of his craft whose
verses might charm for the moment only for
the impression which they gave to melt at the
touch of fact, we have forced every sea and
land to be the highway of our daring, and
everywhere, whether for evil or for good,
have left imperishable monuments behind us.
Such is the Athens for which these men, in
the assertion of their resolve not to lose her,
nobly fought and died; and well may every
one of their survivors be ready to suffer in her
cause.
"Indeed if I have dwelt at some length upon
the character of our country, it has been to
show that our stake in the struggle is not
the same as theirs who have no such blessings to
lose, and also that the panegyric of the men
over whom I am now speaking might be by
definite proofs established. That panegyric
is now in a great measure complete; for the
Athens that I have celebrated is only what
the heroism of these and their like have made
her, men whose fame, unlike that of most Hellenes,
will be found to be only commensurate
with their deserts. And if a test of worth
be wanted, it is to be found in their closing scene,
and this not only in cases in which it set
the final seal upon their merit, but also in those in
which it gave the first intimation of their
having any. For there is justice in the claim that
steadfastness in his country's battles should
be as a cloak to cover a man's other
imperfections; since the good action has blotted
out the bad, and his merit as a citizen
more than outweighed his demerits as an individual.
But none of these allowed either
wealth with its prospect of future enjoyment
to unnerve his spirit, or poverty with its hope
of a day of freedom and riches to tempt him
to shrink from danger. No, holding that
vengeance upon their enemies was more to be
desired than any personal blessings, and
reckoning this to be the most glorious of
hazards, they joyfully determined to accept the
risk, to make sure of their vengeance, and
to let their wishes wait; and while committing to
hope the uncertainty of final success, in
the business before them they thought fit to act
boldly and trust in themselves. Thus choosing
to die resisting, rather than to live submitting,
they fled only from dishonour, but met danger
face to face, and after one brief moment,
while at the summit of their fortune, escaped,
not from their fear, but from their glory.
"So died these men as became Athenians. You,
their survivors, must determine to have as
unfaltering a resolution in the field, though
you may pray that it may have a happier issue.
And not contented with ideas derived only
from words of the advantages which are bound
up with the defence of your country, though
these would furnish a valuable text to a
speaker even before an audience so alive to
them as the present, you must yourselves
realize the power of Athens, and feed your
eyes upon her from day to day, till love of her
fills your hearts; and then, when all her
greatness shall break upon you, you must reflect
that it was by courage, sense of duty, and
a keen feeling of honour in action that men were
enabled to win all this, and that no personal
failure in an enterprise could make them
consent to deprive their country of their
valour, but they laid it at her feet as the most
glorious contribution that they could offer.
For this offering of their lives made in common
by them all they each of them individually
received that renown which never grows old,
and for a sepulchre, not so much that in which
their bones have been deposited, but that
noblest of shrines wherein their glory is
laid up to be eternally remembered upon every
occasion on which deed or story shall call
for its commemoration. For heroes have the
whole earth for their tomb; and in lands far
from their own, where the column with its
epitaph declares it, there is enshrined in
every breast a record unwritten with no tablet to
preserve it, except that of the heart. These
take as your model and, judging happiness to
be the fruit of freedom and freedom of valour,
never decline the dangers of war. For it is
not the miserable that would most justly be
unsparing of their lives; these have nothing to
hope for: it is rather they to whom continued
life may bring reverses as yet unknown, and
to whom a fall, if it came, would be most
tremendous in its consequences. And surely, to a
man of spirit, the degradation of cowardice
must be immeasurably more grievous than the
unfelt death which strikes him in the midst
of his strength and patriotism!
"Comfort, therefore, not condolence, is what
I have to offer to the parents of the dead
who may be here. Numberless are the chances
to which, as they know, the life of man is
subject; but fortunate indeed are they who
draw for their lot a death so glorious as that
which has caused your mourning, and to whom
life has been so exactly measured as to
terminate in the happiness in which it has
been passed. Still I know that this is a hard
saying, especially when those are in question
of whom you will constantly be reminded by
seeing in the homes of others blessings of
which once you also boasted: for grief is felt not
so much for the want of what we have never
known, as for the loss of that to which we
have been long accustomed. Yet you who are
still of an age to beget children must bear up
in the hope of having others in their stead;
not only will they help you to forget those whom
you have lost, but will be to the state at
once a reinforcement and a security; for never can
a fair or just policy be expected of the citizen
who does not, like his fellows, bring to the
decision the interests and apprehensions of
a father. While those of you who have passed
your prime must congratulate yourselves with
the thought that the best part of your life was
fortunate, and that the brief span that remains
will be cheered by the fame of the departed.
For it is only the love of honour that never
grows old; and honour it is, not gain, as some
would have it, that rejoices the heart of
age and helplessness.
"Turning to the sons or brothers of the dead,
I see an arduous struggle before you. When a
man is gone, all are wont to praise him, and
should your merit be ever so transcendent,
you will still find it difficult not merely
to overtake, but even to approach their renown. The
living have envy to contend with, while those
who are no longer in our path are honoured
with a goodwill into which rivalry does not
enter. On the other hand, if I must say anything
on the subject of female excellence to those
of you who will now be in widowhood, it will
be all comprised in this brief exhortation.
Great will be your glory in not falling short of
your natural character; and greatest will
be hers who is least talked of among the men,
whether for good or for bad.
"My task is now finished. I have performed
it to the best of my ability, and in word, at
least, the requirements of the law are now
satisfied. If deeds be in question, those who are
here interred have received part of their
honours already, and for the rest, their children
will be brought up till manhood at the public
expense: the state thus offers a valuable prize,
as the garland of victory in this race of
valour, for the reward both of those who have fallen
and their survivors. And where the rewards
for merit are greatest, there are found the best
citizens.
"And now that you have brought to a close your
lamentations for your relatives, you may
depart."
The Mitylenian Debate (Thucydides, Book 3, chapters 36-50)
Upon the arrival of the prisoners with Salaethus,
the Athenians at once put the latter to
death, although he offered, among other things,
to procure the withdrawal of the
Peloponnesians from Plataea, which was still
under siege; and after deliberating as to what
they should do with the former, in the fury
of the moment determined to put to death not
only the prisoners at Athens, but the whole
adult male population of Mitylene, and to make
slaves of the women and children. It was remarked
that Mitylene had revolted without
being, like the rest, subjected to the empire;
and what above all swelled the wrath of the
Athenians was the fact of the Peloponnesian
fleet having ventured over to Ionia to her
support, a fact which was held to argue a
long meditated rebellion. They accordingly sent a
galley to communicate the decree to Paches,
commanding him to lose no time in
dispatching the Mitylenians. The morrow brought
repentance with it and reflection on the
horrid cruelty of a decree, which condemned
a whole city to the fate merited only by the
guilty. This was no sooner perceived by the
Mitylenian ambassadors at Athens and their
Athenian supporters, than they moved the authorities
to put the question again to the vote;
which they the more easily consented to do,
as they themselves plainly saw that most of
the citizens wished some one to give them
an opportunity for reconsidering the matter. An
assembly was therefore at once called, and
after much expression of opinion upon both
sides, Cleon, son of Cleaenetus, the same
who had carried the former motion of putting
the Mitylenians to death, the most violent
man at Athens, and at that time by far the most
powerful with the commons, came forward again
and spoke as follows:
"I have often before now been convinced that
a democracy is incapable of empire, and
never more so than by your present change
of mind in the matter of Mitylene. Fears or
plots being unknown to you in your daily relations
with each other, you feel just the same
with regard to your allies, and never reflect
that the mistakes into which you may be led by
listening to their appeals, or by giving way
to your own compassion, are full of danger to
yourselves, and bring you no thanks for your
weakness from your allies; entirely forgetting
that your empire is a despotism and your subjects
disaffected conspirators, whose
obedience is ensured not by your suicidal
concessions, but by the superiority given you by
your own strength and not their loyalty. The
most alarming feature in the case is the
constant change of measures with which we
appear to be threatened, and our seeming
ignorance of the fact that bad laws which
are never changed are better for a city than good
ones that have no authority; that unlearned
loyalty is more serviceable than quick-witted
insubordination; and that ordinary men usually
manage public affairs better than their more
gifted fellows. The latter are always wanting
to appear wiser than the laws, and to overrule
every proposition brought forward, thinking
that they cannot show their wit in more
important matters, and by such behaviour too
often ruin their country; while those who
mistrust their own cleverness are content
to be less learned than the laws, and less able to
pick holes in the speech of a good speaker;
and being fair judges rather than rival athletes,
generally conduct affairs successfully. These
we ought to imitate, instead of being led on by
cleverness and intellectual rivalry to advise
your people against our real opinions.
"For myself, I adhere to my former opinion,
and wonder at those who have proposed to
reopen the case of the Mitylenians, and who
are thus causing a delay which is all in favour
of the guilty, by making the sufferer proceed
against the offender with the edge of his anger
blunted; although where vengeance follows
most closely upon the wrong, it best equals it
and most amply requites it. I wonder also
who will be the man who will maintain the
contrary, and will pretend to show that the
crimes of the Mitylenians are of service to us,
and our misfortunes injurious to the allies.
Such a man must plainly either have such
confidence in his rhetoric as to adventure
to prove that what has been once for all decided
is still undetermined, or be bribed to try
to delude us by elaborate sophisms. In such
contests the state gives the rewards to others,
and takes the dangers for herself. The
persons to blame are you who are so foolish
as to institute these contests; who go to see
an oration as you would to see a sight, take
your facts on hearsay, judge of the
practicability of a project by the wit of
its advocates, and trust for the truth as to past
events not to the fact which you saw more
than to the clever strictures which you heard;
the easy victims of new-fangled arguments,
unwilling to follow received conclusions; slaves
to every new paradox, despisers of the commonplace;
the first wish of every man being
that he could speak himself, the next to rival
those who can speak by seeming to be quite
up with their ideas by applauding every hit
almost before it is made, and by being as quick
in catching an argument as you are slow in
foreseeing its consequences; asking, if I may so
say, for something different from the conditions
under which we live, and yet
comprehending inadequately those very conditions;
very slaves to the pleasure of the ear,
and more like the audience of a rhetorician
than the council of a city.
"In order to keep you from this, I proceed
to show that no one state has ever injured you
as much as Mitylene. I can make allowance
for those who revolt because they cannot bear
our empire, or who have been forced to do
so by the enemy. But for those who possessed
an island with fortifications; who could fear
our enemies only by sea, and there had their
own force of galleys to protect them; who
were independent and held in the highest honour
by you- to act as these have done, this is
not revolt- revolt implies oppression; it is
deliberate and wanton aggression; an attempt
to ruin us by siding with our bitterest
enemies; a worse offence than a war undertaken
on their own account in the acquisition of
power. The fate of those of their neighbours
who had already rebelled and had been
subdued was no lesson to them; their own prosperity
could not dissuade them from
affronting danger; but blindly confident in
the future, and full of hopes beyond their power
though not beyond their ambition, they declared
war and made their decision to prefer
might to right, their attack being determined
not by provocation but by the moment which
seemed propitious. The truth is that great
good fortune coming suddenly and unexpectedly
tends to make a people insolent; in most cases
it is safer for mankind to have success in
reason than out of reason; and it is easier
for them, one may say, to stave off adversity than
to preserve prosperity. Our mistake has been
to distinguish the Mitylenians as we have
done: had they been long ago treated like
the rest, they never would have so far forgotten
themselves, human nature being as surely made
arrogant by consideration as it is awed by
firmness. Let them now therefore be punished
as their crime requires, and do not, while
you condemn the aristocracy, absolve the people.
This is certain, that all attacked you
without distinction, although they might have
come over to us and been now again in
possession of their city. But no, they thought
it safer to throw in their lot with the
aristocracy and so joined their rebellion!
Consider therefore: if you subject to the same
punishment the ally who is forced to rebel
by the enemy, and him who does so by his own
free choice, which of them, think you, is
there that will not rebel upon the slightest pretext;
when the reward of success is freedom, and
the penalty of failure nothing so very terrible?
We meanwhile shall have to risk our money
and our lives against one state after another;
and if successful, shall receive a ruined
town from which we can no longer draw the
revenue upon which our strength depends; while
if unsuccessful, we shall have an enemy
the more upon our hands, and shall spend the
time that might be employed in combating
our existing foes in warring with our own
allies.
"No hope, therefore, that rhetoric may instil
or money purchase, of the mercy due to
human infirmity must be held out to the Mitylenians.
Their offence was not involuntary, but
of malice and deliberate; and mercy is only
for unwilling offenders. I therefore, now as
before, persist against your reversing your
first decision, or giving way to the three failings
most fatal to empire- pity, sentiment, and
indulgence. Compassion is due to those who can
reciprocate the feeling, not to those who
will never pity us in return, but are our natural and
necessary foes: the orators who charm us with
sentiment may find other less important
arenas for their talents, in the place of
one where the city pays a heavy penalty for a
momentary pleasure, themselves receiving fine
acknowledgments for their fine phrases;
while indulgence should be shown towards those
who will be our friends in future, instead
of towards men who will remain just what they
were, and as much our enemies as before.
To sum up shortly, I say that if you follow
my advice you will do what is just towards the
Mitylenians, and at the same time expedient;
while by a different decision you will not
oblige them so much as pass sentence upon
yourselves. For if they were right in rebelling,
you must be wrong in ruling. However, if,
right or wrong, you determine to rule, you must
carry out your principle and punish the Mitylenians
as your interest requires; or else you
must give up your empire and cultivate honesty
without danger. Make up your minds,
therefore, to give them like for like; and
do not let the victims who escaped the plot be
more insensible than the conspirators who
hatched it; but reflect what they would have
done if victorious over you, especially they
were the aggressors. It is they who wrong their
neighbour without a cause, that pursue their
victim to the death, on account of the danger
which they foresee in letting their enemy
survive; since the object of a wanton wrong is
more dangerous, if he escape, than an enemy
who has not this to complain of. Do not,
therefore, be traitors to yourselves, but
recall as nearly as possible the moment of suffering
and the supreme importance which you then
attached to their reduction; and now pay them
back in their turn, without yielding to present
weakness or forgetting the peril that once
hung over you. Punish them as they deserve,
and teach your other allies by a striking
example that the penalty of rebellion is death.
Let them once understand this and you will
not have so often to neglect your enemies
while you are fighting with your own
confederates."
Such were the words of Cleon. After him Diodotus,
son of Eucrates, who had also in the
previous assembly spoken most strongly against
putting the Mitylenians to death, came
forward and spoke as follows:
"I do not blame the persons who have reopened
the case of the Mitylenians, nor do I
approve the protests which we have heard against
important questions being frequently
debated. I think the two things most opposed
to good counsel are haste and passion; haste
usually goes hand in hand with folly, passion
with coarseness and narrowness of mind. As
for the argument that speech ought not to
be the exponent of action, the man who uses it
must be either senseless or interested: senseless
if he believes it possible to treat of the
uncertain future through any other medium;
interested if, wishing to carry a disgraceful
measure and doubting his ability to speak
well in a bad cause, he thinks to frighten
opponents and hearers by well-aimed calumny.
What is still more intolerable is to accuse a
speaker of making a display in order to be
paid for it. If ignorance only were imputed, an
unsuccessful speaker might retire with a reputation
for honesty, if not for wisdom; while the
charge of dishonesty makes him suspected,
if successful, and thought, if defeated, not only
a fool but a rogue. The city is no gainer
by such a system, since fear deprives it of its
advisers; although in truth, if our speakers
are to make such assertions, it would be better
for the country if they could not speak at
all, as we should then make fewer blunders. The
good citizen ought to triumph not by frightening
his opponents but by beating them fairly in
argument; and a wise city, without over-distinguishing
its best advisers, will nevertheless
not deprive them of their due, and, far from
punishing an unlucky counsellor, will not even
regard him as disgraced. In this way successful
orators would be least tempted to sacrifice
their convictions to popularity, in the hope
of still higher honours, and unsuccessful
speakers to resort to the same popular arts
in order to win over the multitude.
"This is not our way; and, besides, the moment
that a man is suspected of giving advice,
however good, from corrupt motives, we feel
such a grudge against him for the gain which
after all we are not certain he will receive,
that we deprive the city of its certain benefit.
Plain good advice has thus come to be no less
suspected than bad; and the advocate of
the most monstrous measures is not more obliged
to use deceit to gain the people, than the
best counsellor is to lie in order to be believed.
The city and the city only, owing to these
refinements, can never be served openly and
without disguise; he who does serve it openly
being always suspected of serving himself
in some secret way in return. Still, considering
the magnitude of the interests involved, and
the position of affairs, we orators must make it
our business to look a little farther than
you who judge offhand; especially as we, your
advisers, are responsible, while you, our
audience, are not so. For if those who gave the
advice, and those who took it, suffered equally,
you would judge more calmly; as it is, you
visit the disasters into which the whim of
the moment may have led you upon the single
person of your adviser, not upon yourselves,
his numerous companions in error.
"However, I have not come forward either to
oppose or to accuse in the matter of
Mitylene; indeed, the question before us as
sensible men is not their guilt, but our interests.
Though I prove them ever so guilty, I shall
not, therefore, advise their death, unless it be
expedient; nor though they should have claims
to indulgence, shall I recommend it, unless it
be dearly for the good of the country. I consider
that we are deliberating for the future
more than for the present; and where Cleon
is so positive as to the useful deterrent effects
that will follow from making rebellion capital,
I, who consider the interests of the future
quite as much as he, as positively maintain
the contrary. And I require you not to reject my
useful considerations for his specious ones:
his speech may have the attraction of seeming
the more just in your present temper against
Mitylene; but we are not in a court of justice,
but in a political assembly; and the question
is not justice, but how to make the Mitylenians
useful to Athens.
"Now of course communities have enacted the
penalty of death for many offences far
lighter than this: still hope leads men to
venture, and no one ever yet put himself in peril
without the inward conviction that he would
succeed in his design. Again, was there ever
city rebelling that did not believe that it
possessed either in itself or in its alliances resources
adequate to the enterprise? All, states and
individuals, are alike prone to err, and there is
no law that will prevent them; or why should
men have exhausted the list of punishments in
search of enactments to protect them from
evildoers? It is probable that in early times the
penalties for the greatest offences were less
severe, and that, as these were disregarded,
the penalty of death has been by degrees in
most cases arrived at, which is itself
disregarded in like manner. Either then some
means of terror more terrible than this must
be discovered, or it must be owned that this
restraint is useless; and that as long as poverty
gives men the courage of necessity, or plenty
fills them with the ambition which belongs to
insolence and pride, and the other conditions
of life remain each under the thraldom of
some fatal and master passion, so long will
the impulse never be wanting to drive men into
danger. Hope also and cupidity, the one leading
and the other following, the one
conceiving the attempt, the other suggesting
the facility of succeeding, cause the widest
ruin, and, although invisible agents, are
far stronger than the dangers that are seen. Fortune,
too, powerfully helps the delusion and, by
the unexpected aid that she sometimes lends,
tempts men to venture with inferior means;
and this is especially the case with communities,
because the stakes played for are the highest,
freedom or empire, and, when all are acting
together, each man irrationally magnifies
his own capacity. In fine, it is impossible to
prevent, and only great simplicity can hope
to prevent, human nature doing what it has
once set its mind upon, by force of law or
by any other deterrent force whatsoever.
"We must not, therefore, commit ourselves to
a false policy through a belief in the efficacy
of the punishment of death, or exclude rebels
from the hope of repentance and an early
atonement of their error. Consider a moment.
At present, if a city that has already revolted
perceive that it cannot succeed, it will come
to terms while it is still able to refund
expenses, and pay tribute afterwards. In the
other case, what city, think you, would not
prepare better than is now done, and hold
out to the last against its besiegers, if it is all one
whether it surrender late or soon? And how
can it be otherwise than hurtful to us to be put
to the expense of a siege, because surrender
is out of the question; and if we take the city,
to receive a ruined town from which we can
no longer draw the revenue which forms our
real strength against the enemy? We must not,
therefore, sit as strict judges of the
offenders to our own prejudice, but rather
see how by moderate chastisements we may be
enabled to benefit in future by the revenue-producing
powers of our dependencies; and we
must make up our minds to look for our protection
not to legal terrors but to careful
administration. At present we do exactly the
opposite. When a free community, held in
subjection 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, notwithstanding their change of
feeling, now proceeded to a division, in which
the show of hands was almost equal,
although the motion of Diodotus carried the
day. Another galley was at once sent off in
haste, for fear that the first might reach
Lesbos in the interval, and the city be found
destroyed; the first ship having about a day
and a night's start. Wine and barley-cakes
were provided for the vessel by the Mitylenian
ambassadors, and great promises made if
they arrived in time; which caused the men
to use such diligence upon the voyage that they
took their meals of barley-cakes kneaded with
oil and wine as they rowed, and only slept
by turns while the others were at the oar.
Luckily they met with no contrary wind, and the
first ship making no haste upon so horrid
an errand, while the second pressed on in the
manner described, the first arrived so little
before them, that Paches had only just had time
to read the decree, and to prepare to execute
the sentence, when the second put into port
and prevented the massacre. The danger of
Mitylene had indeed been great.
The other party whom Paches had sent off as
the prime movers in the rebellion, were upon
Cleon's motion put to death by the Athenians,
the number being rather more than a
thousand. The Athenians also demolished the
walls of the Mitylenians, and took
possession of their ships. Afterwards tribute
was not imposed upon the Lesbians; but all
their land, except that of the Methymnians,
was divided into three thousand allotments,
three hundred of which were reserved as sacred
for the gods, and the rest assigned by lot
to Athenian shareholders, who were sent out
to the island. With these the Lesbians agreed
to pay a rent of two minae a year for each
allotment, and cultivated the land themselves.
The Athenians also took possession of the
towns on the continent belonging to the
Mitylenians, which thus became for the future
subject to Athens. Such were the events that
took place at Lesbos.
The Melian Dialogue (Thucydides, Book 5, chapters 84-116)
The next summer Alcibiades sailed with twenty
ships to Argos and seized the suspected
persons still left of the Lacedaemonian faction
to the number of three hundred, whom the
Athenians forthwith lodged in the neighbouring
islands of their empire. The Athenians also
made an expedition against the isle of Melos
with thirty ships of their own, six Chian, and
two Lesbian vessels, sixteen hundred heavy
infantry, three hundred archers, and twenty
mounted archers from Athens, and about fifteen
hundred heavy infantry from the allies and
the islanders. The Melians are a colony of
Lacedaemon that would not submit to the
Athenians like the other islanders, and at
first remained neutral and took no part in the
struggle, but afterwards upon the Athenians
using violence and plundering their territory,
assumed an attitude of open hostility. Cleomedes,
son of Lycomedes, and Tisias, son of
Tisimachus, the generals, encamping in their
territory with the above armament, before
doing any harm to their land, sent envoys
to negotiate. These the Melians did not bring
before the people, but bade them state the
object of their mission to the magistrates and
the few; upon which the Athenian envoys spoke
as follows:
Athenians. Since the negotiations are not to
go on before the people, in order that we
may not be able to speak straight on without
interruption, and deceive the ears of the
multitude by seductive arguments which would
pass without refutation (for we know that
this is the meaning of our being brought before
the few), what if you who sit there were to
pursue a method more cautious still? Make
no set speech yourselves, but take us up at
whatever you do not like, and settle that
before going any farther. And first tell us if this
proposition of ours suits you.
The Melian commissioners answered:
Melians. To the fairness of quietly instructing
each other as you propose there is nothing
to object; but your military preparations
are too far advanced to agree with what you say,
as we see you are come to be judges in your
own cause, and that all we can reasonably
expect from this negotiation is war, if we
prove to have right on our side and refuse to
submit, and in the contrary case, slavery.
Athenians. If you have met to reason about
presentiments of the future, or for anything
else than to consult for the safety of your
state upon the facts that you see before you, we
will give over; otherwise we will go on.
Melians. It is natural and excusable for men
in our position to turn more ways than one
both in thought and utterance. However, the
question in this conference is, as you say, the
safety of our country; and the discussion,
if you please, can proceed in the way which you
propose.
Athenians. For ourselves, we shall not trouble
you with specious pretences- either of how
we have a right to our empire because we overthrew
the Mede, or are now attacking you
because of wrong that you have done us- and
make a long speech which would not be
believed; and in return we hope that you,
instead of thinking to influence us by saying that
you did not join the Lacedaemonians, although
their colonists, or that you have done us no
wrong, will aim at what is feasible, holding
in view the real sentiments of us both; since you
know as well as we do that right, as the world
goes, is only in question between equals in
power, while the strong do what they can and
the weak suffer what they must.
Melians. As we think, at any rate, it is expedient-
we speak as we are obliged, since you
enjoin us to let right alone and talk only
of interest- that you should not destroy what is our
common protection, the privilege of being
allowed in danger to invoke what is fair and
right, and even to profit by arguments not
strictly valid if they can be got to pass current.
And you are as much interested in this as
any, as your fall would be a signal for the
heaviest vengeance and an example for the
world to meditate upon.
Athenians. The end of our empire, if end it
should, does not frighten us: a rival empire like
Lacedaemon, even if Lacedaemon was our real
antagonist, is not so terrible to the
vanquished as subjects who by themselves attack
and overpower their rulers. This,
however, is a risk that we are content to
take. We will now proceed to show you that we
are come here in the interest of our empire,
and that we shall say what we are now going
to say, for the preservation of your country;
as we would fain exercise that empire over
you without trouble, and see you preserved
for the good of us both.
Melians. And how, pray, could it turn out as good for us to serve as for you to rule?
Athenians. Because you would have the advantage
of submitting before suffering the
worst, and we should gain by not destroying
you.
Melians. So that you would not consent to our
being neutral, friends instead of enemies,
but allies of neither side.
Athenians. No; for your hostility cannot so
much hurt us as your friendship will be an
argument to our subjects of our weakness,
and your enmity of our power.
Melians. Is that your subjects' idea of equity,
to put those who have nothing to do with
you in the same category with peoples that
are most of them your own colonists, and some
conquered rebels?
Athenians. As far as right goes they think
one has as much of it as the other, and that if
any maintain their independence it is because
they are strong, and that if we do not molest
them it is because we are afraid; so that
besides extending our empire we should gain in
security by your subjection; the fact that
you are islanders and weaker than others
rendering it all the more important that you
should not succeed in baffling the masters of the
sea.
Melians. But do you consider that there is
no security in the policy which we indicate?
For here again if you debar us from talking
about justice and invite us to obey your
interest, we also must explain ours, and try
to persuade you, if the two happen to coincide.
How can you avoid making enemies of all existing
neutrals who shall look at case from it
that one day or another you will attack them?
And what is this but to make greater the
enemies that you have already, and to force
others to become so who would otherwise
have never thought of it?
Athenians. Why, the fact is that continentals
generally give us but little alarm; the liberty
which they enjoy will long prevent their taking
precautions against us; it is rather islanders
like yourselves, outside our empire, and subjects
smarting under the yoke, who would be
the most likely to take a rash step and lead
themselves and us into obvious danger.
Melians. Well then, if you risk so much to
retain your empire, and your subjects to get rid
of it, it were surely great baseness and cowardice
in us who are still free not to try
everything that can be tried, before submitting
to your yoke.
Athenians. Not if you are well advised, the
contest not being an equal one, with honour
as the prize and shame as the penalty, but
a question of self-preservation and of not
resisting those who are far stronger than
you are.
Melians. But we know that the fortune of war
is sometimes more impartial than the
disproportion of numbers might lead one to
suppose; to submit is to give ourselves over to
despair, while action still preserves for
us a hope that we may stand erect.
Athenians. Hope, danger's comforter, may be
indulged in by those who have abundant
resources, if not without loss at all events
without ruin; but its nature is to be extravagant,
and those who go so far as to put their all
upon the venture see it in its true colours only
when they are ruined; but so long as the discovery
would enable them to guard against it, it
is never found wanting. Let not this be the
case with you, who are weak and hang on a
single turn of the scale; nor be like the
vulgar, who, abandoning such security as human
means may still afford, when visible hopes
fail them in extremity, turn to invisible, to
prophecies and oracles, and other such inventions
that delude men with hopes to their
destruction.
Melians. You may be sure that we are as well
aware as you of the difficulty of contending
against your power and fortune, unless the
terms be equal. But we trust that the gods may
grant us fortune as good as yours, since we
are just men fighting against unjust, and that
what we want in power will be made up by the
alliance of the Lacedaemonians, who are
bound, if only for very shame, to come to
the aid of their kindred. Our confidence,
therefore, after all is not so utterly irrational.
Athenians. When you speak of the favour of
the gods, we may as fairly hope for that as
yourselves; neither our pretensions nor our
conduct being in any way contrary to what men
believe of the gods, or practise among themselves.
Of the gods we believe, and of men we
know, that by a necessary law of their nature
they rule wherever they can. And it is not as
if we were the first to make this law, or
to act upon it when made: we found it existing
before us, and shall leave it to exist for
ever after us; all we do is to make use of it,
knowing that you and everybody else, having
the same power as we have, would do the
same as we do. Thus, as far as the gods are
concerned, we have no fear and no reason to
fear that we shall be at a disadvantage. But
when we come to your notion about the
Lacedaemonians, which leads you to believe
that shame will make them help you, here we
bless your simplicity but do not envy your
folly. The Lacedaemonians, when their own
interests or their country's laws are in question,
are the worthiest men alive; of their
conduct towards others much might be said,
but no clearer idea of it could be given than
by shortly saying that of all the men we know
they are most conspicuous in considering
what is agreeable honourable, and what is
expedient just. Such a way of thinking does not
promise much for the safety which you now
unreasonably count upon.
Melians. But it is for this very reason that
we now trust to their respect for expediency to
prevent them from betraying the Melians, their
colonists, and thereby losing the confidence
of their friends in Hellas and helping their
enemies.
Athenians. Then you do not adopt the view that
expediency goes with security, while
justice and honour cannot be followed without
danger; and danger the Lacedaemonians
generally court as little as possible.
Melians. But we believe that they would be
more likely to face even danger for our sake,
and with more confidence than for others,
as our nearness to Peloponnese makes it easier
for them to act, and our common blood ensures
our fidelity.
Athenians. Yes, but what an intending ally
trusts to is not the goodwill of those who ask
his aid, but a decided superiority of power
for action; and the Lacedaemonians look to this
even more than others. At least, such is their
distrust of their home resources that it is only
with numerous allies that they attack a neighbour;
now is it likely that while we are masters
of the sea they will cross over to an island?
Melians. But they would have others to send.
The Cretan Sea is a wide one, and it is
more difficult for those who command it to
intercept others, than for those who wish to
elude them to do so safely. And should the
Lacedaemonians miscarry in this, they would
fall upon your land, and upon those left of
your allies whom Brasidas did not reach; and
instead of places which are not yours, you
will have to fight for your own country and your
own confederacy.
Athenians. Some diversion of the kind you speak
of you may one day experience, only to
learn, as others have done, that the Athenians
never once yet withdrew from a siege for
fear of any. But we are struck by the fact
that, after saying you would consult for the safety
of your country, in all this discussion you
have mentioned nothing which men might trust in
and think to be saved by. Your strongest arguments
depend upon hope and the future, and
your actual resources are too scanty, as compared
with those arrayed against you, for you
to come out victorious. You will therefore
show great blindness of judgment, unless, after
allowing us to retire, you can find some counsel
more prudent than this. You will surely not
be caught by that idea of disgrace, which
in dangers that are disgraceful, and at the same
time too plain to be mistaken, proves so fatal
to mankind; since in too many cases the very
men that have their eyes perfectly open to
what they are rushing into, let the thing called
disgrace, by the mere influence of a seductive
name, lead them on to a point at which they
become so enslaved by the phrase as in fact
to fall wilfully into hopeless disaster, and incur
disgrace more disgraceful as the companion
of error, than when it comes as the result of
misfortune. This, if you are well advised,
you will guard against; and you will not think it
dishonourable to submit to the greatest city
in Hellas, when it makes you the moderate
offer of becoming its tributary ally, without
ceasing to enjoy the country that belongs to
you; nor when you have the choice given you
between war and security, will you be so
blinded as to choose the worse. And it is
certain that those who do not yield to their
equals, who keep terms with their superiors,
and are moderate towards their inferiors, on
the whole succeed best. Think over the matter,
therefore, after our withdrawal, and reflect
once and again that it is for your country
that you are consulting, that you have not more
than one, and that upon this one deliberation
depends its prosperity or ruin.
The Athenians now withdrew from the conference;
and the Melians, left to themselves,
came to a decision corresponding with what
they had maintained in the discussion, and
answered: "Our resolution, Athenians, is the
same as it was at first. We will not in a
moment deprive of freedom a city that has
been inhabited these seven hundred years; but
we put our trust in the fortune by which the
gods have preserved it until now, and in the
help of men, that is, of the Lacedaemonians;
and so we will try and save ourselves.
Meanwhile we invite you to allow us to be
friends to you and foes to neither party, and to
retire from our country after making such
a treaty as shall seem fit to us both."
Such was the answer of the Melians. The Athenians
now departing from the conference
said: "Well, you alone, as it seems to us,
judging from these resolutions, regard what is
future as more certain than what is before
your eyes, and what is out of sight, in your
eagerness, as already coming to pass; and
as you have staked most on, and trusted most
in, the Lacedaemonians, your fortune, and
your hopes, so will you be most completely
deceived."
The Athenian envoys now returned to the army;
and the Melians showing no signs of
yielding, the generals at once betook themselves
to hostilities, and drew a line of
circumvallation round the Melians, dividing
the work among the different states.
Subsequently the Athenians returned with most
of their army, leaving behind them a certain
number of their own citizens and of the allies
to keep guard by land and sea. The force
thus left stayed on and besieged the place.
About the same time the Argives invaded the
territory of Phlius and lost eighty men cut off
in an ambush by the Phliasians and Argive
exiles. Meanwhile the Athenians at Pylos took
so much plunder from the Lacedaemonians that
the latter, although they still refrained from
breaking off the treaty and going to war with
Athens, yet proclaimed that any of their
people that chose might plunder the Athenians.
The Corinthians also commenced hostilities
with the Athenians for private quarrels of
their own; but the rest of the Peloponnesians
stayed quiet. Meanwhile the Melians attacked
by night and took the part of the Athenian
lines over against the market, and killed
some of the men, and brought in corn and all else
that they could find useful to them, and so
returned and kept quiet, while the Athenians
took measures to keep better guard in future.
Summer was now over. The next winter the Lacedaemonians
intended to invade the
Argive territory, but arriving at the frontier
found the sacrifices for crossing unfavourable,
and went back again. This intention of theirs
gave the Argives suspicions of certain of their
fellow citizens, some of whom they arrested;
others, however, escaped them. About the
same time the Melians again took another part
of the Athenian lines which were but feebly
garrisoned. Reinforcements afterwards arriving
from Athens in consequence, under the
command of Philocrates, son of Demeas, the
siege was now pressed vigorously; and some
treachery taking place inside, the Melians
surrendered at discretion to the Athenians, who
put to death all the grown men whom they took,
and sold the women and children for
slaves, and subsequently sent out five hundred
colonists and inhabited the place
themselves.
For the unabridged chapters, see
https://classics.mit.edu/Thucydides/pelopwar.2.second.html
(ch. 6, par. 35-end of ch.)
https://classics.mit.edu/Thucydides/pelopwar.3.third.html
(ch. 9, par. 36-end of ch.)
https://classics.mit.edu/Thucydides/pelopwar.5.fifth.html
(ch. 17-end of ch)