ot, if victorious, slaughter
their chief men. Much less, when we invade a country, do we kill or
mutilate all those who have endeavored to protect their own homes. Caesar
has evidently much to boast, and among the Italians he has caused it to
be believed. It suited Cicero to assert it in Caesar's ears. Caesar wished
to be told of his own clemency among the men of his own country. But
because Caesar boasted, and Cicero was complaisant, posterity is not to
run away with the boast, and call it true. For all that is great in
Caesar's character I am willing to give him credit; but not for mercy;
not for any of those divine gifts the loveliness of which was only
beginning to be perceived in those days by some few who were in advance
of their time. It was still the maxim of Rome that a "supplicatio"
should be granted only when two thousand of the enemy should have been
left on the field. We have something still left of the pagan cruelty
about us when we send triumphant words of the numbers slain on the field
of battle. We cannot but remember that Caesar had killed the whole Senate
of the Veneti, a nation dwelling on the coast of Brittany, and had sold
all the people as slaves, because they had detained the messengers he
had sent to them during his wars in Gaul. "Gravius vindicandum
statuit"[164]--"He had thought it necessary to punish them somewhat
severely." Therefore he had killed the entire Senate, and enslaved the
entire people. This is only one of the instances of wholesale horrible
cruelty which he committed throughout his war in Gaul--of cruelty so
frightful that we shudder as we think of the sufferings of past ages.
The ages have gone their way, and the sufferings are lessened by
increased humanity. But we cannot allow Cicero's compliment to pass idly
by. The "nemo nisi armatus" referred to Italians, and to Italians, we
may take it, of the upper rank--among whom, for the sake of dramatic
effect, Deiotarus was placed for the occasion.

This was the last of Cicero's casual speeches. It was now near the end
of the year, and on the ides of March following it was fated that Caesar
should die. After which there was a lull in the storm for a while, and
then Cicero broke out into that which I have called his final scream of
liberty. There came the Philippics--and then the end. This speech of
which I have given record as spoken Pro Rege Deiotaro was the last
delivered by him for a private purpose. Forty-two he has spoken
hither