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[4]
Although, O Romans, it is not an
embassy, but a denunciation of war if he does not obey. For the decree has been
drawn up as if ambassadors were being sent to Hannibal. For men are sent to
order him not to attack the consul elect, not to besiege Mutina, not to lay waste the province, not
to enlist troops, but to submit himself to the power of the senate and people of
Rome. No doubt he is a likely man
to obey this injunction, and to submit to the power of the conscript fathers and
to yours, who has never even had any mastery over himself. For what has he ever
done that showed any discretion, being always led away wherever his lust, or his
levity, or his frenzy, or his drunkenness has hurried him? He has always been
under the dominion of two very dissimilar classes of men, pimps and robbers; he
is so fond of domestic adulteries and forensic murders, that he would rather
obey a most covetous woman than the senate and people of Rome.
M. Tullius Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, literally translated by C. D. Yonge. London. George Bell & Sons. 1903.
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