M. Tullius Cicero, For Sulla
C. D. Yonge, Ed.

And since you have listened attentively to Hortensius, while speaking on the charge respecting the former conspiracy, now, I beg you, listen to this first statement of mine respecting the conspiracy which was formed in my consulship.

When I was consul I heard many reports, I made many inquiries, I learnt a great many circumstances concerning the extreme peril of the republic. No messenger, no information, no letters, no suspicion ever reached me at any time in the least affecting Sulla. Perhaps this assertion ought to have great weight when coming from a man who as consul had investigated the plots laid against the republic with prudence, had revealed them with sincerity had chastised them with magnanimity and who says that he himself never heard a word against Publius Sulla and never entertained a suspicion of him. But I do not as yet employ this assertion for the purpose of defending him I rather use it with a view to clear myself in order that Torquatus may cease to wonder that I, who would not appear by the side of Autronius, am now defending Sulla. [15] For what was the cause of Autronius? and what is the cause of Sulla? The former tried to disturb and get rid of a prosecution for bribery by raising in the first instance a sedition among gladiators and runaway slaves, and after that as we all saw, by stoning people, and collecting a violent mob. Sulla, if his own modesty and worth could not avail him, sought no other assistance. The former, when he had been convicted, behaved in such a manner, not only in his secret designs and conversation, but in every look and in his whole countenance, as to appear an enemy to the most honourable orders in the state, hostile to every virtuous man, and a foe to his country. The latter considered himself so bowed down, so broken down by that misfortune, that he thought that none of his former dignity was left to him, except what he could retain by his present moderation. [16] And in this conspiracy, what union was ever so close as that between Autronius and Catiline, between Autronius and Lentulus? What combination was there ever between any men for the most virtuous purposes, so intimate as his connection with them for deeds of wickedness, lust and audacity?—what crime is there which Lentulus did not plot with Autronius?—what atrocity did Catiline ever commit without his assistance? while, in the meantime, Sulla not only abstained from seeking the concealment of night and solitude in their company, but he had never the very slightest intercourse with them, either in conversation or in casual meetings. [17] The Allobroges, those who gave us the truest information on the most important matters, accused Autronius, and so did the letters of many men, and many private witnesses. All that time no one ever accused Sulla; no one ever mentioned his name. Lastly, after Catiline had been driven out or allowed to depart out of the city, Autronius sent him arms, trumpets, bugles, scythes, ¹ standards, legions. He who was left in the city, but expected out of it though checked by the punishment of Lentulus, gave way at times to feelings of fear, but never to any right feelings or good sense. Sulla, on the other hand, was so quiet, that all that time he was at Naples, where it is not supposed that there were any men who were implicated in or suspected of this crime; and the place itself is one not so well calculated to excite the feelings of men in distress, as to console them.