Searching for Antonius /Cic. Phil
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Cic. Phil. 5.5.1 (y)
This is what we have gained in the last twelve days, that the man whom no single person except Cotyla was then found to defend, has now advocates, even of consular rank. Would that they had all been asked their opinion before me; (although I have my suspicions as to what some of those men who will be asked after me, are intending to say;) I should find it easier to speak against them if any argument appeared to have been advanced.
For there is an opinion in some quarters, that some one intends to propose to decree Antonius that further Gaul, which Plancus is at present in possession of. What else is that but supplying an enemy with all the arms necessary for civil war: first of all with the sinews of war, money in abundance, of which he is at present destitute; and secondly, with as much cavalry as he pleases? Cavalry do I say? He is a likely man to hesitate, I suppose, to bring with him the barbarian nations;—a man who does not see this is senseless; he who does see it, and still advocates such a measure, is impious.
Cic. Phil. 5.8.1 (y)
What is become of the law that such bills should be published on three market days? What is become of the penalty appointed by the recent Junian and Licinian law? Can these laws be ratified without the destruction of all other laws? Has any one had a right of entering the forum? Moreover, what thunder, and what a storm that was! so that even if the consideration of the auspices had no weight with Marcus Antonius, it would seem strange that he could endure and bear such exceeding violence of tempest, and rain, and whirlwind. When therefore he, as augur, says that he carried a law while Jupiter was not only thundering, but almost uttering an express prohibition of it by his clamour from heaven, will he hesitate to confess that it was carried in violation of the auspices?
But that squandering of the public money cannot possibly be endured by which he got rid of seven hundred millions of sesterces by forged entries and deeds of gifts, so that it seems an absolute miracle that so vast a sum of money belonging to the Roman people can have disappeared in so short a time. What? are those enormous profits to be endured which the household of Marcus Antonius has swallowed up? He was continually selling forged decrees; ordering the names of kingdoms and states, and grants of exemptions to be engraved on brass, having received bribes for such orders. And his statement always was, that he was doing these things in obedience to the memoranda of Cæsar, of which he himself was the author. In the interior of his house there was going on a brisk market of the whole republic. His wife, more fortunate for herself than for her husband, was holding an auction of kingdoms and provinces: exiles were restored without any law, as if by law: and unless all these acts are rescinded by the authority of the senate, now that we have again arrived at a hope of recovering the republic, there will be no likeness of a free city left to us.
Nor is it only by the sale of forged memoranda and autographs that a countless sum of money was collected together in that house, while Antonius, whatever he sold, said that he was acting in obedience to the papers of Cæsar; but he even took bribes to make false entries of the resolutions of the senate; to seal forged contracts; and resolutions of the senate that had never been passed were entered on the records of that treasury. Of all this baseness even foreign nations were witnesses. In the meantime treaties were made; kingdoms given away; nations and provinces released from the burdens of the state; and false memorials of all these transactions were fixed up all over the Capitol, amid the groans of the Roman people. And by all these proceedings so vast a sum of money was collected in one house, that if it were all made available, the Roman people would never want money again.
V. Moreover, he passed a law to regulate judicial proceedings, this chaste and upright man, this upholder of the tribunals and the law. And in this he deceived us. He used to say that he appointed men from the front ranks of the army, common soldiers, men of the Alauda, as judges. But he has in reality selected gamesters; he has selected exiles; he has selected Greeks. Oh the fine bench of judges! Oh the admirable dignity of that council!
And would that madman have chosen these men as judges, would he have entered their names as such in the treasury, would he have trusted a great portion of the republic to them, if he had intended to leave the least semblance of a republic?
VI. And I have been speaking of those judges who are known. Those whom you are less acquainted with I have been unwilling to name. Know then that dancers, harp-players, the whole troop, in fact, of Antonius’s revellers, have all been pitchforked into the third decury of judges. Now you see the object of passing so splendid and admirable a law, amid excessive rain, storm, wind, tempest, and whirlwind, amid thunder and lightning; it was that we might have those men for our judges whom no one would like to have for guests. It is the enormity of his wickedness, the consciousness of his crimes, the plunder of that money of which the account was kept in the temple of Ops, which have been the real inventors of this third decury. And infamous judges were not sought for, till all hope of safety for the guilty was despaired of, if they came before respectable ones.
Is not this, too, to be marked with the deepest ignominy, and with the severest animadversion of this order, so as to be recollected by all posterity, that Marcus Antonius (the first man who has ever done so since the foundation of the city) has openly taken armed men about with him in this city? A thing which the kings never did, nor those men who, since the kings have been banished, have endeavoured to seize on kingly power. I can recollect Cinna; I have seen Sylla; and lately Cæsar. For these three men are the only ones since the city was delivered by Lucius Brutus, who have had more power than the entire republic. I cannot assert that no man in their trains had weapons.
And although all these proceedings cannot be ratified, if you annul his laws, still I think that they ought all to be separately taken note of, article by article; and that we ought formally to decide that the appointment of septemvirs was null and void; and that nothing is ratified which is said to have been done by them.
VIII. But who is there who can consider Marcus Antonius a citizen, rather than a most foul and barbarous enemy, who, while sitting in front of the temple of Castor, in the hearing of the Roman people, said that no one should survive except those who were victorious? Do you suppose, O conscript fathers, that he spoke with more violence than he would act? And what are we to think of his having ventured to say that, after he had given up his magistracy, he should still be at the city with his army? that he should enter the city as often as he pleased? What else was this but threatening the Roman people with slavery?
And he in a fury was now moving his hostile standards against his country from Brundusium, when Caius Cæsar, by the kind inspiration of the immortal gods, by the greatness of his own heavenly courage, and wisdom, and genius, of his own accord, indeed, and prompted by his own admirable virtue, but still with the approbation of my authority, went down to the colonies which had been founded by his father; convoked the veteran soldiery; in a few days raised an army; and checked the furious advance of this bandit. But after the Martial legion saw this admirable leader, it had no other thoughts but those of securing our liberty. And the fourth legion followed its example.
IX. And Antonius, on hearing of this news, after he had summoned the senate, and provided a man of consular rank to declare his opinion that Caius Cæsar was an enemy of his country, immediately fainted away.
Was then Hannibal an enemy, and is Antonius a citizen? What did the one do like an enemy, that the other has not done, or is not doing, or planning, and thinking of? What was there in the whole of the journey of the Antonii; except depopulation, devastation, slaughter, and rapine? Actions which Hannibal never did, because he was reserving many things for his own use, these men do, as men who live merely for the present hour; they never have given a thought not only to the fortunes and welfare of the citizens, but not even to their own advantage.
Are we then, O ye good gods, to resolve to send ambassadors to this man? Are those men who propose this acquainted with the constitution of the republic, with the laws of war, with the precedents of our ancestors? Do they give a thought to what the majesty of the Roman people and the severity of the senate requires? Do you resolve to send ambassadors? If to beg his mercy, he will despise you; if to declare your commands he will not listen to them; and last of all, however severe the message may be which we give the ambassadors, the very name of ambassadors will extinguish this ardour of the Roman people which we see at present, and break the spirit of the municipal towns and of Italy. To say nothing of these arguments, though they are weighty, at all events that sending of an embassy will cause delay and slowness to the war.
For we are not sending to Hannibal to desire him to retire from before Saguntum; to whom the senate formerly sent Publius Valerius Flaccus and Quintus Bæbius Tampilus; who, if Hannibal did not comply, were ordered to proceed to Carthage. Whither do we order our ambassadors to proceed, if Antonius does not comply? Are we sending an embassy to our own citizen, to beg him not to attack a general and a colony of the Roman people? Is it so? Is it becoming to us to beg this by means of ambassadors? What is the difference, in the name of the immortal gods, whether he attacks this city itself, or whether he attacks an outpost of this city, a colony of the Roman people, established for the sake of its being a bulwark and protection to us? The siege of Saguntum was the cause of the second Punic war, which Hannibal carried on against our ancestors. It was quite right to send ambassadors to him. They were sent to a Carthaginian, they were sent on behalf of those who were the enemies of Hannibal, and our allies. What is there resembling that case here? We are sending to one of our own citizens to beg him not to blockade a general of the Roman army, not to attack our army and our colony,—in short, not to be an enemy of ours. Come; suppose he obeys, shall we either be inclined, or shall we be able by any possibility, to treat him as one of our citizens?
I have read the letter of Antonius which he sent to one of the septemviri, a thoroughpaced scoundrel, a colleague of his own. “Look out, and see what you take a fancy to; what you do fancy you shall certainly have.” See to what a man we are sending ambassadors; against what a man we are delaying to make war; a man who does not even let us draw lots for our fortunes, but hands us over to each man’s caprice in such a way, that he has not left even himself anything untouched, or which has not been promised to somebody. With this man, O conscript fathers, we must wage war,—war, I say, and that instantly. We must reject the slow proceedings of ambassadors.
Therefore, that we may not have a number of decrees to pass every day, I give my vote that the whole republic should be committed to the consuls; and that they should have a charge given them to defend the republic, and to take care “that the republic suffer no injury.” And I give my vote that those men who are in the army of Antonius be not visited with blame, if they leave him before the first of February.
If you adopt these proposals of mine, O conscript fathers, you will in a short time recover the liberty of the Roman people and your own authority. But if you act with more mildness, still you will pass those resolutions, but perhaps you will pass them too late. As to the general welfare of the republic, on which you, O consuls, have consulted us, I think that I have proposed what is sufficient.
XIV. And, furthermore, I give my vote that the most ample honours be decreed to Marcus Lepidus, as a reward for his eminent services to the republic. He has at all times wished the Roman people to be free; and he gave the greatest proof of his inclination and opinion on that day, when, while Antonius was placing the diadem on Cæsar’s head, he turned his face away, and by his groans and sorrow showed plainly what a hatred of slavery he had, how desirous he was for the Roman people to be free, and how he had endured those things which he had endured, more because of the necessity of the times, than because they harmonised with his sentiments. And who of us can forget with what great moderation he behaved during that crisis of the city which ensued after the death of Cæsar? These are great merits; but I hasten to speak of greater still.
XVI. I come now to Caius Cæsar, O conscript fathers; if he had not existed, which of us could have been alive now? That most intemperate of men, Antonius, was flying from Brundusium to the city, burning with hatred, with a disposition hostile to all good men, with an army. What was there to oppose to his audacity and wickedness? We had not as yet any generals, or any forces. There was no public council, no liberty; our necks were at the mercy of his nefarious cruelty; we were all preparing to have recourse to flight, though flight itself had no escape for us.
Who was it—what god was it, who at that time gave to the Roman people this godlike young man, who, while every means for completing our destruction seemed open to that most pernicious citizen, rising up on a sudden, beyond every one’s hope, completed an army fit to oppose to the fury of Marcus Antonius before any one suspected that he was thinking of any such step? Great honours were paid to Cnæus Pompeius when he was a young man, and deservedly; for he came to the assistance of the republic; but he was of a more vigorous age, and more calculated to meet the eager requirements of soldiers seeking a general. He had also been already trained in other kinds of war. For the cause of Sylla was not agreeable to all men. The multitude of the proscribed, and the enormous calamities that fell on so many municipal towns, show this plainly.