I think you all understand, gentlemen, that it is better to make peace on fair terms than to continue fighting. But some of you fail to see that although our political leaders have no objection to peace in the abstract, they are opposed to such measures as would lead to it, on the ground that the people would be in very grave danger of seeing the existing constitution overthrown once peace was concluded.

Now had the Athenian people never made peace with Sparta in the past, our lack of previous experience and the untrustworthy character of the Spartans might have justified such fears. But you have done so on a number of occasions since the establishment of the democracy; and it is therefore only logical that you should first of all consider the results which followed at the time; one must use the past as a guide to the future, gentlemen.

3-12 of this speech were inserted by Aeschines, with slight alterations, in his ( Aeschin. 2.172-176), an interesting example of the plagiarism which is known to have been common in ancient times. The was delivered in 343, almost fifty years after this. Now take the days when we were fighting EuboeaAndocides is confused in his history here. He is referring to the revolt of Euboea which occurred in 446 B.C. and which was followed by a thirty years’ peace with Sparta. He is also inaccurate in stating that Athens was still holding Megara; Megara revolted at the same time as Euboea, and Athens was left only with the two ports of Pegae and Nisaea. The peace marked the end of her effort to acquire an empire on land. See Thuc. 1.112. and controlled Megara, Pegae, and Troezen. We were seized with a longing for peace; and, in virtue of his being Sparta’s representative at Athens, we recalled Cimon’s son, MiltiadesA double historical error. (a) Andocides means Cimon, son of Miltiades. (b) Cimon had been dead three years when the thirty years’ peace was negotiated. A. is thinking of the truce of five years with Sparta arranged by Cimon in 451 immediately upon his return from exile. It was at the time of its expiry that the revolt of Euboea occurred. Cimon had been ostracized in 461 after his ignominious dismissal by the Spartans from Ithome. His exile marked the triumph of the advanced democrats headed by Ephialtes and Pericles.,who had been ostracized and was living in the Chersonese, for the one purpose of sending him to Sparta to make overtures for an armistice.

On that occasion we secured a peace of fifty years with Sparta; and both sides kept the treaty in question for thirteen. Let us consider this single instance first, gentlemen. Did the Athenian democracy ever fall during this peace? No one can show that it did. On the contrary, I will tell you how much you benefited by this peace.

To begin with, we fortified Peiraeus in the course of this periodAgain an error. Peiraeus was fortified by Themistocles immediately after the repulse of the Persians in 480.: secondly, we built the Long Wall to the northThe northern Long Wall, connecting Athens with Peiraeus, was in fact built in 457, over ten years before the negotiation of the peace which Andocides is discussing. Nothing is said of the wall to the south, running between Athens and Phalerum, which was constructed at the same time.: then the existing fleet of old, unseaworthy triremes with which we had won Greece her independence by defeating the king of Persia and his barbarians—these existing vessels were replaced by a hundred new onesAn obvious inaccuracy. The Athenian fleet had been growing steadily since the Persian Wars and the institution of the Delian League.: and it was at this time that we first enrolled three hundred cavalry and purchased three hundred Scythian archersCavalry had been in existence since at least the seventh century. Solon, at the beginning of the sixth, formed his second property class of Ἱππεῖς, citizens wealthy enough to provide themselves with a horse in time of war. Archers (τοξόται) were imported for the first time shortly after Salamis (480 B.C.). Such were the benefits which Athens derived from the peace with Sparta, such the strength which was added thereby to the Athenian democracy.