SOURCE: "The Speeches of Thucydides," in Essays and Addresses, Cambridge at the University Press, 1907, pp. 359-443.

Jebb was a Scottish-born classicist, translator, and author of numerous works on ancient literature, and the founder of the Cambridge Philological Society, the Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies, and the British School of Archeology in Athens. In the essay excerpted below, originally published in 1880 in Hellenica: a Collection of Essays on Greek Poetry, Philosophy, History, and Religion, Jebb approaches the speeches as a vital part of the History for their "light on the inner workings of the Greek political mind, … on the whole play of feeling and opinion which lay behind the facts." He further applauds Thucydides's ability to balance the accuracy of the speeches with dramatic presentation.

The famous phrase in which Thucydides claims a lasting value for his work has had the fate of many striking expressions: it...