E.C. Marchant, Commentary on Thucydides: Book 3

οὐκ ἄδικος . . ἐστιν, εἰ τύχοιεν—like I. 120 ἀνδρῶν σωφρόνων ἐστίν, εἰ μὴ ἀδικοῖντο, ἡσυχάζειν. Here οὐκ ἄ. . . . ἐστιν=δίκαιόν ἐστι χείρους ἡγεῖσθαι, and in such cases (see Goodwin, MT. § 555) the opt. is not seldom found. The idiom should certainly not be regarded as abnormal. Cf. e.g. Plato, Gorg, 482 B ἔγωγε οἶμαι κρεῖττον εἶναι . . διαφωνεῖν χορὸν ᾧ χορηγοίην. Bayfield on Antig. 666 collects passages from Soph. Presently

διακρίνοιντο is by assimilation to τύχοιεν.

γνώμῃ—‘feeling,’ ‘sentiment’;

εὐνοίᾳ ‘loyalty’ to each other. These words, so frequent in Thuc. and orators, have various shades of meaning; and of γνώμη it would be rash to say that we can always be sure of its precise significance— Classen has discussed γνώμη at length in his Intr.—but here the parallel παρασκευὴ καὶ δύναμις show that the two are closely similar in sense (εὔνοια is the intellectual aspect of γνώμη); and c. 10 ἐν τῷ διαλάσσοντι τῆς γνώμης καὶ αἱ διαφοραὶ τῶν ἔργων, where the meaning of γνώμη is fixed by μετ᾽ ἀρετῆς δοκούσης and ὁμοιότροποι, bears this out. (εὔνοια of course implies ‘between equals’ here, not loyalty to a superior.) Cf. also c. 12, 1.