that after a victory
with these we may despise the infantry. You know well that the whole
outcome of the war depends on each side on our fleets. If we come out
victorious in this engagement, we shall suffer no harm from any of the
rest but cut them off on a kind of islet,--for all surrounding regions
are in our possession,--and without effort subdue them, if in no other
way, by hunger.

[-20-] "Now I do not think that further words are necessary to tell you
that we shall be struggling not for small or unimportant interests, but
it will prove true that if you are zealous you will obtain the greatest
rewards, but if careless will suffer the most frightful misfortunes.
What would they not do to us, if they should prevail, when they killed
practically all the followers of Sextus that had been of any prominence,
and even destroyed many followers of Lepidus that cooeperated with Caesar's
party? But why should I mention this, seeing that they have removed
Lepidus, who was guilty of no wrong and was further their ally, from
all his powers as general and keep him under guard as if he were some
captive? They have further hounded for money all the freedmen in Italy
and likewise other men who possess any land to such an extent as to
force some of them to take up arms, with the consequence that not a few
perished. Is it possible that those who spared not their allies will
spare us? Will those who seized for funds the property of their own
adherents refrain from our wealth? Will they show humanity as victors who
before victory have committed every conceivable outrage? Not to spend
time in speaking of the concerns of other people, I will enumerate the
audacity that they have displayed toward us who stand here. Who was
ignorant that I was chosen a partner and colleague of Caesar and received
charge of the management of public affairs equally with him, received
similar honors and offices, and have been a great while now in possession
of them? Yet of all of them, so far as is in his power, I have been
deprived; I have become a private citizen instead of a leader, an outcast
from the franchise instead of consul, and this not by the action of the
people or the senate but by his own act and that of his adherents, who do
not comprehend that they are preparing a sovereign for themselves first
of all. For how could one speak of enactments of people and senate, when
the consuls and some others fled straightway from the city, in order
to escape