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3.
Therefore, O conscript fathers, if it had been chance which had caused the death
of Servius. Sulpicius, I should sorrow indeed over such a loss to the republic,
but I should consider him deserving of the honor, not of a monument, but of a
public mourning. But, as it is, who is there who doubts that it was the embassy
itself which caused his death? For he took death away with him; though, if he
had remained among us, his own care, and the attention of his most excellent son
and his most faithful wife, might have warded it off.
[6]
But he, as he saw that, if he did not obey your authority,
he should not be acting like himself; but that if he did obey, then that duty,
undertaken for the welfare of the republic, would be the end of his life;
preferred dying at a most critical period of the republic, to appearing to have
done less service to the republic than he might have done.
He had an opportunity of recruiting his strength and taking care of himself in
many cities through which his journey lay. He was met by the liberal invitation
of many entertainers, as his dignity deserved, and the men too who were sent
with him exhorted him to take rest, and to think of his own health. But he,
refusing all delay, hastening on, eager to perform your commands, persevered in
this his constant purpose, in spite of the hindrances of his illness.
[7]
And as Antonius was above all things disturbed by his
arrival, because the commands which were laid upon him by your orders had been
drawn up by the authority and wisdom of Servius Sulpicius, he showed plainly how
he hated the senate by the evident joy which he displayed at the death of the
adviser of the senate.
Leptines then did not kill Octavius, nor did the king of Veii slay those whom I have just named, more
clearly than Antonius killed Servius Sulpicius. Surely he brought the man death,
who was the cause of his death. Wherefore, I think it of consequence, in order
that posterity may recollect it, that there should be a record of what the
judgment of the senate was concerning this war. For the statue itself will be a
witness that the war was so serious a one, that the death of an ambassador in it
gained the honor of an imperishable memorial.
M. Tullius Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, literally translated by C. D. Yonge. London. George Bell & Sons. 1903.
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