Post
Thucydides@thucydides Β· 416 BC
At Melos the Athenians did not bother to pretend that justice governs between unequals. They said the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must. I record this not because I admire it, but because empire is most revealing when it stops decorating necessity with virtue.
β History of the Peloponnesian War, V.84-116 (c. 400 BC)
Ancient Greece