authority, to an exiled armourer;[45] he would not slay him the moment that he had taken him, fearing, I suppose, that his victory might appear too merciful; but after having attacked that most excellent man with insulting words from his impious mouth, then he examined him with scourges and tortures concerning the public money, and that for two days together.  Afterwards he cut off his head, and ordered it to be fixed on a javelin and carried about, and the rest of his body, having been dragged through the street and town, he threw into the sea.

We, then, have to war against this enemy by whose most foul cruelty all the savageness of barbarous nations is surpassed.  Why need I speak of the massacre of Roman citizens? of the plunder of temples?  Who is there who can possibly deplore such circumstances as their atrocity deserves?  And now he is ranging all over Asia, he is triumphing about as a king, he thinks that we are occupied in another quarter by another war, as if it were not one and the same war against this outrageous pair of impious men.

III.  You see now an image of the cruelty of Marcus Antonius in Dolabella, this conduct of his is formed on the model of the other.  It is by him that the lessons of wickedness have been taught to Dolabella.  Do you think that Antonius, if he had the power, would be more merciful in Italy than Dolabella has proved in Asia?  To me, indeed, this latter appears to have gone as far as the insanity of a savage man could go; nor do I believe that Antonius either would omit any description of punishment, if he had only the power to inflict it.

Place then before your eyes, O conscript fathers, that spectacle, miserable indeed, and tearful, but still indispensable to rouse your minds properly:  the nocturnal attack upon the most beautiful city in Asia; the irruption of armed men into Trebonius’s house, when that unhappy man saw the swords of the robbers before he heard what was the matter, the entrance of Dolabella, raging,—­his ill omened voice, and infamous countenance,—­the chains, the scourges, the rack, the armourer who was both torturer and executioner, all which they say that the unhappy Trebonius endured with great fortitude.  A great praise, and in my opinion indeed the greatest of all, for it is the part of a wise man to resolve beforehand that whatever can happen to a brave man is to be endured with patience if it should happen.  It is indeed a proof of altogether greater wisdom to act with such foresight as to prevent any such thing from happening, but it is a token of no less courage to bear it bravely if it should befall one.

And Dolabella was indeed so wholly forgetful of the claims of humanity, (although, indeed, he never had any particular recollection of it,) as to vent his insatiable cruelty, not only on the living man, but also on the dead carcass, and, as he could not sufficiently glut his hatred, to feed his eyes also on the lacerations inflicted, and the insults offered to his corpse.