Political Speeches (Oxford World's Classics) (19 page)

Verres convicted all of them on the advice of his council. However, although the issue was such an important one and so many people were affected, he did not send for his quaestor Titus Vettius
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to ask for his advice, nor did he consult his legate the excellent Publius Cervius
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(in fact Cervius was the first person that Verres rejected as a juror, and he rejected him precisely because he had been his legate in
Sicily). So it was on the advice of his council that he condemned them all—that is, on the advice of robbers.

[115] The Sicilians are our oldest and most loyal allies; our ancestors rewarded them with numerous privileges. When they heard the verdict, they were deeply disturbed, and feared for their own lives and property. They were outraged that the mildness and gentleness of our rule had turned into such monstrous cruelty and inhumanity, that so many people who had done nothing wrong should have been convicted at the same time, and that a corrupt governor should seek to justify his thefts by shamefully killing innocent men.

You could be forgiven, members of the jury, for supposing that, as far as the defendant’s corruption, madness, and savagery are concerned, that is all there is. That would be a reasonable enough assumption. After all, if he were to compete in wickedness with others, he would leave them all far behind. [116] But he also competes with himself: he is constantly trying to outdo his worst crime to date with some new criminal act. I said that Phalacrus of Centuripae was spared by Cleomenes, because Cleomenes had been sailing in his quadrireme. The young man was extremely anxious, because he saw that his own case was the same as that of the innocent men who had been convicted. So Timarchides went to him and reassured him that he was not in danger of being executed; but he advised him to take care not to get flogged. I will spare you the details; you have heard Phalacrus himself testify that this frightened him into paying money to Timarchides.
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[117] But in the case of Verres, these are trivial charges. A ship’s captain from a highly distinguished city paid a bribe because he was afraid of being flogged: it is human nature. Someone else pays a bribe to escape conviction: it happens. The Roman people does not want Verres to be prosecuted on conventional charges. They demand new ones, they long for unprecedented ones: in their eyes, this trial is not about a governor of Sicily, but about an unspeakable tyrant.

The condemned men were shut up inside the prison.
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Punishment was prescribed for them, but it was also inflicted on the captains’ unhappy parents, who were forbidden access to their sons, and forbidden to bring their children food and clothes. [118] The fathers who you see here in court lay in the doorway; the wretched mothers spent the whole night at the prison entrance, denied the slightest glimpse of their children, begging for nothing except to be allowed
to take up on their lips their sons’ last breath. The prison warder stood by, the governor’s executioner, the bringer of death and terror to allies and citizens alike—the lictor Sextius, to whom every shriek and cry of pain was worth a specific sum of money. ‘To visit him, it will cost you so much; to bring food inside, so much.’ Nobody refused. ‘So what will you give me to kill your son with only one blow of my axe? Not to let him suffer too long, not to strike him too many times, not to let him feel the pain as his life is taken away?’ Money was paid to the lictor even for this. [119] What great, intolerable suffering! What grievous, bitter bad luck! Parents were forced to pay not for their children’s lives, but for the quickness of their deaths. And even the young men themselves talked to Sextius about the blow and that one single strike; and their final request to their parents was that they give the lictor what he wanted for minimizing the agony they were about to undergo.

Many terrible sufferings were inflicted on those parents and relatives, many—but the death of their sons is surely the last. No, it is not going to be. But how can cruelty go any further? A way will be found. For when the men have been beheaded and killed, their bodies will be thrown to the beasts. And if this distresses their parents, they can always pay for the privilege of burial. [120] You have heard Onasus of Segesta, a gentleman of the highest rank, testify that he paid Timarchides to be allowed to bury one of the captains, Heraclius. So you cannot say, ‘fathers who have lost their sons are naturally going to come to court in a state of anger’, because this is a leading man in his city and a man of exceptionally high rank, and he is not talking about his son. And can you name anyone at Syracuse at that time who has not heard or does not know that these deals with Timarchides for permission to bury the captains’ bodies were actually struck with the men themselves before they were killed? Do you deny that they spoke openly to Timarchides about this, that they all called all their loved ones in, that they openly made formal arrangements for their funerals while they were still alive?

[121] When this business had all been settled and concluded, the men were led from the prison and tied to the post. Who on that occasion was so iron-hearted, who was so inhuman—except you alone—as not to be deeply moved by their youth, their noble birth, and their tragic situation? Who did not shed tears? Who did not think that the disaster which had befallen those men was not
something which affected them alone, but represented a danger that threatened everyone? They were beheaded. Amid everyone’s cries of grief, you rejoiced and triumphed, overjoyed that the witnesses to your greed had been removed.

But you were wrong, Verres, very wrong to think that you could wash away the stains of your thefts and scandals with the blood of innocent allies. You must have been out of your mind to think that you could heal the wounds caused by your avarice by using cruelty as your medicine. For although those witnesses to your crimes are indeed dead, their nearest and dearest have not forgotten them—or you. And some of the captains are in fact still alive, and are here in court. Destiny, I believe, has kept them back to avenge their innocent comrades at this trial. [122] Phylarchus of Haluntium is here. He refused to flee with Cleomenes, and so was overcome by the pirates and taken prisoner. That disaster proved to be his salvation: had he not been taken by the pirates, he would have fallen to this brigand instead. He has testified to us about the exemption of the sailors, their lack of food, and how Cleomenes fled. Phalacrus of Centuripae is also present, a member of a distinguished family from a distinguished city. He tells the same story, and agrees with Phylarchus in every particular.

[123] Immortal gods! How do you feel after hearing all of this, members of the jury? How have you reacted to it? Am I being silly about it all, and being excessively affected by the terrible disaster and misery which has overwhelmed our allies? Or do you feel the same distress as I do at the dreadful agony of people who are innocent, and at the grief of their parents? For my part, when I tell you that a man from Herbita or a man from Heraclea has been beheaded, I see before my eyes the shameful injustice of what they suffered. They were citizens of those communities; they grew up in the fields from which, by their own effort and hard work, a vast quantity of grain is contributed every year to feed the Roman populace. Their parents brought them up and educated them to believe in our rule and our sense of justice. And now they have fallen victim to the monstrous barbarity of Gaius Verres and his deadly axe.

[124] Whenever that captain from Tyndaris, whenever the one from Segesta comes into my mind, I think both of the privileges that those cities have enjoyed in the past and the services that they have rendered us. These are cities that Publius Africanus
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thought should
be adorned with spoils taken from the enemy; but now Gaius Verres has not only stripped them of those adornments, but has even, in an act of supreme wickedness, deprived them of their noblest sons. Listen to what the people of Tyndaris would freely declare: ‘We are counted among the seventeen peoples of Sicily.
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We consistently maintained our ties of friendship and loyalty with the Roman people throughout all the Punic and Sicilian Wars. We have always provided the Roman people with every requisite of war and every perquisite of peace.’ But a fat lot of good their services did them while they were under the authority and power of Verres! [125] Once upon a time Scipio led your sailors
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against Carthage; but now Cleomenes leads your ship—almost empty—against the pirates. Africanus shared with you the spoils of war and the rewards of victory; but now, because of Verres, you are despoiled, your ship is taken away by the pirates, and you are yourselves classed as enemies.

And what about Segesta’s kinship with us
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—something not merely recorded in books and recalled in speech, but validated and confirmed by that city’s many services to us? I ask you, what benefits did this tie bring while Verres was governor? Clearly, gentlemen, the only privilege Segesta enjoyed was to have its noblest young citizen torn from the bosom of his country and handed over to Verres’ executioner Sextius. Our ancestors gave this state extensive, fertile lands together with immunity from taxation. But with you its kinship with Rome, its loyalty, its antiquity, and its standing did not even secure for it the privilege of having its prayer answered when it appealed to prevent the bloody death of one honourable, innocent citizen.

[126] Where can our allies take refuge? To whom can they appeal? What hope can they have that their lives will be worth living, if you abandon them? Should they go to the senate? What for? To have Verres punished? But that would not be customary: that is not the senate’s function. Should they take refuge with the Roman people? The people would have an answer ready: they would say that they have passed a law for the allies and that they have appointed you as its guardians and enforcers. So this is the only place where the allies can take refuge, this is their safe harbour, this is their citadel, and this is their sanctuary.

But they are not taking refuge here, as in the past, to secure restitution of their property. They are not asking for their silver, their gold, their textiles, and their slaves, nor for the works of art
which have been removed from cities and temples. Ignorant as they are, they are afraid that the Roman people have come to condone such thefts and are happy to see them continue. For many years now we have put up with this and said nothing, despite seeing all the wealth of all the nations flow into the hands of a very few people. And the fact that none of those people hides what he has done or takes any trouble to conceal his greed only increases our apparent toleration and acceptance of what is going on. [127] In this beautiful city of ours, so well stocked with works of art, do you think there is a single statue, a single painting that was not taken from defeated enemies and brought here? On the other hand, the country houses of those men I am referring to are decorated and indeed stuffed with large quantities of beautiful treasures which have been looted from our most steadfast allies. Where do you imagine the wealth of all those foreign countries has gone, countries that are now so poor, when you observe that all Athens, Pergamum, Cyzicus, Miletus, Chios, Samos, and indeed all Asia, Achaea, Greece, and Sicily are now crammed inside a tiny number of country houses?

But, as I say, your allies are giving all this up and letting it go, gentlemen. By their services and loyalty towards us, they took steps to prevent their being officially plundered by the Roman people as a whole. When they found themselves unable to resist the private greed of only a small number of individuals, they were still able somehow to supply the loot required. But they have now reached the point where they have not only no means of resisting, but no means of satisfying the demand. So they let their property go. The name of this court is the court for the restitution of monies, but they do not ask for theirs to be returned: they give it up. Dressed in the clothes you now see them in, they take refuge before you. [128] Look, gentlemen, look at the filth and rags of our allies!
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Sthenius of Thermae
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is with us today: look at his hair and clothing. His home has been completely ransacked, but he does not breathe a word about your thefts. Instead, he seeks restoration of his own self—nothing more. Through your criminal greed, you have forced him out of his own country, a country in which he, by his great merits and public-spirited actions, was the leading citizen. Dexo whom you see here is not asking for the return of the public property of Tyndaris or for his own private property which you stole, but in his wretchedness he asks for his only son, his excellent and entirely
innocent son. He does not want to take home money from the damages that you, Verres, will have to pay, but to take instead some consolation from your ruin for his son’s bones and ashes. The aged Eubulida here has not undertaken such a long and difficult journey at the very end of his life in order to recover some part of his property; no, he has come to watch your conviction with those same eyes with which he saw the blood spurting from his son’s neck.

[129] And if Lucius Metellus had allowed it, gentlemen, the dead men’s mothers and sisters would be here too. One of them came to meet me as I was approaching Heraclea one night. She was accompanied by all the married women of the city carrying torches; she addressed me as her saviour, and named you as her executioner. Calling out her son’s name, the poor woman threw herself at my feet, as if I had the power to bring him back from the dead. In the other cities I visited the older women did exactly the same, as did the dead men’s young children; and both of these alike, young and old, made appeals to my efforts and energy, and to your honour and pity.

[130] And so it is, gentlemen, that Sicily has come to me with this complaint, the one it feels most strongly about; and I took it up for them out of compassion, not through any hope of glory. My motive was simply to prevent false convictions, the prison, chains, whips, axes, the torture of the allies, the blood of the innocent, and even the pallid corpses of the dead and the grief of parents and loved ones becoming a source of financial gain to our magistrates. If, through your integrity and your sense of honour, gentlemen, I succeed in securing the defendant’s conviction and so freeing Sicily from its fear of this happening again, I will conclude that I have done enough to satisfy my own sense of duty and the wishes of those who asked me to take on this case.