[71]
And to you, O judges, what can appear more scandalous or more intolerable than
this? Shall Verres have at his own house a candelabrum, made of jewels and gold,
belonging to the great and good Jupiter?
Shall that ornament be set out in his house at banquets which will be one scene of
adultery and debauchery, with the brilliancy of which the temple of the great and
good Jupiter ought to glow and to be
lighted up? Shall the decorations of the Capitol be placed in the house of that most
infamous debauchee with the other ornaments which he has inherited from Chelidon?
What do you suppose will ever be considered sacred or holy by him, when he does not
now think himself liable to punishment for such enormous wickedness? who dares to
come into this court of justice, where he cannot, like all others who are arraigned,
pray to the great and good Jupiter, and
entreat help from him? from whom even the immortal gods are reclaiming their
property, before that tribunal which was appointed for the benefit of men, that they
might recover what had been extorted unjustly from them? Do we marvel that Minerva
at Athens, Apollo at Delos, Juno at Samos, Diana at Perga, and that many other gods besides all over
Asia and Greece, were plundered by him, when he could not keep his hands off
the Capitol? That temple which private men are decorating and are intending to
decorate out of their own riches, that Caius Verres would not suffer to be decorated
by a king.
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