Misrepresentations of Philinus and Fabius
The writers whom I have named exemplify the truth
note
of these remarks. Philinus, for instance, commencing the narrative with his second book,
says that the "Carthaginians and Syracusans
engaged in the war and sat down before Messene; that the
Romans arriving by sea entered the town, and immediately
sallied out from it to attack the Syracusans; but that after
suffering severely in the engagement they retired into Messene;
and that on a second occasion, having issued forth to attack
the Carthaginians, they not only suffered severely but lost a
considerable number of their men captured by the enemy."
But while making this statement, he represents Hiero as so
destitute of sense as, after this engagement, not only to have
promptly burnt his stockade and tents and fled under cover of
night to Syracuse, but to have abandoned all the forts which
had been established to overawe the Messenian territory.
Similarly he asserts that "the Carthaginians immediately after
their battle evacuated their entrenchment and dispersed into
various towns, without venturing any longer even to dispute
the possession of the open country; and that, accordingly,
their leaders seeing that their troops were utterly demoralised
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determined in consideration not to risk a battle: that the
Romans followed them, and not only laid waste the territory
of the Carthaginians and Syracusans, but actually sat down
before Syracuse itself and began to lay siege to it." These
statements appear to me to be full of glaring inconsistency,
and to call for no refutation at all. The very men whom he
describes to begin with as besieging Messene, and as victorious
in the engagements, he afterwards represents as running away,
abandoning the open country, and utterly demoralised:
while those whom he starts by saying were defeated and
besieged, he concludes by describing as engaging in a pursuit,
as promptly seizing the open places, and finally as besieging
Syracuse. Nothing can reconcile these statements. It is impossible. Either his initial statement, or his account of the
subsequent events, must be false. In point of fact the latter
part of his story is the true one. The Syracusans and Carthaginians did abandon the open country, and the Romans did
immediately afterwards commence a siege of Syracuse and
of Echetla, which lies in the district between the Syracusan
and Carthaginian pales. For the rest it must necessarily be
acknowledged that the first part of his account is false; and
that whereas the Romans were victorious in the engagements
under Messene, they have been represented by this historian
as defeated. Through the whole of this work we shall find
Philinus acting in a similar spirit: and much the same may be
said of Fabius, as I shall show when the several points arise.
I have now said what was proper on the subject of this
digression. Returning to the matter in hand I will endeavour
by a continuous narrative of moderate dimensions to guide
my readers to a true knowledge of this war.
