[79]
Now, when you produce
this man of yours, whoever he may be, still you see that you are laughed at. What
would you have done if he had escaped? if he had broken his bonds, as Nico, that
most celebrated pirate did, who was afterwards retaken by Publius Servilius, with
the same good fortune as he had originally taken him with; what would you have said
then? But the case was this.—If once that real captain of the pirates was
put to death, you would not get that money. If this counterfeit one had died or had
escaped, it would not have been difficult to substitute another in the room of one
who was himself only a substitute. I have said more than I intended of that pirate
captain; and yet I have passed over those things which are the most certain proofs
of this crime. For I wish the whole of this accusation to remain untouched for the
present. There is a certain place for its discussion, a certain law to be mentioned
in connection with it, a certain tribunal for whose judgment it is reserved.
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M. Tullius Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, literally translated by C. D. Yonge. London. George Bell & Sons. 1903.
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