This text is part of:
Search the Perseus Catalog for:
Table of Contents:
THE SIXTH ORATION OF M. T. CICERO AGAINST MARCUS ANTONIUS. CALLED ALSO THE SIXTH PHILIPPIC. ADDRESSED TO THE PEOPLE.
3.
The matter at issue is, whether power is to be given to Marcus Antonius of
oppressing the republic, of massacring the virtuous citizens, of plundering the
city, of distributing the lands among his robbers, of overwhelming the Roman
people in slavery; or, whether he is not to be allowed to do all this. Do you
doubt what you are to do? “Oh, but all this does not apply to
Antonius.”
[7]
Even Cotyla would not
venture to say that. For what does not apply to him? A man who, while he says
that he is defending the acts of another, perverts all those laws of his which
we might most properly praise. Caesar wished to drain the marshes: this man has
given all Italy to that moderate man
Lucius Antonius to distribute.—What? has the Roman people adopted this
law?—What? could it be passed with a proper regard for the auspices?
But this conscientious augur acts in reference to the auspices without his
colleagues. Although those auspices do not require any
interpretation—for who is there who is ignorant that it is impious to
submit any motion to the people while it is thundering? The tribunes of the
people carried laws respecting the provinces in opposition to the acts of
Caesar; Caesar had extended the provisions of his law over two years; Antonius
over six years. Has then the Roman people adopted this law? What? was it ever
regularly promulgated? What? was it not passed before it was even drawn up? Did
we not see the deed done before we even suspected that it was going to be done?
Where is the Caecilian and Didian law?
[8]
What is
become of the law that such bills should be published on three market-days? What
is become of the penalty appointed by the recent Junian and Licinian law? Can
these laws be ratified without the destruction of all other laws? Has any one
had a right of entering the forum? Moreover what thunder and what a storm that
was! so that, even if the consideration of the auspices had no weight with
Marcus Antonius, it would seem strange that he could endure and bear such
exceeding violence of tempest, and rain and whirlwind. When therefore he, as
augur, says that he carried a law while Jupiter was not only thundering, but
almost uttering an express prohibition of it by his clamor from heaven, will he
hesitate to confess that it was carried in violation of the auspices?
[9]
What? does the virtuous augur think that it has
nothing to do with the auspices, that he carried the law with the aid of that
colleague whose election he himself vitiated by giving notice of the auspices?
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.