stripped our allies and robbed the gods, which furthermore we have contributed ourselves from what we did not possess, and then expended it against one another? Or who could number the mass of men that have been lost, not only of ordinary persons (that is beyond computation) but of knights and senators, each one of whom was able in foreign wars to preserve the whole city by his life and death? How many Curtii, how many Decii, Fabii, Gracchi, Marcelli, Scipiones have been killed? Not, by Jupiter, to repel Samnites or Latins or Spaniards or Carthaginians, but only to perish themselves in the end. And for those under arms who died, no matter how deep sorrow one might feel for them, there is less reason to lament. They entered the battles as volunteers, if it is proper to call volunteers men compelled by fear, and they met even if an unjust at least a brave death, in an equal struggle; and in the hope that they might even survive and conquer they fell without grieving. But how might one mourn as they deserve those who were pitiably destroyed in their houses, in the roads, in the Forum, in the senate-chamber even, on the Capitol even, by violence--not only men but also women, not only those in their prime, but also old men and children? And after subjecting one another to so many of these reprisals of such a nature as all our enemies put together never inflicted upon us (nor were we ever the authors of anything similar to them), so far from loathing such acts and manfully wishing to have done with them, we rejoice and hold festivals and term those who are guilty of them benefactors. Honestly, I cannot deem this life that we have been leading human; it is rather that of wild beasts which are consumed by one another.