[61]
Why, then, did he obey the
law?”as if he had not already sworn to obey other laws also which
he considered to have been unjustly passed. He does not give in to such rash
counsels, as to think himself at liberty to deprive the republic of his
services as a citizen, when he can do no good to the republic. While I was
consul and when he was tribune of the people elect he voluntarily exposed
his own life to danger he delivered that opinion, the unpopularity of which
be saw would be so great as to imperil his life. He spoke with vehemence; he
acted with energy, what he felt he stated in the most open manner. He was
the lender and the adviser and main advocate of those
measures,—not that he did not see his own danger, but in such a
storm as that which was threatening to overwhelm the republic, he thought
that he ought not to think of anything but the dangers of his country.
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M. Tullius Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, literally translated by C. D. Yonge, B. A. London. George Bell & Sons, York Street, Covent Garden. 1891.
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