Against Verres. Marcus Tullius Cicero

the praetor or the judges to be hanged in this cause. I will not permit the matter to be delayed till the lictors of the consuls can go and summon the Sicilians, whom the servants of the consuls elect did not influence before, when by an unprecedented course of proceeding they sent for them all; I will not permit those miserable men, formerly the allies and friends of the Roman people, now their slaves and suppliants, to lose not only their rights and fortunes by their tyranny, but to be deprived of even the power of bewailing their condition; ⁵⁴I will not, I say, when the cause has been summed up by me, permit them after a delay of forty days has intervened, then at last to reply to me when my accusation has already fallen into oblivion through lapse of time; I will not permit the decision to be given when this crowd collected from all Italy has departed from Rome, which has assembled from all quarters at the same time on account of the comitia, of the games, and of the census. The reward of the credit gained by your decision, or the danger arising from the unpopularity which will accrue to you if you decide unjustly, I think ought to belong to you; the labour and anxiety to me; the knowledge of what is done and the recollection of what has been said by every one, to all. ⁵⁵I will adopt this course, not an unprecedented one, but one that has been adopted before, by those who are now the chief men of our state,—the course, I mean, of at once producing the witnesses. What you will find novel, O judges, is this, that I will so marshal my witnesses as to unfold the whole of my accusation; that when I have established it by examining my witnesses, by arguments, and by my speech, then I shall show the agreement of the evidence with my accusation: so that there shall be no difference between the established mode of prosecuting, and this new one, except that, according to the established mode, when everything has been said which is to be said, then the witnesses are produced; here they shall be produced as each count is brought forward; so that the other side shall have the same opportunity of examining them, of arguing and making speeches or of attacking their evidence. If there be any one who prefers an uninterrupted speech and the old mode of conducting a prosecution without any break, he shall have it in some other trial. But for this time let him understand that what we do is done by us on compulsion, (for we only do it with the design of opposing the artifice of the opposite party by our prudence.) ⁵⁶This will be the first part of the prosecution. We say that Caius Verres has not only done many licentious acts, many cruel ones, towards Roman citizens, and towards some of the allies, many wicked acts against both gods and men; but especially that he has taken away forty million sesterces^[17] out of Sicily contrary to the laws. We will make this so plain to you by witnesses, by private documents, and by public records that you shall decide that, even if we had abundant space and leisure days for making a long speech without any inconvenience, still there was no need at all of a long speech in this matter.

      Footnotes

       Table of Contents

      1 ↑ It is not certainly known what Cicero refers to here.

      2 ↑ This refers to the same subject as the previous note.

      3 ↑ "In any given case the litigant parties agreed upon a judex, or accepted him whom the magistrates proposed; a party had the power of rejecting a proposed judex, though there must have been some limit to this power." (Cic. Pro Cluent. 43.) Smith, Dict. Ant. v. Judex. What the limits to this power were, or under what restrictions it was exercised, we do not now know.

      4 ↑ Because the provinces which involved all these obligations were distributed by lot to the different magistrates.

      5 ↑ "The proconsul or praetor who had the administration of a province was attended by a quaestor. This quaestor had undoubtedly to perform the same offices as those who accompanied the armies into the field..They had also to levy those parts of the public revenue which were not farmed by the publicani... In the provinces they had the same jurisdiction as the curule aediles at Rome... The relation existing between a praetor or proconsul and his quaestor was according to ancient custom regarded as resembling that between a father and his son. When a quaestor died in his province, the praetor had the right to appoint a proquaestor in his stead."--Smith, Dict. Ant. p. 814, v. Quaestor.

      6 ↑ The coast of Sicily being much infested by pirates, it was the custom of the praetors to fit out a fleet every year for the protection of trade. This fleet was provided by a contribution of the maritime towns, each of which usually furnished a ship, properly appointed with men and provisions; but Verres, for a sufficient bribe, often excused them from providing the ship, and always discharged as many men as were willing to pay for it. On one occasion a fleet was fitted out, and the command of it given, not to any Roman officer, but to Cleomenes, a Syracusan, who being both incapable, and also short of hands from the proceedings of Verres, was attacked in the port of Pachynus, two of his ships taken, and the rest burnt, after which the pirates sailed into the port of Syracuse, and returned back in safety; but Verres compelled all the captains of Cleomenes' fleet to sign a document testifying that this disaster had not happened through any deficiency in the equipment of their ships, which were fully provided with everything necessary, and then he put them to death.

      7 ↑ This refers to the way in which Hortensius had once marked the judges whom he had bribed, as is mentioned in the speech against Caecilius.

      8 ↑ The comitia centuriata for the election of consuls for the succeeding year were held on the 26th of July.

      9 ↑ This arch had been erected to commemorate the victory obtained by Fabius over the Allobroges; and it was erected in the Via Sacra, as Cicero mentions in his speech Pro Plancio.

      10 ↑ "The order in which the centuries voted was decided by lot, and that which gave its vote first was called centuria praerogativa."—Smith, Dict. Ant. p. 274, v. Comitia. "We also find the plural praerogativae, because they were of two kinds, juniorum and seniorum."—Riddle's Dict. in v. Praerogativa.

      11 ↑ Caesonius was now aedile elect with Cicero. In the prosecution instituted by Cluentius against Oppianicus, while Verres was praetor urbanus, Oppianicus had tried to ensure his acquittal by bribing Stalenus, Ballus and Gutta, three of the Judges; but Caesonius divulged the corrupt nature of their motives, procured the conviction of Oppianicus, and the subsequent impeachment and punishment of the judges who had been bribed.

      12 ↑ The Latin is ut comperindinem. "Comperendinare is, when the cause has been pleaded on each side, to order that on the third day both the defendant and the prosecutor appear to speak a second time."—Hottoman. "The parties appeared before the judex on the third day (comperendinatio), unless the praetor had deferred the judicium for some sufficient reason."—Smith, Dict. Ant. p. 529. v Judex.

      13 ↑ That is to say, when the power of appealing to the tribunes of the people was taken away.

      14 ↑ The senator was Dolabella.

      15 ↑ Cicero several times in these orations takes credit to himself for his industry and intrepidity in striking all judges liable to suspicion off the list of those who were to try this case.

      16 ↑ The