[14]
And since you have listened attentively to Hortensius, while speaking on the charge
respecting the former conspiracy, now, I beg you, listen to this first statement of mine
respecting the conspiracy which was formed in my consulship.
When I was consul I heard many reports, I made many inquiries, I learnt a great many
circumstances concerning the extreme peril of the republic. No messenger, no information, no
letters, no suspicion ever reached me at any time in the least affecting Sulla. Perhaps this
assertion ought to have great weight when coming from a man who as consul had investigated the
plots laid against the republic with prudence, had revealed them with sincerity had chastised
them with magnanimity and who says that he himself never heard a word against Publius Sulla
and never entertained a suspicion of him. But I do not as yet employ this assertion for the
purpose of defending him I rather use it with a view to clear myself in order that Torquatus
may cease to wonder that I, who would not appear by the side of Autronius, am now defending
Sulla.
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M. Tullius Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, literally translated by C. D. Yonge, B. A. London. Henry G. Bohn, York Street, Covent Garden. 1856.
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