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Philip's Increasing Deterioration

A fragment of a speech of some Macedonian orator as to the Aetolians making an alliance with Rome.

"The case is just like that of the disposition of the

Alliance between Aetolians and Rome against Philip, negotiated by Scopas and Dorimachus, B. C. 211. See Livy, 26, 24.
various kinds of troops on the field of battle. The light-armed and most active men bear the brunt of the danger, are the first to be engaged and the first to perish, while the phalanx and the heavy-armed generally carry off the glorySo in this case, the Aetolians, and such of the Peloponnesians as are in alliance with them, are put in the post of danger; while the Romans, like the phalanx, remain in reserve. And if the former meet with disaster and perish, the Romans will retire unharmed from the struggle; while if they are victorious, which Heaven forbid ! the Romans will get not only them but the rest of the Greeks also into their power. . . ."1

1 On the margin of one MS. the following is written, which may be a sentence from the same speech, or a comment of the Epitomator: "A confederacy with democratic institutions always stands in need of external support, owing to the fickleness of the multitude."

Histories. Polybius. Evelyn S. Shuckburgh. translator. London, New York. Macmillan. 1889. Reprint Bloomington 1962.

Robert B. Strassler provided support for entering this text.

This text was converted to electronic form by professional data entry, Running heads in Walbank's reprint have been converted to chapter titles, and titles have been added, usually from the marginal notes, for chapters without them. Some pages have notes of the form "line X: A should read B," which I believe are Walbank's; they have "resp=fww". Summaries of missing sections are encoded as inline notes with "resp=ess." A very few unidentified quotations are marked in notes with "resp=aem" (the markup editor) Citations are marked using Perseus abbreviations. and has been proofread to a high level of accuracy.

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    • Livy, The History of Rome, Book 26, 24
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