M. Tullius Cicero, For Plancius
C. D. Yonge, Ed.

But why am I hunting up instances of men having failed as candidates for the aedileship, when it is an office which has often been discharged in such a way that the people appeared to have been doing a kindness to the men who had been passed over. Lucius Philippus, a man of the highest truth and most distinguished eloquence failed in his election to military tribune. Caius Caelius, a most illustrious and admirable young man, was beaten for the quaestorship. Publius Rutilius Rufus, Caius Fimbria, Caius Cassius, Cnaeus Orestes all stood in vain for the tribuneship of the people. And yet we know that every one of these men were afterwards made consuls. And your father and your ancestors will of their own accord tell you this not with the object of comforting you, nor to excuse you from any fault which you fear that you must seem to have been guilty of, but with a view of encouraging you to persevere in that course which you have followed from your earliest youth. No credit believe me, O Laterensis, has been lost by you. Lost, do I say? I declare solemnly, if you were to come to a right appreciation of what has happened, an especial testimony has been borne to your virtue.