that you might never have admitted the Romans [into your city],
when Pompey came first into the country. But so it was, that our
ancestors and their kings, who were in much better circumstances
than we are, both as to money, and strong bodies, and [valiant]
souls, did not bear the onset of a small body of the Roman army.
And yet you, who have now accustomed yourselves to obedience from
one generation to another, and who are so much inferior to those
who first submitted, in your circumstances will venture to oppose
the entire empire of the Romans. While those Athenians, who, in
order to preserve the liberty of Greece, did once set fire to
their own city; who pursued Xerxes, that proud prince, when he
sailed upon the land, and walked upon the sea, and could not be
contained by the seas, but conducted such an army as was too
broad for Europe; and made him run away like a fugitive in a
single ship, and brake so great a part of Asia at the Lesser
Salamis; are yet at this time servants to the Romans; and those
injunctions which are sent from Italy become laws to the
principal governing city of Greece. Those Lacedemonians also who
got the great victories at Thermopylae. and Platea, and had
Agesilaus [for their king], and searched every corner of Asia,
are contented to admit the same lords. Those Macedonians also,
who still fancy what great men their Philip and Alexander were,
and see that the latter had promised them the empire over the
world, these bear so great a change, and pay their obedience to
those whom fortune hath advanced in their stead. Moreover, ten
thousand ether nations there are who had greater reason than we
to claim their entire liberty, and yet do submit. You are the
only people who think it a disgrace to be servants to those to
whom all the world hath submitted. What sort of an army do you
rely on? What are the arms you depend on? Where is your fleet,