35.33
The
great mass of the assembly, eager for a change of policy, were wholly on the
side of Antiochus and were even opposed to admitting the Romans into the
council. Mainly, however, through the influence of the elders amongst their
leading men, it was decided that a meeting of the council should be
summoned to hear them. When the Athenians returned and reported this
decision Quinctius felt that he ought to go to Aetolia, as he might do
something to change their purpose, if not the whole world would see that the
responsibility for the war rested solely on the Aetolians and that Rome was
taking up arms in a just and necessary cause. Quinctius began his address to
the council by tracing the history of the league between the Aetolians and
Rome and pointing out how frequently they had infringed its provisions. He
then dealt briefly with the rights of the cities which were the subject of
controversy and showed how much better it would be, if they thought they
had a fair case, to send a deputation to Rome to argue their cause or bring it
before the senate, whichever they preferred, instead of a war between Rome
and Antiochus at the instigation of the Aetolians, a war which would create a
world-wide disturbance and utterly ruin Greece. None would feel the fatal
result of such a war sooner than those who set it in motion. The Roman was
a true prophet, but he spoke in vain. Without allowing time for deliberation
by adjourning the council or even waiting for the Romans to retire, Thoas
and the rest of his supporters got a decree passed amidst the cheers of the
assembly for inviting Antiochus to give liberty to Greece and arbitrate
between the Romans and the Aetolians. The insolence of this decree was
aggravated by the personal effrontery of Damocritus their chief magistrate.
When Quinctius asked him for a copy of the decree, Damocritus, without the
slightest regard for his official position, told him that a more pressing matter
demanded his immediate attention, he would shortly give him his reply and
the decree from his camps in Italy on the banks of the Tiber. Such was the
madness which at that time possessed the Aetolians and their magistrates.