tors are very many; it is not
only with these few that you are dealing. On whatever you decide, decide
quickly. Caesar tells you of the Sempronian law[210]--the law, namely,
forbidding the death of a Roman citizen--but can he be regarded as a
citizen who has been found in arms against the city?" Then there is a
fling at Caesar's assumed clemency, showing us that Caesar had already
endeavored to make capital out of that virtue which he displayed
afterward so signally at Alesia and Uxellodunum. Then again he speaks of
himself in words so grand that it is impossible but to sympathize with
him: "Let Scipio's name be glorious--he by whose wisdom and valor
Hannibal was forced out of Italy. Let Africanus be praised loudly, who
destroyed Carthage and Numantia, the two cities which were most hostile
to Rome. Let Paulus be regarded as great--he whose triumph that great
King Perses adorned. Let Marius be held in undying honor, who twice
saved Italy from foreign yoke. Let Pompey be praised above all, whose
noble deeds are as wide as the sun's course. Perhaps among them there
may be a spot, too, for me; unless, indeed, to win provinces to which we
may take ourselves in exile is more than to guard that city to which the
conquerors of provinces may return in safety." The last words of the
orator also are fine: "Therefore, Conscript Fathers, decide wisely and
without fear. Your own safety, and that of your wives and children, that
of your hearths and altars, the temples of your gods, the homes
contained in your city, your liberty, the welfare of Italy and of the
whole Republic are at stake. It is for you to decide. In me you have a
Consul who will obey your decrees, and will see that they be made to
prevail while the breath of life remains to him." Cato then spoke
advocating death, and the Senate decreed that the men should die. Cicero
himself led Lentulus down to the vaulted prison below, in which
executioners were ready for the work, and the other four men were made
to follow. A few minutes afterward, in the gleaming of the evening, when
Cicero was being led home by the applauding multitude, he was asked
after the fate of the conspirators. He answered them but by one word
"Vixerunt"--there is said to have been a superstition with the Romans as
to all mention of death--"They have lived their lives."

As to what was being done outside Rome with the army of conspirators in
Etruria, it is not necessary for the biographer of Cicero to say