“For the former, volenti non fit injuria. It is said of the people under Eumenes, that they would not have changed them no their subjection for liberty; wherefore the Romans gave disturbance. If a people be contented with their government, it is a certain sign that it is good, and much good do them with it. The sword of your magistracy is for a terror to them that do evil. Eumenes had the fear of God, or of the Romans, before his eyes; concerning such he has given you no commission. “But till we can say, here are the Romans, where is Eumenes? do not think that the late appearances of God to you have been altogether for yourselves; ‘He has surely seen the affliction of your brethren, and heard their cry by reason of their task masters.’ For to believe otherwise is not only to be mindless of his ways, but altogether deaf. If you have ears to hear, this is the way in which you will certainly be called upon; for if, while there is no stock of liberty no sanctuary of the afflicted, it be a common object to behold a people casting themselves out of the pan of one prince into the fire of another, what can you think, but if the world should see the Roman ‘eagle again, she would renew her age and her flight? Nor did ever she spread her wings with better omen than will be read in your ensigns; which if, called in by an oppressed people they interpose between them and their yoke, the people themselves must either do nothing in the meantime or have no more pains to take for their wished fruit than to gather it, if that be not likewise done for them. Wherefore this must needs be easy, and yet you have a greater facility than is in the arm of flesh; for if the cause of mankind be the cause of God, the Lord of Hosts will be your captain, and you shall be a praise to the whole earth. “The facility of holding is in the way of your propagation; if you take that of Athens and Lacedemon, you shall rain snares, but either catch or hold nothing. Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord: if setting up for liberty you impose yokes, he will infallibly destroy you. On the other side, to go about a work of this nature by a league without a head, is to abdicate that magistracy wherewith he has not only endued you, but whereof he will require an account of you; for, ‘cursed is he that does the work of the Lord negligently.’ Wherefore you are to take the course of Rome: if you have subdued a nation that is capable of liberty, you shall make them a present of it, as did Flaminius to Greece, and AEmilius to Macedon, reserving to yourselves some part of that revenue which was legally paid to the former government, together with the right of being head of the league, which includes such levies of men and money as shall be necessary for the carrying on of the public work.