[146]
And you will observe that this is the opinion which men hold, not of these heroes only, but of all mankind. Thus, no one would praise our city either because she was once mistress of the sea, or because she extorted such huge sums of money from her allies and carried them up into the Acropolis,1 nor yet, surely, because she obtained power over many cities—power to devastate them, or aggrandize them, or manage them according to her pleasure (for all these things it was possible for her to do);