[20]
Let this praise, then, be placed to your account; let
these men come to your relief with their authority, who neither ought to help you if
they were able, nor could do so if they wished; on whom in their private capacity
you have inflicted many injuries, and put many affronts, while in their city you
have dishonoured many families for ever by your adulteries and crimes “But
you have been of public service to their city.” Not without great injury
to the republic and to the province of Sicily. They were bound to supply and they used to supply sixty
thousand modii of wheat to the Roman people for
payment; that was remitted by you of your own sole authority. The republic was
injured because by your means its right of dominion over one city was disparaged;
the Sicilians were injured, because this quantity was not deducted from the total
amount of the corn to be provided by the island, but was only transferred to the
cities of Centuripa and Halesa, whose inhabitants were exempt from that tax; and on
them a greater burden was imposed than they were able to bear.
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M. Tullius Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, literally translated by C. D. Yonge. London. George Bell & Sons. 1903.
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