[187]
But I might apply this point also to the misfortune which befell the Spartans at Thermopylae, which all who have heard of it praise and admire more than the battles and victories which have been won over adversaries against whom wars ought never to have been waged,1 albeit some are without scruple in extolling such successes, not realizing that nothing is either righteous or honorable which is not said or done with justice.2
1 Cf. Isoc. 5.148; Isoc. 4.90; Isoc. 6.99-100.
2 The high moral tone here is, like the plea for absolute justice as a principle of foreign policy in the Peace, inconsistent with the “practical” doctrine of Isoc. 12.117-118. See note on 118.
Isocrates. Isocrates with an English Translation in three volumes, by George Norlin, Ph.D., LL.D. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1980.
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