Isokrates holds the same language touching the obligations of Sparta,—in the speech which he puts into the mouth of Archidamus. “No one will quarrel with Epidaurians and Phliasians, for looking only how they can get through and keep themselves in being. But for Lacedæmonians, it is impossible to aim simply at preservation and nothing beyond—by any means, whatever they may be. If we cannot preserve ourselves with honor, we ought to prefer a glorious death.” (Isokrates, Orat. vi. Archid. s. 106.)
The backward and narrow policy, which Isokrates here proclaims as fit for Epidaurus and Phlius, but not for Sparta—is precisely what Phokion always recommended for Athens, even while Philip’s power was yet nascent and unsettled.
[84] Arrian, i. 7, 9.
[85] Arrian, i. 7. 6. See, respecting this region, Colonel Leake’s Travels in Northern Greece, ch. vi. p. 300-304; ch. xxviii. p. 303-305, etc.; and for Alexander’s line of march, [the map] at the end of the volume.
[86] Diodorus (xvii. 9) incorrectly says that Alexander came back unexpectedly from Thrace. Had this been the fact, he would have come by Pella.
[87] Diodor. xvii. 9; Plutarch. Alexand. 11.
[88] Arrian, i. 7, 16.
[89] Diodor. xvii. 9.
[90] Diodor. xvii. 9.
[91] The attack of Perdikkas was represented by Ptolemy, from whom Arrian copies (i. 8, 1), not only as being the first and only attack made by the Macedonian army on Thebes, but also as made by Perdikkas without orders from Alexander, who was forced to support it in order to preserve Perdikkas from being overwhelmed by the Thebans. According to Ptolemy and Arrian, therefore, the storming of Thebes took place both without the orders, and against the wishes, of Alexander; the capture moreover was effected rapidly with little trouble to the besieging army (ἡ ἅλωσις δι᾽ ὀλίγου τε καὶ οὐ ξὺν πόνῳ τῶν ἑλόντων ξυνενεχθεῖσα, Arr. i. 9, 9): the bloodshed and pillage was committed by the vindictive sentiment of the Bœotian allies.