2.29
For he believed that at one stroke he would repay the Egyptian for his good offices to Sparta, would again set free the Greeks in Asia, and would chastise the Persian for his former hostility, and for demanding now, when he professed to be an ally of Sparta, that her claim to Messene should be given up.
2.30
However, when this suitor for his assistance failed to give him the command Agesilaus felt that he had been grossly deceived, and was in doubt what he ought to do. At this juncture first a portion of the Egyptian troops, operating as a separate army, revolted from the king, and then the rest of his forces deserted him. The king left Egypt and fled in terror to Sidon in Phoenicia, while the Egyptians split up into two parties, and each chose its own king.
2.31
Agesilaus now realised that if he helped neither king, neither of them would pay the Greeks their wages, neither would provide a market, and the conqueror, whichever he proved to be, would be hostile, but if he co-operated with one of them, that one, being under an obligation to him, would in all probability adopt a friendly attitude. Accordingly, having decided which of them showed the stronger signs of being a friend to the Greeks, he took the field with him. He inflicted a crushing defeat on the enemy of the Greeks, and helped to establish his rival; and so having made him the friend of Sparta, and having received a362 B.C. great sum of money in addition, he sailed home, though it was mid-winter, with all haste, in order that the state might be in a position to take action against her enemies in the coming summer.
3.1
Such, then, is the record of my hero’s deeds, so far as they were done before a crowd of witnesses. Actions like these need no proofs; the mere mention of them is enough and they command belief immediately. But now I will attempt to show the virtue that was in his soul, the virtue through which he wrought those deeds and loved all that is honourable and put away all that is base.
