I saw this, O judges, that unless, while the recollection of the senate on the subject was still fresh, I bore evidence to the authority and to the particulars of this information by public records, hereafter some one, not Torquatus, nor any one like Torquatus, (for in that indeed I have been much deceived,) but some one who had lost his patrimony, some enemy of tranquillity, some foe to all good men, would say that the information given had been different; in order the more easily, when some gale of odium had been stirred up against all virtuous men, to be able, amid the misfortunes of the republic, to discover some harbour for his own broken vessel. Therefore, having introduced the informers into the Senate, I appointed senators to take down every statement made by the informers, every question that was asked, and every answer that was given.

And what men they were! Not only men of the greatest virtue and good faith, of which sort of men there are plenty in the senate, but men, also, who I knew from their memory, from their knowledge, from their habit and rapidity of writing, could most easily follow everything that was said. I selected Caius Cosconius, who was praetor at the time; Marcus Messala, who was at the time standing for the praetorship; Publius Nigidius, and Appius Claudius. I believe that there is no one who thinks that these men were deficient either in the good faith or in the ability requisite to enable them to give an accurate report. What followed? What did I do next? As I knew that the information was by these means entered among the public documents, but yet that those records would be kept in the custody of private individuals, according to the customs of our ancestors, I did not conceal it; I did not keep it at my own house; but I caused it at once to be copied out by several clerks, and to be distributed everywhere, and published and made known to the Roman people. I distributed it all over Italy, I sent copies of it into every province; I wish no one to be ignorant of that information, by means of which safety was procured for all.

And I took this precaution, though at so disturbed a time, and when all opportunities of acting were so sudden and so brief at the suggestion of some divine providence, as I said before, and not of my own accord, or of my own wisdom; taking care, in the first instance, that no one should be able to recollect of the danger to the republic, or to any individual, only as much as he pleased; and in the second place, that no one should be able at any time to find fault with that information, or to accuse us of having given credit to it rashly; and lastly, that no one should ever put any questions to me, or seek to learn anything from my private journals, lest I might be accused of either forgetting or remembering too much, and lest any negligence of mine should be thought discreditable, or lest any eagerness on my part might seem cruel.