What a man, O ye immortal gods! and how great a man might you have been, if you
had been able to preserve the inclination you displayed that day;—we
should still have peace which was made then by the pledge of a hostage, a boy of
noble birth, the grandson of Marcus Bamballo. Although it was fear that was then
making you a good citizen, which is never a lasting teacher of duty; your own
audacity, which never departs from you as long as you are free from fear, has
made you a worthless one. Although even at that time, when they thought you an
excellent man, though I indeed differed from that opinion, you behaved with the
greatest wickedness while presiding at the funeral of the tyrant, if that ought
to be called a funeral. All that fine
panegyric was yours, that commiseration was yours, that exhortation was yours.
It was you—you, I say—who hurled those firebrands, both
those with which your friend himself was nearly burned, and those by which the
house of Lucius Bellienus was set on fire and destroyed. It was you who let
loose those attacks of abandoned men, slaves for the most part, which we
repelled by violence and our own personal exertions; it was you who set them on
to attack our houses. And yet you, as if you had wiped off all the soot and
smoke in the ensuing days, carried those excellent resolutions in the Capitol,
that no document conferring any exemption, or granting any favor, should he
published after the ides of March. You recollect yourself, what you said about
the exiles; you know what you said about the exemption; but the best thing of
all was, that you forever abolished the name of the dictatorship in the
republic. Which act appeared to show that you had conceived such a hatred of
kingly power that you took away all fear of it for the future, on account of him
who had been the last dictator.
To other men the republic now seemed established, but it did not appear so at all
to me, as I was afraid of every sort of shipwreck, as long as you were at the
helm. Have I been deceived? or, was it possible for that man long to continue
unlike himself? While you were all looking on, documents were fixed up over the
whole Capitol, and exemptions were being sold, not merely to individuals, but to
entire states. The freedom of the city was also being given now not to single
persons only, but to whole provinces. Therefore, if these acts are to
stand,—and stand they can not if the republic stands
too,—then, O conscript fathers, you have lost whole provinces; and not
the revenues only, but the actual empire of the Roman people has been diminished
by a market this man held in his own house.
Where are the seven hundred millions of sesterces which were entered in the
account-books which are in the temple of Ops? a sum lamentable indeed, as to the
means by which it was procured, but still one which, if it were not restored to
those to whom it belonged, might save us from taxes. And how was it, that when
you owed forty millions of sesterces on the fifteenth of March, you had ceased
to owe them by the first of April? Those things are quite countless which were
purchased of different people, not without your knowledge; but there was one
excellent decree posted up in the Capitol affecting king Deiotarus, a most
devoted friend to the Roman people. And when that decree was posted up, there
was no one who, amid all his indignation, could restrain his laughter.
For who ever was a more bitter enemy to
another than Caesar was to Deiotarus? He was as hostile to him as he was to this
order, to the equestrian order, to the people of Massilia, and to all men whom he knew to look on the republic
of the Roman people with attachment. But this man, who neither present nor
absent could ever obtain from him any favor or justice while he was alive,
became quite an influential man with him when he was dead. When present with him
in his house, he had called for him though he was his host, he had made him give
in his accounts of his revenue, he had exacted money from him; he had
established one of his Greek retainers in his tetrarchy, and he had taken
Armenia from him, which had been
given to him by the senate. While he was alive he deprived him of all these
things; now that he is dead, he gives them back again. And in what words? At one time he says, “that it
appears to him to be just,...” at another, “that it appears
not to be unjust...” What a strange combination of words! But while
alive (I know this, for I always supported Deiotarus, who was at a distance), he
never said that anything which we were asking for, for him, appeared just to
him. A bond for ten millions of sesterces was entered into in the women's
apartment (where many things have been sold, and are still being sold), by his
ambassadors, well-meaning men, but timid and inexperienced in business, without
my advice or that of the rest of the hereditary friends of the monarch. And I
advise you to consider carefully what you intend to do with reference to. this
bond. For the king himself, of his own accord, without. waiting for any of
Caesar's memoranda, the moment that her heard of his death, recovered his own
rights by his own courage and energy. He,
like a wise man, knew that this was always the law, that those men from whom the
things which tyrants had taken away had been taken, might recover them when the
tyrants were slain. No lawyer, therefore, not even he who is your lawyer and
yours alone, and by whose advice you do all these things, will say that any
thing is due to you by virtue of that bond for those things which had been
recovered before that bond was executed. For he did not purchase them of you;
but, before you undertook to sell him his own property, be had taken possession
of it. He was a man—we, indeed, deserve to be despised, who hate the
author of the actions, but uphold the actions themselves.
Why need I mention the countless mass of papers, the innumerable autographs which
have been brought forward? writings of which there are imitators who sell their
forgeries as openly as if they were gladiators playbills. Therefore, there are
now such heaps of money piled up in that man's house, that it is weighed out
instead of being counted.This accidental resemblance to the
incident in the “Forty Thieves” in the
“Arabian Nights” is curious. But bow blind is
avarice! Lately, too, a document has been posted up by which the most wealthy
cities of the Cretans are released from tribute; and by which it is ordained
that after the expiration of the consulship of Marcus Brutus, Crete shall cease to be a province. Are you in
your senses.? Ought you not to be put in confinement? Was it possible for there
really to be a decree of Caesar's exempting Crete after the departure of Marcus. Brutus, when Brutus had no
connection whatever with Crete while
Caesar was alive? But by the sale of this decree (that you may not, O conscript
fathers, think it wholly ineffectual) you have lost the province of Crete. There was nothing in the whole world
which any one wanted to buy that this fellow was not ready to sell.
Caesar too, I suppose, made the law about the exiles which you have posted up. I
do not wish to press upon any one in misfortune; I only complain, in the first
place, that the return of those men has had discredit thrown upon it, whose
cause Caesar judged to be different from that of the rest; and in the second
place, I do not know why you do not mete out the same measure to all. For there
can not be more than three or four left. Why do not they who are in similar
misfortune enjoy a similar degree of your mercy? Why do you treat them as you
treated your uncle? about whom you refused to pass a law when you were passing
one about all the rest; and whom at the same time you encouraged to stand for
the censorship, and instigated him to a canvass, which excited the ridicule and
the complaint of every one.
But why did you not hold that comitia? Was it
because a tribune of the people announced that there had been an ill-omened
flash of lightning seen? When you have any interest of your own to serve, then
auspices are all nothing; but when it is only your friends who are concerned,
then you become scrupulous. What more? Did you not also desert him in the matter
of the septemvirate?The septemviri, at full length septemviri
epulones or epulonum, were
originally triumviri. They were first created
A. C. 198, to attend to the epulum Jovis, and the banquets given in honour of the other
gods, which duty had originally belonged to the pontifices. Julius Caesar
added three more, but that alteration did not last. They formed a collegium, and were one of the four great religious
corporations at Rome with the
pontifices, the augures, and the quindecemviri.
Smith, Dict. Ant. v. Epulones.
“Yes, for he interfered with me.” What were you afraid of? I
suppose you were afraid that you would be able to refuse him nothing if he were
restored to the full possession of his rights. You loaded him with every species
of insult, a man whom you ought to have considered in the place of a father to
you, if you had had any piety or natural affection at all, You put away his
daughter, your own cousin, having already looked out and provided yourself
beforehand with another. That was not enough. You accused a most chaste woman of
misconduct. What can go beyond this? Yet you were not content with this. In a
very full senate held on the first of January, while your uncle was present, you
dared to say that this was your reason for hatred of Dolabella, that you had
ascertained that he had committed adultery with your cousin and your wife, Who
can decide whether it was more shameless of you to make such profligate and such
impious statements against that unhappy woman in the senate, or more wicked to
make them against Dolabella, or more scandalous to make them in the presence of
her father, or more cruel to make them at all?
However, let us return to the subject of Caesar's written papers. How were they
verified by you? For the acts of Caesar were for peace's sake confirmed by the
senate; that is to say, the acts which Caesar had really done, not those which
Antonius said that Caesar had done. Where do all these come from? By whom are
they produced and vouched for? If they are false, why are they ratified? If they
are true, why are they sold? But the vote which was come to enjoined you, after
the first of June, to make an examination of Caesar's acts with the assistance
of a council. What council did you consult? whom did you ever invite to help
you? what was the first of June that you waited for? Was it that day on which
you, having traveled all through the colonies where the veterans were settled,
returned escorted by a band of armed men?
Oh what a splendid progress of yours was that in the months of April and May,
when you attempted even to lead a colony to Capua! How you made your escape from thence, or rather how you
barely made your escape, we all know. And
now you are still threatening that city. I wish you would try, and we should not
then be forced to say “barely.” However, what a splendid
progress of yours that was! Why need I mention your preparations for banquets,
why your frantic hard drinking? Those things are only an injury to yourself;
these are injuries to us. We thought that a great blow was inflicted on the
republic when the Campanian district was released from the payment of taxes, in
order to be given to the soldiery; but you have divided it among your partners
in drunkenness and gambling. I tell you, O conscript fathers, that a lot of
buffoons and actresses have been settled in the district of Campania. Why should I now complain of what
has been done in the district of Leontini? Although formerly these lands of
Campania and Leontini were
considered part of the patrimony of the Roman people, and were productive of
great revenue, and very fertile. You gave your physician three thousand acres;
what would you have done if he had cured you? and two thousand to your master of
oratory; what would you have done if he had been able to make you eloquent?
However, let us return to your progress, and to Italy.
You led a colony to Casilinum, a place
to which Caesar had previously led one. You did indeed consult me by letter
about the colony of Capua (but I
should have given you the same answer about Casilinum), whether you could legally lead a new colony to a
place where there was a colony already. I said that a new colony could not be
legally conducted to an existing colony, which had been established with a due
observance of the auspices, as long as it remained in a flourishing state; but I
wrote you word that new colonists might be enrolled among the old ones. But you,
elated and insolent, disregarding all the respect due to the auspices, led a
colony to Casilinum, whither one had
been previously led a few years before; in order to erect your standard there,
and to mark out the line of the new colony with a plow. And by that plow you
almost grazed the gate of Capua, so
as to diminish the territory of that flourishing colony. After this violation of all religious observances, you
hasten off to the estate of Marcus Varro, a most conscientious and upright man,
at Casinum. By what right? with
what face do you do this? By just the same, you will say, as that by which you
entered on the estates of the heirs of Lucius Rubrius, or of the heirs of Lucius
Turselius, or of other innumerable possessions. If you got the right from any
auction, let the auction have all the force to which it is entitled; let
writings be of force, provided they are the writings of Caesar, and not your
own; writings by which you are bound, not those by which you have released
yourself from obligation.
But who says that the estate of Varro at Casinum was ever sold at all? who ever saw any notice of that
auction? who ever heard the voice of the auctioneer? You say that you sent a man
to Alexandria to buy it of
Caesar. It was too long to wait for Caesar himself to come! But who ever heard
(and there was no man about whose safety more people were anxious) that any part
whatever of Varro's property had been confiscated? What? what shall we say if
Caesar even wrote you that you were to give it up? What can be said strong
enough for such enormous impudence? Remove for a while those swords which we see
around us. You shall now see that the cause of Caesar's auctions is one thing
and that of your confidence and rashness is another. For not only shall the
owner drive you from that estate, but any one of his friends, or neighbors, or
hereditary connections, and any agent, will have the right to do so.
But how many days did he spend reveling in the most scandalous manner in that
villa! From the third hour there was one scene of drinking, gambling, and
vomiting. Alas for the unhappy house itself! how different a master from its
former one has it fallen to the share of! Although, how is he the master at all?
but still by how different a person has it been occupied! For Marcus Varro used
it as a place of retirement for his studies, not as a theatre for his lusts.
What noble discussions used to take
place in that villa! what ideas were originated there! what writings were
composed there! The laws of the Roman people, the memorials of our ancestors,
the consideration of all wisdom and all learning, were the topics that used to
be dwelt on then;—but now, while you were the intruder there (for I
will not call you the master), every place was resounding with the voices of
drunken men; the pavements were floating with wine; the walls were dripping;
nobly-born boys were mixing with the basest hirelings; prostitutes with mothers
of families. Men came from Casinum,
from Aquinum, from Interamna to salute him. No one was admitted.
That, indeed, was proper. For the ordinary marks of respect were unsuited to the
most profligate of men. When going from
thence to Rome he approached
Aquinum, a pretty numerous
company (for it is a populous municipality) came out to meet him. But he was
carried through the town in a covered litter, as if he had been dead. The people
of Aquinum acted foolishly, no
doubt; but still they were in his road. What did the people of Anagnia do? who, although they were out of
his line of road, came down to meet him, in order to pay him their respects, as
if he were consul. It is an incredible thing to say, but still it was only too
notorious at the time, that he returned nobody's salutation; especially as he
had two men of Anagnia with him,
Mustela and Laco; one of whom had the care of his swords, and the other of his
drinking-cups.
Why should I mention the threats and insults
with which he inveighed against the people of Teanum Sidicinum, with which he
harassed the men of Puteoli,
because they had adopted Caius Cassius and the Bruti as their patrons? a choice
dictated, in truth, by great wisdom, and great zeal, benevolence, and affection
for them; not by violence and force of arms, by which men have been compelled to
choose you, and Basilus, and others like you both,—men whom no one
would choose to have for his own clients, much less to be their client himself.
In the mean time, while you yourself were absent, what a day was that for your
colleague when he overturned that tomb in the forum, which you were accustomed
to regard with veneration! And when that action was announced to you,
you—as is agreed upon by all who were with you at the
time—fainted away. What happened afterward I know not. I imagine that
terror and arms got the mastery. At all events, you dragged your colleague down
from his heaven; and you rendered him, not even now like yourself, at all events
very unlike his own former self.
After that what a return was that of yours to Rome! How great was the agitation of the whole city! We
recollected Cinna being too powerful; after him we had seen Sulla with absolute
authority, and we had lately beheld Caesar acting as king. There were perhaps
swords, but they were sheathed, and they were not very numerous. But how great
and how barbaric a procession is yours! Men follow you in battle array with
drawn swords; we see whole litters full of shields borne along. And yet by
custom, O conscript fathers, we have become inured and callous to these things,
When on the first of June we wished to come to the senate, as it had been
ordained, we were suddenly frightened and forced to flee. But he, as having no need of a senate, did not miss any of
us, and rather rejoiced at our departure, and immediately proceeded to those
marvelous exploits of his. He who had defended the memoranda of Caesar for the
sake of his own profit, overturned the laws of Caesar—and good laws
too—for the sake of being able to agitate the republic. He increased
the number of years that magistrates were to enjoy their provinces; moreover,
though he was bound to be the defender of the acts of Caesar, he rescinded them
both with reference to public and private transactions.
In public transactions nothing is more authoritative than law; in private affairs
the most valid of all deeds is a will. Of the laws, some he abolished without
giving the least notice; others he gave notice of bills to abolish. Wills he
annulled; though they have been at all times held sacred even in the case of the
very meanest of the citizens. As for the statues and pictures which Caesar
bequeathed to the people, together with his gardens, those he carried away, some
to the house which belonged to Pompeius, and some to Scipio's villa.
And are you then diligent in doing honor to Caesar's memory? Do you love him even
now that he is dead? What greater honor had he obtained than that of having a
holy cushion, an image, a temple, and a priest? As then Jupiter, and Mars, and Quirinus have priests,
so Marcus. Antonius is the priest of the god Julius. Why then do you delay? why
are not you inaugurated? Choose a day; select some one to inaugurate you; we are
colleagues; no one will refuse. O you detestable man, whether you are the priest
of a tyrant, or of a dead man! I ask you then, whether you are ignorant what day
this is? Are you ignorant that yesterday was the fourth day of the Roman games
in the Circus? and that you yourself submitted a motion to the people, that a
fifth day should be added besides, in honor of Caesar? Why are we not all clad
in the praetexta? Why are we permitting the honor which by your law was
appointed for Caesar to be deserted? Had you no objection to so holy a day being
polluted by the addition of supplications, while you did not choose it to be so
by the addition of ceremonies connected with a sacred cushion? Either take away
religion in every case, or preserve it in every case.
You will ask whether I approve of his having
a sacred cushion, a temple and a priest? I approve of none of those things. But
you, who are defending the acts of Caesar, what reason can you give for
defending some, and disregarding others? unless, indeed, you choose to admit
that you measure every thing by your own gain, and not by his dignity. What will
you now reply to these arguments—(for I am waiting to witness your
eloquence; I knew your grandfather, who was a most eloquent man, but I know you
to be a more undisguised speaker than he was; he never harangued the people
naked; but we have seen your breast, man, without disguise as you are)? Will you
make any reply to these statements? will you dare to open your mouth at all? Can
you find one single article in this long speech of mine, to which you trust that
you can make any answer? However, we will say no more of what is past.
But this single day, this very day that now is, this very moment while I am
speaking, defend your conduct during this very moment, if you can. Why has the
senate been surrounded with a belt of armed men? Why are your satellites
listening to me sword in hand? Why are not the folding-doors of the temple of
Concord open? Why do you bring men of all nations the most barbarous, Ityrcans,
armed with arrows, into the forum? He says that he does so as a guard. Is it not
then better to perish a thousand times than to be unable to live in one's own
city without a guard of armed men? But believe me, there is no protection in
that;—a man must be defended by the affection and good will of his
fellow-citizens, not by arms. The Roman
people will take them from you, will wrest them from ) our hands. I wish that
they may do so while we are still safe. But however you treat us, as long as you
adopt those counsels it is impossible for you, believe me, to last long. In
truth, that wife of yours, who is so far removed from covetousness, and whom I
mention without intending any slight to her, has been too long owingIt has been explained before that Fulvia had been the widow
of Clodius and of Curio, before she married Antonius. her third
payment to the state. The Roman people has men to whom it can entrust the helm
of the state; and wherever they are, there is all the defense of the republic,
or rather, there is the republic itself; which as yet has only avenged, but has
not reestablished itself. Truly and surely has the republic most high-born
youths ready to defend it,—though they may for a time keep in the
background from a desire for tranquillity, still they can be recalled by the
republic at any time.
The name of peace is sweet, the thing itself is most salutary. But between peace
and slavery there is a wide difference. Peace is liberty in tranquillity;
slavery is the worst of all evils,—to be repelled, if need be, not
only by war, but even by death. But if those
deliverers of ours have taken themselves away out of our sight, still they have
left behind the example of their conduct. They have done what no one else had
done. Brutus pursued Tarquinius with
war; who was a king when it was lawful for a king to exist in Rome. Spurius Cassius, Spurius. Maelius, and
Marcus.Manlius were all slain because
they were suspected of aiming at regal power. These are the first men who have
ever ventured to attack, sword in hand, a man who was not aiming at regal power,
but actually reigning. And their action is not only of itself a glorious and
godlike exploit, but it is also one put forth for our imitation; especially
since by it they have acquired such glory as appears hardly to be bounded by
heaven itself. For although in the very consciousness of a glorious action there
is a certain reward, still I do not consider immortality of glory a thing to be
despised by one who is himself mortal.
Recollect then, O Marcus Antonius, that day on which you abolished the
dictatorship. Set before you the joy of the senate and people of Rome; compare it with this infamous market
held by you and by your friends; and then you will understand how great is the
difference between praise and profit. But in truth, just as some people, through
some disease which has blunted the senses, have no conception of the niceness of
food, so men who are lustful, avaricious, and criminal, have no taste for true
glory. But if praise can not allure you to act rightly, still can not even fear
turn you away from the most shameful actions? You are not afraid of the courts
of justice. If it is because you are innocent, I praise you; if because you
trust in your power of overbearing them by violence, are you ignorant of what
that man has to fear, who on such an account as that does not fear the courts of
justice?
But if you are not afraid of brave men and illustrious citizens, because they are
prevented from attacking you by your armed retinue, still, believe me, your own
fellows will not long endure you. And what a life is it, day and night to be
fearing danger from one's own people! Unless, indeed, you have men who are bound
to you by greater kindnesses than some of those men by whom he was slain were
bound to Caesar; or unless there are points in which you can be compared with
him.
In that man were combined genius, method, memory, literature, prudence,
deliberation, and industry. He had performed exploits in war which, though
calamitous for the republic, were nevertheless mighty deeds. Having for many
years aimed at being a king, he had with great labor, and much personal danger,
accomplished what he intended. He had conciliated the ignorant multitude by
presents, by monuments, by largesses of food, and by banquets; he had bound his
own party to him by rewards, his adversaries by the appearances of clemency. Why
need I say much on such a subject? He had already brought a free city, partly by
fear, partly by patience, into a habit of slavery.
With him I can, indeed, compare you as to your desire to reign; but in all other
respects you are in no degree to be compared to him. But from the many evils
which by him have been burned into the republic, there is still this good, that
the Roman people has now learned how much to believe every one, to whom to trust
itself, and against whom to guard. Do you never think on these things? And do
you not understand that it is enough for brave men to have learned how noble a
thing it is as to the act, how grateful it is as to the benefit done, how
glorious as to the fame acquired, to slay a tyrant? When men could not bear him, do you think they will bear
you? Believe me, the time will come when men will race with one another to do
this deed, and when no one will wait for the tardy arrival of an opportunity.
Consider, I beg you, Marcus Antonius, do some time or other consider the
republic: think of the family of which you are born, not of the men with whom
you are living. Be reconciled to the republic. However, do you decide on your
conduct. As to mine, I myself will declare what that shall be. I defended the
republic as a young man, I will not abandon it now that I am old. I scorned the
sword of Catiline, I will not quail before yours. No, I will rather cheerfully
expose my own person, if the liberty of the city can her restored by my death.
May the indignation of the Roman people at last bring forth what it has been so
long laboring with. In truth, if twenty years ago in this very temple I asserted
that death could not come prematurely upon a man of consular rank, with how much
more truth must I now say the same of an old man? To me, indeed, O conscript
fathers, death is now even desirable, after all the honors which I have gained,
and the deeds which I have done. I only pray for these two things: one, that
dying I may leave the Roman people free. No greater boon than this can be
granted me by the immortal gods. The other, that every one may meet with a fate
suitable to his deserts and conduct toward the republic.