To enhance the greatness of Greece they had the courage, not merely to imperil themselves for their own preservation, but also to die for their enemies’ freedom: for they fought the allies of the Lacedaemonians for the freedom of those allies. Had they conquered, they deemed their foes worthy of obtaining equal rights: in their misfortune they settled an inheritance of slavery on the peoples of the Peloponnese . The Athenian’s object in these operations was to check the expansive policy of Sparta by striking at her allies in the Peloponnese . Corinth was the center of the struggle.