Titus Livius (Livy), The History of Rome, Book 30
Frank Gardener Moore, Professor Emeritus in Columbia University, Ed.

42. Then the senate deliberated concerning the embassies of Philip and the Carthaginians. It was decided that the Macedonians should be brought in first. [2] Their speeches were in different veins, as some of them tried to excuse acts of which envoys who were sent from Rome to the king in regard to the ravaging of allied territory had complained. [3] Others actually turned accuser, attacking allies of the Roman people, to be sure, but Marcus Aurelius with much more violence, alleging that, being one of three envoys¹ sent to them, he had conducted a levy, had remained and made war upon them in violation of the treaty, and had repeatedly engaged in regular battles with their commanders. [4] Still others demanded that the Macedonians and their general, Sopater, who as mercenaries had [p. 525]served with Hannibal and at the time were captives² in chains, be restored to them.³ [5] In reply Marcus Furius, who had been sent for the very purpose from Macedonia by Aurelius, maintained that Aurelius had been left behind in order to prevent allies of the Roman people from being exhausted by raids and forced by acts of violence to go over to the king's side; that he had not gone beyond the boundaries⁴ of the allies; that he had exerted himself that raiders should not come over into the allies' lands with impunity. [6] He said that Sopater was one of the king's high officials and of his kin; that he had been sent recently to Africa with four thousand Macedonians⁵ and money to bring aid to Hannibal and the Carthaginians. [7] Inasmuch as the Macedonians, when questioned in regard to these matters, gave ambiguous answers, they in turn received an answer of a very different sort: [8] that the king was looking for war and if he kept on would soon find it; that he had twice violated the treaty, in that he wronged allies of the Roman people and harried them with war and arms, and in that he aided the enemy by reinforcements and money; [9] that not only had Scipio acted and was now acting in their opinion with perfect propriety in keeping in chains as enemies men who had been captured while bearing arms against the Roman people, but also that Marcus Aurelius was acting in conformity [10??] with the interest of the state, and that the senate was grateful that he was defending allies of the Roman people by arms, since he was unable to do so by the obligations of a treaty.

[11] With so stern an answer as this the Macedonians [p. 527]were dismissed and the Carthaginian ambassadors⁶ summoned. When the senators observed the age and high station of each-for these were the very first of the citizens-thereupon all agreed that they were really treating for peace. [12] Most conspicuous among them, however, was Hasdrubal surnamed Haedus⁷ among his people, always a supporter of peace and an opponent of the Barcine party. [13] Hence he had all the more weight then, as he shifted the blame for the war from the state to the greed of the few. [14] His speech was in different keys, now excusing what was charged, now making some admissions, lest pardon should be harder to obtain if they shamelessly denied known facts, and now even admonishing the conscript fathers to make a moderate and restrained use of their good fortune. [15] He said that if the Carthaginians had listened to him and to Hanno⁸ and had been minded to take advantage of the right moment, the Romans would have given the terms of peace which they were at that time seeking; that seldom were men given good fortune and good judgment at the same time; [16] that the Roman people was invincible for the reason that in its good fortune it remembered to be wise and to take counsel. And certainly, he said, it would have been wonderful if its practice were different. [17] Men whose good fortune was new because of its strangeness went wild, unable to control their rejoicing; for the Roman people the joys of victory were familiar and now all but threadbare, and they had enlarged their empire almost more by sparing the vanquished than by conquest. [18] The rest of the speakers employed more pathos as they stated from what wealth the Carthaginians' situation had fallen to what depths; that men who [p. 529]recently held almost the whole world by their⁹ arms had nothing left but the walls of Carthage. Shut up within these walls, they said, they saw nothing on land or sea subject to their rule. [19] Even the city itself and their homes they would hold only in case the Roman people did not choose to vent its animosity upon those possessions also, the last possible step. [20] When it was clear that the senators were inclining to pity, one of their number,¹⁰ outraged by the perfidy of the Carthaginians, is said to have called out to them, asking who were the gods in whose name they were to make the treaty, inasmuch as they had proved false to the gods in whose name the former treaty had been made. [21] “The same” said Hasdrubal, since they are so hostile to treaty-breakers."