61.
"If these men had answered briefly to the question and not both turned against us with an accusation and also out of the purpose and wherein they were not charged made much apology and commendation of themselves in things unquestioned, we had never asked leave to speak.
But as it is, we are to the one point to answer and to confute the other, that neither the fault of us nor their own reputation may do them good, but your sentence may be guided by hearing of the truth of both.
[2]
The quarrel between us and them arose at first from this, that when we had built Plataea last of all the cities of Boeotia, together with some other places which, having driven out the promiscuous nations, we had then in our dominion, they would not (as was ordained at first) allow us to be their leaders;
but being the only men of all the Boeotians that transgressed the common ordinance of the country when they should have been compelled to their duty, they turned unto the Athenians and together with them did us many evils, for which they likewise suffered as many from us.
The English works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury. Thucydides. Thomas Hobbes. translator. London. Bohn. 1843.
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