Sparta Must Be On Guard Against Attack from Rome
"With a knowledge of such transactions before his eyes
note
who could help suspecting an attack from Rome, and feeling
abhorrence at the abandoned conduct of the Aetolians in
daring to make such a treaty? They have already wrested
Oeniadae and Nesus from the Acarnanians, and recently
seized the city of the unfortunate Anticyreans, whom, in conjunction with the Romans,
they have sold into slavery. note Their
children and women are led off by the Romans to suffer all
the miseries which those must expect who fall into the hands
of aliens; while the houses of the unhappy inhabitants are
allotted among the Aetolians. Surely a noble alliance this to
join deliberately! Especially for Lacedaemonians: who, after conquering the barbarians,
decreed that the Thebans, for being the only Greeks that
-- 598 --
resolved to remain neutral during the Persian invasion, should
pay a tenth of their goods to the gods.
"The honourable course then, men of Sparta, and the one
becoming your character, is to remember from what ancestors
you are sprung; to be on your guard against an attack from
Rome; to suspect the treachery of the Aetolians. Above all
to recall the services of Antigonus: and so once more show
your loathing for dishonest men; and, rejecting the friendship
of the Aetolians, unite your hopes for the future with those of
Achaia and Macedonia. If, however, any of your own
influential citizens are intriguing against this policy, then at
least remain neutral, and do not take part in the iniquities of
these Aetolians. . . ."
note
