I did not choose, after I had as consul maintained the general safety of the state without having recourse to arms, to take arms as a private individual in my own cause; I preferred that virtuous men should grieve for my fortune rather than despair of their own; and if I were slain by myself; that I thought would be a shameful end for me; but if I were slain with many others, that I thought would be fatal to the republic. If I had supposed that eternal misery was before me, I would rather have endured death than everlasting agony. But I felt sure that I should not be absent from this city any longer than the constitution itself was, and, while that was banished, I thought it no longer desirable for myself that I should remain in it; and in accordance with my expectation, as soon as ever the constitution was restored, it brought me back in triumph as its companion. The laws were all banished as well as I, the courts of justice were banished as well as I; the prerogatives of the magistrates, the authority of the senate, the liberty of the citizens, even the fruitfulness of the land, all piety and all religion, whether it was with respect to men or gods, were all banished from the state when I was banished. And if they had been lost to you for ever, I should mourn over your fortunes rather than regret the loss of my home amongst you; but if they were ever restored, I was quite sure that I should be enabled to return with them.

And of these feelings of mine, he who was the protector of my life is also my most indisputable witness, namely Cnaeus Plancius, who, disregarding all the distinctions and emoluments which might have been derived from a province, devoted his whole quaestorship to supporting and preserving me. If he had been my quaestor when I was commander-in-chief; he would have stood in the relation of a son to me; now he surely shall be looked upon by me as a parent, since he has been my quaestor, not while in authority, but in grief.

Wherefore, O conscript fathers, since I have been restored to the republic at the same time with the constitution of the republic, in whatever I do for the defence of it, I will not only not in the slightest degree abridge my former liberty, but I will even increase it. In truth, if I defended the republic at a time when it was under some obligations to me, what ought I to do now when I owe everything to it? For what is there that can crush or even weaken my spirit, when you see that calamity itself is in my case not a witness of any error; but of most extraordinary services rendered to the republic? For these disasters were brought on me by my defence of the state; they were undergone by me of my own free will, in order that the republic which had been defended by me should not be brought into the very extremity of peril.