SOURCE: "Thucydides," in A History of Greek Literature: From the Earliest Period to the Death of Demosthenes, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1900, pp. 327-48.

In the following excerpt from his monograph written in 1886, Jevons maintains that Thucydides sought "to give a strict and faithful account of the facts" of the Peloponnesian War and demonstrates the importance of the War to Western history.

"Thucydides, an Athenian, wrote the history of the war in which the Peloponnesians and the Athenians fought against one another. He began to write when they first took up arms, believing that it would be great and memorable above any previous war. For he argued that both states were then at the full height of their military power, and he saw the rest of the Hellenes either siding or intending to side with one or other of them. No movement ever stirred Hellas more deeply than this; it...