ds, in regard to which you feel yourself so guilty
that you do not dare to make them public. Yet it is a most miserable and
pitiable state to be in, not to be able to deny these charges which are
the most disgraceful conceivable to admit. But I will leave these to one
side and bring forward the rest. Well, though we did grant the trainer,
as you say, two thousand plethra of the ager Leontinus, we still learned
nothing adequate from it.[15] But who should not admire your system of
instruction? And what is it? You are ever jealous of your superiors,
you always toady to the prominent man, you slander him who has attained
distinction, you inform against the powerful and you hate equally all the
excellent, and you pretend love only for those through whom you may do
some mischief. This is why you are always inciting the younger against
their elders and lead those who trust you even in the slightest into
dangers, where you desert them. [-9-] A proof of this is, that you have
never accomplished any achievement worthy of a distinguished man either
in war or in peace. How many wars have we won under you as praetor and
what kind of territory did we acquire with you as consul? Your private
activity all these years has consisted in continually deceiving some of
the foremost men and winning them to your side and managing everything
you like, while publicly you have been shouting and bawling out at random
those detestable phrases,--'I am the only one that loves you,' or, if it
should so chance, 'And what's-his-name, all the rest, hate you,' and 'I
alone am friendly to you, all the rest are engaged in plots,' and other
such stuff by which you fill some with elation and conceit, only to
betray them, and scare the rest so that you gain their attachment. If any
service is rendered by any one whomsoever of the whole people, you lay
claim to it and write your own name upon it, repeating: 'I moved it, I
proposed it, it was through me that this was done so.' But if anything
happens that ought not to have occurred, you take yourself out of the way
and censure all the rest, saying: 'You see I wasn't praetor, you see
I wasn't envoy, you see I wasn't consul.' And you abuse everybody
everywhere all the time, setting more store by the influence which
comes from appearing to speak your mind boldly than by saying what duty
demands: and you exhibit no important quality of an orator. [-10-] What
public advantage has been preserved or established by you? W