carrying out his entire policy with the help of his army, he is violating
the Peace and is making war against you;--unless you mean to say that even
to bring up engines to besiege you is no breach of the Peace, until they
are actually planted against your walls. But you will not say this; for
the man who is taking the steps and contriving the means which will lead
to my capture is at war with me, even though he has not yet thrown a
missile or shot an arrow. {18} Now what are the things which would imperil
your safety, if anything should happen?[n] The alienation of the
Hellespont, the placing of Megara and Euboea in the power of the enemy,
and the attraction of Peloponnesian sympathy to his cause. Can I then say
that one who is erecting such engines of war as these against the city is
at peace with you? {19} Far from it! For from the very day when he
annihilated the Phocians--from that very day, I say, I date the beginning
of his hostilities against you. And for your part, I think that you will
be wise if you resist him at once; but that if you let him be, you will
find that, when you wish to resist, resistance itself is impossible.
Indeed, so widely do I differ, men of Athens, from all your other
advisers, that I do not think there is any room for discussion to-day in
regard to the Chersonese or Byzantium. {20} We _must_ go to their defence,
and take every care that they do not suffer [and we must send all that
they need to the soldiers who are at present there]. But we _have_ to take
counsel for the good of all the Hellenes, in view of the grave peril in
which they stand. And I wish to tell you on what grounds I am so alarmed
at the situation, in order that if my reasoning is correct, you may share
my conclusions, and exercise some forethought for yourselves at least, if
you are actually unwilling to do so for the Hellenes as a whole; but that
if you think that I am talking nonsense, and am out of my senses, you may
both now and hereafter decline to attend to me as though I were a sane
man.