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42“But suppose, now, some one of you should answer me with this objection: ‘What wrong has Ariovistus done so great that he should have become an enemy of ours in place of a friend and ally?’ Let any such man consider the fact that one has to defend one’s self against those who are undertaking to do a wrong not merely on the basis of what they do, but also on the basis of what they intend, and has to check their growth promptly, before suffering any injury, instead of waiting until the wrong is actually done and then taking vengeance. 2Now how could it better be proved that he is hostile, nay, most hostile toward us than by what he has done? I sent to him in a friendly way to bid him come to us and consult with us about present conditions, and he neither came nor promised that he would appear. 3And yet what did I do that was unfair or unseemly or arrogant in summoning him as a friend and ally? What insolence and wantonness, on the other hand, has he failed to show in refusing to come! Is it not inevitable that he did this for one of two reasons—either that he suspected he should suffer some harm or that he felt contempt for us? 4Now if he felt any suspicion, he convicts himself most clearly of conspiring against us; for no one, when he has suffered no injury, is suspicious towards us, nor does one become so with an upright and guileless mind; rather, it is those who have prepared themselves to wrong others because of their own conscience that harbour suspicion against them. 5If, on the other hand, nothing of this sort was at the bottom of his action, but he merely looked down on us and insulted us with overweening words, what must we expect him to do when he lays hold of some real project? For when a man has shown such disdain in matters where he was not going to gain anything, does he not stand convicted from afar off of utter injustice both in thought and in deed?
“Not content, now, with this, he further bade me come to him, if I wanted anything of him.
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