M. Tullius Cicero, For Milo
C. D. Yonge, Ed.

Come now, compare the journey of this unencumbered bandit with all the hindrances which beset Milo. Before this time be always used to travel with his wife; now he was without her. He invariably went in a carriage; now he was on horseback. His train were a lot of Greeklings wherever he was going; even when he was hastening to the camp in Etruria¹ but this time there were no triflers in his retinue. Milo, who was never in the habit of doing so, did by chance have with him some musical slaves belonging to his wife, and troops of maid-servants. The other man, who was always carrying with him prostitutes, worn-out debauchees, both men and women, this time had no one with him except such a band that you might have thought every one of them picked men. Why, then, was he defeated? Because the traveler is not always murdered by the robber; sometimes the robber is killed by the traveler; because, although Clodius in a state of perfect preparation was attacking men wholly unprepared, still it was the case of a woman falling upon men. [56] And, indeed, Milo was never so utterly unprepared for his violence, as not to be nearly sufficiently prepared. He was always aware how greatly it concerned the interest of Publius Clodius that he should be slain, how greatly he hated him, and how great was his daring. Wherefore, he never exposed his life to danger without some sort of protection and guard, knowing that, it was threatened, and that a large price, as it were, was set upon it.

Add to this consideration all the chances; add the always uncertain result of a battle, and the common fortune of Mars, who often overthrows the man who is already exulting and stripping his enemy, and strikes him to the ground by some mean agent; add the blundering conduct of a leader who had dined and drank, and who was yawning and drowsy; who, when he had left his enemy cut off in the rear, never thought of his companions on the outskirts of his train; and then when he fell among them inflamed with anger, and despairing of saving the life of their master, he fell on that punishment which the faithful slaves inflicted on him as a retribution for their master's death. Why, then, has Milo emancipated them? [57] He was afraid, I suppose, lest they should give information against him; lest they should be unable to bear pain; lest they should be compelled by tortures to confess that Publius Clodius was slain in the Appian road by the slaves of Milo.

What need is there of any torturer? What do you want to know? whether he was slain? He was slain. Whether he was slain lawfully or unlawfully? That is beyond the province of the torturer. For the rack can only inquire into the fact; it is the bench of judges that must decide on the law.