his task and the means of accomplishing it. Hence he succeeded, as is now universally admitted, in gaining a place beside Demosthenes, or at all events immediately after him, though he does not come up to the moral consciousness and consequent impressiveness of the Attic orator. But Cicero surpasses him in variety and splendour, where he is more akin to the Asiatic school than to the Attic. He commands such abundance of words as sometimes to become diffuse, though in other places he is verbose to cover the weakness of his arguments. His strongest part is his style; there he is clear, concise, and apt, perspicuous, elegant, and brilliant. He commands all moods, from playful jest to tragic pathos, but is most successful in the imitation of conviction and feeling, to which he gave increased impression by his fiery delivery. Hence he pleaded especially in criminal causes. Sometimes, of course, his rhetoric degenerates to a mere study of effect, and the grandeur of his words serves only to hide the poverty of thought and the badness of the It is true he was not over-scrupulous as to the causes he pleaded, but this feature he shares with the solicitors and lawyers of all times. In their general effect we are often dissatisfied with his speeches, since they are frequently deficient in acuteness; but we must allow him to be highly impressive in details.

cause.

THE INTRODUCTION,

I. THE CATILINE ORATIONS.

It was on the 21st of October, B.C. 63, that Cicero formally brought before the Senate information that a most dangerous and revolutionary conspiracy was about to break forth on the city under the leadership of the abandoned and profligate L. Sergius Catiline, its originator. It had been arranged that the rebels under C. Manlius were in five days to encamp openly at Faesule; in six days a massacre of all the rich and powerful in Rome, who were not parties to the conspiracy, was to be perpetrated, and the government and city were to be seized by a gang of desperadoes, bankrupt in character and in purse. The Senate was equal to the emergency, and passed the decree proper to the crisis, that "the Consuls shall look to it that the State receive no damage" (darent operam consules, ne quid respublici detrimenti copent). About three weeks after this senatus consultum was passed, Catiline, who was the recognised leader of all the social profligacy and public anarchy at Rome, convened his partisans in the house of M. Læca (Nov. 5) to arrange the parts to be taken by the different leaders. First, Cicero must be assassinated; and this part was assigned to L. Vargunteius and C. Cornelius. Cicero, however, was happily forewarned, and so forearmed, throngh Fabia, the mistress of Curius,

B

one of the conspirators, whom Cicero had bribed to act as the informer and spy on the conspiracy. Cicero, as Consul, called together the Senate on the 8th, to lay before them the attempt upon his life and the preparations of Catiline. Catiline appeared in his place, and Cicero broke out against him in the speech which is still extant. Catiline attempted to clear himself by accusing Cicero the Upstart of malevolence; but the Senate would not hear him. He left the city for the Etruscan camp the same night. Cicero thought that the battle was won, as he said the next day in his speech before the people (Orat. ii.). An attempt was now made to excite odium against him, on the ground that he had driven Catiline into exile untried and guiltless. This was soon prevented by the news of Catiline's arrival in the camp. Three weeks afterwards the news was brought to Cicero that Catiline's friends in the city had been negotiating with the Allobrogian ambassadors for succours of their Gallic horse. By the Consul's advice the latter demanded letters; these were given, and on the night of December 2nd, when they were leaving the city, they were arrested by the prætors, their letters carried to Cicero, the conspirators apprehended and convicted before the Senate by the evidence of the Gallic envoys and of their own handwriting. They had fixed the destruction of the city for the 19th of December, the day of the Saturnalia. Cicero tells us all this in his Third Oration, delivered before the people. Immediately the emissaries of the imprisoned conspirators began to agitate for an armed intervention in their favour, and the Senate was convoked to determine their fate. The Consul elect, D. Junius Silanus, was first asked to give his opinion; and he gave it for immediate punishment (supplicium sumendum). The others followed in the same tone, till it came to the turn of the prætor elect, C. Julius Cæsar. He declared his abhorrence of the conspirators, proposed to

confine them for life in the strongest municipium, and to make it a high offence against the State for any one to work for their liberation. But he denounced the punishment of death upon men who were untried as unconstitutional. This speech made a deep impression; many of Cicero's friends, among them his brothers, afraid of the consequences to him, gave in their adhesion to Tiberius Nero, who spoke later, and moved that the guards should be strengthened, and in the meantime the debate adjourned. The Consul elect himself, who spoke firstly in favour of immediate execution, now came over to this proposal. It was not so with Cicero. He was bent on having the conspirators put out of the way, and he rose and advocated this course. This speech is the Fourth Oration. He was followed by Cato, whose powerful eloquence finally decided the vote, and the conspirators were condemned.

Cicero saw them executed that night in the "Tulli anum." There was much rejoicing in the city. Even the plebs, which at first had been disposed to favour the conspiracy, had been terrified by the dangers of the city which Cicero put strongly before them, and were now entirely on his side.

II. ABSTRACT OF THE CATILINE ORATIONS.

Oration First.

CHAP. 1. Do you not see, Catiline, that your conspiracy has got wind, and measures are taken to crush it. 2. Yet you dare to enter the Senate House, when you ought to be paying the penalty of your crimes by death. 3. For this there are precedents in abundance, and it is only through the remiss conduct of the Consuls that the full constitutional powers entrusted to them have not been