[43]
Turn your eyes to that tempest—to that season of darkness to all
good men,—to that sudden and unforeseen danger which overwhelmed
all things,—to that cloud which came over the
republic—to the ruin and conflagration of the city—to
the alarm given to Caesar with respect to all the acts of his
consulship,—to the fear of massacre with which all good men were
struck,—to the wickedness, and covetousness, and indigence, and
audacity of the consuls! If I was not aided by him then, he was under no
obligation to aid me; if I was deserted by him, perhaps he was providing for
his own safety; if I was even attacked by him, as some men think, or at all
events wish me to think, then our friendship was violated, I received an
injury, and he has deserved that I should be his enemy. I do not deny it;
but still, if he was anxious for my safety when you were all regretting me
like the dearest of your sons, and if you all at the same time thought it of
great importance to my cause that the inclinations of Caius
Caesar should not be averse to my safety; and if I have his son in law as a
witness of his good will towards me at that time, who himself stirred up all
Italy in the municipal towns
and the Roman people in the assembly, and you too who were always most
devoted to me, in the Capitol, to take measures for my safety; if in short
Cnaeus Pompeius is at the same time a witness to me of the good will which
Caesar entertains for me, and a surety to him of my attachment to him; does
it not appear to you that I ought rather to recollect the times that are
long past and also to remember this time which is nearest to us now, and by
means of these memories to eradicate that middle time so full of infamy and
misery, if not from the history of events, (which indeed may be impossible,)
at all events from my own mind?
This text is part of:
Search the Perseus Catalog for:
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.