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Let us first compare the two men in their warlike capacity. <A NAME="12"></A>Pericles presided in his commonwealth when it was in its most flourishing <A NAME="13"></A>and opulent condition, great and growing in power; so that it may be thought <A NAME="14"></A>it was rather the common success and fortune that kept him from any fall <A NAME="15"></A>or disaster. But the task of Fabius, who undertook the government in the <A NAME="16"></A>worst and most difficult times, was not to preserve and maintain the well-established <A NAME="17"></A>felicity of a prosperous state, but to raise and uphold a sinking and ruinous <A NAME="18"></A>commonwealth. Besides, the victories of Cimon, the trophies of Myronides <A NAME="19"></A>and Leocrates, with the many famous exploits of Tolmides, were employed <A NAME="20"></A>by Pericles rather to fill the city with festive entertainments and solemnities <A NAME="21"></A>than to enlarge and secure its empire. Whereas, Fabius, when he took upon <A NAME="22"></A>him the government, had the frightful object before his eyes of Roman armies <A NAME="23"></A>destroyed, of their generals and consuls slain, of lakes and plains and <A NAME="24"></A>forests strewed with the dead bodies, and rivers stained with the blood <A NAME="25"></A>of his fellow-citizens; and yet, with his mature and solid counsels, with <A NAME="26"></A>the firmness of his resolution, he, as it were, put his shoulder to the <A NAME="27"></A>falling commonwealth, and kept it up from foundering through the failings <A NAME="28"></A>and weaknesses of others. Perhaps it may be more easy to govern a city <A NAME="29"></A>broken and tamed with calamities and adversity, and compelled by danger <A NAME="30"></A>and necessity to listen to wisdom, than to set a bridle on wantonness and <A NAME="31"></A>temerity, and rule a people pampered and restive with long prosperity as <A NAME="32"></A>were the Athenians when Pericles held the reins of government. But then <A NAME="33"></A>again, not to be daunted nor discomposed with the vast heap of calamities <A NAME="34"></A>under which the people of Rome at that time groaned and succumbed, argues <A NAME="35"></A>a courage in Fabius and a strength of purpose more than <A NAME="36"></A>ordinary. <A NAME="37"></A><BR><BR>We may set Tarentum retaken against Samos won by Pericles, and <A NAME="38"></A>the conquest of Euboea we may well balance with the towns of Campania; <A NAME="39"></A>though Capua itself was reduced by the consuls Fulvius and Appius. I do <A NAME="40"></A>not find that Fabius won any set battle but that against the Ligurians, <A NAME="41"></A>for which he had his triumph; whereas Pericles erected nine trophies for <A NAME="42"></A>as many victories obtained by land and by sea. But no action of Pericles <A NAME="43"></A>can be compared to that memorable rescue of Minucius, when Fabius redeemed <A NAME="44"></A>both him and his army from utter destruction; a noble act combining the <A NAME="45"></A>highest valour, wisdom, and humanity. On the other side, it does not appear <A NAME="46"></A>that Pericles was ever so overreached as Fabius was by Hannibal with his <A NAME="47"></A>flaming oxen. His enemy there had, without his agency, put himself accidentally <A NAME="48"></A>into his power, yet Fabius let him slip in the night, and, when day came, <A NAME="49"></A>was worsted by him, was anticipated in the moment of success, and mastered <A NAME="50"></A>by his prisoner. If it is the part of a good general, not only to provide <A NAME="51"></A>for the present, but also to have a clear foresight of things to come, <A NAME="52"></A>in this point Pericles is the superior; for he admonished the Athenians, <A NAME="53"></A>and told them beforehand the ruin the war would bring upon them, by their <A NAME="54"></A>grasping more than they were able to manage. But Fabius was not so good <A NAME="55"></A>a prophet, when he denounced to the Romans that the undertaking of Scipio <A NAME="56"></A>would be the destruction of the commonwealth. So that Pericles was a good <A NAME="57"></A>prophet of bad success, and Fabius was a bad prophet of success that was <A NAME="58"></A>good. And, indeed, to lose an advantage through diffidence is no less blamable <A NAME="59"></A>in a general than to fall into danger for want of foresight; for both these <A NAME="60"></A>faults, though of a contrary nature, spring from the same root, want of <A NAME="61"></A>judgment and experience. <A NAME="62"></A><BR><BR>As for their civil policy, it is imputed to Pericles that he occasioned <A NAME="63"></A>the war, since no terms of peace, offered by the Lacedaemonians, would <A NAME="64"></A>content him. It is true, I presume, that Fabius, also, was not for yielding <A NAME="65"></A>any point to the Carthaginians, but was ready to hazard all, rather than <A NAME="66"></A>lessen the empire of Rome. The mildness of Fabius towards his colleague <A NAME="67"></A>Minucius does, by way of comparison, rebuke and condemn the exertions of <A NAME="68"></A>Pericles to banish Cimon and Thucydides, noble, aristocratic men, who by <A NAME="69"></A>his means suffered ostracism. The authority of Pericles in Athens was much <A NAME="70"></A>greater than that of Fabius in Rome. Hence it was more easy for him to <A NAME="71"></A>prevent miscarriages arising from the mistakes and insufficiency of other <A NAME="72"></A>officers; only Tolmides broke loose from him, and, contrary to his persuasions, <A NAME="73"></A>unadvisedly fought with the Boeotians, and was slain. The greatness of <A NAME="74"></A>his influence made all others submit and conform themselves to his judgment. <A NAME="75"></A>Whereas Fabius, sure and unerring himself, for want of that general power, <A NAME="76"></A>had not the means to obviate the miscarriages of others; but it had been <A NAME="77"></A>happy for the Romans if his authority had been greater, for so, we may <A NAME="78"></A>presume, their disasters had been fewer. <A NAME="79"></A><BR><BR>As to liberality and public spirit, Pericles was eminent in never <A NAME="80"></A>taking any gifts, and Fabius, for giving his own money to ransom his soldiers, <A NAME="81"></A>though the sum did not exceed six talents. Than Pericles, meantime, no <A NAME="82"></A>man had ever greater opportunities to enrich himself, having had presents <A NAME="83"></A>offered him from so many kings and princes and allies, yet no man was ever <A NAME="84"></A>more free from corruption. And for the beauty and magnificence of temples <A NAME="85"></A>and public edifices with which he adorned his country, it must be confessed, <A NAME="86"></A>that all the ornaments and structures of Rome, to the time of the Caesars, <A NAME="87"></A>had nothing to compare, either in greatness of design or of expense, with <A NAME="88"></A>the lustre of those which Pericles only erected at Athens. <A NAME="end"></A> <BR><BR> <BR><DIV ALIGN="CENTER"><B>THE END</B></DIV> <BR><HR SIZE="1" COLOR="990033" NOSHADE></BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV ALIGN="CENTER"><TABLE BORDER="0" CELLSPACING="15"> <TR ALIGN="CENTER" VALIGN="CENTER"> <TD ALIGN="CENTER" VALIGN="BOTTOM" NOWRAP><A HREF="/index.html" onMouseOver="window.status='Go to home page'; return true;" TARGET="_top"><IMG SRC="/Images/home-icon.gif" WIDTH="35" HEIGHT="21" BORDER="0" ALT="Go to home page"></A> <FONT SIZE="-1"><BR><A HREF="/index.html" onMouseOver="window.status='Go to home page'; return true;" TARGET="_top">Home</A><BR> </FONT></TD> <TD ALIGN="CENTER" VALIGN="BOTTOM" NOWRAP><A HREF="/Browse/index-Plutarch.html" onMouseOver="window.status='Browse a list of titles'; return true;" TARGET="_top"><IMG SRC="/Images/browse-icon.gif" WIDTH="30" HEIGHT="30" BORDER="0" ALT="Browse a list of titles"></A> <FONT SIZE="-1"><BR><A HREF="/Browse/index-Plutarch.html" onMouseOver="window.status='Browse a list of titles'; return true;" TARGET="_top">Browse and<BR>Comment</A></FONT></TD> <TD ALIGN="CENTER" VALIGN="BOTTOM" NOWRAP><A HREF="/Search/index.html" onMouseOver="window.status='Search texts'; return true;" TARGET="_top"><IMG SRC="/Images/search-icon.gif" WIDTH="19" HEIGHT="29" BORDER="0" ALT="Search texts"></A> <FONT SIZE="-1"><BR><A HREF="/Search/index.html" onMouseOver="window.status='Search texts'; return true;" TARGET="_top">Search</A><BR> </FONT></TD> <TD ALIGN="CENTER" VALIGN="BOTTOM" NOWRAP><A HREF="/Buy/Plutarch.html" onMouseOver="window.status='Buy books and CD-ROMs'; return true;" TARGET="_top"><IMG SRC="/Images/buy-icon.gif" WIDTH="32" HEIGHT="28" BORDER="0" ALT="Buy books and CD-ROMs"></A> <FONT SIZE="-1"><BR><A HREF="/Buy/Plutarch.html" onMouseOver="window.status='Buy books and CD-ROMs'; return true;" TARGET="_top">Buy Books and<BR>CD-ROMs</A></FONT></TD> <TD ALIGN="CENTER" VALIGN="BOTTOM" NOWRAP><A HREF="/Help/general.html" onMouseOver="window.status='Get help'; return true;" TARGET="_top"><IMG SRC="/Images/help-icon.gif" WIDTH="26" HEIGHT="26" BORDER="0" ALT="Get help"></A> <FONT SIZE="-1"><BR><A HREF="/Help/general.html" onMouseOver="window.status='Get help'; return true;" TARGET="_top">Help</A><BR> </FONT></TD> </TR> </TABLE></DIV> <BR><BR><DIV ALIGN="RIGHT"><FONT SIZE="-1"><NOBR><A HREF="/Help/permissions.html" onMouseOver="window.status='View information on copyright and permissions'; return true;">© 1994-2009</A></NOBR></FONT></FONT></DIV> </BODY> </HTML>