He
shows in many ways that he wishes me well. I saw the tempest impending,
and I long ago took care to secure his good-will. But suppose him to be my
friend indeed, is it becoming in a good and valiant citizen, who has held
the highest offices and done such distinguished things, to be in the power
of any man? Ought I to expose myself to the danger, and perhaps disgrace,
which would lie before me, should Pompey recover his position? This on one
side; but now look at the other. Pompey has shown neither conduct nor
courage, and he has acted throughout against my advice and judgment. I
pass over his old errors: how he himself armed this man against the
constitution; how he supported his laws by violence in the face of the
auspices; how he gave him Further Gaul, married his daughter, supported
Clodius, helped me back from exile indeed, but neglected me afterward; how
he prolonged Caesar's command, and backed him up in everything; how in his
third consulship, when he had begun to defend the constitution, he yet
moved the tribunes to curry a resolution for taking Caesar's name in his
absence, and himself sanctioned it by a law of his own; how he resisted
Marcus Marcellus, who would have ended Caesar's government on the 1st of
March. Let us forget all this: but what was ever more disgraceful than the
flight from Rome? What conditions would not have been preferable? He will
restore the constitution, you say, but when? by what means? Is not Picenum
lost? Is not the road open to the city? Is not our money, public and
private, all the enemy's? There is no cause, no rallying point for the
friends of the constitution.
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