What more need I say? Could he not have obtained the freedom
 of the city from Quintus Metellus Pius, his own most intimate friend, who gave it to many men,
 either by his own request, or by the intervention of the Luculli? especially when Metellus was
 so anxious to have his own deeds celebrated in writing, that he gave his attention willingly to
 poets born even at Cordova, whose poetry had a very heavy and foreign flavour. 
 For this should not be concerned, which cannot possibly be kept in the dark, but it might be
 avowed openly: we are all influenced by a desire of praise, and the best men are the most
 especially attracted by glory. Those very philosophers even in the books which they write about
 despising glory, put their own names on the title-page. In the very act of recording their
 contempt for renown and notoriety, they desire to have their own names known and talked of.
 Decimus Brutus, that most excellent citizen and consummate
 general, adorned the approaches to his temples and monuments with the verses of Attius. And
 lately that great man Fulvius, who fought with the Aetolians, having Ennius for his companion,
 did not hesitate to devote the spoils of Mars to the Muses. Wherefore, in a city in which
 generals, almost in arms, have paid respect to the name of poets and to the temples of the
 Muses, these judges in the garb of peace ought not to act in a manner inconsistent with the
 honour of the Muses and the safety of poets. And that you may do that the more willingly, I will now reveal my own feelings to you, O
 judges, and I will make a confession to you of my own love of glory,—too eager perhaps, but
 still honourable. For this man has in his verses touched upon and begun the celebration of the
 deeds which we in our consulship did in union with you, for the safety of this city and empire,
 and in defence of the life of the citizens and of the whole republic. And when I had heard his
 commencement because it appeared to me to be a great subject and at the same time an agreeable
 one, I encouraged him to complete his work. For virtue seeks no other reward for its labours and
 its dangers beyond that of praise and renown; and if that be denied to it, what reason is there,
 O judges, why in so small and brief a course of life as is allotted to us, we should impose such
 labours on ourselves? Certainly, if the mind had no
 anticipations of posterity, and if it were to confine all its thoughts within the same limits as
 those by which the space of our lives is bounded, it would neither break itself with such severe
 labours, nor would it be tormented with such cares and sleepless anxiety, nor would it so often
 have to fight for its very life. At present there is a certain virtue in every good man, which
 night and day stirs up the mind with the stimulus of glory, and reminds it that all mention of
 our name will not cease at the same time with our lives, but that our fame will endure to all
 posterity. Do we all who are occupied in the affairs of the state, and who are surrounded by such perils
 and dangers in life, appear to be so narrow-minded, as, though to the last moment of our lives
 we have never passed one tranquil or easy moment, to think that everything will perish at the
 same time as ourselves? Ought we not, when many most illustrious men have with great care
 collected and left behind them statues and images, representations not of their minds but of
 their bodies, much more to desire to leave behind us a copy of our counsels and of our virtues,
 wrought and elaborated by the greatest genius? I thought, at the very moment of performing them,
 that I was scattering and disseminating all the deeds which I was performing, all over the world
 for the eternal recollection of nations. And whether that delight is to be denied to my soul
 after death, or whether, as the wisest men have thought, it will affect some portion of my
 spirit, at all events, I am at present delighted with some such idea and hope.