At
 present, when we are speaking of the dignity and glory of your empire, since that is the
 beginning of my oration, consider what feelings you think you ought to entertain. 
 Your ancestors have often waged war on account of their merchants and seafaring men having
 been injuriously treated. What ought to be your feelings when so many thousand Roman citizens
 have been put to death by one order and at one time? Because their ambassadors had been spoken
 to with insolence, your ancestors determined that Corinth , the light of all Greece , should
 be destroyed. Will you allow that king to remain unpunished, who has murdered a lieutenant of
 the Roman people of consular rank, having tortured him with chains and scourging, and every sort
 of punishment? They would not allow the freedom of Roman citizens to be diminished; will you be
 indifferent to their lives being taken? They avenged the privileges of our embassy when they
 were violated by a word; will you abandon an ambassador who has been put to death with every
 sort of cruelty? Take care lest, as it was a most glorious
 thing for them, to leave you such wide renown and such a powerful empire, it should be a most
 discreditable thing for you, not to be able to defend and preserve that which you have received.
 What more shall I say? Shall I say, that the safety of our allies is involved in the greatest
 hazard and danger? King Ariobarzanes has been driven from his kingdom, an ally and friend of the
 Roman people; two kings are threatening all Asia , who
 are not only most hostile to you, but also to your friends and allies. And every city throughout
 all Asia, and throughout all Greece , is compelled by
 the magnitude of the danger to put its whole trust in the expectation of your assistance. They
 do not dare to beg of you any particular general, especially since you have sent them another,
 nor do they think that they can do this without extreme danger. They see and feel this, the same thing which you too see and feel,—that there is one man in
 whom all qualities are in the highest perfection, and that he is near, (which circumstance makes
 it seem harder to be deprived of him,) by whose mere arrival and name, although it was a
 maritime war for which he came, they are nevertheless aware that the attacks of the enemy were
 retarded and repressed. They then, since they cannot speak freely, silently entreat you to think
 them (as you have thought your allies in the other provinces) worthy of having their safety
 recommended to such a man; and to think them worthy even more than others, because we often send
 men with absolute authority into such a province as theirs, of such character, that, even if
 they protect them from the enemy, still their arrival among the cities of the allies is not very
 different from an invasion of the enemy. They used to hear of him before, now they see him among
 them; a man of such moderation, such mildness, such humanity, that those seem to be the happiest
 people among whom he remains for the longest time. Wherefore, if on account of their allies, though they themselves had not been roused by any
 injuries, your ancestors waged war against Antiochus, against Philip, against the Aetolians, and
 against the Carthaginians; with how much earnestness ought you, when you yourselves have been
 provoked by injurious treatment, to defend the safety of the allies, and at the same time, the
 dignity of your empire? especially when your greatest revenues are at stake. For the revenues of
 the other provinces, O Romans, are such that we can scarcely derive enough from them for the
 protection of the provinces themselves. But Asia is so
 rich and so productive, that in the fertility of its soil, and in the variety of its fruits, and
 in the vastness of its pasture lands, and in the multitude of all those things which are matters
 of exportation, it is greatly superior to all other countries. Therefore, O Romans, this
 province, if you have any regard for what tends to your advantage in time of war, and to your
 dignity in time of peace, must be defended by you, not only from all calamity, but from all fear
 of calamity. For in other matters when calamity comes on one,
 then damage is sustained; but in the case of revenues, not only the arrival of evil, but the
 bare dread of it, brings disaster. For when the troops of the enemy are not far off, even though
 no actual irruption takes place, still the flocks are abandoned, agriculture is relinquished,
 the sailing of merchants is at an end. And accordingly, neither from harbour dues, nor from
 tenths, nor from the tax on pasture lands, can any revenue be maintained. And therefore it often
 happens that the produce of an entire year is lost by one rumour of danger, and by one alarm of
 war.