Philippicae

The most important events, O conscript fathers, are often determined by very trivial moving influences in every circumstance that can happen in the republic, and also in war, and especially in civil war, which is usually governed a great deal by men's opinions and by reports. No one will ask what is the commission with which we have sent the ambassadors; the mere name of an embassy, and that sent by us of our, own accord, will appear an indication of fear. Let him depart from Mutina; let him cease to attack Brutus; let him retire from Gaul. He must not be begged in words to do so; he must be compelled by arms. For we are not sending to Hannibal to desire him to retire from before Saguntum; to whom the senate formerly sent Publius Valerius Flaccus and Quintus. Baebius Tampilus; who, if Hannibal did not comply, were ordered to proceed to Carthage. Whither do we order our ambassadors to proceed, if Antonius does not comply? Are we sending an embassy to our own citizen, to beg him not to attack a general and a colony of the Roman people? Is it so? Is it becoming to us to beg this by means of ambassadors? What is the difference in the name of the immortal gods, whether he attacks this city itself or whether he attacks an outpost of this city a colony of the Roman people established for the sake of its being a bulwark and protection to us? The siege of Saguntum was the cause of the second Punic war, which Hannibal carried on against our ancestors. It was quite right to send ambassadors to him They were sent to a Carthaginian, they were sent on behalf of those who were the enemies of Hannibal and our allies. What is there resembling that case here? We are sending to one of our own citizens to beg him not to blockade a general of the Roman army, not to attack our army and our colony,—in short not to be an enemy or ours. Come; suppose he obeys, shall we either be inclined, or shall we be able by any possibility, to treat him as one of our citizens?

On the nineteenth of December, you overwhelmed him with your decrees; you ordained that this motion should be submitted to you on the first of January, which you see is submitted now, respecting the honors and rewards to be conferred on those who have deserved or do deserve well of the republic. And the chief of those men you have adjudged to be the man who really has done so, Caius Caesar, who had diverted the nefarious attacks of Marcus. Antonius against this city, and compelled him to direct them against Gaul; and next to him you consider the veteran soldiers who first followed Caesar; then those excellent and heavenly-minded legions the Martial and the fourth, to whom you have promised honors and rewards, for having not only abandoned their consul, but for having even declared war against him. And on the same day, having a decree brought before you and published on purpose, you praised the conduct of Decimus Brutus, a most excellent citizen, and sanctioned with your public authority this war which he had undertaken of his own head.

What else, then, did you do on that day except pronounce Antonius a public enemy? After these decrees of yours, will it be possible for him to look upon you with equanimity, or for you to behold him without the most excessive indignation! He has been excluded and cut off and wholly separated from the republic, not merely by his own wickedness, as it seems to me, but by some especial good fortune of the republic. And if he should comply with the demands of the ambassadors and return to Rome, do you suppose that abandoned citizens will ever be in need of a standard around which to rally? But this is not what I am so much afraid of. There are other things which I am more apprehensive of and more alarmed at. He never will comply with the demands of the ambassadors. I know the man's insanity and arrogance; I know the desperate counsels of his friends, to which he is wholly given up. Lucius his brother, as being a man who has fought abroad, leads on his household. Even suppose him to be in his senses himself, which he never will be; still he will not be allowed by these men to act as if he were so. In the mean time, time will be wasted. The preparations for war will cool. How is it that the war has been protracted as long as this, if it is not by procrastination and delay?

From the very first moment after the departure, or rather after the hopeless flight of that bandit, that the senate could have met in freedom, I have always been demanding that we should be called together. The first day that we were called together, when the consuls elect were not present, I laid, in my opinion, amidst the greatest unanimity on your part, the foundations of the republic; later, indeed, than they should have been laid; for I could not do so before; but still if no time had been lost after that day, we should have no war at all now. Every evil is easily crushed at its birth; when it has become of long standing, it usually gets stronger. But then every body was waiting for the first of January; perhaps not very wisely.

However, let us say no more of what is past Are we still to allow any farther delay while the ambassadors are on their road to him? and while they are coming back again? and the time spent in waiting for them will make men doubt about the war. And while the fact of the war is in doubt, how can men possibly be zealous about the levies for the army?

Wherefore, O conscript fathers, I give my vote that there should be no mention made of ambassadors. I think that the business that is to be done must be done without any delay and instantly. I say that it is necessary that we should decree that there is sedition abroad, that we should suspend the regular courts of justice, order all men to wear the garb of war, and enlist men in all quarters suspending all exemptions from military service in the city and in all Italy except in Gaul. And if this be done, the general opinion and report of your severity will overwhelm the insanity of that wicked gladiator. He will feel that he has undertaken a war against the republic; he will experience the sinews and vigor of a unanimous senate. For at present he is constantly saying that it is a mere struggle between parties. Between what parties? One party is defeated, the other is the heart of Caius Caesar's party. Unless, indeed we believe that the party of Caesar is attacked by Pansa and Hirtius the consuls and by Caius Caesar's son. But this war has been kindled not by a struggle between parties, but by the nefarious hopes of the most abandoned citizens; by whom all our estates and properties had been marked down, and already distributed according as every one has thought them desirable.

I have read the letter of Antonius which he sent to one of the septemviri, a thorough-paced scoundrel, a. colleague of his own. “Look out, and see what you take a fancy to; what you do fancy you shall certainly have.” See to what a man we are sending ambassadors; against what a man we are delaying to make war; a man who does not even let us draw lots for our fortunes, but hands us over to each man's caprice in such a way, that he has not left even himself any thing untouched, or which has not been promised to somebody. With this man, O conscript fathers, we must wage war,—war, I say, and that instantly. We must reject the slow proceedings of ambassadors.

Therefore, that we may not have a number of decrees to pass every day, I give my vote that the whole republic should be committed to the consuls; and that they should have a charge given them to defend the republic, and to take care “that the republic suffer no injury.” And I give my vote that those men who are in the army of Antonius be not visited with blame, if they leave him before the first of February.

If you adopt these proposals or mine, O conscript fathers, you will in a short time recover the liberty of the Roman people and your own authority. But if you act with more mildness, still you will pass those resolutions, but perhaps you will pass them too late. As to the general welfare of the republic, on which you, O consuls, have consulted us, I think that I have proposed what is sufficient.

The next question is about honors. And to this point I perceive that I must speak next. But I will preserve the same order in paying respect to brave men, that is usually preserved in asking their opinions.

Let us, therefore, according to the usages of our ancestors, begin with Brutus, the consul elect; and, to say nothing of his former conduct,—which has indeed been most admirable, but still such as has been praised by the individual judgments of men, rather than by public authority,—what words can we find adequate to his praise at this very time? For such great virtue requires no reward except this one of praise and glory; and even if it were not to receive that, still it would be content with itself, and would rejoice at being laid up in the recollection of grateful citizens, as if it were placed in the full light. The praise then of our deliberate opinion, and of our testimony in his favor, must be given to Brutus. Therefore, O conscript fathers, I give my vote that a resolution of the senate be passed a these words:

“As Decimus Brutus, imperator, consul elect, is maintaining the province of Gaul in obedience to the senate and people of Rome; and as he has enlisted and collected in so short a time a very numerous army, being aided by the admirable zeal of the municipal towns and colonies of the province of Gaul, which has deserved and still does deserve admirably well of the republic; he has acted rightly and virtuously, and greatly for the advantage of the republic. And that most excellent service done by Decimus Brutus to the republic, is and always will be, grateful to the senate and people of Rome. Therefore, the senate and the Roman people is of opinion that the exertions, and prudence, and virtue of Decimus Brutus, imperator and consul-elect, and the incredible zeal and unanimity of the province of Gaul, have been a great assistance to the republic, at a most critical time.”

What honor, O conscript fathers, can be too great to be due to such a mighty service as this of Brutus, and to such important aid as he has afforded the republic? For if Gaul had been open to Marcus Antonius—if after having overwhelmed the municipal towns and colonies unprepared to resist him, he had been able to penetrate into that farther Gaul—what great danger would have hung over the republic! That most insane of men, that man so headlong and furious in all his courses,—would have been likely I suppose to hesitate at waging war against us not only with his own army but with all the savage troops of barbarism, so that even the wall of the Alps would not have enabled us to check his frenzy. These thanks then will be deservedly paid to Decimus Brutus, who, before any authority of yours had been interposed, acting on his own judgment and responsibility, refused to receive him as consul, but repelled him from Gaul as an enemy, and preferred to be besieged himself rather than to allow this city to be so. Let him therefore have, by your decree, an everlasting testimony to this most important and glorious action, and let Gaul,[*](The English reader must recollect that what is called Gaul in these orations, is Cisalpine Gaul, containing what we now call the North of Italy, coming down as far south as Modena and Ravenna.) which always is and has been a protection to this empire and to the general liberty be deservedly and truly praised for not having surrendered herself and her power to Antonius but for having opposed him with them.

And, furthermore I give my vote that the most simple honors be decreed to Marcus Lepidus as a reward for his eminent services to the republic. He has at all times wished the Roman people to be free; and he gave the greatest proof of his inclination and opinion on that day, when, while Antonius was placing the diadem on Caesar's head, he turned his face away, and by his groans and sorrow showed plainly what a hatred of slavery he had, how desirous he was for the Roman people to be free, and how he had endured those things which he had endured, more because of the necessity of the times, than because they harmonized with his sentiments. And who of us can forget with what great moderation he behaved during that crisis of the city which ensued after the death of Caesar? These are great merits; but I hasten to speak of greater still. For (O ye immortal gods!) what could happen more to be admired by foreign nations, or more to be desired by the Roman people than, at a time when there was a most important civil war, the result of which we were all dreading, that it should be extinguished by prudence rather than that arms and violence should be able to put every thing to the hazard of a battle? And if Caesar had been guided by the same principles in that odious and miserable war, we should have—to say nothing of their father—the two sons of Cnaeus Pompeius, that most illustrious and virtuous man, safe among us; men whose piety and filial affection certainly ought not to have been their ruin. Would that Marcus. Lepidus had been able to save them all! He showed that he would have done so, by his conduct in cases where he had the power; when he restored Sextus Pompeius to the state, a great ornament to the republic, and a most illustrious monument of his clemency. Sad was that picture, melancholy was the destiny then of the Roman people. For after Pompeius the father was dead, he who was the light of the Roman people, the son too, who was wholly like his father, was also slain. But all these calamities appear to me to have been effaced by the kindness of the immortal gods, Sextus Pompeius being preserved to the republic.

For which cause, reasonable and important as it is, and because Marcus Lepidus, by his humanity and wisdom, has changed a most dangerous and extensive civil war into peace and concord, I give my vote, that a resolution of the senate be drawn up in these words:

“Since the affairs of the republic have repeatedly been well and prosperously conducted by Marcus Lepidus, imperator, and Pontifex Maximus, and since the Roman people is fully aware that kingly power is very displeasing to him; and since by his exertions, and virtue, and prudence, and singular clemency and humanity, a most bitter civil war has been extinguished; and Sextus Pompeius Magnus, the son of Cnaeus, having submitted to the authority of this order and laid down his arms, and, in accordance with the perfect good-will of the senate and people of Rome, has been restored to the state by Marcus Lepidus, imperator, and Pontifex Maximus; the senate and people of Rome, in return for the important and numerous services of Marcus Lepidus to the republic, declares that it places great hopes of future tranquillity and peace and concord, in his virtue, authority, and good fortune; and the senate and people of Rome will ever remember his services to the republic; and it is decreed by the vote of this order, that a gilt equestrian statue be erected to him in the Rostra, or in whatever other place in the forum he pleases.”

And this honor, O conscript fathers, appears to me a very great one, in the first place, because it is just;—for it is not merely given on account of our hopes of the future, but it is paid, as it were, in requital of his ample services already done. Nor are we able to mention any instance of this honor having been conferred on any one by the senate by their own free and voluntary judgment before.