16.
[36]
Among other reasons, this, O judges, is a very great reason for his acquittal, to prevent
any notable stain and disgrace from falling on our dominion, by news going to Gaul that the senate and knights of the Roman people gave their
decisions in a criminal trial just as the Gauls pleased; being influenced not by their
evidence, but by their threats. But in that case, if they attempt to make war upon us, we must
summon up Caius Marius from the shades below, in order that he may be equal in war to that
great man, that threatening and arrogant Induciomarus. Cnaeus Domitius and Quintus Maximus
must be raised from the dead, that they may again subdue and crush the nation of the
Allobroges and the other tribes by their arms; or, since that indeed is impossible, we must
beg my friend Marcus Plaetorius to deter his new clients from making war, and to oppose by his
entreaties their angry feelings and formidable violence; or, if he be not able to do so, we
will ask Marcus Fabius, his junior counsel, to pacify the Allobroges, since among their tribe
the name of Fabius is held in the highest honour, and induce them either to be willing to
remain quiet, as defeated and conquered nations usually are, or else to make them understand
that they are holding out to the Roman people not a terror of war, but a hope of triumph.
[37]
And if, even in the case of an ignoble defendant, it
would not be endurable that those men should think they had effected anything by their
threats, what do you think you ought to do in the case of Marcus Fonteius? concerning whom, O
judges, (for I think that I am entitled to say this now, when I have almost come to the
termination of two trials,) concerning whom, I say, you have not only not heard any
disgraceful charge invented by his enemies, but you have not even heard any really serious
reproach. Was ever any defendant, especially when he had moved in such a sphere as this man,
as a candidate for honours, as an officer in command, and as a governor, accused in such a
way, that no disgraceful act, no deed of violence, no baseness originating either in lust or
insolence or audacity, was attributed to him, if not with truth, at least with some suspicious
circumstances giving a reasonable colouring to the invention?
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