Perhaps some of my readers will wonder why while elsewhere I dealt with the successive events of each year separately, in the case of <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Egypt&groupId=556&placeId=368">Egypt</a> alone I give on the present occasion a narrative of occurrences there extending over a considerable period.
The reason of this I may state as follows.
Ptolemy Philopator, of whom I am now talking, after the termination of the war for <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Coele-Syria&groupId=484&placeId=908">Coele-Syria</a> abandoned entirely the path of virtue and took to a life of dissipation such as I have just described.
Late in his reign he was forced by circumstances into the war I have mentioned, a war which, apart from the mutual savagery and lawlessness of the combatants, contained nothing worthy of note, no pitched battle, no sea-fight, no siege.
It, therefore, struck me that my narrative would be easier both for me to write and for my readers to follow if I performed this part of my task not by merely alluding every year to small events not worth serious attention, but by giving once for all a life-like picture so to speak of this king's character.
Walbank Commentary