Book: The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4

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The new tribunes convoked the senate for the nineteenth, on which
occasion Cicero had intended to be absent, but receiving the day
before the edict of Decimus Brutus, by which he forbade Antonius to
enter his province (immediately after the death of Caesar he had taken
possession of Cisalpine Gaul, which had been conferred on him by
Caesar), and declared that he would defend it against him by force and
preserve it in its duty to the senate, he thought it necessary to
procure for Brutus a resolution of the senate in his favour. He went
down therefore very early, and, in a very full house, delivered the
following speech.

I. We have been assembled at length, O conscript fathers, altogether
later than the necessities of the republic required; but still we are
assembled, a measure which I, indeed, have been every day demanding,
inasmuch as I saw that a nefarious war against our altars and our
hearths, against our lives and our fortunes was, I will not say being
prepared, but being actually waged by a profligate and desperate man.
People are waiting for the first of January. But Antonius is not
waiting for that day, who is now attempting with an army to invade the
province of Decimus Brutus, a most illustrious and excellent man. And
when he has procured reinforcements and equipments there, he threatens
that he will come to this city. What is the use then of waiting, or
of even a delay for the very shortest time? For although the first of
January is at hand, still a short time is a long one for people who
are not prepared. For a day, or I should rather say an hour, often
brings great disasters, if no precautions are taken. And it is not
usual to wait for a fixed day for holding a council, as it is for
celebrating a festival. But if the first of January had fallen on
the day when Antonius first fled from the city, or if people had not
waited for it, we should by this time have no war at all. For we
should easily have crushed the audacity of that frantic man by the
authority of the senate and the unanimity of the Roman people. And
now, indeed, I feel confident that the consuls elect will do so,
as soon as they enter on their magistracy. For they are men of the
highest courage, of the most consummate wisdom, and they will act in
perfect harmony with each other. But my exhortations to rapid and
instant action are prompted by a desire not merely for victory, but
for speedy victory.

For how long are we to trust to the prudence of an individual to repel
so important, so cruel, and so nefarious a war? Why is not the public
authority thrown into the scale as quickly as possible?

II. Caius Caesar, a young man, or, I should rather say, almost a boy,
endued with an incredible and godlike degree of wisdom and valour, at
the time when the frenzy of Antonius was at its height, and when
his cruel and mischievous return from Brundusium was an object of
apprehension to all, while we neither desired him to do so, nor
thought of such a measure, nor ventured even to wish it, (because it
did not seem practicable,) collected a most trustworthy army from the
invincible body of veteran soldiers, and has spent his own patrimony
in doing so. Although I have not used the expression which I
ought,--for he has not spent it,--he has invested it in the safety of
the republic.

And although it is not possible to requite him with all the thanks to
which he is entitled, still we ought to feel all the gratitude towards
him which our minds are capable of conceiving. For who is so ignorant
of public affairs, so entirely indifferent to all thoughts of the
republic, as not to see that, if Marcus Antonius could have come with
those forces which he made sure that he should have, from Brundusium
to Rome, as he threatened, there would have been no description of
cruelty which he would not have practised? A man who in the house of
his entertainer at Brundusium ordered so many most gallant men
and virtuous citizens to be murdered, and whose wife's face was
notoriously besprinkled with the blood of men dying at his and her
feet. Who is there of us, or what good man is there at all, whom a man
stained with this barbarity would ever have spared; especially as he
was coming hither much more angry with all virtuous men than he had
been with those whom he had massacred there? And from this calamity
Caesar has delivered the republic by his own individual prudence, (and,
indeed, there were no other means by which it could have been done.)
And if he had not been born in this republic we should, owing to the
wickedness of Antonius, now have no republic at all.

For this is what I believe, this is my deliberate opinion, that if
that one young man had not checked the violence and inhuman projects
of that frantic man, the republic would have been utterly destroyed.
And to him we must, O conscript fathers, (for this is the first time,
met in such a condition, that, owing to his good service, we are at
liberty to say freely what we think and feel,) we must, I say, this
day give authority, so that he may be able to defend the republic, not
because that defence has been voluntarily undertaken by him but also
because it has been entrusted to him by us.

III. Nor (since now after a long interval we are allowed to speak
concerning the republic) is it possible for us to be silent about the
Martial legion. For what single man has ever been braver, what single
man has ever been more devoted to the republic than the whole of the
Martial legion? which, as soon as it had decided that Marcus Antonius
was an enemy of the Roman people, refused to be a companion of his
insanity; deserted him though consul; which, in truth, it would not
have done if it had considered him as consul, who, as it saw, was
aiming at nothing and preparing nothing but the slaughter of the
citizens, and the destruction of the state. And that legion has
encamped at Alba. What city could it have selected either more
suitable for enabling it to act, or more faithful, or full of more
gallant men, or of citizens more devoted to the republic?

The fourth legion, imitating the virtue of this legion, under the
leadership of Lucius Egnatuleius, the quaestor, a most virtuous and
intrepid citizen, has also acknowledged the authority and joined the
army of Caius Caesar.

We, therefore, O conscript fathers, must take care that those things
which this most illustrious young man, this most excellent of all men
has of his own accord done, and still is doing, be sanctioned by our
authority; and the admirable unanimity of the veterans, those most
brave men, and of the Martial and of the fourth legion, in their zeal
for the reestablishment of the republic, be encouraged by our praise
and commendation. And let us pledge ourselves this day that their
advantage, and honours, and rewards shall be cared for by us as soon
as the consuls elect have entered on their magistracy.

IV. And the things which I have said about Caesar and about his army,
are, indeed, already well known to you. For by the admirable valour
of Caesar, and by the firmness of the veteran soldiers, and by the
admirable discernment of those legions which have followed our
authority, and the liberty of the Roman people, and the valour of
Caesar, Antonius has been repelled from his attempts upon our lives.
But these things, as I have said, happened before; but this recent
edict of Decimus Brutus, which has just been issued, can certainly not
be passed over in silence. For he promises to preserve the province of
Gaul in obedience to the senate and people of Rome. O citizen, born
for the republic; mindful of the name he bears; imitator of his
ancestors! Nor, indeed, was the acquisition of liberty so much an
object of desire to our ancestors when Tarquinius was expelled, as,
now that Antonius is driven away, the preservation of it is to us.
Those men had learnt to obey kings ever since the foundation of
the city, but we from the time when the kings were driven out have
forgotten how to be slaves. And that Tarquinius, whom our ancestors
expelled, was not either considered or called cruel or impious,
but only The Proud. That vice which we have often borne in private
individuals, our ancestors could not endure even in a king.

Lucius Brutus could not endure a proud king. Shall Decimus Brutus
submit to the kingly power of a man who is wicked and impious? What
atrocity did Tarquinius ever commit equal to the innumerable acts of
the sort which Antonius has done and is still doing? Again, the kings
were used to consult the senate; nor, as is the case when Antonius
holds a senate, were armed barbarians ever introduced into the council
of the king. The kings paid due regard to the auspices, which this
man, though consul and augur, has neglected, not only by passing laws
in opposition to the auspices, but also by making his colleague (whom
he himself had appointed irregularly, and had falsified the auspices
in order to do so) join in passing them. Again, what king was ever
so preposterously impudent as to have all the profits, and
kindnesses, and privileges of his kingdom on sale? But what immunity
is there, what rights of citizenship, what rewards that this man has
not sold to individuals, and to cities, and to entire provinces?
We have never heard of anything base or sordid being imputed to
Tarquinius. But at the house of this man gold was constantly being
weighed out in the spinning room, and money was being paid, and in
one single house every soul who had any interest in the business was
selling the whole empire of the Roman people. We have never heard of
any executions of Roman citizens by the orders of Tarquinius, but this
man both at Suessa murdered the man whom he had thrown into prison,
and at Brundusium massacred about three hundred most gallant men and
most virtuous citizens. Lastly, Tarquinius was conducting a war in
defence of the Roman people at the very time when he was expelled.
Antonius was leading an army against the Roman people at the time
when, being abandoned by the legions, he cowered at the name of Caesar
and at his army, and neglecting the regular sacrifices, he offered up
before daylight vows which he could never mean to perform, and at
this very moment he is endeavouring to invade a province of the Roman
people. The Roman people, therefore, has already received and is still
looking for greater services at the hand of Decimus Brutus than our
ancestors received from Lucius Brutus, the founder of this race and
name which we ought to be so anxious to preserve.

V. But, while all slavery is miserable, to be slave to a man who is
profligate, unchaste, effeminate, never, not even while in fear,
sober, is surely intolerable. He, then, who keeps this man out of
Gaul, especially by his own private authority, judges, and judges most
truly, that he is not consul at all. We must take care, therefore, O
conscript fathers, to sanction the private decision of Decimus Brutus
by public authority. Nor, indeed, ought you to have thought Marcus
Antonius consul at any time since the Lupercalia. For on the day
when he, in the sight of the Roman people, harangued the mob, naked,
perfumed, and drunk, and laboured moreover to put a crown on the head
of his colleague, on that day he abdicated not only the consulship,
but also his own freedom. At all events he himself must at once have
become a slave, if Caesar had been willing to accept from him that
ensign of royalty. Can I then think him a consul, can I think him a
Roman citizen, can I think him a freeman, can I even think him a man,
who on that shameful and wicked day showed what he was willing to
endure while Caesar lived, and what he was anxious to obtain himself
after he was dead?

Nor is it possible to pass over in silence the virtue and the firmness
and the dignity of the province of Gaul. For that is the flower of
Italy, that is the bulwark of the empire of the Roman people, that is
the chief ornament of our dignity. But so perfect is the unanimity of
the municipal towns and colonies of the province of Gaul, that all
men in that district appear to have united together to defend the
authority of this order, and the majesty of the Roman people.
Wherefore, O tribunes of the people, although you have not actually
brought any other business before us beyond the question of
protection, in order that the consuls may be able to hold the senate
with safety on the first of January, still you appear to me to have
acted with great wisdom and great prudence in giving an opportunity
of debating the general circumstances of the republic. For when you
decided that the senate could not be held with safety without some
protection or other, you at the same time asserted by that decision
that the wickedness and audacity of Antonius was still continuing its
practices within our walls.

VI. Wherefore, I will embrace every consideration in my opinion which
I am now going to deliver, a course to which you, I feel sure, have no
objection, in order that authority may be conferred by us on admirable
generals, and that hope of reward may be held out by us to gallant
soldiers, and that a formal decision may be come to, not by words
only, but also by actions, that Antonius is not only not a consul, but
is even an enemy. For if he be consul, then the legions which have
deserted the consul deserve beating[24] to death. Caesar is wicked,
Brutus is impious, since they of their own heads have levied an army
against the consul. But if new honours are to be sought out for the
soldiers on account of their divine and immortal merits, and if it
is quite impossible to show gratitude enough to the generals, who is
there who must not think that man a public enemy, whose conduct
is such that those who are in arms against him are considered the
saviours of the republic?

Again, how insulting is he in his edicts! how ignorant! How like a
barbarian! In the first place, how has he heaped abuse on Caesar,
in terms drawn from his recollection of his own debauchery and
profligacy. For where can we find any one who is chaster than this
young man? who is more modest? where have we among our youth a more
illustrious example of the old-fashioned strictness? Who, on the other
hand, is more profligate than the man who abuses him? He reproaches
the son of Caius Caesar with his want of noble blood, when even his
natural[25] father, if he had been alive, would have been made consul.
His mother is a woman of Aricia. You might suppose he was saying a
woman of Tralles, or of Ephesus. Just see how we all who come from the
municipal towns--that is to say, absolutely all of us--are looked down
upon; for how few of us are there who do not come from those towns?
and what municipal town is there which he does not despise who looks
with such contempt on Aricia; a town most ancient as to its antiquity;
if we regard its rights, united with us by treaty; if we regard its
vicinity, almost close to us; if we regard the high character of its
inhabitants, most honourable? It is from Aricia that we have received
the Voconian and Atinian laws; from Aricia have come many of those
magistrates who have filled our curule chairs, both in our fathers'
recollection and in our own; from Aricia have sprung many of the best
and bravest of the Roman knights. But if you disapprove of a wife from
Aricia, why do you approve of one from Tusculum? Although the father
of this most virtuous and excellent woman, Marcus Atius Balbus, a man
of the highest character, was a man of praetorian rank; but the father
of your wife,--a good woman, at all events a rich one,--a fellow of
the name of Bambalio, was a man of no account at all. Nothing could be
lower than he was, a fellow who got his surname as a sort of insult,
derived[26] from the hesitation of his speech and the stolidity of his
understanding. Oh, but your grandfather was nobly born. Yes, he was
that Tuditanus who used to put on a cloak and buskins, and then go
and scatter money from the rostra among the people. I wish he had
bequeathed his contempt of money to his descendants! You have, indeed,
a most glorious nobility of family! But how does it happen that the
son of a woman of Aricia appears to you to be ignoble, when you
are accustomed to boast of a descent on the mother's side which is
precisely the same?[27] Besides, what insanity is it for that man to
say anything about the want of noble birth in men's wives, when his
father married Numitoria of Fregellae, the daughter of a traitor, and
when he himself has begotten children of the daughter of a freedman.
However, those illustrious men Lucius Philippus, who has a wife who
came from Aricia, and Caius Marcellus, whose wife is the daughter of
an Arician, may look to this; and I am quite sure that they have no
regrets on the score of the dignity of those admirable women.

VII. Moreover, Antonius proceeds to name Quintus Cicero, my brother's
son, in his edict; and is so mad as not to perceive that the way in
which he names him is a panegyric on him. For what could happen more
desirable for this young man, than to be known by every one to be the
partner of Caesar's counsels, and the enemy of the frenzy of Antonius?
But this gladiator has dared to put in writing that he had designed
the murder of his father and of his uncle. Oh the marvellous
impudence, and audacity, and temerity of such an assertion! to dare to
put this in writing against that young man, whom I and my brother,
on account of his amiable manners, and pure character, and splendid
abilities, vie with one another in loving, and to whom we incessantly
devote our eyes, and ears, and affections! And as to me, he does not
know whether he is injuring or praising me in those same edicts. When
he threatens the most virtuous citizens with the same punishment which
I inflicted on the most wicked and infamous of men, he seems to praise
me as if he were desirous of copying me; but when he brings up again
the memory of that most illustrious exploit, then he thinks that he is
exciting some odium against me in the breasts of men like himself.

VIII. But what is it that he has done himself? When he had published
all these edicts, he issued another, that the senate was to meet in a
full house on the twenty-fourth of November. On that day he himself
was not present. But what were the terms of his edict? These, I
believe, are the exact words of the end of it: "If any one fails to
attend, all men will be at liberty to think him the adviser of my
destruction and of most ruinous counsels". What are ruinous counsels?
those which relate to the recovery of the liberty of the Roman people?
Of those counsels I confess that I have been and still am an adviser
and prompter to Caesar. Although he did not stand in need of any one's
advice, but still I spurned on the willing horse, as it is said. For
what good man would not have advised putting you to death, when on
your death depended the safety and life of every good man, and the
liberty and dignity of the Roman people?

But when he had summoned us all by so severe an edict, why did he not
attend himself? Do you suppose that he was detained by any melancholy
or important occasion? He was detained drinking and feasting. If,
indeed, it deserves to be called a feast, and not rather gluttony.
He neglected to attend on the day mentioned in his edict, and he
adjourned the meeting to the twenty-eighth. He then summoned us to
attend in the Capitol, and at that temple he did arrive himself,
coming up through some mine left by the Gauls. Men came, having been
summoned, some of them indeed men of high distinction, but forgetful
of what was due to their dignity. For the day was such, the report of
the object of the meeting such, such too the man who had convened the
senate, that it was discreditable for a senate to feel no fear for the
result. And yet to those men who had assembled he did not dare to
say a single word about Caesar, though he had made up his mind[28]
to submit a motion respecting him to the senate. There was a man of
consular rank who had brought a resolution ready drawn up. Is it not
now admitting that he is himself an enemy, when he does not dare to
make a motion respecting a man who is leading an army against him
while he is consul? For it is perfectly plain that one of the two
must be an enemy, nor is it possible to come to a different decision
respecting adverse generals. If then Caius Caesar be an enemy, why does
the consul submit no motion to the senate? If he does not deserve to
be branded by the senate, then what can the consul say, who, by his
silence respecting him, has confessed that he himself is an enemy? In
his edicts he styles him Spartacus, while in the senate he does not
venture to call him even a bad citizen.

IX. But in the most melancholy circumstances what mirth does he not
provoke? I have committed to memory some short phrases of one edict,
which he appears to think particularly clever, but I have not as yet
found any one who has understood what he intended by them. "That is no
insult which a worthy man does." Now, in the first place, what is the
meaning of "worthy?" For there are many men worthy of punishment, as
he himself is. Does he mean what a man does who is invested with any
dignity?[29] if so, what insult can be greater? Moreover, what is the
meaning of "doing an insult?" Who ever uses such an expression? Then
comes, "Nor any fear which an enemy threatens" What then? is fear
usually threatened by a friend? Then came many similar sentences. Is
it not better to be dumb, than to say what no one can understand? Now
see why his tutor, exchanging pleas for ploughs, has had given to him
in the public domain of the Roman people two thousand acres of land in
the Leontine district, exempt from all taxes, for making a stupid man
still stupider at the public expense.

However, these perhaps are trifling matters. I ask now, why all on a
sudden he became so gentle in the senate, after having been so fierce
in his edicts? For what was the object of threatening Lucius Cassius,
a most fearless tribune of the people, and a most virtuous and loyal
citizen, with death if he came to the Senate? of expelling Decimus
Caifulenus, a man thoroughly attached to the republic, from the senate
by violence and threats of death? of interdicting Titus Canutius, by
whom he had been repeatedly and deservedly harassed by most legitimate
attacks, not only from the temple itself but from all approach to it?
What was the resolution of the senate which he was afraid that they
would stop by the interposition of their veto? That, I suppose,
respecting the supplication in honour of Marcus Lepidus, a most
illustrious man! Certainly there was a great danger of our hindering
an ordinary compliment to a man on whom we were every day thinking
of conferring some extraordinary honour. However, that he might not
appear to have had no reason at all for ordering the senate to
meet, he was on the point of bringing forward some motion about the
republic, when the news about the fourth legion came; which entirely
bewildered him, and hastening to flee away, he took a division on the
resolution for decreeing this supplication, though such a proceeding
had never been heard of before.[30]

X. But what a setting out was his after this! what a journey when he
was in his robe as a general! How did he shun all eyes, and the light
of day, and the city, and the forum! How miserable was his flight! how
shameful! how infamous! Splendid, too, were the decrees of the senate
passed on the evening of that very day; very religiously solemn
was the allotment of the provinces; and heavenly indeed was the
opportunity, when everyone got exactly what he thought most desirable.
You are acting admirably, therefore, O tribunes of the people, in
bringing forward a motion about the protection of the senate and
consuls, and most deservedly are we all bound to feel and to prove to
you the greatest gratitude for your conduct. For how can we be free
from fear and danger while menaced by such covetousness and audacity?
And as for that ruined and desperate man, what more hostile decision
can be passed upon him than has already been passed by his own
friends? His most intimate friend, a man connected with me too, Lucius
Lentulus, and also Publius Naso, a man destitute of covetousness, have
shown that they think that they have no provinces assigned them, and
that the allotments of Antonius are invalid. Lucius Philippus, a man
thoroughly worthy of his father and grandfather and ancestors, has
done the same. The same is the opinion of Marcus Turanius, a man of
the greatest integrity and purity of life. The same is the conduct
of Publius Oppius; and those very men,--who, influenced by their
friendship for Marcus Antonius, have attributed to him more power than
they would perhaps really approve of,--Marcus Piso, my own connexion,
a most admirable man and virtuous citizen, and Marcus Vehilius, a man
of equal respectability, have both declared that they would obey the
authority of the senate. Why should I speak of Lucius Cinna? whose
extraordinary integrity, proved under many trying circumstances, makes
the glory of his present admirable conduct less remarkable; he has
altogether disregarded the province assigned to him; and so has Caius
Cestius, a man of great and firm mind.

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