You can see at once from this instance best of all how much milder and more moderate we
 were in our supervision over the affairs of the Hellenes, but you can see it also from
 what I shall now say. The Spartans remained at the head of Hellas hardly ten years, Isocrates elsewhere
 views the Spartan supremacy as lasting from the end of the Peloponnesian War, 405-404 B.C. , to the battle of Leuctra, 371 B.C. See Isoc. 5.47 . But later in
 Isoc. 5.63-64 he speaks of Conon’s naval victory at the
 battle of Cnidus , 394
 B.C. , as the end of the Spartan rule, since it re-established the maritime
 influence of Athens. The latter is the version followed here. It is reasonable to say
 that Sparta ’s supremacy by sea ceased with
 the battle of Cnidus and her supremacy by land
 with Leuctra. while we held the hegemony without interruption for sixty-five
 years. See Isoc. 4.106 ,
 note. And yet it is known to all that states which come under the supremacy of
 others remain loyal for the longest time to those under which they suffer the least degree
 of oppression. Now both Athens and Lacedaemon incurred the
 hatred of their subjects and were plunged into war and confusion, but in these
 circumstances it will be found that our city, although attacked by all the Hellenes and by
 the barbarians as well, was able to hold out against them for ten years, The last decade of the Peloponnesian War, from what he terms
 the Decelean War, 413 B.C. (see Isoc.
 8.37 , 84, note.), to the fall of Athens 404-403 B.C. while the Lacedaemonians, though still the leading
 power by land, after waging war against the Thebans alone and being defeated in a single
 battle, Leuctra, 371
 B.C. were stripped of all the possessions which they had held and involved
 in misfortunes and calamities which were very similar to these which overtook
 ourselves. See Isoc.
 8.105 . 
 More than that, our city recovered her power in less years than it took to overthrow it,
 while the Spartans after their defeat at Leuctra have not been able even in a period many
 times as long to regain the position from which they fell, but are even now Under the Peace of Antalcidas. See Isoc.
 4.115 , note. no better off than they were then. Again, I must set forth how these two cities demeaned themselves toward the
 barbarians; Compare the treatment of this topic in Isoc. 4.100-132 . for this still remains to be done. In
 the time of our supremacy, the barbarians were prevented from marching with an army beyond
 the Halys river See Isoc. 4.144 . and from sailing with their ships
 of war this side of Phaselis, See Isoc. 4.118 , Isoc. 7.80 , note. but under
 the hegemony of the Lacedaemonians not only did they gain the freedom to march and sail
 wherever they pleased, but they even became masters over many Hellenic states. Well then, does not the city which made the nobler and prouder covenants with the Persian
 king, which brought to pass the most and the greatest injuries to the barbarians and
 benefits to the Hellenes, which, furthermore, seized from her foes the sea-coast of Asia
 and much other territory besides and appropriated it to her allies,