But on this day I have thought that it became me to return thanks especially to the different magistrates by name, and also to one private individual, who for the sake of my safety, had visited all the municipal towns and colonies, had as a suppliant addressed his entreaties to the Roman people, and had declared that opinion which you followed when you restored me to my dignities. You always distinguished me when I was prosperous; when I was in distress you defended me to the extent of your power, by the change of your garments, and your general mourning, There have been times within our own recollection when senators did not dare to change their robes even in their own personal dangers; but in my danger the whole senate changed its garments as far as it was allowed to do without interruption from the edicts of those men who wished to deprive me in my peril not only of all protection from them, but of even the benefit of your prayers in my behalf.

And when I was in such circumstances as these, when I saw that I as a private individual had to contend with the same array which as consul I had defeated, using not arms but your authority, I deliberated much with myself. The consul had said that he would make the Roman knights pay for the scenes on the Capitoline Hill. Some were summoned by name, others were prosecuted, some were banished. All access to the temples was prevented, not merely by their being garrisoned or occupied with a strong force, but by their being demolished. The other consul, not content with only abandoning me and the republic, unless he could also betray us to the enemies of the republic, had bound those enemies to him by promising them the rewards which they coveted. There was another man at the gates with a command He means Julius Caesar, who had the command in Gaul as proconsul for five years. given to him for many years, and with a large army. I do not say that he was an enemy of mine, but I do know that he did nothing when he was stated to be my enemy.

As there were thought to be two parties in the republic, the one was supposed, out of its enmity to me, to demand that I should be given up to it; the other, to defend me, but timidly out of fear of bloodshed. But those who seemed to require me to be given up to them increased the fear of a contest by their conduct as they never diminished the suspicions and anxieties of men by denying what they were suspected of. Wherefore, when I saw the senate deprived of leaders, and myself attacked by some of the magistrates, betrayed by some, and abandoned by others; when I saw that slaves were being enlisted by name under some pretence of forming guilds; “Clodius not only restored the old collegia or guilds, but formed some new ones of the very dregs of the city, and of the slaves; and this is alluded to in several of the subsequent orations.”—Manut. that all the troops of Catiline were recalled to their original hopes of massacre and conflagration under almost the same leaders as before; that the Roman knights were under the same fear of proscription as before; that the municipal towns were in dread of being pillaged, and every one in fear of his life; I might—I might, I say, O conscript fathers, still have been able to defend myself by force of arms, and many wise and brave men advised me to do so; nor was I wanting in the same courage which I had shown before, and which was not unknown to you. But I saw that if I defeated my present enemy, I had still too many others behind who must also be defeated; that if I were beaten myself; many virtuous men would fall for my sake, and with me, and even after me; and that the avengers of the blood of the tribunes were present, but that all satisfaction for my death must he exacted by the slow progress of the law, and reserved for posterity.