Note 500 — Chapter LX · FROM THE RESUMPTION OF DIRECT HOSTILITIES BETWEEN ATHENS AND SPARTA, DOWN TO THE DESTRUCTION OF THE ATHENIAN ARMAMENT IN SICILY.

Thucyd. vii, 77. Ἱκανὰ γὰρ τοῖς τε πολεμίοις εὐτύχηται, καὶ εἴ τῳ θεῶν ἐπίφθονοι ἐστρατεύσαμεν, ἀποχρώντως ἤδη τετιμωρήμεθα· ἦλθον γάρ που καὶ ἄλλοι τινὲς ἤδη ἐφ’ ἑτέρους, καὶ ἀνθρώπεια δράσαντες ἀνεκτὰ ἔπαθον. Καὶ ἡμᾶς εἰκὸς νῦν τά τε ἀπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ ἐλπίζειν ἠπιώτερα ἕξειν· οἴκτου γὰρ ἀπ’ αὐτῶν ἀξιώτεροι ἤδη ἐσμὲν ἢ φθόνου.

This is a remarkable illustration of the doctrine, so frequently set forth in Herodotus, that the gods were jealous of any man or any nation who was preëminently powerful, fortunate, or prosperous. Nikias, recollecting the immense manifestation and promise with which his armament had started from Peiræus, now believed that this had provoked the jealousy of some of the gods, and brought about the misfortunes in Sicily. He comforts his soldiers by saying that the enemy is now at the same dangerous pinnacle of exaltation, whilst they have exhausted the sad effects of the divine jealousy.

Compare the story of Amasis and Polykratês in Herodotus (iii, 39), and the striking remarks put into the mouth of Paulus Æmilius by Plutarch (Vit. Paul. Æmil. c. 36).