Meanwhile new perils were gathering round the Athenians at home, which
should have warned them to abandon their wild plans of conquest, and
concentrate all their strength for their own defence. The Spartans had
long been restrained by a scruple of conscience from an open
declaration of war, wishing to avoid the guilt which is associated
with the first act of aggression. Eighteen years before they had
refused all offers of arbitration, and deliberately provoked an
encounter with Athens, in direct violation of the Thirty Years' Truce,
which provided for an amicable settlement of differences; and by so
acting they had, as they believed, incurred the anger of heaven, and
brought on themselves a long train of disasters. But now the position
was reversed: for in the previous year the Athenians had made descents
on the coasts of Laconia, and other districts of Peloponnesus; and
they had repeatedly turned a deaf ear to the friendly overtures of the
Spartans, who proposed to submit all disputed matters to a peaceful
tribunal.
Thus relieved of their scruples, the Spartans prepared to renew the
war in good earnest, and early in the following spring [Footnote: B.C.
4I3.] they summoned their allies to the Isthmus, and marched under
Agis their king into Attica.
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