[11]
Postumus, then, is not an additional criminal implicated in the cause, which
has been already decided. But still one Roman knight has been
dragged before the court as a defendant, on a charge of extortion and
peculation. On what account-books is this charge founded? On some which were
not read on the trial of Aulus Gabinius. By what witness is it supported? By
some one who never once mentioned his name at that time. On the sentence of
what arbitrator do they rely? On one in which no mention whatever was made
of Postumus. In accordance with the provisions of what law? Of one under
which he is not liable.
Here now, O judges, the affair is one which has need of all your acuteness
and of all your good sense. For you ought to consider what it is becoming to
you to do, and not what is lawful for you. For if you ask what is lawful,
you certainly have the power to remove any one whom you please out of the
city. It is the voting tablet which gives you that power; and at the same
time it conceals the capricious exercise of it. No one has any need to fear
the consciousness of the tablet if he has no reverence for his own
conscience.
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