[54]
Which, indeed, we recollect to have been in existence till quite lately,
engraved and written on a brazen column at the back of the rostra. How then was Lucius Cossinius, a man of
Tibur, the father of our
present Roman knight of the same name, a most excellent and most
accomplished man, after Titus Caelius had been condemned; and how was Titus
Coponius, of the same city, he also being a citizen of the very greatest
virtue and dignity, (his grandsons Titus and Caius Coponius you are all
acquainted with,) after Caius Masso had been condemned, made a Roman
citizen? Are we going to affirm that the path to the freedom of the city is
open to eloquence and genius, but shall not be open to courage and virtue?
Was it lawful for the federate states to acquire spoils from us, and shall
it not be lawful for them to carry them off from the enemy? Or shall it be
impossible for them to acquire by fighting what they are enabled to acquire
by speaking? Or did our ancestors intend that the rewards of a prosecutor
should be greater than those of a warrior?
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