In a matter of this sort, will any one be found so impudent as to dare to approach or to aspire to the conduct of the cause of others against the will of those very people whose affairs are involved in it? If, O Quintus Caecilius, the Sicilians were to say this to you,—we do not know you—we know not who you are, we never saw you before; allow us to defend our fortunes through the instrumentality of that man whose good faith is known to us; would they not be saying what would appear reasonable to every one? But now they say this—that they know both the men, that they wish one of them to be the defender of their cause, that they are wholly unwilling that the other should be.

Even if they were silent they would say plainly enough why they are unwilling. But they are not silent; and yet will you offer yourself, when they are most unwilling to accept you! Will you still persist in speaking in the cause of others? Will you still defend those men who would rather be deserted by every one than defended by you? Will you still promise your assistance to those men who do neither believe that you wish to give it for their sake, nor that, if you did wish it, you could do it? Why do you endeavour to take away from them by force the little hope for the remainder of their fortunes which they still retain, built upon the impartiality of the law and of this tribunal? Why do you interpose yourself expressly against the will of those whom the law directs to be especially consulted? Why do you now openly attempt to ruin the whole fortunes of those of whom you did not deserve very well when in the province? Why do you take away from them, not only the power of prosecuting their rights, but even of bewailing their calamities?

If you are their counsel, whom do you expect to come forward of those men who are now striving, not to punish some one else by your means, but to avenge themselves on you yourself, through the instrumentality of some one or other? But this is a well established fact, that the Sicilians especially desire to have me for their counsel; the other point, no doubt, is less clear,—namely, by whom Verres would least like to be prosecuted! Did any one ever strive so openly for any honour, or so earnestly for his own safety, as that man and his friends have striven to prevent this prosecution from being entrusted to me? There are many qualities which Verres believes to be in me, and which he knows, O Quintus Caecilius, do not exist in you: and what qualities each of us have I will mention presently;