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But in the third year thereafter,1 when Xerxes was marching through Thessaly and Boeotia against Attica, they repealed their law of ostracism, and voted that those who had been sent away under it might return. The chief reason for this was their fear of Aristides, lest he attach himself to the enemy's cause, and corrupt and pervert many of his fellow-citizens to the side of the Barbarian. But they much misjudged the man. Even before this decree of theirs, he was ever inciting and urging the Hellenes to win their freedom; and after it was passed, when Themistocles was general with sole powers, he assisted him in every undertaking and counsel, although he thereby, for the sake of the general safety, made his chiefest foe the most famous of men.

1 480 B.C.

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