ABSTRACT
EXPOSURE to common danger, and afterwards the memory of great things accomplished together—by these national feeling is usually strengthened and exalted. It was when facing the enemy that the Greeks were to find that they were one same people. Since Cyrus, after overcoming Lydia, had conquered the Greek cities of the seaboard, the Great King had had Hellenes among his subjects. Since Darius, after his Scythian campaign, had annexed Thrace and placed Macedonia under his protectorate, the Persian empire had bordered on European Greece. That vast territory, rich in gold and in men, seemed destined to absorb the little Greek states without difficulty. From then onwards the Greeks saw the danger close at hand, and felt that it was serious.
