Philippicae

But who is there who can consider Marcus Antonius a citizen, rather than a most foul and barbarous enemy, who, while sitting in front of the temple of Castor, in the hearing of the Roman people, said that no one should survive except those who were victorious? Do you suppose, O conscript fathers, that he spoke with more violence than he would act? And what are we to think of his having ventured to say that, after he had given up his magistracy, he should still be at the city with his army? that he should enter the city as often as he pleased? What else was this but threatening the Roman people with slavery? And what was the object of his journey to Brundusium? and of that great haste? What was his hope, except to lead that vast army to the city or rather into the city? What a proceeding was that selection of the centurions! What unbridled fury of an intemperate mind! For when those gallant legions had raised an outcry against his promises he ordered those centurions to come to him to his house whom he perceived to be loyally attached to the republic and then he had them all murdered before his own eyes and those of his wife whom this noble commander had taken with him to the army What disposition do you suppose that this man will display toward us whom he hates when he was so cruel to those men whom he had never seen? And how covetous will he be with respect to the money of rich men when he thirsted for even the blood of poor men? whose property such as it was he immediately divided among his satellites and boon companions.

And he in a fury was now moving his hostile standards against his country from Brundusium when Caius Caesar by the kind inspiration of the immortal gods, by the greatness of his own heavenly courage, and wisdom, and genius, of his own accord, indeed and prompted by his own admirable virtue, but still with the approbation of my authority went down to the colonies which had been founded by his father; convoked the veteran soldiery; in a few days raised an army and checked the furious advance of this bandit. But after the Martial legion saw this admirable leader, it had no other thoughts but those of securing our liberty. And the fourth legion followed its example.

And Antonius, on hearing of this news after he had summoned the senate, and provided a man of consular rank to declare his opinion that Caius. Caesar was an enemy of his country, immediately fainted away. And afterward without either performing the usual sacrifices or offering the customary vows, he, I will not say went forth, but took to flight in his robe as a general. But which way did he flee? To the province of our most resolute and bravest citizens, men who could never have endured him if he had not come bringing war in his train, an intemperate, passionate, insolent, proud man, always making demands, always plundering, always drunk. But he, whose worthlessness even when quiet was more than any one could endure, has declared war upon the province of Gaul; he is besieging Mutina, a valiant and splendid colony of the Roman people; he is blockading Decimus Brutus, the general, the consul-elect, a citizen born not for himself, but for us and the republic. Was then Hannibal an enemy, and is Antonius a citizen? What did the one do like an enemy, that the other has not done, or is not doing, or planning, and thinking of? What was there in the whole of the journey of the Antonii; except depopulation, devastation, slaughter, and rapine? Actions which Hannibal never did, because he was reserving many things for his own use, these men do, as men who live merely for the present hour; they never have given a thought not only to the fortunes and welfare of the citizens, but not even to their own advantage.

Are we then, O ye good gods, to resolve to send ambassadors to this man? Are those men who propose this acquainted with the constitution of the republic, with the laws of war, with the precedents of our ancestors? Do they give a thought to what the majesty of the Roman people and the severity of the senate requires? Do you resolve to send ambassadors? If to beg his mercy, he will despise you; if to declare your commands, he will not listen to them; and last of all, however severe the message may be which we give the ambassadors, the very name of ambassadors will extinguish this ardor of the Roman people which we see at present, and break the spirit of the municipal towns and of Italy. To say nothing of these arguments, though they are weighty, at all events that sending of an embassy will cause delay and slowness to the war. Although those who propose it should say, as I hear that some intend to say,—“Let the ambassadors go, but let war be prepared for all the same.” Still the very name of ambassadors will damp men's courage, and delay the rapidity of the war.

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.

I come now to Caius Caesar, O conscript fathers; if he had not existed, which of us could have been alive now? That most intemperate of men, Antonius, was flying from Brundusium to the city, burning with hatred, with a disposition hostile to all good men, with an army. What was there to oppose to his audacity and wickedness? We had not as yet any generals, or any forces. There was no public council, no liberty; our necks were at the mercy of his nefarious cruelty; we were all preparing to have recourse to flight, though flight itself had no escape for us. Who was it—what god was it; who at that time gave to the Roman people this godlike young man, who, while every means for completing our destruction seemed open to that most pernicious citizen, rising up on a sudden, beyond every one's hope, completed an army fit to oppose the fury of Marcus Antonius before any one suspected that he was thinking of any such step? Great honors were paid to Cnaeus Pompeius when he was a young man and deservedly, for he came to the assistance of the republic but he was of a more vigorous age and more calculated to meet the eager requirements of soldiers seeking a general. He had also been already trained in other kinds of war. For the cause of Sulla was not agreeable to all men. The multitude of the proscribed, and the enormous calamities that fell on so many municipal towns show this plainly. But Caesar, though many years younger, armed veterans who were now eager to rest; he has embraced that cause which was most agreeable to the senate, to the people, to all Italy,—in short, to gods and men. And Pompeius came as a reinforcement to the extensive command and victorious army of Lucius Sulla, Caesar had no one to join himself to. He of his own accord was the author and executor of his plan of levying an army, and arraying a defense for us. Pompeius found the whole Picene district hostile to the party of his adversaries; but Caesar has levied an army against Antonius from men who were Antonius's own friends, but still greater friends to liberty. It was owing to the influence of Pompeius that Sulla was enabled to act like a king. It is by the protection afforded us by Caesar that the tyranny of Antonius has been put down.

Let us then confer on Caesar a regular military command, without which the military affairs can not be directed, the army can not be held together, war can not he waged. Let him be made propraetor with all the privileges which have ever been attached to that appointment. That honor, although it is a great one for a man of his age, still is not merely of influence as giving dignity, but it confers powers calculated to meet the present emergency. Therefore, let us seek for honors for him which we shall not easily find at the present day.

But I hope that we and the Roman people shall often have an opportunity of complimenting and honoring this young man. But at the present moment I give my vote that we should pass a decree in this form:

“As Caius Caesar, the son of Caius, pontiff and propraetor, has at a most critical period of the republic exhorted the veteran soldiers to defend the liberty of the Roman people, and has enlisted them in his army; and as the Martial legion and the fourth legion, with great zeal for the republic, and with admirable unanimity, under the guidance and authority of Caius Caesar, have defended and are defending the republic and the liberty of the Roman people; and as Caius Caesar, propraetor, has gone with his army as a reinforcement to the province of Gaul; has made cavalry, and archers, and elephants, obedient to himself and to the Roman people, and has, at a most critical time for the republic, come to the aid of the safety and dignity of the Roman people;—on these accounts, it seems good to the senate that Caius Caesar, the son of Caius, pontiff and propraetor, shall be a senator, and shall deliver his opinions from the bench occupied by men of praetorian rank; and that, on occasion of his offering himself for any magistracy, he shall be considered of the same legal standing and qualification as if he had been quaestor the preceding year.”

For what reason can there be, O conscript fathers, why we should not wish him to arrive at the highest honors at as early an age as possible? For when, by the laws fixing the age at which men might be appointed to the different magistracies, our ancestors fixed a more mature age for the consulship, they were influenced by fears of the precipitation of youth; Caius Caesar at his first entrance into life, has shown us that, in the case of his eminent and unparalleled virtue, we have no need to wait for the progress of age. Therefore our ancestors, those old men in the most ancient times, had no laws regulating the age for the different offices; it was ambition which caused them to be passed many years afterwards, in order that there might be among men of the same age different steps for arriving at honors And it has often happened that a disposition of great natural virtue has been lost before it had any opportunity of benefiting the republic

But among the ancients, the Rulli, the Decii, the Corvini, and many others and in more modern times the elder Africanus and Titus Flaminius were made consuls very young, and performed such exploits as greatly to extend the empire of the Roman people, and to embellish its name What more? Did not the Macedonian Alexander, having begun to perform mighty deeds from his earliest youth, die when he was only in his thirty-third year? And that age is ten years less than that fixed by our laws for a man to be eligible for the consulship. From which it may be plainly seen that the progress of virtue is often swifter than that of age.