known historical circumstances of
the time. B.C. 55, he made that attack upon his old enemy, the late
Consul Piso, which is perhaps the most egregious piece of abuse extant
in any language. Even of this we do not know the precise date, but we
may be sure that it was spoken early in the year, because Cicero alludes
in it to Pompey's great games which were in preparation, and which were
exhibited when Pompey's new theatre was opened in May.[28] Plutarch
tells us that they did not take place till the beginning of the
following year.[29] Piso on his return from Macedonia attacked Cicero in
the Senate in answer to all the hard things that had already been said
of him, and Cicero, as Middleton says, "made a reply to him on the spot
in an invective speech, the severest, perhaps, that ever was spoken by
any man, on the person, the parts, the whole life and conduct of Piso,
which as long as the Roman name subsists must deliver down a most
detestable character of him to all posterity."

We are here asked to imagine that this attack was delivered on the spur
of the moment in answer to Piso's attack. I cannot believe that it
should have been so, however great may have been the orator's power over
thoughts and words. We have had in our own days wonderful instances of
ready and indignant reply made instantaneously, but none in which the
angry eloquence has risen to such a power as is here displayed. We
cannot but suppose that had human intellect ever been perfect enough for
such an exertion, it would have soared high enough also to have
abstained from it. It may have been that Cicero knew well enough
beforehand what the day was about to produce, so as to have prepared his
reply. It may well have been that he himself undertook the polishing of
his speech before it was given to the public in the words which we now
read. We may, I think, take it for granted that Piso did make an attack
upon him, and that Cicero answered him at once with words which crushed
him, and which are not unfairly represented by those which have come
down to us.

The imaginative reader will lose himself in wonder as he pictures to
himself the figure of the pretentious Proconsul, with his assumption of
confidence, as he was undergoing the castigation which this great master
of obloquy was inflicting upon him, and the figure of the tall, lean
orator, with his long neck and keen eyes, with his arms trained to
assist his voice, managing his purple bordered toga with