Discussion in the Adolian Council.---The mee t Mg of the Aetolian League which they call the Pan-Aetolium v犷as to be held on a certain day. The king's envoys hastened journey in order to be in time for it, and Lucius Furius Purl was also present as representing the consul, as was al deputation from Athens. The Macedonians were allowed to speak first, as the ti with them was the latest that had been made. Thev said as no new circumstances had arisen they had nothi ng new to urge in support of the existing treaty. The Aetolians. having learnt by experience how little they had to gain oy amance with the Romans, had made peace with it now that it was made.“Would you prefer," asked the envoys,“to copy the unscrupulousness-or shall the levity?--of the Romans?When your ambassadors Rome, the reply they received was‘Why doyou come to us, Aetolians, after you have made peace with Philip without our consent?’ And now the me men insist upon your jo-in吨them in war against Formerly they pretended that they had taken U P arms against him on your account and for your protection. now they forbid you to be }、at peace with Philip. In the first Punic war they went to Sicily. ostensibly to help Messana; in the second, to deliver Syracuse from Carthaginian tyranny and restore her freedom. Now Messana and Syracuse and in fact the whole of Sicily are tributary to them.:they have reduced the island to a province in which thev exercise absolute power of life and death. You imazine. I supvose. that the Sicilians eni ov the same riLyhts ..7，.户‘i，.，。.“、甲_--，. as you.and that as you hold your council at到auDactus under J了.口.户二 your own laws,and with full黯ed over by magistrates of your own choice,of forming alliances or declaring war as you please, so it is with the councils which nieet in the cities of Sicily, in Syracuse or Messana or Lilybaeum. No:a Roman governor manaees their meetines: it is at his summons that 、.沙、电J产 they have to assemble;they see him issuing his edicts from his lofty tribunal like a despot. and surrounded by his lictors; .口A产 their backs are threatened with the rod, their necks with the axe, and every year they have a different master allotted them. Nor ought they, nor can they wonder at this when they see the cities of Italy, such as Rezium. Tarentum and a, 1户ng prostrate beneath the same tvrannv. to sav not 二of those close to Rome out of whose ruin she has grown to greatness. Capua does indeed survive as the sepulchre and] memorial of the Campanian nation, the _people themselves are either dead and buried, or else cast forth as exiles. it is a headless a senate, without a plebs, without magistrates, an unnatural portent in ' the land. To leave it as a habitation for men was an act of greater cruelty than its utter destruction would have been. If men of an alien race, separated from you more widely by language, customs and laws than by intervening sea and land, obtain a hold here, it is folly and madness to hope that anything will remain as it is now. “You thin k that Phil; p's sovereignty isa danger t ;oyouro liberty. It was your own doing that he took up ar刀以s against and his sole aim was to have a settled peace with you. All that he asks today is that you will keep that peace unbroken. Once make foreign legions familiar with these shores and bow your necks to the yoke, then you will seek in vain and too late for Philip's support as your ally;you will have the Romans for your masters. Aetolians, Acarnanians, Macedonians are united and disunited by slight and purely temporary causes;with foreigners and barbarians, all Greeks ever have been and ever will be at war. For they are our enemies by nature, and nature is unchanging;their hostility is not due to causes which vary from day to day. “But I will end where I began. Three years ago you decided on this very spot to make peace with Philip. You are the same men that you were then, he is the same that he was, the Romans who were opposed to it then are just those who want to upset it now. Fortune has altered nothing, I do not see why you should alter your minds."