ughly understood that war is a necessity; but
that the more readily we accept it, the less will be the ardour of
our opponents, and that out of the greatest dangers communities and
individuals acquire the greatest glory. Did not our fathers resist the
Medes not only with resources far different from ours, but even when
those resources had been abandoned; and more by wisdom than by fortune,
more by daring than by strength, did not they beat off the barbarian and
advance their affairs to their present height? We must not fall behind
them, but must resist our enemies in any way and in every way, and
attempt to hand down our power to our posterity unimpaired."

Such were the words of Pericles. The Athenians, persuaded of the wisdom
of his advice, voted as he desired, and answered the Lacedaemonians as
he recommended, both on the separate points and in the general; they
would do nothing on dictation, but were ready to have the complaints
settled in a fair and impartial manner by the legal method, which the
terms of the truce prescribed. So the envoys departed home and did not
return again.

These were the charges and differences existing between the rival powers
before the war, arising immediately from the affair at Epidamnus and
Corcyra. Still intercourse continued in spite of them, and mutual
communication. It was carried on without heralds, but not without
suspicion, as events were occurring which were equivalent to a breach of
the treaty and matter for war.

BOOK II

CHAPTER VI

_Beginning of the Peloponnesian War--First Invasion of Attica--Funeral
Oration of Pericles_

The war between the Athenians and Peloponnesians and the allies on
either side now really begins. For now all intercourse except through
the medium of heralds ceased, and hostilities were commenced and
prosecuted without intermission. The history follows the chronological
order of events by summers and winters.

The thirty years' truce which was entered into after the conquest of
Euboea lasted fourteen years. In the fifteenth, in the forty-eighth year
of the priestess-ship of Chrysis at Argos, in the ephorate of Aenesias
at Sparta, in the last month but two of the archonship of Pythodorus
at Athens, and six months after the battle of Potidaea, just at the
beginning of spring, a Theban force a little over three hundred strong,
under the command of their Boeotarchs, Pythangelus, son of Phyleides,
and Diemporus, son of Onetorides, about the fi