Pro L. Murena

What I entreated of the immortal gods, O judges, according to the manners and institutions of our ancestors, on that day when, after taking the auspices in the comitia centuriata, [*](The comitia centuriata, or as they were sometimes called majora, were the assembly in which the people gave their votes according to the classification instituted by Servius Tullius; they were held in the Campus Martius without the city, and in reference to their military organization they were summoned by the sound of the horn, not by the voice of the lictor. All magistrates were elected in these comitia.) I declared Lucius Murena to have been elected consul,—namely, that that fact might turn out gloriously and happily for me and for my office, and for the Roman nation and people,—that same thing do I now pray for from the same immortal gods, that the consulship may be obtained by that same man with safety, and that your inclinations and opinions may agree with the wishes and suffrages of the Roman people, and that that fact may bring to you and to the Roman people peace, tranquillity, ease, and unanimity. And if that solemn prayer of the comitia, consecrated under the auspices of the consul, has as much power and holy influence as the dignity of the republic requires, I pray also that the matter may turn out happily, fortunately, and prosperously to those men to whom the consulship was given when I presided over the election.

And as this is the case, O judges, and as all the power of the immortal gods is either transferred to, or at all events is shared with you, the same consul recommends him now to your good faith who before recommended him to the immortal gods; so that he being both declared consul and being defended by the voice of the same man, may uphold the kindness of the Roman people to your safety and that of all the citizens. And since in this duty which I have undertaken the zeal of my defence has been found fault with by the accusers, and even the very fact of my having undertaken the cause at all, before I begin to say anything of Lucius Murena, I will say a few words on behalf of myself; not because at this time the defence of my duty seems to me more important than that of his safety, but in order that, when what I have done is approved of by you, I may be able with the greater authority to repel the attacks of his enemies upon his honour, his reputation, and all his fortunes.

And first of all I will answer Marcus Cato a man who directs his life by a certain rule and system and who most carefully weighs the motives of every duty about my own duty. Cato says it is not right that I who have been consul and the very passer [*](There had been several previous laws against bribery and corruption (de ambitu). The Lex Acilia, passed B.C. 67, imposed a fine on the offending party, with exclusion from the senate and from all public offices. The Lex Tullia, passed in Cicero's consulship, added banishment for ten years; and, among other restrictions, forbade any one to exhibit gladiators within two years of his being a candidate, unless he was required to do so on a fixed day by a testator's will.) of the law of bribery and corruption and who behaved so rigorously in my own consulship should take up the cause of Lucius Murena and his reproach has great weight with me and makes me desirous to make not only

And if, as is accustomed to be done in some states, an advocate were appointed to this cause by the public, that man would above all others be assigned to one invested with honours as his defender, who having himself enjoyed the same honour, brought to his advocacy no less authority than ability. But if those who are being wafted from the main into harbour are wont with the greatest care to inform those who are sailing out of harbour, of the character of storms, and pirates, and of places, because nature prompts us to favour those who are entering on the same dangers which we have passed through, of what disposition ought I to be, who after having been much tossed about am now almost in sight of land, towards him by whom I see the greatest tempests of the republic about to be encountered? Wherefore, if it is the part of a virtuous consul not only to see what is being done, but to foresee what is likely to happen, I will show in another place how much it is for the interest of the common safety that there should be two consuls in the republic on the first of January.

And if that be the case, then it is not so much my duty which ought to summon me to defend the fortunes of a man who is my friend, as the republic which ought to invite the consul to the defence of the common safety. For as to my having passed a law concerning bribery and corruption, certainly I passed it so as not to abrogate that law which I have long since made for myself concerning defending my fellow-citizens from dangers. If, indeed, I confessed that a largess had been distributed, and were to defend it as having been rightly done, I should be acting wrongly, even if another had passed the law; but when I am saving in defence that nothing has been done contrary to law; then what reason is there that my having passed the law should he an obstacle to my undertaking the defence?

He says that it does not belong to the same severity of character, to have banished from the city by words, and almost by express command, Catiline, when planning the destruction of the republic within its very walls, and now to speak on behalf of Lucius Murena. But I have always willingly acted the part of lenity and clemency which nature itself has taught me but I have not sought the character of severity and rigour, but I have supported it when imposed upon me by the republic as the dignity of this empire required at the time of the greatest peril to the citizens. But if then, when the public required vigour and severity, I overcame my nature, and was as severe as I was forced to be not as I wished to be; now, when all causes invite me to mercy and humanity, with what great zeal ought I to obey my nature and my usual habits? and concerning my duty of defending, and your method of prosecuting, perhaps I shall have again to speak in another part of my speech.

But, O judges, the complaint of Servius Sulpicius, a most wise and accomplished man, moved me no less than the accusation of Cato; for he said that he was exceedingly and most bitterly vexed that I had forgotten my friendship and intimacy with him, and was defending the cause of Lucius Murena against him. I wish, O judges, to satisfy him, and to make you arbitrators between us. For as it is a sad thing to be accused with truth in a case of friendship, so, even if you be falsely accused, it is not to be neglected. I, O Servius Sulpicius, both allow that according to my intimacy with you I did owe you all my zeal and activity to assist you in your canvass, and I think I displayed it when you stood for the consulship, nothing on my part was wanting to you which could have been expected either from a friend, or from an obliging person, or from a consul. That time has gone by,—the case is changed. I think, and am persuaded, that I owed you as much aid as ever you have ventured to require of me against the advancement of Lucius Murena but no aid at all against his safety.

Nor does it follow, because I stood by you when you were a candidate for the consulship, that on that account I ought now to be an assistant to you in the same

If, indeed, I may rest from my labours,—if you advise me that I can do so,—if no reproach of indolence, none of unworthy arrogance, none of inhumanity is incurred by so doing, in good truth I will willingly rest. But if flying from toil convicts me of laziness,—if rejection of suppliants convicts me of arrogance,—if neglect of my friends is a proof of worthlessness, then, above all others, this cause is such an one as no industrious, or merciful, or obliging man can abandon. And you may easily form your opinion of this matter, O Servius, from your own pursuits. For if you think it necessary to give answers to even the adversaries of your friends when they consult you about law, and if you think it shameful, when you have been retained as an advocate for him in whose cause you have come forward, to fail; be not so unjust; as, when your springs are open even to your enemies, to think it right that our small streams should be closed even against our friends.

Indeed, if my intimacy with you had prevented my appearing in this cause, and if the same thing had happened to Quintus Hortensius and Marcus Crassus, most honourable men, and to others also by whom I know that your affection is greatly esteemed, the consul elect would have had no defender in that city in which our ancestors intended that even the lowest of the people should never want an advocate. But I, O judges, should think myself wicked if I had failed my friend,—cruel if I had failed one in distress,—arrogant if I had failed the consul. So that what ought to be given to friendship shall be abundantly given by me, so that I will deal with you, O Servius, as if my brother, who is the dearest of all men to me, stood in your place. What ought to be given to duty, to good faith, to religion, that I will so regulate as to recollect that I am speaking contrary to the wish of one friend to defend another friend from danger.

I understand, O judges, that this whole accusation is divided into three parts, and that one of them refers to find my fault with Murena's habits of life, another to his contest for the dignity, and a third to charges of bribery and corruption. And of these three divisions, that first which ought to have been the weightiest of all, was so weak and trifling, that it was rather some general rule of accusing, than any real occasion for finding fault, which prompted them to say anything about the way of life of Lucius Murena. For Asia has been mentioned as a reproach to him, which was not sought by him for the sake of pleasure and luxury, but was traversed by him in the performance of military labours; but if he while a young man had not served under his father when general, he would have seemed either to have been afraid of the enemy, or of the command of his father, or else to have been repudiated by his father. Shall we say that, when all the sons who wear the praetexta [*](The toga praetexta was a robe bordered with purple worn by the higher magistrates, and by freeborn children till they arrived at the age of manhood.) are accustomed to sit on the chariot of those who are celebrating a triumph, this man ought to have shunned adorning the triumph of his father with military gifts, so as almost to share his fathers triumph for exploits which they had performed in common?

But this man, O judges, both was in Asia and was a great assistance to that bravest of men his own father in his dangers, a comfort to him in his labours a source of congratulation to him in his victory. And if Asia does carry with it a suspicion of luxury, surely it is a praiseworthy thing,

Cato calls Lucius Murena a dancer. If this be imputed to him truly, it is the reproach of a violent accuser; but if falsely, it is the abuse of a scurrilous railer. Wherefore, as you are a person of such influence, you ought not, O Marcus Cato, to pick up abusive expressions out of the streets, or out of some quarrel of buffoons; you ought not rashly to call a consul of the Roman people a dancer; but to consider with what other vices besides that man must be tainted to whom that can with truth be imputed. For no man, one may almost say, ever dances when sober, unless perhaps he be a madman, nor in solitude, nor in a moderate and sober party; dancing is the last companion of prolonged feasting, of luxurious situation, and of many refinements. You charge me with that which must necessarily be the last of all vices, you say nothing of those things without which this vice absolutely cannot exist: no shameless feasting, no improper love, no carousing, no lust no extravagance is alleged; and when those things which have the name of pleasure, and which are vicious, are not found, do you think that you will find the shadow of luxury in that man in whom you cannot find the luxury itself?

Can nothing, therefore, be said against the life of Lucius Murena? Absolutely nothing, I say, O judges. The consul elect is defended by me on this ground, that no fraud of his, no avarice, no perfidy, no cruelty, no wanton word can be alleged against him in his whole life. It is well. The foundations of the defence are laid; for we are not as yet defending this virtuous and upright man with my own panegyric, which I will employ presently, but almost by the confession of his adversaries. And now that this is settled, the approach to the contest for this dignity, which was the second part of the accusation, is more easy to me.

I see that there is in you, O Servius Sulpicius, the greatest dignity of birth, of integrity, of industry, and of all the other accomplishments which a man ought to rely on when he offers himself as a candidate for the consulship. I know that all those qualities are equal in Lucius Murena, and so equal that he can neither be surpassed in worth by you, nor can himself surpass you in worth. You have spoken slightingly of the family of Lucius Murena, you have extolled your own; but if you dwell on this topic so as to allow no one to be considered as born of a good family, unless he be a patrician, you will compel the common people again to secede to the Aventine Hill. [*](This refers to the time of Appius the decemvir, when the soldiers, at the call of Virginius, after the death of Virginia, occupied the Aventine, and were joined by great part of the plebs, demanding the abolition of the decemvirate.) But if there are honourable and considerable families among the plebeians,—both the great-grandfather of Lucius Murena, and his grand-father, were praetors; and his father, when he had triumphed most splendidly and honourably for exploits performed in his praetorship, left the steps towards the acquisition of the consulship more easy, because that honour which was due to the father was demanded by the son.

But your nobility, O Servius Sulpicius, although it is most eminent yet it is known rather to men versed in literature and history, but not much so to the people and to the voters. For your father was in the rank of the knights, your grandfather was renowned for no conspicuous action. So that the recollection of your nobility is to be extracted not from the modern conversation of men, but from the antiquity of annals. So that I also am accustomed to class you in our number, because you by your own virtue and industry, though you are the son of a Roman knight, have yet earned the being considered worthy of the very highest advancement. Nor did it ever seem to me that there was less virtue in Quintus Pompeius, a new man and a most brave man, than in that most high-born man, Marcus Aemilius. Indeed, it is a proof of the same spirit and genius, to hand down to his

Although I now thought, O judges, that it had been brought about by my labours, that a want of nobleness of birth should not be objected to many brave men, who were neglected, though men were praising not only the Curii, the Catos, the Pompeii, those ancient new but most distinguished men, but also, these more modern new men, the Marii, and Didii, and Coelii. But when I, after so great an interval, had broken down those barriers of nobility, so that entrance to the consulship should hereafter be opened, as it was in the time of I our ancestors, not more to high birth than to virtue, I did not think when a consul-elect of an ancient and illustrious family was being defended by the son of a Roman knight himself a consul, that the accusers would say anything about newness of family. In truth it happened to me myself to stand against two patricians, one a most worthless and audacious man, the other a most modest and virtuous one; yet I surpassed Catiline in worth, Galba in popularity. But if that ought to have been imputed as a crime to a new man, forsooth, I should have wanted neither enemies nor detractors.

Let us, therefore, give up saying anything about birth, the dignity of which is great in both the candidates; let us look at the other points. He stood for the quaestorship at the same time with me, and I was appointed first. We need not answer every point; for it cannot escape the observation of any one of you, when many men are appointed equal in dignity, but only one can obtain the first place, that the order of the dignity and of the declaration of it are not the same, because the declaration has degrees, but the dignity of all is usually the same. But the quaestorship of each was, given them by almost an equal decision of the lots: the one had by the Titian law a quiet and orderly province; you had that, one of Ostia, at the name of which, when the quaestors distribute the provinces by lot, a shout, is raised,—a province not so much pleasant and illustrious as troublesome and vexatious. The name of each was together in the quaestorship. For the drawing of the lots gave you no field on which your virtue could display itself and make itself known.

The remaining space of time is dedicated to the contest. It was employed by each in a very dissimilar fashion. Servius

What has Murena been doing in the meantime? He was lieutenant to Lucius Lucullus, a very brave and wise man, and a consummate general; and in this post he commanded an army, he fought a battle, he engaged the enemy, he routed numerous forces of the enemy, he took several cities, some by storm, some by blockade. He traversed that populous and luxurious Asia you speak of; in such a manner as to leave in it no trace either of his avarice or of his luxury; in a most important war he so behaved himself that he performed many glorious exploits without the commander-in-chief; but the commander-in-chief did nothing without him. And all these things, although I am speaking in the presence of Lucius Lucullus, yet that we may not appear to have a licence of invention granted us by him on account of the danger we are in, we are borne witness to in the public despatches; in which Lucius Lucullus gives him such praise as no ambitious nor envious commander-in-chief could have given another while dividing with him the credit of his exploits.