n you saw him pleading his illness
as an excuse more by the truth of the fact than by any laboured plea
of words, you were not indeed cruel, (for what can be more impossible
for this order to be guilty of than that,) but as you hoped that
there was nothing that could not be accomplished by his authority and
wisdom, you opposed his excuse with great earnestness, and compelled
the man, who had always thought your decisions of the greatest weight,
to abandon his own opinion. But when there was added the exhortation
of Pansa, the consul, delivered with more weight than the ears of
Servius Sulpicius had learnt to resist, then at last he led me and his
own son aside, and said that he was bound to prefer your authority to
his own life. And we, admiring his virtue, did not dare to oppose
his determination. His son was moved with extraordinary piety and
affection, and my own grief did not fall far short of his agitation,
but each of us was compelled to yield to his greatness of mind, and to
the dignity of his language, when he, indeed, amid the loud praises
and congratulations of you all, promised to do whatever you wished,
and not to avoid the danger which might be inclined by the adoption of
the opinion of which he himself had been the author. And we the next
day escorted him early in the morning as he hastened forth to execute
your commands. And he, in truth, when departing, spoke with me in such
a manner that his language seemed like an omen of his fate.

V. Restore then, O conscript fathers, life to him from whom you have
taken it. For the life of the dead consists in the recollection
cherished of them by the living. Take ye care that he, whom you
without intending it sent to his death, shall from you receive
immortality. And if you by your decree erect a statue to him in the
rostia, no forgetfulness of posterity will ever obscure the memory of
his embassy. For the remainder of the life of Servius Sulpicius will
be recommended to the eternal recollection of all men by many and
splendid memorials. The praise of all mortals will for ever celebrate
his wisdom, his firmness, his loyalty, his admirable vigilance and
prudence in upholding the interests of the public. Nor will that
admirable, and incredible, and almost godlike skill of his in
interpreting the laws and explaining the principles of equity be
buried in silence. If all the men of all ages, who have ever had any
acquaintance with the law in this city, were got together