I see that of those men who wish to be considered attached to the people one man is absent,
that they may not seem forsooth to give a vote about the lives of Roman citizens. He only three
days ago gave Roman citizens into custody, and decreed me a supplication, and voted most
magnificent rewards to the witnesses only yesterday. It is not now doubtful to any one what he,
who voted for the imprisonment of the criminals, congratulation to him who had detected them,
and rewards to those who had proved the crime, thinks of the whole matter, and of the cause.
But Caius Caesar considers that the Sempronian The Sempronian law was
proposed by Caius Gracchus, B.C. 123, and enacted that the people
only should decide respecting the life or civil condition of a citizen. It is alluded to also
in the oration Pro Rabir. c. 4, where Cicero says, “Caius
Gracchus passed a law that no decision should be come to about the life of a Roman citizen
without your command,” speaking to the Quirites. law
was passed about Roman citizens, but that he who is an enemy of the republic can by no means be
a citizen; and moreover that the very proposer of the Sempronian law suffered punishment by the
command of the people. He also denies that Lentulus, a briber and a spendthrift, after he has
formed such cruel and bitter plans about the destruction of the Roman people and the ruin of
this city, can be called a friend of the people. Therefore this most gentle and merciful man
does not hesitate to commit Publius Lentulus to eternal darkness and imprisonment, and
establishes a law to all posterity that no one shall be able to boast of alleviating his
punishment or hereafter to appear a friend of the people to the destruction of the Roman
people. He adds also the confiscation of their goods, so that want also and beggary may be
added to all the torments of mind and body.
Wherefore, if you decide on this you give me a companion in my address, dear and acceptable
to the Roman people; or if you prefer to adopt the opinion of Silanus, you will easily defend
me and yourselves from the reproach of cruelty, and I will prevail that it shall be much
lighter. Although, O conscript fathers, what cruelty can there be in chastising the enormity of
such excessive wickedness? For I decide from my own feeling. For so may I be allowed; to enjoy
the republic in safety in your company, as I am not moved to be somewhat vehement in this cause
by any severity of disposition, (for who is more merciful than I am?) but rather by a singular
humanity and mercifulness. For I seem to myself to see this city, the light of the world and
the citadel of all nations, falling on a sudden by one conflagration. I see in my mind's eye
miserable and unburied heaps of cities in my buried country; the sight of Cethegus and his
madness raging amid your slaughter is ever present to my sight.
But when I have set before myself Lentulus reigning, as he himself confesses
that he had hoped was his destiny, and this Gabinius arrayed in the purple and Catiline arrived
with his army, then I shudder at the lamentation of matrons, and the flight of virgins and of
boys and the insults of the vestal virgins; and because these things appear to me exceedingly
miserable and pitiable, therefore I show myself severe and rigorous to those who have wished to
bring about this state of things. I ask, forsooth, if any father of a family, supposing his
children had been slain by a slave, his wife murdered, his house burnt, were not to inflict on
his slaves the severest possible punishment would he appear clement and merciful or most
inhuman and cruel? To me he would seem unnatural and hard-hearted who did not soothe his own
pain and anguish by the pain and torture of the criminal. And so we, in the case
of these men who desired to murder us, and our wives, and our children,—who endeavoured to
destroy the houses of every individual among us, and also the republic, the home of all,—who
designed to place the nation of the Allobroges on the relics of this city, and on the ashes of
the empire destroyed by fire;—if we are very rigorous, we shall be considered merciful; if we
choose to be lax, we must endure the character of the greatest cruelty, to the damage of our
country and our fellow-citizens.
Unless, indeed, Lucius The
brother-in-law of Lucius Caesar was Marcus Fulvius, whose death, at the command of Opimius the
consul, is referred to at Cat. 2. chap1. He sent his son to
the consul to treat for his surrender, whom Opimius sent back the first time, and forbade to
return to him; when he did return, he put him to death. Caesar, a thoroughly brave man
and of the best disposition towards the republic, seemed to any one to be too cruel three, days
ago, when he said that the husband of his own sister, a most excellent woman, (in his presence
and in his hearing,) ought to be deprived of life,— when he said that his grandfather had been
put to death by command of the consul and his youthful son, sent as an ambassador by his
father, had been put to death in prison. And what deed had they done like these men? had they
formed any plan for destroying the republic? At that time great corruption was rife in the
republic, and there was the greatest strife between parties. And, at that time, the grandfather
of this Lentulus, a most illustrious man, put on his armour and pursued Gracchus; he even
received a severe wound that there might be no diminution of the great dignity of the republic.
But this man, his grandson, invited the Gauls to overthrow the foundations of the republic; he
stirred up the slaves, he summoned Catiline, he distributed us to Cethegus to be massacred, and
the rest of the citizens to Gabinius to be assassinated, the city he allotted to Cassius to
burn, and the plundering and devastating of all Italy he assigned to Catiline. You fear, I
think, lest in the case of such unheard of and abominable wickedness you should seem to decide
anything with too great severity; when we ought much more to fear lest by being remiss in
punishing we should appear cruel to our country, rather than appear by the severity of our
irritation too rigorous to its most bitter enemies.
But O conscript fathers, I cannot conceal what I hear; for sayings are bruited about, which
come to my ears, of those men who seem to fear that I may not have force enough to put in
execution the things which you determine on this day. Everything is provided for, and prepared,
and arranged, O conscript fathers, both by my exceeding care and diligence, and also by the
still greater zeal of the Roman people for the retaining of their supreme dominion, and for the
preserving of the fortunes of all. All men of all ranks are present, and of all ages; the forum
is full, the temples around the forum are full, all the approaches to this place and to this
temple are full. For this is the only cause that has ever been known since the first foundation
of the city, in which all men were of one and the same opinion—except those, who, as they saw
they must be ruined, preferred to perish in company with all the world rather than by
themselves.
These men I except, and I willingly set apart from the
rest; for I do not think that they should be classed in the number of worthless citizens, but
in that of the most bitter enemies. But, as for the rest, O ye immortal gods! in what crowds,
with what zeal, with what virtue do they agree in defence of the common dignity and safety. Why
should I here speak of the Roman knights? who yield to you the supremacy in rank and wisdom, in
order to vie with you in love for the republic,—whom this day and this cause now reunite with
you in alliance and unanimity with your body reconciled after a disagreement of many years. And
if we can preserve for ever in the republic this union now established in nay consulship, I
pledge myself to you that no civil and domestic calamity can hereafter reach any part of the
republic. I see that the tribunes of the treasury—excellent men—have united with similar zeal
in defence of the republic, and all the notaries. The notaries at Rome
were in the pay of the state; they were chiefly employed in making up the public accounts. In
the time of Cicero it seems to have been lawful for any one to obtain the office of scriba by purchase, (see Cic. in Verr.
2.79,) and freedmen and their sons frequently availed themselves of this privilege.
For as this day had by chance brought them in crowds to the treasury, I see that they
were diverted from an anxiety for the money due to them, from an expectation of their capital,
to a regard for the common safety.
The entire multitude of
honest men, even the poorest is present; for who is there to whom these temples, the sight of
the city, the possession of liberty,—in short; this light and this soil of his, common to us
all, is not both dear and pleasant and delightful?
It is worth while, O conscript fathers, to know the inclinations of the freedmen; who, having
by their good fortune obtained the rights of citizens, consider this to be really their
country, which some who have been born here, and born in the highest rank, have considered to
be not their own country, but a city of enemies. But why should I speak of men of this body
whom their private fortunes, whom their common republic, whom, in short, that liberty which is
most delightful has called forth to defend the safety of their country? There is no slave who
is only in an endurable condition of slavery who does not shudder at the audacity of citizens,
who does not desire that these things may stand, who does not contribute all the good-will that
he can, and all that he dares, to the common safety.
Wherefore, if this consideration moves any one, that it
has been heard that some tool of Lentulus is running about the shops,—is hoping that the minds
of some poor and ignorant men may be corrupted by bribery; that, indeed, has been attempted and
begun, but no one has been found either so wretched in their fortune or so abandoned in their
inclination as not to wish the place of their seat and work and daily gain, their chamber and
their bed, and, in short, the tranquil course of their lives, to be still preserved to them.
And far the greater part of those who are in the shops,—yes, indeed, (for that is the more
correct way of speaking,) the whole of this class is of all the most attached to tranquillity;
their whole stock, indeed, their whole employment and livelihood, exists by the peaceful
intercourse of the citizens, and is wholly supported by peace. And if their gains are
diminished whenever their shops are shut, what will they be when they are burnt?
And, as this is the case, O conscript fathers, the protection of the
Roman people is not wanting to you; do you take care that you do not seem to be wanting to the
Roman people.
You have a consul preserved out of many dangers and plots, and from death itself not for his
own life, but for your safety. All ranks agree for the preservation of the republic with heart
and will, with zeal, with virtue, with their voice. Your common country, besieged by the hands
and weapons of an impious conspiracy, stretches forth her hands to you as a suppliant; to you
she recommends herself to you she recommends the lives of all the citizens, and the citadel,
and the Capitol, and the altars of the household gods, and the eternal inextinguishable fire of
Vesta, and all the temples of all the gods, and the altars and the walls and the houses of the
city. Moreover, your own lives, those of your wives and children, the fortunes of all men, your
homes, your hearth; are this day interested in your decision.