History of the Peloponnesian War

ATH. “Of these contingencies one or another might indeed happen; but they would not be new to our experience, and you yourselves are not unaware that the Athenians have never in a single instance withdrawn from a siege through fear of any foe.

However, we cannot but reflect that, although you said[*](See chs. lxxxvii., lxxxviii.) that you would take counsel concerning your deliverance, you have not in this long discussion advanced a single argument that ordinary men[*](ie. men who expect to be saved by human means, not by divine intervention; cf. ch. civ. f.) would put their confidence in if they expected to be delivered. On the contrary, your strongest grounds for confidence are merely cherished hopes whose fulfilment is in the future, whereas your present resources are too slight, compared with those already arrayed against you, for any chance of success.