The crowning absurdity of all, however, is the fact that among the articles which are
 written in the agreement it is only the worst which we guard and observe. For those which
 guarantee the independence of the islands and of the cities in Europe have long since been broken and are dead letters on
 the pillars, Articles of treaties were commonly inscribed
 on pillars of stone, set up either within a public temple or near it. while those
 which bring shame upon us and by which many of our allies have been given over to the
 enemy—these remain intact, and we all regard them as binding upon us, though we ought to
 have expunged them and not allowed them to stand a single day, looking upon them as
 commands, and not as compacts; for who does not know that a compact is something which is
 fair and impartial to both parties, while a command is something which puts one side at a
 disadvantage unjustly? On this ground we may justly complain of our envoys who negotiated this peace, Chiefly Antalcidas of Sparta and Tiribazus, the Persian satrap, negotiated the peace. Isocrates
 complains that the treaty was arbitrary—not based on any principle whatsoever. 
 because, although dispatched by the Hellenes, they made the Treaty in the interest of the
 barbarians. For they ought, no matter whether they took the view that each of the states
 concerned should retain its original territory, or that each should extend its sovereignty
 over all that it had acquired by conquest, or that we should each retain control over what
 we held when peace was declared—they ought, I say, to have adopted definitely some one of
 these views, applying the principle impartially to all, and on this basis to have drafted
 the articles of the Treaty. But instead of that, they assigned no honor whatsoever to our city or to Lacedaemon , while they set up the barbarian as lord of all
 Asia; as if we had gone to war for his sake, or as if the rule of the Persians had been
 long established, and we were only just now founding our cities—whereas in fact it is they
 who have only recently attained this place of honor, while Athens and Lacedaemon have been
 throughout their entire history a power among the Hellenes. I think, however, that I shall show still more clearly both the dishonor which we have
 suffered, and the advantage which the King has gained by putting the matter in this way:
 All the world which lies beneath the firmament being divided into two parts, the one
 called Asia, the other Europe , he has taken half
 of it by the Treaty, as if he were apportioning the earth with Zeus, Compare the boast of Xerxes in Hdt. 7.8 . and
 not making compacts with men. Yes, and he has compelled us to engrave this Treaty on pillars of stone and place it in
 our public temples See Isoc.
 12.107 . — a trophy far more glorious for him than those which are set up
 on fields of battle; for the latter are for minor deeds and a single success, but this
 treaty stands as a memorial of the entire war and of the humiliation of the whole of
 Hellas .