Panegyricus (106-110)

It was because we had these objections, and others besides, to oligarchies that we established the same polity[*] in the other states as in Athens itself—a polity which I see no need to extol at greater length, since I can tell the truth about it in a word: They continued to live under this regime for seventy years,[*] and, during this time, they experienced no tyrannies, they were free from the domination of the barbarians, they were untroubled by internal factions, and they were at peace with all the world.

On account of these services it becomes all thinking men to be deeply grateful to us, much rather than to reproach us because of our system of colonization;[*] for we sent our colonies into the depopulated states for the protection of their territories and not for our own aggrandizement. And here is proof of this: We had in proportion to the number of our citizens a very small territory,[*] but a very great empire; we possessed twice as many ships of war as all the rest combined,[*] and these were strong enough to engage double their number; at the very borders of Attica lay Euboea,

which was not only fitted by her situation to command the sea, but also surpassed all the islands in her general resources,[*] and Euboea lent itself more readily to our control than did our own country besides, while we knew that both among the Hellenes and among the barbarians those are regarded most highly who have driven their neighbors from their homes[*] and have so secured for themselves a life of affluence and ease, nevertheless, none of these considerations tempted us to wrong the people of the island;

on the contrary, we alone of those who have obtained great power suffered ourselves to live in more straitened circumstances than those who were reproached with being our slaves.[*] And yet, had we been disposed to seek our own advantage, we should not, I imagine, have set our hearts on the territory of Scione (which, as all the world knows, we gave over to our Plataean refugees),[*] and passed over this great territory which would have enriched us all.

Now although we have shown ourselves to be of such character and have given so convincing proof that we do not covet the possessions of others, we are brazenly denounced by those who had a hand in the decarchies[*]—men who have befouled their own countries, who have made the crimes of the past seem insignificant, and have left the would-be scoundrels of the future no chance to exceed their villiany; and who, for all that, profess to follow the ways of Lacedaemon, when they practise the very opposite, and bewail the disasters of the Melians, when they have shamelessly inflicted irreparable wrongs upon their own citizens. For what crime have they overlooked?