On the Murder of Herodes (81-85)

Proof as complete as the presumptions and the evidence supplied by things human could make it has now been presented to you. But in cases of this nature the indications furnished by heaven must also have no small influence on your verdict.[*] It is upon them that you chiefly depend for safe guidance in affairs of state, whether in times of crisis or tranquillity; so they should be allowed equal prominence and weight in the settlement of private questions.

I hardly think I need remind you that many a man with unclean hands or some other form of defilement who has embarked on shipboard with the righteous has involved them in his own destruction.[*] Others, while they have escaped death, have had their lives imperilled owing to such polluted wretches. Many, too, have been proved to be defiled as they stood beside a sacrifice, because they prevented the proper performance of the rites.

With me the opposite has happened in every case. Not only have fellow-passengers of mine enjoyed the calmest of voyages: but whenever I have attended a sacrifice, that sacrifice has invariably been successful. I claim that these facts furnish the strongest presumption in my favor that the charge brought against me by the prosecution is unfounded; I have witnesses to confirm them.

Witnesses

I know furthermore, gentlemen of the jury, that if the witnesses were testifying against me that my presence on shipboard or at a sacrifice had been the occasion of some unholy manifestation, the prosecution would be treating that fact as supremely significant; they would be showing that here, in the signs from heaven, was to be found the clearest confirmation of their charge. As, however, the signs have contradicted their assertions and the witnesses testify that what I say is true and that what the prosecution say is not, they urge you to put no credence in the evidence of those witnesses; according to them, it is their own statements which you should believe. Whereas every one else uses the facts to prove the worth of mere assertion, they use mere assertion for the purpose of discrediting the facts.

All the charges which I can remember, gentlemen, I have answered; and for your own sakes I think that you should acquit me. A verdict saving my life will alone enable you to comply with the law and your oath; for you have sworn to return a lawful verdict; and while the crime with which I am charged can still be tried legally, the laws under which I was arrested do not concern my case.[*] If two trials have been made out of one, it is not I, but my accusers, who are to blame; and I cannot suppose that if my bitterest enemies have involved me in two trials, impartial ministers of justice like yourselves will prematurely find me guilty of murder in the present one.