History of the Peloponnesian War

"We should not have asked permission to make this speech, if the Plataeans had briefly answered the question, and had not turned upon us and accused us, at the same time setting up a long defence of themselves on matters foreign to the issue and on which no charge whatever had been made against them, and praising themselves where nobody had blamed them. But as it is, we must answer their charges and expose their self-praise, in order that neither our baseness nor their good repute may help them, but that you may hear the truth about us both before you decide. "The quarrel we had with them began in this way: