In C. Verrem

You heard Onasus the Segestan, a man of noble birth, say that he had paid money to Timarchides for leave to bury the naval captain, Heraclius. And this (that you may not be able to say, “Yes, the fathers come, angry at the loss of their sons,”) is stated by a man of the highest consideration, a man of the noblest birth; and he does not state it with respect to any son of his own. And as to this, who was there at Syracuse at that time, who did not hear, and who does not know that these bargains for permission to bury were made with Timarchides by the living relations of those who had been put to death? Did they not speak openly with Timarchides? Were not all the relations of all the men present? Were not the funerals of living men openly bargained for? And then, when all those matters were settled and arranged, the men are brought out of prison and tied to the stake.

Who at that time was so cruel and hard-hearted, who was so inhuman, except you alone, as not to be moved by their youth, their high birth, and their misfortunes? Who was there who did not weep? who did not feel their calamity, as if he thought that it weep; not the fortune of others alone, but the common safety of all that was at stake? They are executed. You rejoice and triumph at the universal misery; you are delighted that the witnesses of your avarice are put out of the way: you were mistaken, O Verres, you were greatly mistaken, when you thought that you could wash out the stains of your thefts and iniquities in the blood of our innocent allies. You were borne on headlong in your frenzy, when you thought that you could heal the wounds of your avarice by applying remedies of inhumanity. In truth, although those who were the witnesses of your wickedness are dead, yet their relations are wanting neither to you nor to them; yet, out of this very body of naval captains some are alive, and are present here; whom, as it seems to me, fortune saved out of that punishment of innocent men.

For this trial Philarchus the Haluntian is present, who, because be did not flee with Cleomenes, was overwhelmed by the pirates, and taken prisoner; whose misfortune was his safety, who, if he had not been taken prisoner by the pirates, would have fallen into to power of this partner of pirates. He will give his evidence, concerning the discharge of the sailors, the want of provisions, and the flight of Cleomenes. Phalargus the Centuripan is present, born in a most honourable city, and in a most honourable rank. He tells you the same thing; he differs from the other in no particular.

In the name of the immortal gods, O judges, with what feelings are you sitting them? or with what feelings are you hearing these things? Am I out of my mind, and now I grieving more than I ought amid such disasters and distresses of our allies? or does this most bitter torture and agony of innocent man affect you also with an equal sense of pain? For when I say that a Herbitan, that a Heraclean was put to death, I see before my eyes all the indignity of that misfortune. That the citizens of those states, that the population of those lands, by whom and by whose care and labour an immense quantity of corn is procured every year for the Roman people, who were brought up and educated by their parents in the hope of our paternal rule, and of justice, should have been reserved for the nefarious inhumanity of Caius Verres, and for his fatal axe!

When the thought of that unhappy Tyndaritan, and of that Segestan, comes across me, then I consider at the same time the rights of the cities, and their duties. Those cities which Publius Africanus thought fit to be adorned with the spoils of the enemy, those Caius Verres has stripped, not only of those ornaments, but even of their noblest citizens, by the most abominable wickedness. See what the people of Tyndaris will willingly state. “We were not among the seventeen tribes of Sicily. We, in all the Punic and Sicilian wars, always adhered to the friendship and alliance of the Roman people; all possible aid in war, all attention and service in peace, has been at all times rendered by us to the Roman people.” Much, however, did their rights avail them, under that man's authority and government!

Scipio once led your sailors against Carthage; but now Cleomenes leads ships that are almost dismantled against pirates. “Africanus,” says he, “shared with you the spoils of the enemy, and the reward of glory; but now, you, having been plundered by me, having had your vessel taken away by the pirates, are considered in the number and class of enemies.” What more shall I say? what advantages did that relationship of the Segestans to us, not only stated in old papers, and commemorated by words, but adopted and proved by many good offices of theirs towards us, bring to them under the government of that man? Just this much, O judges, that a young man of the highest rank was torn from his father's bosom, an innocent son from his mother's embrace, and given to that man's executioner, Sextius. That city to which our ancestors gave most extensive and valuable lands, which they exempted from tribute; the city, with all the weight of its relationship to us, of its loyalty, and of its ancient alliance with us, could not obtain even this privilege, of being allowed to avert by its prayers the death and execution of one most honourable and most innocent citizen.

Whither shall the allies flee for refuge? Whose help shall they implore? by what hope shall they still be retained in the desire to live, if you abandon them? Shall they come to the senate and beg them to punish Verres? That is not a usual course; it is not in accordance with the duty of the senate. Shall they betake themselves to the Roman people? The people will easily find all excuse; for they will say that they have established a law for the sake of the allies, and that they have appointed you as guardians and vindicators of that law. This then is the only place to which they can flee; this is the harbour, this is the citadel, this is the altar of the allies; to which indeed they do not at present betake themselves with the same views as they formerly used to entertain in seeking to recover their property. They are not seeking to recover silver, nor gold, nor robes, nor slaves, nor ornaments which have been carried off from their cities and their temples;—they fear, like ignorant men, that the Roman people now allows such things and permits them to be done. For we have now for many years been suffering; and we are silent when we see that all the money of all the nations has come into the hands of a few men; which we seem to tolerate and to permit with the more equanimity, because none of these robbers conceals what he is doing; none of them take the least trouble to keep their covetousness in any obscurity.

In our most beautiful and highly decorated city what statue, or what painting is there, which has not been taken and brought away from conquered enemies? But the villas of those men are adorned and filled with numerous and most beautiful spoils of our most faithful allies. Where do you think is the wealth of foreign nations, which they are all now deprived of, when you see Athens, Pergamos, Cyzicus, Miletus, Chios, Samos, all Asia in short, and Achaia, and Greece, and Sicily, now all contained in a few villas? But all these things, as I was saying, your allies abandon and are indifferent to now. They took care by their own services and loyalty not to be deprived of their property by the public authority of the Roman people; though they were unable to resist the covetousness of a few individuals, yet they could in some degree satiate it; but now not only as all their power of resisting taken away, but also all their means also of supplying such demands. Therefore they do not care about their property; they do not seek to recover their money, though that is nominally the subject of this prosecution; that they abandon and are indifferent to;—in this dress in which you see them they now fly to you.