grieve, I did grieve, O conscript fathers, that the republic which had once been saved by your counsels and mine, was fated to perish in a short time.  Nor was I so inexperienced in and ignorant of this nature of things, as to be disheartened on account of a fondness for life, which while it endured would wear me out with anguish, and when brought to an end would release me from all trouble.  But I was desirous that those most illustrious men, the lights of the republic, should live:  so many men of consular rank, so many men of praetorian rank, so many most honourable senators; and besides them all the flower of our nobility and of our youth; and the armies of excellent citizens.  And if they were still alive, under ever such hard conditions of peace, (for any sort of peace with our fellow-citizens appeared to me more desirable than civil war,) we should be still this day enjoying the republic.

And if my opinion had prevailed, and if those men, the preservation of whose lives was my main object, elated with the hope of victory, had not been my chief opposers, to say nothing of other results, at all events you would never have continued in this order, or rather in this city.  But say you, my speech alienated from me the regard of Pompeius?  Was there any one to whom he was more attached? any one with whom he conversed or shared his counsels more frequently?  It was, indeed, a great thing that we, differing as we did respecting the general interests of the republic, should continue in uninterrupted friendship.  But I saw clearly what his opinions and views were, and he saw mine equally.  I was for providing for the safety of the citizens in the first place, in order that we might be able to consult their dignity afterwards.  He thought more of consulting their existing dignity.  But because each of us had a definite object to pursue, our disagreement was the more endurable.  But what that extraordinary and almost godlike man thought of me is known to those men who pursued him to Paphos from the battle of Pharsalia.  No mention of me was ever made by him that was not the most honourable that could be, that was not full of the most friendly regret for me; while he confessed that I had had the most foresight, but that he had had more sanguine hopes.  And do you dare taunt me with the name of that man whose friend you admit that I was, and whose assassin you confess yourself?

XVI.  However, let us say no more of that war, in which you were too fortunate.  I will not reply even with those jests to which you have said that I gave utterance in the camp.  That camp was in truth full of anxiety, but although men are in great difficulties, still, provided they are men, they sometimes relax their minds.  But the fact that the same man finds fault with my melancholy, and also with my jokes, is a great proof that I was very moderate in each particular.