[8]
Is there any one who does not know, that when inquiry is made into the
slaying of a man, it is usual either altogether to deny that the deed has
been done, or else to defend it on the ground that it was rightly and
lawfully done? unless, indeed, you think that Publius Africanus was out of
his mind, who, when he was asked in a seditious spirit by Caius Carbo, a
tribune of the people, what was his opinion of the death of Tiberius
Gracchus, answered that he seemed to have been rightly slain. For neither
could Servilius Ahala, that eminent man, nor Publius Nasica, nor Lucius
Opimius, nor Caius Marius, nor indeed the senate itself during my
consulship, have been accounted anything but wicked, if it was unlawful for
wicked citizens to be put to death. And therefore, O judges, it was not
without good reason, that even in legendary fables learned men have handed
down the story, that he, who for the sake of avenging his father had killed
his mother, when the opinions of men varied, was acquitted not
only by the voices of the gods, but even by the very wisest goddess.
This text is part of:
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.