ἱστορίαι Historiai
Plb. 2.60 The Histories, Polybius; served verbatim
But this shows that we ought not to be indignant if a man reaps as he has sown; but rather if he is allowed to end his days in peace, without experiencing such retribution at all. Nor ought we to accuse Antigonus or Aratus of crime, for having racked and put to death a tyrant whom they had captured in war: to have killed and wreaked vengeance on whom, even in time of peace, would have brought praise and honour to the doers from all right-minded persons. But when, in addition to these crimes, he was guilty also of treachery to the league, what shall we say that he deserved? The facts of the case are these. He abdicated his sovereignty of Argos shortly before, finding himself in difficulties, owing to the state of affairs brought on by the death of Demetrius. He was, however, protected by the clemency and generosity of the league; and, much to his own surprise, was left unmolested. For the Achaean government not only secured him an indemnity for all crimes committed by him while despot, but admitted him as a member of the league, and invested him with the highest office in it,—that, namely, of Commander-in-Chief and Strategus. All these favours he immediately forgot, as soon as his hopes were a little raised by the Cleomenic war; and at a crisis of the utmost importance he withdrew his native city, as well as his own personal adhesion, from the league, and attached them to its enemies. For such an act of treason what he deserved was not to be racked under cover of night at Cenchreae, and then put to death, as Phylarchus says: he ought to have been taken from city to city in the Peloponnese, and to have ended his life only after exemplary torture in each of them. And yet the only severity that this guilty wretch had to endure was to be drowned in the sea by order of the officers at Cenchreae.

The Greek stands ready in the workroom; the English is served. Both faces will read together.

← Plb. 2.59 contents Plb. 2.61 →

Filed here — the addresses this episode attests; counted by the house’s first pass
battle of Antigonus — a candidate entry Aratus — a life Demetrius — a life Phylarchus — a life Strategus — a candidate entry

The Histories, Polybius — translated by Evelyn S. Shuckburgh, 1889
Apparatus shelf — Polybius, The Histories (Evelyn S. Shuckburgh translation; Musaicum ebook) · Evelyn S. Shuckburgh, The Histories of Polybius, 2 vols (Macmillan, 1889); Musaicum Books ebook, 2018
license: public-domain (US: the translation is pre-1890 by the epub's own front matter — its preface opens 'This is the first English translation of the complete works of Polybius', carries the dedication 'TO F. M. S.', and cites nothing later than the 1880s; identified as Shuckburgh 1889, this lane's bibliographic judgment, since the ebook nowhere names its translator; the Musaicum 2018 packaging is not extracted and not served)