United States or Finland ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Matters are progressing rapidly; the works have been carried on; severe battles are taking place. We sent three chief men of the city to interpose. Antonius has despised, rejected, and repudiated them. And still you continue a persevering defender of Antonius.
Compare Dion Cassius, 40. c. 65, and Appianus, Civil Wars, ii. 29. The illness of Pompeius and the return of the legions from Gaul took place in the year B.C. 50. The legions were not sent to Syria, but both wintered in Capua. Some of the great Roman churches are called Basilicæ, and in their construction bear some resemblance to the antient Basilicæ. Compare the Life of M. Antonius, c. 2.
Caius Caesar, indeed, did not wait for our decrees; especially as that conduct of his was not unsuited to his age. He undertook war against Antonius of his own accord; for there was not yet time to pass a decree; and he saw that, if he let slip the opportunity of waging war, when the republic was crushed it would be impossible to pass any decrees at all.
The windy speeches in the Senate, the crowded and excited meetings in the Forum, the action and reaction of the tides of popular prejudice and fancy, the eloquence of Antonius, and the threatenings and ravings of Marcellus the consul all these were interesting but not disturbing.
For when Antonius had gone into winter quarters, and the state of the Atrebates continued in their allegiance, Comius, who, after that wound which I before mentioned, was always ready to join his countrymen upon every commotion, that they might not want a person to advise and head them in the management of the war, when his state submitted to the Romans, supported himself and his adherents on plunder by means of his cavalry, infested the roads, and intercepted several convoys which were bringing provisions to the Roman quarters.
For we men of consular rank are not in this war conducting ourselves in such a manner that the Roman people will be likely to look with equanimity on the ensigns of our honour, when some of us are so cowardly as to have cast away all recollection of the kindnesses which they have received from the Roman people, some are so disaffected to the republic that they openly allege that they favour this enemy, and easily bear having our ambassadors despised and insulted by Antonius, while they wish to support the ambassador sent by Antonius.
On this supposition apparently Caesar had first prepared himself to meet an attack on Italy. One of the ablest of his officers, the tribune of the people Marcus Antonius, commanded there with propraetorian powers. The southeastern ports Sipus, Brundisium, Tarentum where an attempt at landing was first to be expected, had received a garrison of three legions.
XIV. But that I may reduce my sentiments into a formal motion, I give my vote that: "As Caius Pansa, consul, imperator, set the example of fighting with the enemy in a battle in which the martial legion defended the freedom of the Roman people with admirable and incredible valour, and the legions of the recruits behaved equally well; and as Caius Pansa, consul, imperator, while engaged in the middle of the ranks of the enemy received wounds; and as Aulus Hirtius, consul, imperator, the moment that he heard of the battle, and knew what was going on, with a most gallant and loyal soul, led his army out of his camp and attacked Marcus Antonius and his army, and put his troops to the sword, with so little injury to his own army that he did not lose one single man; and as Caius Caesar, propraetor, imperator, with great prudence and energy defended the camp successfully, and routed and put to the sword the forces of the enemy which had come near the camp: "On these accounts the senate thinks and declares that the Roman people has been released from the most disgraceful and cruel slavery by the valour, and military skill, and prudence, and firmness, and perseverance, and greatness of mind and good fortune of these their generals.
For what single man has ever been braver, what single man has ever been more devoted to the republic than the whole of the Martial legion? which, as soon as it had decided that Marcus Antonius was an enemy of the Roman people, refused to be a companion of his insanity; deserted him though consul; which, in truth, it would not have done if it had considered him as consul, who, as it saw, was aiming at nothing and preparing nothing but the slaughter of the citizens, and the destruction of the state.
The same influence caused Cicero in his youthful De inventione to classify rhetoric as part of political science, and in the De oratore to make Antonius restrict rhetoric to public and communal affairs, although in another section he returns to Aristotle's "any subject" as the material of rhetoric as does Quintilian later.
Word Of The Day