Page:Thucydides, translated into English Vol 1.djvu/359

 82] REFLECTIONS ON REVOLUTION 043 applauded, and so was he who encouraged to evil one who had no idea of it. The tie of party was stronger than the tie of blood, because a partisan was more ready to dare without asking why. (For party associations are not based upon any established law, nor do they seek the public good ; they are formed in defiance of the laws and from self-interest.) The seal of good faith was not divine law, but fellowship in crime. If an enemy when he was in the ascendant offered fair words, the opposite party received them not in a generous spirit, '^ but by a jealous watchful- ness of his actions ^ Revenge was dearer than self-pre- servation. Any agreements sworn to by either party, when they could do nothing else, were binding as long as both were powerless. But he who on a favourable opportunity first took courage, and struck at his enemy when he saw him off his guard, had greater pleasure in a perfidious than he would have had in an open act of revenge; he congratulated himself that he had taken the safer course, and also that he had overreached his enemy and gained the prize of superior ability. In general the dishonest more easily gain credit for cleverness than the simple for goodness ; men take a pride in the one, but are ashamed of the other. — —-~-*-^ The cause of all these evils was the love of power, originating in avarice and ambition. Causes and effects oj and the party-spirit which is engendered the revohtUcuary spirt'/. by them when men are fairly embarked ^'^''^s:"'-^ of all laws,, , . , human and divine. m a contest. For the leaders on either side used specious names, the one party professing to up- hold the constitutional equality of the many, the other the wisdom of an aristocracy, while they made the public interests, to which in name they were devoted, in reality their prize. Striving in every way to overcome each other, they committed the most monstrous crimes; yet even these were surpassed by the magnitude of their revenges J R 2
 * Or, ' but by active precautions,'