In respect of the honors proposed by Cicero in the last speech the senate agreed with him, voting to Octavius honors beyond any that Cicero had proposed. But they were much divided about the question of sending an embassy to Antonius; and the consuls, seeing that a majority agreed with Cicero, adjourned the debate till the next day. The discussion lasted three days, and the senate would at last have adopted all Cicero's measures, if one of the tribunes, Salvius, had not put his veto on them. So that at last the embassy was ordered to be sent, and Servius Sulpicius, Lucius Piso, and Lucius Philippus, appointed as the ambassadors; but they were charged merely to order Antonius to abandon the siege of Mutina, and to desist from hostilities against the province of Gaul; and farther, to proceed to Decimus Brutus in Mutina, and to give him and his army the thanks of the senate and people.

The length of the debates roused the curiosity of the people, who, being assembled in the forum to learn the result, called on Cicero to come forth and give them an account of what had been done; on which he went to the rostra, accompanied by Publius Appuleius the tribune, and related to them all that had passed in the following speech.

I am well aware, O Romans, that this decision is disapproved of by you; and reasonably too. For to whom are we sending ambassadors? Is it not to him who, after having dissipated and squandered the public money, and imposed laws on the Roman people by violence and in violation of the auspices,—after having put the assembly of the people to flight and besieged the senate, sent for the legions from Brundusium to oppress the republic? who, when deserted by them; has invaded Gaul with a troop of banditti? who is attacking Brutus? who is besieging Mutina? How can you offer conditions to, or expect equity from, or send an embassy to, or, in short, have any thing in common with, this gladiator? Although, O Romans, it is not an embassy, but a denunciation of war if he does not obey. For the decree has been drawn up as if ambassadors were being sent to Hannibal. For men are sent to order him not to attack the consul elect, not to besiege Mutina, not to lay waste the province, not to enlist troops, but to submit himself to the power of the senate and people of Rome. No doubt he is a likely man to obey this injunction, and to submit to the power of the conscript fathers and to yours, who has never even had any mastery over himself. For what has he ever done that showed any discretion, being always led away wherever his lust, or his levity, or his frenzy, or his drunkenness has hurried him? He has always been under the dominion of two very dissimilar classes of men, pimps and robbers; he is so fond of domestic adulteries and forensic murders, that he would rather obey a most covetous woman than the senate and people of Rome.

Therefore, I will do now before you what I have just done in the senate. I call you to witness, I give notice, I predict beforehand, that Marcus. Antonius will do nothing whatever of those things which the ambassadors are commissioned to command him to do; but that he will lay waste the lands, and besiege Mutina, and enlist soldiers, wherever he can. For he is a man who has at all times despised the judgment and authority of the senate, and your inclinations and power. Will he do what it has been just now decreed that he shall do,—lead his army back across the Rubicon, which is the frontier of Gaul, and yet at the same time not come nearer Rome than two hundred miles? Will he obey this notice? will he allow himself to be confined by the river Rubicon, and by the limit of two hundred miles? Antonius is not that sort of man. For if he had been, he would never have allowed matters to come to such a pass, as for the senate to give him notice, as it did to Hannibal at the beginning of the Punic war not to attack Saguntum. But what ignominy it is to be called away from Mutina, and at the same time to be forbidden to approach the city as if he were some fatal conflagration! what an opinion is this for the senate to have of a man! What? As to the commission which is given to the ambassadors to visit Decimus Brutus and his soldiers, and to inform them that their excellent zeal in behalf of, and services done to the republic, are acceptable to the senate and people of Rome, and that that conduct shall tend to their great glory and to their great honor; do you think that Antonius will permit the ambassadors to enter Mutina? and to depart from thence in safety? He never will allow it, believe me. I know the violence of the man, I know his impudence, I know his audacity.

Nor, indeed, ought we to think of him as of a human being, but as of a most ill-omened beast. And as this is the case, the decree which the senate has passed is not wholly improper. The embassy has some severity in it; I only wish it had no delay. For as in the conduct of almost every affair slowness and procrastination are hateful, so above all things does this war require promptness of action. We must assist Decimus Brutus; we must collect all our forces from all quarters; we can not lose a single hour in effecting the deliverance of such a citizen without wickedness. Was it not in his power, if he had considered Antonius a consul, and Gaul the province of Antonius, to have given over the legions and the province to Antonius? and to return home himself? and to celebrate a triumph? and to be the first man in this body to deliver his opinion, until he entered on his magistracy? What was the difficulty of doing that? But as he remembered that he was Brutus, and that he was born for your freedom, not for his own tranquillity, what else did he do but—as I may almost say—put his own body in the way to prevent Antonius from entering Gaul? Ought we then to send ambassadors to this man, or legions? However, we will say nothing of what is past. Let the ambassadors hasten, as I see that they are about to do. Prepare your robes of war. For it has been decreed, that, if he does not obey the authority of the senate, we are all to betake ourselves to our military dress. And we shall have to do so. He will never obey. And we shall lament that we have lost so many days, when we might have been doing something.

I have no fear, O Romans, that when Antonius hears that I have asserted, both in the senate and in the assembly of the people, that he never will submit himself to the power of the senate, he will, for the sake of disproving my words, and making me to appear to have had no foresight, alter his behavior and obey the senate. He will never do so. He will not grudge me this part of my reputation; he will prefer letting me be thought wise by you to being thought modest himself. Need I say more? Even if he were willing to do so himself, do you think that his brother Lucius would permit him? It has been reported that lately at Tibur, when Marcus Antonius appeared to him to he wavering, he, Lucius, threatened his brother with death. And do we suppose that the orders of the senate, and the words of the ambassadors, will be listened to by this. Asiatic gladiator? It will be impossible for him to be separated from a brother, especially from one of so much authority. For he is another Africanus among them. He is considered of more influence than Lucius Trebellius, of more than Titus Plancus a noble young man. As for Plancus, who, having been condemned by the unanimous vote of every one, amid the overpowering applause of you yourselves, somehow or other got mixed up in this crowd, and returned with a countenance so sorrowful, that he appeared to have been dragged back rather than to have returned, he despises him to such degree, as if he were interdicted from fire and water. At times he says that that man who set the senate-house on fire has no right to a place in the senate-house. For at this moment he is exceedingly in love with Trebellius. He hated him some time ago, when he was opposing an abolition of debts; but now he delights in him, ever since he has seen that Trebellius himself can not continue in safety without an abolition of debts. For I think that you have heard, O Romans, what indeed you may possibly have seen, that the sureties and creditors of Lucius Trebellius meet every day. Oh confidence! for I imagine that Trebellius has taken this surname; what can be greater confidence than defrauding one's creditors? than flying from one's house? than, because of one's debts, being forced to go to war? What has become of the applauses which he received on the occasion of Caesar's triumph, and often at the games? Where is the aedileship that was conferred on him by the zealous efforts of all good men? who is there who does not now think that he acted virtuously by accident?

However, I return to your love and especial delight, Lucius Antonius, who has admitted you all to swear allegiance to him. Do you deny it? is there any one of you who does not belong to a tribe? Certainly not. But thirty-five tribes have adopted him for their patron. Do you again cry out against my statement? Look at that gilt statue of him on the left: what is the inscription upon it? “The thirty-five tribes to their patron.” Is then Lucius Antonius the patron of the Roman people? Plague take him! For I fully assent to your outcry. I won't speak of this bandit whom no one would choose to have for a client; but was there ever a man possessed of such influence, or illustrious and mighty deeds, as to dare to call himself the patron of the whole Roman people, the conqueror and master of all nations? We see in the forum a statue of Lucius Antonius; just as we see one of Quintus Tremulus, who conquered the Hernici, before the temple of Castor. Oh the incredible impudence of the man! Has he assumed all this credit to himself, because as a mirmillo at Mylasa he slew the Thracian, his friend? How should we be able to endure him, if he had fought in this forum before the eyes of you all? But, however, this is but one statue. He has another erected by the Roman knights who received horses from the state;After the year B.C. 403, there were two classes of Roman knights; one of which received a horse from the state, and were included in the eighteen centuries of service; the other class, first mentioned by Livy (v. 7) in the account of the siege of Veii, served with their own horses, and instead of having a horse found them, received a certain pay (three times that of the infantry), and were not included in the eighteen centuries of service. The original knights, to distinguish them from these latter, are often called equites equo publico, sometimes also flexumines or trossuli. Vide Smith, Dict. Ant. p. 394-96, v. Equites. and they too inscribe on that, “To their patron.” Who was ever before adopted by that order as its patron? If it ever adopted any one as such, it ought to have adopted me. What censor was ever so honored? what imperator? “But he distributed land among them.” Shame on their sordid natures for accepting it! shame on his dishonesty for giving it!

Moreover, the military tribunes who were in the army of Caesar have erected him a statue. What order is that? There have been plenty of tribunes in our numerous legions in so many years. Among them he has distributed the lands of Semurium. The Campus Martius was all that was left, if he had not first fled with his brother. But this allotment of lands was put an end to a little while ago, O Romans, by the declaration of his opinion by Lucius Caesar, a most illustrious man and a most admirable senator. For we all agreed with him and annulled the acts of the septemvirs. So all the kindness of NuculaHe had been one of the septemvirs appointed to preside over the distribution of the lands. goes for nothing; and the patron Antonius is at a discount. For those who had taken possession will depart with more equanimity. They had not been at any expense; they had not yet furnished or stocked their domains, partly because they did not feel sure of their title, and partly because they had no money.

But as for that splendid statue, concerning which, if the times were better, I could not speak without laughing, “To Lucius. Antonius, patron of the middle of Janus.”Janus was the name of a street near the temple of Janus, especially frequented by bankers and usurers. It was divided into summus, medius and imus. Horace says:—“Haec Janus summus ab imo Edocet Postquam omnis res mea Janum Ad medium fracta est.” Is it so? Is the middle of Janus a client of Lucius Antonius? Who ever was found in that Janus who would have lent Lucius Antonius a thousand sesterces?

However, we have been spending too much time in trifles. Let us return to our subject and to the war. Although it was not wholly foreign to the subject for some characters to be thoroughly appreciated by you, in order that you might in silence think over who they were against whom you were to wage war.

But I exhort you, O Romans, though perhaps other measures might have been wiser, still now to wait with calmness for the return of the ambassadors. Promptness of action has been taken from our side; but still some good has accrued to it. For when the ambassadors have reported what they certainly will report, that Antonius will not submit to you nor to the senate, who then will be so worthless a citizen as to think him deserving of being accounted a citizen? For at present there are men, few indeed, but still more than there ought to be, or than the republic deserves that there should be, who speak in this way,—“Shall we not even wait for the return of the ambassadors?” Certainly the republic itself will force them to abandon that expression and that pretense of clemency. On which account, to confess the truth to you, O Romans, I have less striven today, and labored all the less today, to induce the senate to agree with me in decreeing the existence of a seditious war and ordering the apparel of war to be assumed. I preferred having my sentiments applauded by every one in twenty day's time, to having it blamed today by a few. Wherefore, O Romans, wait now for the return of the ambassadors and devour your annoyance for a few days. And when they do return if they bring back peace, believe me that I have been desirous that they should if they bring back war, then allow me the praise of foresight. Ought I not to be provident for the welfare of my fellow-citizens? Ought I not day and night to think of your freedom and of the safety of the republic? For what do I not owe to you, O Romans, since you have preferred for all the honors of the state a man who is his own father to the most nobly born men in the republic? Am I ungrateful? Who is less so? I, who, after I had obtained those honors, have constantly labored in the forum with the same exertions as I used while striving for them. Am I inexperienced in state affairs? Who has had more practice than I, who have now for twenty years been waging war against impious citizens?

Wherefore, O Romans, with all the prudence of which I am master, and with almost more exertion than I am capable of, will I put forth my vigilance and watchfulness in your behalf In truth, what citizen is there, especially in this rank in which you have placed me, so forgetful of your kindness, so unmindful of his country, so hostile to his own dignity, as not to be roused and stimulated by your wonderful unanimity? I, as consul, have held many assemblies of the people; I have been present at many others; I have never once seen one so numerous as this one of yours now is. You have all one feeling, you have all one desire, that of averting the attempts of Marcus Antonius from the republic, of extinguishing his frenzy and crushing his audacity. All orders have the same wish. The municipal towns, the colonies, and all Italy are laboring for the same end. Therefore you have made the senate, which was already pretty firm of its own accord, firmer still by your authority. The time has come, O Romans, later altogether than for the honor of the Roman people it should have been, but still so that the things are now so ripe that they do not admit of a moment's delay. There has been a sort of fatality, if I may say so, which we have borne as it was necessary to bear it. But hereafter if any disaster happens to us it will be of our own seeking. It is impossible for the Roman people to be slaves; that people whom the immortal gods have ordained should rule over all nations. Matters are now come to a crisis. We are fighting for our freedom. Either you must conquer, O Romans, which indeed you will do if you continue to act with such piety and such unanimity, or you must do anything rather than become slaves. Other nations can endure slavery, Liberty is the inalienable possession of the Roman people.

After the senate had decided on sending them, the ambassadors immediately set out, though Servius Sulpicius was in a very bad state of health. In the meantime the partisans of Antonius in the city, with Calenus at their head, were endeavoring to gain over the rest of the citizens, by representing him as eager for an accommodation and they kept up a correspondence with him, and published such of his letters as they thought favorable for their views. Matters being in this state, Cicero, at an ordinary meeting of the senate, made the following speech to counteract the machinations of this party and to warn the citizens generally of the danger of being deluded by them.

And these men speak in this way, who on account of their trifling disposition used to be considered friends of the people. From which it may be understood that they in their hearts have at all times been disinclined to a good constitution of the state, and they were not friends of the people from inclination. For how comes it to pass that those men who were anxious to gratify the people in evil things, now, on an occasion which above all others concerns the people's interests, because the same thing would be also salutary for the republic, now prefer being wicked to being friends of the people? This noble cause of which I am the advocate has made me popular, a man who (as you know) has always opposed the rashness of the people. And those men are called, or rather they call themselves, consulars; though no man is worthy of that name except those who can support so high an honor. Will you favor an enemy? Will you let him send you letters about his hopes of success? Will you be glad to produce them? to read them? Will you even give them to wicked citizens to take copies of? Will you thus raise their courage? Will you thus damp the hopes and valor of the good? And then will you think yourself a consular, or a senator, or even a citizen! Caius Pansa, a most fearless and virtuous consul, will take what I say in good part. For I will speak with a disposition most friendly to him; but I should not consider him himself a consul, though a man with whom I am most intimate, unless he was such a consul as to devote all his vigilance, and cares, and thoughts to the safety of the republic.

Although long acquaintance, and habit, and a fellowship and resemblance in the most honorable pursuits, has bound us together from his first entrance into life; and his incredible diligence, proved at the time of the most formidable dangers of the civil war, showed that he was a favorer not only of my safety, but also of my dignity; still as I said before if he were not such a consul as I have described, I should venture to deny that he was a consul at all. But now I call him not only a consul but the most excellent and virtuous consul within my recollection; not but that there have been others of equal virtue and equal inclination, but still they have not had an equal opportunity of displaying the virtue and inclination. But the opportunity of a time of most formidable change has been afforded to his magnanimity and dignity and wisdom. And that is the time when the consulship is displayed to the greatest advantage when it governs the republic during a time which if not desirable is at all events critical and momentous. And a more critical time than the present, O conscript father, never was.

Therefore I who have been at all times an adviser of peace, and who, though all good men was considered peace and especially internal peace, desirable, have considered it more than all of them;—for the whole of career of my industry has been passed in the forum and in the senate-house and in warding off dangers from my friends. It is by this course that I have arrived at the highest honors, at moderate wealth, and at any dignity which we may be thought to have: I therefore, a nursling of peace, as I may call myself, I who, whatever I am (for I arrogate nothing to myself), should undoubtedly not have been such without internal peace: I am speaking in peril: I shudder to think how you will receive it, O conscript fathers; but still, out of regard for my unceasing desire to support and increase your dignity, I beg and entreat you, O conscript fathers, although it may be a bitter thing to hear, or an incredible thing that it should be said by Marcus Cicero, still to receive at first, without offense, what I am going to say, and not to reject it before I have fully explained what it is. I, who, I will say so over and over again, have always been a panegyrist, have always been an adviser of peace, do not wish to have peace with Marcus Antonius. I approach the rest of my speech with great hope, O conscript fathers, since I have now passed by that perilous point amid your silence.

Why then do I not wish for peace? Because it would be shameful; because it would be dangerous; because it can not possibly be real. And while I explain these three points to you, I beg of you, O conscript fathers, to listen to my words with the same kindness which you usually show to me.

What is more shameful than inconsistency, fickleness, and levity, both to individuals, and also to the entire senate? Moreover, what can be more inconsistent than on a sudden to be willing to be united in peace with a man whom you have lately adjudged to be an enemy, not by words, but by actions and by many formal decrees? Unless, indeed, when you were decreeing honors to Caius Caesar, well deserved indeed by and fairly due to him, but still unprecedented and never to be forgotten, for one single reason,—because he had levied an army against Marcus Antonius,—you were not judging Marcus Antonius to be an enemy; and unless. Antonius was not pronounced an enemy by you, when the veteran soldiers were praised by your authority, for having followed Caesar; and unless you did not declare Antonius an enemy when you promised exemptions and money and lands to those brave legions, because they had deserted him who was consul while he was an enemy.

What? when you distinguished with the highest praises Brutus, a man born under some omen, as it were, of his race and name, for the deliverance of the republic, and his army which was waging war against Antonius on behalf of the liberty of the Roman people, and the most loyal and admirable province of Gaul, did you not then pronounce Antonius an enemy? What? when you decreed that the consuls, one or both of them, should go to the war, what war was there if Antonius was not an enemy? Why then was it that most gallant man, my own colleague and intimate friend, Aulus Hirtius the consul, has set out? And in what delicate health he is; how wasted away! But the weak state of his body could not repress the vigor of his mind. He thought it fair, I suppose, to expose to danger in defense of the Roman people that life which had been preserved to him by their prayers. What? when you ordered levies of troops to be made throughout all Italy, when you suspended all exemptions from service, was he not by those steps declared to be an enemy? You see manufactories of arms in the city; soldiers, sword in hand, are following the consul; they are in appearance a guard to the consul, but in fact and reality to us; all men are giving in their names, not only without any shirking, but with the greatest eagerness; they are acting in obedience to your authority. Has not Antonius been declared an enemy by such acts?

“Oh, but we have sent ambassadors to him.” Alas, wretched that I am! why am I compelled to find fault with the senate whom I have always praised? Why? Do you think, O conscript fathers that you have induced the Roman people to approve of the sending ambassadors? Do you not perceive, do you not hear that the adoption of my opinion is demanded by them? that opinion which you, in a full house, agreed to the day before, though the day after you allowed yourselves to be brought down to a groundless hope of peace. Moreover, how shameful it is for the legions to send out ambassadors to the senate, and the senate to Antonius! Although that is not an embassy; it is a denunciation that destruction is prepared for him if he does not submit to this order. What is the difference? At all events, men's opinions are unfavorable to the measure; for all men see that ambassadors have been sent, but it is not all who are acquainted with the terms of your decree.

You must, therefore, preserve your consistency, your wisdom, your firmness, your perseverance. You must go back to the old-fashioned severity, if at least the authority of the senate is anxious to establish its credit, its honor, its renown, and its dignity, things which this order has been too long deprived of. But there was some time ago some excuse for it, as being oppressed; a miserable excuse indeed, but still a fair one; now there is none. We appeared to have been delivered from kingly tyranny; and afterward we were oppressed much more severely by domestic enemies. We did indeed turn their arms aside; we must now wrest them from their hands. And if we can not do so (I will say what it becomes one who is both a senator and a Roman to say), let us die. For how just will be the shame, how great will be the disgrace, how great the infamy to the republic, if Marcus Antonius can deliver his opinion in this assembly from the consular bench. For, to say nothing of the countless acts of wickedness committed by him while consul in the city, during which time he has squandered a vast amount of public money, restored exiles without any law, sold our revenues to all sorts of people, removed provinces from the empire of the Roman people, given men kingdoms for bribes, imposed laws on the city by violence, besieged the senate, and, at other times, excluded it from the senate-house by force of arms;—to say nothing, I say, of all this, do you not consider this, that he who has attacked Mutina, a most powerful colony of the Roman people—who has besieged a general of the Roman people, who is consul elect—who has laid waste the lands,—do you not consider, I say, how shameful and iniquitous a thing it would be for that man to be received into this order, by which he has been so repeatedly pronounced an enemy for these very reasons?

I have said enough of the shamefulness of such a proceeding; I will now speak next, as I proposed, of the danger of it; which, although it is not so important to avoid as shame, still offends the minds of the greater part of mankind even more.

Will it then be possible for you to rely on the certainty of any peace, when you see Antonius, or rather the Antonii, in the city? Unless, indeed, you despise Lucius: I do not despise even Caius. But, as I think, Lucius will be the dominant spirit,—for he is the patron of the five-and-thirty tribes, whose votes he took away by his law, by which he divided the magistracies in conjunction with Caius Caesar. He is the patron of the centuries of the Roman knights, which also he thought fit to deprive of the suffrages: he is the patron of the men who have been military tribunes; he is the patron of the middle of Janus. O ye gods! who will he able to support this man's power? especially when he has brought all his dependents into the lands. Who ever was the patron of all the tribes? and of the Roman knights? and of the military tribunes? Do you think that the power of even the Gracchi was greater than that of this gladiator will be? whom I have called gladiator, not in the sense in which sometimes Marcus. Antonius too is called gladiator, but as men call him who are speaking plain Latin. He has fought in Asia as a mirmillo. After having equipped his own companion and intimate friend in the armor of a Thracian, he slew the miserable man as he was flying; but he himself received a palpable wound, as the scar proves.

What will the man who murdered his friend in this way, when he has an opportunity, do to an enemy? and if he did such a thing as this for the fun of the thing, what do you think he will do when tempted by the hope of plunder? Will he not again meet wicked men in the decuries? will he not again tamper with those men who have received lands? will he not again seek those who have been banished? will he not, in short, be Marcus Antonius; to whom, on the occasion of every commotion, there will be a rush of all profligate citizens? Even if there be no one else except those who are with him now, and these who in this body now openly speak in his favor, will they be too small in number? especially when all the protection which we might have had from good men is lost, and when those men are prepared to obey his nod? But I am afraid, if at this time we fail to adopt wise counsels, that that party will in a short time appear too numerous for us. Nor have I any dislike to peace; only I do dread war disguised under the name of peace. Wherefore, if we wish to enjoy peace we must first wage war. If we shrink from war, peace we shall never have.

But it becomes your prudence, O conscript fathers, to provide as far forward as possible for posterity. That is the object for which we were placed in this garrison, and as it were on this watch-tower; that by our vigilance and foresight we might keep the Roman people free from fear. It would be a shameful thing, especially in so clear a case as this, for it to be notorious that wisdom was wanting to the chief council of the whole world. We have such consuls, there is such eagerness on the part of the Roman people, we have such a unanimous feeling of all Italy in our favor, such generals, and such armies, that the republic cannot possibly suffer any disaster without the senate being in fault. I, for my part, will not be wanting. I will warn you, I will forewarn you, I will give you notice, I will call gods and men to witness what I do really believe. Nor will I display my good faith alone, which perhaps may seem to be enough, but which in a chief citizen is not enough; I will exert all my care, and prudence, and vigilance.

I have spoken about danger. I will now proceed to prove to you that it is not possible for peace to be firmly cemented; for of the propositions which I promised to establish this is the last.

What peace can there be between Marcus Antonius and (in the first, place) the senate? with what face will he be able to look upon you, and with what eyes will you, in turn, look upon him? Which of you does not hate him? which of you does not he hate? Come, are you the only people who hate him, and whom he hates? What? what do you think of those men who are besieging Mutina, who are levying troops in Gaul, who are threatening your fortunes? will they ever be friends to you, or you to them? will he embrace the Roman knights? For, suppose their inclinations respecting, and their opinions of Antonius were very much concealed, when they stood in crowds on the steps of the temple of Concord, when they stimulated you to endeavor to recover your liberty, when they demanded arms, the robe of war, and war, and who, with the Roman people, invited me to meet in the assembly of the people, will these men ever become friends to Antonius? will Antonius ever maintain peace with them? For why should I speak of the whole Roman people? which, in a full and crowded forum, twice, with one heart and one voice, summoned me into the assembly, and plainly showed their excessive eagerness for the recovery of their liberty. So, desirable as it was before to have the Roman people for our comrade, we now have it for our leader.

What hope then is there that there ever can be peace between the Roman people and the men who are besieging Mutina and attacking a general and army of the Roman people? Will there be peace with the municipal towns, whose great zeal is shown by the decrees which they pass, by the soldiers whom they furnish, by the sums which they promise, so that in each town there is such a spirit as leaves no one room to wish for a senate of the Roman people? The men of Firmium deserve to be praised by a resolution of our order, who set the first example of promising money; we ought to return a complimentary answer to the Marrucini, who have passed a vote that all who evade military service are to be branded with infamy. These measures are adopted all over Italy. There is great peace between Antonius and these men, and between them and him! What greater discord can there possibly be? And in discord civil peace can not by any possibility exist. To say nothing of the mob, look at Lucius Visidius, a Roman knight, a man of the very highest accomplishments and honor, a citizen always eminent, whose watchfulness and exertions for the protection of my life I felt in my consulship; who not only exhorted his neighbors to become soldiers, but also assisted them from his own resources; will it be possible ever to reconcile Antonius to such a man as this, a man whom we ought to praise by a formal resolution of the senate? What? will it be possible to reconcile him to Caius Caesar, who prevented him from entering the city, or to Decimus Brutus, who has refused him entrance into Gaul? Moreover, will he reconcile himself to, or look mercifully on the province of Gaul, by which he has been excluded and rejected? You will see every thing, O conscript fathers, if you do not take care, full of hatred and full of discord, from which civil wars arise. Do not then desire that which is impossible; and beware, I entreat you by the immortal gods, O conscript fathers, that out of hope of present peace you do not lose perpetual peace.

What now is the object of this oration? For we do not yet know what the ambassadors have done. But still we ought to be awake, erect, prepared, armed in our minds, so as not to be deceived by any civil or supplicatory language, or by any pretense of justice. He must have complied with all the prohibitions and all the commands which we have sent him, before he can demand any thing. He must have desisted from attacking Brutus and his army, and from plundering the cities and lands of the province of Gaul; he must have permitted the ambassadors to go to Brutus, and led his army back on this side of the Rubicon, and yet not come within two hundred miles of this city. He must have submitted himself to the power of the senate and of the Roman people. If he does this, then we shall have an opportunity of deliberating without any decision being forced upon us either way. If he does not obey the senate, then it will not be the senate that declares war against him, but he who will have declared it against the senate.

But I warn you, O conscript fathers, the liberty of the Roman people, which is entrusted to you, is at stake. The life and fortune of every virtuous man is at stake, against which Antonius has long been directing his insatiable covetousness, united to his savage cruelty. Your authority is at stake, which you will wholly lose if you do not maintain it now. Beware how you let that foul and deadly beast escape now that you have got him confined and chained. You too, Pansa, I warn (although you do not need counsel, for you have plenty of wisdom yourself: but still, even the most skillful pilots receive often warnings from the passengers in terrible storms.), not to allow this vast and noble preparation which you have made to fall away to nothing. You have such an opportunity as no one ever had. It is in your power so to avail yourself of this wise firmness of the senate, of this zeal of the equestrian order, of this ardor of the Roman people, as to release the Roman people from fear and danger forever. As to the matters to which your motion before the senate refers, I agree with Publius Servilius.

After the embassy to Antonius had left Rome, the consuls zealously exerted themselves in preparing for war, in case he should reject the demands of the ambassadors. Hirtius, though in bad health, left Rome first, at the head of an army containing, among others, the Martial and the fourth legions; intending to join Octavius, and hoping with his assistance to prevent his gaining any advantage over Brutus till Pansa could join them. And he gained some advantages over Antonius at once.

About the beginning of February the two remaining ambassadors (for Servius Sulpicius had died just as they arrived at Antonius's camp) returned, bringing word that Antonius would comply with none of the commands of the senate, nor allow them to proceed to Decimus Brutus; and bringing also (contrary to their duty) demands from him, of which the principal were, that his troops were to be rewarded, all the acts of himself and Dolabella to be ratified, as also all that he had done respecting Caesar's papers; that no account was to be required of him of the money in the temple of Ops; and that he should have the further Gaul with an army of six legions.

Pansa summoned the senate to receive the report of the ambassadors when Cicero made a severe speech, proposing very vigorous measures against Antonius; which, however, Calenus and his party were still numerous enough to mitigate very greatly; and even Pansa voted against him and in favor of the milder measures; though they could not prevail against Cicero to have a second embassy sent to Antonius, and though Cicero carried his point of ordering the citizens to assume the sagum, or robe of war, which he also (waiving his privilege as a man of consular rank) wore himself The next day the senate met again, to draw up in form the decrees on which they had resolved the day before; when Cicero addressed the following speech to them, expostulating with them for their wavering the day before.