matter, and second, if there
was any truth in the charge of malfeasance, it ought to have been
stopped then on the moment. For none of the transactions was carried on
underhandedly, Cicero, but they were all recorded on tablets, as you
yourself affirm. If Antony committed his many wrongs so openly and
shamelessly as you say, and plundered the whole of Crete on the pretext
that in accord with Caesar's letters it had been left free after the
governorship of Brutus, though the latter was later given charge of it by
us, how could you have kept silent and how could any one else have borne
it? But these matters, as I said, I shall pass over; for the majority of
them have not been mentioned individually, and Antony is not present,
who could inform you exactly of what he has done in each instance. As to
Macedonia and Gaul and the remaining provinces and legions, yours are
the decrees, Conscript Fathers, according to which you assigned to the
various governors their separate charges and delivered to Antony Gaul,
together with the soldiers. This is known also to Cicero. He was there
and helped vote for all of them just like you. Yet how much better it
would have been for him then to speak in opposition, if any item of
business was not going as it should, and to instruct you in these matters
that are now brought forward, than to be silent at the time and allow
you to make mistakes, and now nominally to censure Antony but really to
accuse the senate!

[-24-] "Any sensible person could not assert, either, that Antony forced
you to vote these measures. He himself had no band of soldiers so as to
compel you to do anything contrary to your inclinations, and further the
business was done for the good of the city. For since the legions had
been sent ahead and united, there was fear that when they heard of
Caesar's assassination they might revolt, put some inferior man at their
head, and begin to wage war again: so it seemed good to you, taking a
proper and excellent course, to place in command of them Antony the
consul, who was charged with the promotion of harmony, who had rejected
the dictatorship entirely from the system of government. And that is the
reason that you gave him Gaul in place of Macedonia, that he should stay
here in Italy, committing no harm, and do at once whatever errand was
assigned him by you.

[-25-] "This I have said to you that you may know that you decided
rightly. For Cicero that other point of mine was suffi