Fourth Philippic
Philippica IV
Headnote
The popular counterpart to the Third Philippic, delivered to the people in the Forum on the very same day — 20 December 44 BC — only hours after the senatorial speech. The order is fixed: in the morning the tribunes of the plebs convened the Senate to provide a guard for the consuls-elect, Pansa and Hirtius, who would take office on the Kalends of January; Cicero addressed that meeting (the Third Philippic) and carried his motion that Decimus Brutus and the Gallic municipalities, the Martian and Fourth Legions and their officers Lucius Egnatuleius and the rest, and Octavian himself, be commended for what they had done against Antony. The Senate dispersed; Cicero went down into the Forum and addressed the crowd that had gathered there. This second speech is what they heard.
It is short — only sixteen sections — and a single, sustained announcement: that the Senate has just decreed Antony an enemy in fact, though not yet in name (est hostis a senatu nondum verbo appellatus, sed re iam iudicatus Antonius, §1). Cicero builds the speech around that one proposition. §1–6 set out the inferential chain: if armies have rightly been raised against Antony, he is an enemy; the Senate has just praised those who raised them (Octavian, Egnatuleius, the legions); therefore by inescapable inference the Senate has judged him an enemy — and the Martian and Fourth Legions, by deserting him for Octavian and taking their stand at Alba, judged him an enemy before the Senate did. §7–9 add the converging judgments of Decimus Brutus, the province of Gaul, all Italy, and the people themselves: every body that matters has reached the same verdict. §10 closes the demonstration with the gods — prodigies and a universal consent which cannot have been without divine prompting — and §11–16 are the hortatory close: Antony is no longer a wicked man but a beast in a pit (immani taetraque belua quae, quoniam in foveam incidit, obruatur, §12); the Roman people, conqueror of all nations, has its whole contest now with a brigand and a Spartacus. The speech ends, characteristically, on Cicero’s own role: with Marcus Servilius bringing the motion and Cicero, after a long withdrawal, acting as proposer and leader (me auctore et principe), the city has caught fire again with the hope of liberty.
The register is louder and more public than the Third Philippic. The Senate had been addressed in measured legal language — the technical word hostis held back, the honours framed as a motion. The Forum is addressed at a higher pitch of indignation: Antony is a plague (pestis), a beast (belua), an assassin (percussor), a brigand (latro), a Spartacus. The Tarquin material of the Third Philippic is dropped; the comparison with Catiline takes its place (§15), and is sharpened into a boast: Catiline at least raised an army from nothing, whereas Antony has lost the army he was given. The thirty-nine sections of senatorial argument are compressed into sixteen sections of public address, and the senatorial conclusion — that what the Senate has done amounts to the judgment of hostis — is announced to the people as already decided.
Both speeches were carried, and the practical effect was immediate: Octavian and the legions were now operating with formal senatorial sanction; Decimus Brutus’s defence of Cisalpine Gaul was the Senate’s defence; the siege of Mutina, which Antony was even now beginning, was a siege against Rome. The formal hostis declaration would come only at the end of April 43, after Forum Gallorum and Mutina; for the present it was held back, by the calculation Cicero makes explicit in §1 — the foundation has been laid; the rest will follow.
Your incredible crowd, citizens, and an assembly as great as I do not seem to remember, both brings me the greatest eagerness to defend the commonwealth and the greatest hope of recovering it. Spirit, indeed, has never failed me; what failed were the times — and as soon as they seemed to show some glimpse of light, I was first to defend your liberty. If I had tried to do it earlier, I could not be doing it now. For on this day, citizens, do not suppose that some trivial matter has been done: the foundations have been laid for the actions still to come. For Antony has not yet been called an enemy by the Senate in word, but in fact he has already been so judged.
frequentia vestrum incredibilis, Quirites, contioque tanta quantam meminisse non videor et alacritatem mihi summam defendendae rei publicae adfert et spem recuperandae. quamquam animus mihi quidem numquam defuit: tempora defuerunt, quae simul ac primum aliquid lucis ostendere visa sunt, princeps vestrae libertatis defendendae fui. quod si id ante facere conatus essem, nunc facere non possem. hodierno enim die, Quirites, ne mediocrem rem actam arbitremini, fundamenta iacta sunt reliquarum actionum. nam est hostis a senatu nondum verbo appellatus, sed re iam iudicatus Antonius.
Now indeed I am far more lifted up, since you too have approved, with so great a consent and so great an outcry, that he is an enemy. For it cannot be, citizens, that those men are not impious who have raised armies against the consul, or else that he is not an enemy against whom arms have rightly been taken up. This doubt, then, although there was none, the Senate on this day removed, so that none could remain. Gaius Caesar, who has defended and is defending the commonwealth and your liberty by his own zeal, his own counsel, and finally his own patrimony, has been honoured with the highest praises of the Senate.
nunc vero multo sum erectior quod vos quoque illum hostem esse tanto consensu tantoque clamore approbavistis. neque enim, Quirites, fieri potest ut non aut ei sint impii qui contra consulem exercitus comparaverunt, aut ille hostis contra quem iure arma sumpta sunt. hanc igitur dubitationem, quamquam nulla erat, tamen ne qua posset esse senatus hodierno die sustulit. C. Caesar qui rem publicam libertatemque vestram suo studio, consilio, patrimonio denique tutatus est et tutatur maximis senatus laudibus ornatus est.
I praise you, I praise you, citizens, that with the most grateful hearts you attend the name of that most illustrious young man — or boy, rather; for his deeds are those of immortality, his name those of his age. Many things I remember, many I have heard, many I have read, citizens: nothing of this kind have I learned of from the memory of all the ages: that, when we were pressed down by slavery, when the evil was growing day by day, when we had no protection, when we feared the deadly and pestilent return of Marcus Antonius from Brundisium, this young man should have taken a plan unhoped-for by all and certainly unheard of — to raise an unconquered army out of his father’s soldiers, and to turn aside from the ruin of the commonwealth the frenzy of Antony, goaded on by the cruellest counsels.
laudo, laudo vos, Quirites, quod gratissimis animis prosequimini nomen clarissimi adulescentis vel pueri potius; sunt enim facta eius immortalitatis, nomen aetatis. multa memini, multa audivi, multa legi, Quirites: nihil ex omnium saeculorum memoria tale cognovi: qui cum servitute premeremur, in dies malum cresceret, praesidi nihil haberemus, capitalem et pestiferum a Brundisio tum M. Antoni reditum timeremus, hoc insperatum omnibus consilium, incognitum certe ceperit, ut exercitum invictum ex paternis militibus conficeret Antonique furorem crudelissimis consiliis incitatum a pernicie rei publicae averteret.
For who is there who does not understand this: that, had Caesar not prepared an army, Antony’s return would not have been without our destruction? For he was returning so ablaze with hatred against you, so steeped in the blood of the Roman citizens whom he had slaughtered at Suessa, whom at Brundisium, that he was thinking of nothing but the ruin of the Roman people. What protection, then, was there for your safety and your liberty, had there not been the army of Gaius Caesar, raised from the bravest of his father’s soldiers? Concerning his praises and the honours which, in return for his more-than-divine and immortal services, are owed to him as divine and immortal, the Senate with my assent decreed a little while ago that the matter be brought forward at the earliest opportunity.
quis est enim qui hoc non intellegat, nisi Caesar exercitum paravisset, non sine exitio nostro futurum Antoni reditum fuisse? ita enim se recipiebat ardens odio vestri, cruentus sanguine civium Romanorum quos Suessae, quos Brundisi occiderat ut nihil nisi de pernicie populi Romani cogitaret. quod autem praesidium erat salutis libertatisque vestrae, si C. Caesaris fortissimorum sui patris militum exercitus non fuisset? cuius de laudibus et honoribus qui ei pro divinis et immortalibus meritis divini immortalesque debentur mihi senatus adsensus paulo ante decrevit ut primo quoque tempore referretur.
Who, by that decree, does not see that Antony has been judged an enemy? For what else can we call him, when the Senate judges that singular honours must be sought out for those who lead armies against him? What, again, of the Martian Legion — which seems to me to have drawn its name, by divine appointment, from that god from whom we are taught the Roman people was begotten — did it not, by its own decrees, judge Antony an enemy before the Senate did? For if he is no enemy, we must of necessity judge these men enemies who have abandoned the consul. Splendidly and aptly, citizens, with your shouts of acclamation you have ratified the most glorious deed of the Martian soldiers: they who attached themselves to the authority of the Senate, to your liberty, to the whole commonwealth, abandoned that man, an enemy, a brigand, and a parricide of his country.
quo decreto quis non perspicit hostem esse Antonium iudicatum? quem enim possumus appellare eum contra quem qui exercitus ducunt, eis senatus arbitratur singularis exquirendos honores? quid? legio Martia, quae mihi videtur divinitus ab eo deo traxisse nomen a quo populum Romanum generatum accepimus, non ipsa suis decretis prius quam senatus hostem iudicavit Antonium? nam si ille non hostis, hos qui consulem reliquerunt hostis necesse est iudicemus. praeclare et loco, Quirites, reclamatione vestra factum pulcherrimum Martialium comprobavistis: qui se ad senatus auctoritatem, ad libertatem vestram, ad universam rem publicam contulerunt, hostem illum et latronem et parricidam patriae reliquerunt.
Nor did they do this with spirit and bravery only, but also with deliberation and wisdom: they took their stand at Alba — a town well placed, fortified, near at hand, of the bravest of men, of the most loyal and best of citizens. Imitating the courage of this legion, the Fourth Legion, under the lead of Lucius Egnatuleius — whom the Senate, deservedly, has just praised — has followed the army of Gaius Caesar. What graver judgments are you waiting for, Marcus Antonius? Caesar is exalted to the skies for raising an army against you; the legions which abandoned you, which had been sent for by you, which would have been yours had you preferred to be a consul rather than an enemy, are praised in the choicest words; the bravest and truest judgment of those legions the Senate confirms, the whole Roman people approves — unless perhaps you, citizens, judge Antony a consul, not an enemy.
nec solum id animose et fortiter sed considerate etiam sapienterque fecerunt: Albae constiterunt, in urbe opportuna, munita, propinqua, fortissimorum virorum, fidelissimorum civium atque optimorum. huius legionis legio quarta imitata virtutem, duce L. Egnatuleio, quem senatus merito paulo ante laudavit, C. Caesaris exercitum persecuta est. quae exspectas, M. Antoni, iudicia graviora? Caesar fertur in caelum qui contra te exercitum comparavit; laudantur exquisitissimis verbis legiones quae te reliquerunt, quae a te arcessitae sunt, quae essent, si te consulem quam hostem maluisses, tuae: quarum legionum fortissimum verissimumque iudicium confirmat senatus, comprobat universus populus Romanus, nisi forte vos, Quirites, consulem, non hostem iudicatis Antonium.
So I thought, citizens, that you would judge, as indeed you show. What, then? Do you think that the towns, the colonies, the prefectures judge any differently? All mortals consent with one mind; all arms are to be taken up by those who would have these things safe, against that plague. What, again, of the judgment of Decimus Brutus, citizens — which you have been able to perceive from his edict of this very day — does it seem to anyone, after all, fit to be despised? Rightly and truly do you deny it, citizens. For it is as though, by the kindness and gift of the immortal gods, the race and name of the Bruti has been granted to the commonwealth for either the establishing or the recovering of the liberty of the Roman people.
sic arbitrabar, Quirites, vos iudicare ut ostenditis. quid? municipia, colonias, praefecturas num aliter iudicare censetis? omnes mortales una mente consentiunt; omnia arma eorum qui haec salva velint contra illam pestem esse capienda. quid? D. Bruti iudicium, Quirites, quod ex hodierno eius edicto perspicere potuistis, num cui tandem contemnendum videtur? recte et vere negatis, Quirites. est enim quasi deorum immortalium beneficio et munere datum rei publicae Brutorum genus et nomen ad libertatem populi Romani vel constituendam vel recipiendam.
What, then, has Decimus Brutus judged concerning Marcus Antonius? He shuts him out of his province; he resists him with an army; he urges all Gaul to war — Gaul itself roused of its own accord and by its own judgment. If Antony is consul, Brutus is an enemy: if Brutus is the preserver of the commonwealth, Antony is an enemy. Can we, then, doubt which of these is the case? And just as you, with one mind and one voice, deny that you doubt, so the Senate has just now decreed that Decimus Brutus deserves the best of the commonwealth, in defending the authority of the Senate and the liberty and empire of the Roman people. From whom was he defending them? From an enemy, of course: for what other defence is there that deserves praise?
quid igitur D. Brutus de M. Antonio iudicavit? excludit provincia; exercitu obsistit; Galliam totam hortatur ad bellum, ipsam sua sponte suoque iudicio excitatam. si consul Antonius, Brutus hostis: si conservator rei publicae Brutus, hostis Antonius. num igitur utrum horum sit dubitare possumus? atque ut vos una mente unaque voce dubitare vos negatis, sic modo decrevit senatus, D. Brutum optime de re publica mereri, cum senatus auctoritatem populique Romani libertatem imperiumque defenderet. A quo defenderet? nempe ab hoste: quae est enim alia laudanda defensio?
Next the province of Gaul is praised, and rightly adorned by the Senate with the fullest words, because it resists Antony. If that province thought him consul and would not receive him, it would bind itself by a great crime: for all the provinces ought to be in the law and power of the consul. Decimus Brutus, commander, consul-elect, a citizen born for the commonwealth, denies this; Gaul denies it; all Italy denies it; the Senate denies it; you deny it. Who, then, takes him for a consul, except the brigands? — though not even they, in fact, feel what they say, nor can they dissent from the judgment of all mortals, however impious and wicked they are (and they are). But the hope of plundering and seizing blinds the minds of those whom no donation of goods, no assignment of lands, no spear of those endless auctions has ever satisfied; who have set out the City, the goods and fortunes of the citizens, as their plunder; who suppose, so long as there is anything here for them to seize and carry off, that they shall lack for nothing — to whom Marcus Antonius (O immortal gods, avert and curse this omen, I beseech you!) has promised that he will divide the City among them.
deinceps laudatur provincia Gallia meritoque ornatur verbis amplissimis ab senatu quod resistat Antonio. quem si consulem illa provincia putaret neque eum reciperet, magno scelere se astringeret: omnes enim in consulis iure et imperio debent esse provinciae. negat hoc D. Brutus imperator, consul designatus, natus rei publicae civis; negat Gallia, negat cuncta Italia, negat senatus, negatis vos. quis illum igitur consulem nisi latrones putant? quamquam ne ei quidem ipsi, quod loquuntur, id sentiunt nec ab iudicio omnium mortalium, quamvis impii nefariique sint, sicut sunt, dissentire possunt. sed spes rapiendi atque praedandi occaecat animos eorum quos non bonorum donatio, non agrorum adsignatio, non illa infinita hasta satiavit; qui sibi urbem, qui bona et fortunas civium ad praedam proposuerunt; qui, dum hic sit quod rapiant, quod auferant, nihil sibi defuturum arbitrantur; quibus M. Antonius —o di immortales, avertite et detestamini, quaeso, hoc omen!—urbem se divisurum esse promisit.
So indeed, citizens, may it fall out for them as you pray, and may the penalty for this madness recoil upon him and his household! That so it shall be, I am confident. For now I judge that not only men but the immortal gods themselves have agreed to preserve the commonwealth. For whether by prodigies and portents the immortal gods foretell the future to us, things have been so openly proclaimed that penalty draws near to him and liberty to us; or whether so great a consent of all could not have been without the prompting of the gods, what is there that we could doubt about the will of the heavens?
ita vero, Quirites, ei ut precamini eveniat atque huius amentiae poena in ipsum familiamque eius recidat! quod ita futurum esse confido. iam enim non solum homines sed etiam deos immortalis ad rem publicam conservandam arbitror consensisse. Sive enim prodigiis atque portentis di immortales nobis futura praedicunt, ita sunt aperte pronuntiata ut et illi poena et nobis libertas appropinquet; sive tantus consensus omnium sine impulsu deorum esse non potuit, quid est quod de voluntate caelestium dubitare possimus?
It remains, citizens, for you to persevere in that resolve which you carry openly before you. I shall therefore do as commanders, with the battle-line drawn up, are accustomed to do: although they see their soldiers most ready for the fight, they still exhort them; so I shall encourage you, burning and lifted up for the recovery of liberty. Yours is no contest, citizens, with an enemy with whom any terms of peace can be possible. He no longer covets your slavery, as before, but, now enraged, your blood. No sport seems to him more delightful than gore, than slaughter, than the butchery of citizens before his eyes.
reliquum est, Quirites, ut vos in ista sententia quam prae vobis fertis perseveretis. faciam igitur ut imperatores instructa acie solent, quamquam paratissimos milites ad proeliandum videant, ut eos tamen adhortentur, sic ego vos ardentis et erectos ad libertatem recuperandam cohortabor. non est vobis, Quirites, cum eo hoste certamen cum quo aliqua pacis condicio esse possit. neque enim ille servitutem vestram, ut antea, sed iam iratus sanguinem concupiscit. nullus ei ludus videtur esse iucundior quam cruor, quam caedes, quam ante oculos trucidatio civium.
You have to do, citizens, not with a wicked and impious man, but with a vast and foul beast which, since it has fallen into the pit, must be buried under it. For if he climbs out of there, no cruelty of punishment will be too much to refuse. But he is held, he is hemmed in, he is pressed — now by the forces we have already, soon by those which the new consuls will assemble in a few days. Lean upon the cause, citizens, as you are doing. Never was your consent greater in any cause; never were you so vehemently allied with the Senate. And no wonder: for it is not on what terms we shall live that is at stake, but whether we shall live at all, or perish with torment and disgrace.
non est vobis res, Quirites, cum scelerato homine ac nefario, sed cum immani taetraque belua quae, quoniam in foveam incidit, obruatur. si enim illim emerserit, nullius supplici crudelitas erit recusanda. sed tenetur, premitur, urgetur nunc eis copiis quas iam habemus, mox eis quas paucis diebus novi consules comparabunt. incumbite in causam, Quirites, ut facitis. numquam maior consensus vester in ulla causa fuit; numquam tam vehementer cum senatu consociati fuistis. nec mirum: agitur enim non qua condicione victuri, sed victurine simus an cum supplicio ignominiaque perituri.
Death, indeed, nature has set before all; but the cruelty and dishonour of death is for valour to ward off — valour which is the property of the Roman race and stock. Hold fast to this, I beg, citizens, which your ancestors left you as an inheritance. All other things are false, uncertain, perishable, shifting: valour alone is set with the deepest roots; she can never by any force be shaken, never moved from her place. By her your ancestors first conquered all Italy, then razed Carthage, overthrew Numantia, brought into the power of this empire the most powerful kings and the most warlike peoples.
quamquam mortem quidem natura omnibus proposuit; crudelitatem mortis et dedecus virtus propulsare solet, quae propria est Romani generis et seminis. hanc retinete, quaeso, Quirites, quam vobis tamquam hereditatem maiores vestri reliquerunt. Alia omnia falsa, incerta sunt, caduca, mobilia: virtus est una altissimis defixa radicibus, quae numquam vi ulla labefactari potest, numquam demoveri loco. hac maiores vestri primum universam Italiam devicerunt, deinde Karthaginem exciderunt, Numantiam everterunt, potentissimos reges, bellicosissimas gentis in dicionem huius imperi redegerunt.
And your ancestors, citizens, had to do with an enemy who had a commonwealth, a senate-house, a treasury, the consent and concord of citizens — with whom, if circumstances so required, there was at least some prospect of peace and treaty. This enemy of yours assails your commonwealth, while himself having none; he longs to destroy the Senate (that is, the council of the whole world), while himself having no public council; he has emptied your treasury, while having none of his own. For how can a man have the concord of citizens, when he has no citizen body at all? And what prospect of peace can there be with one in whom there is incredible cruelty and no good faith?
ac maioribus quidem vestris, Quirites, cum eo hoste res erat qui haberet rem publicam, curiam, aerarium, consensum et concordiam civium, rationem aliquam, si ita res tulisset, pacis et foederis: hic vester hostis vestram rem publicam oppugnat, ipse habet nullam; senatum, id est orbis terrae consilium, delere gestit, ipse consilium publicum nullum habet; aerarium vestrum exhausit, suum non habet. nam concordiam civium qui habere potest, nullam cum habeat civitatem? pacis vero quae potest esse cum eo ratio in quo est incredibilis crudelitas, fides nulla?
Yours, then, citizens — the Roman people, conqueror of all nations — the whole contest is with an assassin, with a brigand, with a Spartacus. For as for his being accustomed to glory that he is like Catiline, he is equal to him in crime, inferior in energy. Catiline, having no army, suddenly threw one together: this man has lost the army which he received. As, then, you broke Catiline by my diligence, by the Senate’s authority, by your own zeal and valour, so the wicked banditry of Antony you shall in a short time hear has been crushed by your concord with the Senate (greater than ever there was), by the good fortune and valour of your armies and their commanders.
est igitur, Quirites, populo Romano, victori omnium gentium, omne certamen cum percussore, cum latrone, cum Spartaco. nam quod se similem esse Catilinae gloriari solet, scelere par est illi, industria inferior. ille cum exercitum nullum habuisset, repente conflavit: hic eum exercitum quem accepit amisit. Vt igitur Catilinam diligentia mea, senatus auctoritate, vestro studio et virtute fregistis, sic Antoni nefarium latrocinium vestra cum senatu concordia tanta quanta numquam fuit, felicitate et virtute exercituum ducumque vestrorum brevi tempore oppressum audietis.
For my part, so much as I can accomplish and achieve by care, by labour, by sleepless nights, by authority, by counsel, I shall pass over nothing that I think pertains to your liberty: for indeed, in view of your most generous services to me, I cannot do otherwise without crime. This day, with the motion brought by a most brave man and a friend most devoted to you, this Marcus Servilius, and by his colleagues, men most distinguished, citizens most excellent, for the first time after a long interval, with me as proposer and leader, we have caught fire with the hope of liberty.
equidem quantum cura, labore, vigiliis, auctoritate, consilio eniti atque efficere potero, nihil praetermittam quod ad libertatem vestram pertinere arbitrabor; neque enim id pro vestris amplissimis in me beneficiis sine scelere facere possum. hodierno autem die primum referente viro fortissimo vobisque amicissimo, hoc M. Servilio, conlegisque eius, ornatissimis viris, optimis civibus, longo intervallo me auctore et principe ad spem libertatis exarsimus.