5.
As, then, this is the case, O Catiline, continue as you have begun. Leave the city at last
the gates are open; depart. That Manlian camp of yours has been waiting too long for you as
its general. And lead forth with you all your friends, or at least as many as you can; purge
the city of your presence; you will deliver me from a great fear, when there is a wall
between me and you. Among us you can dwell no longer—I will not bear it, I will not
permit it, I will not tolerate it..
[11]
Great thanks are due
to the immortal gods, and to this very Jupiter Stator, in whose temple we are, the most
ancient protector of thus city, that we have already so often escaped so foul, so horrible,
and so deadly an enemy to the republic. But the safety of the commonwealth must not be too
often allowed to be risked on one man. As long as you, O Catiline, plotted against me while I
was the consul elect, I defended myself not with a public guard, but by my own private
diligence. When, in the next consular comitia, you wished to
slay me when I was actually consul, and your competitors also, in the Campus Martius, I checked your nefarious attempt by the
assistance and resources of my own friends, without exciting any disturbance publicly. In
short, as often as you attacked me, I by myself opposed you, and that, too, though I saw that
my ruin was connected with great disaster to the republic.
[12]
But now you are openly attacking the entire republic.
You are summoning to destruction and devastation the temples of the immortal gods, the
houses of the city, the lives of all the citizens; in short, all Italy. Wherefore, since I do not yet venture to do that which is the best
thing, and which belongs to my office and to the discipline of our ancestors, I will do that
which is more merciful if we regard its rigour, and more expedient for the state. For if I
order you to be put to death, the rest of the conspirators will still remain in the republic;
if as I have long been exhorting you, you depart, your companions, those worthless dregs of
the republic, will be drawn off from the city too.
[13]
What is
the matter, Catiline? Do you hesitate to do that which I order you which you were already
doing of your own accord? The consul orders an enemy to depart from the city. Do you ask me,
Are you to go into banishment? I do not order it; but, if you consult me, I advise it.
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