15. “Why not rather, having dropped that fable of last night, recur to what really grieves you, what kindles your envy? Say,—Why, Demetrius, is mention made any where of your mounting the throne? Why do you appear, to some, a more worthy successor to your father’s dignity than I? Why do you disturb with doubt and anxiety my hopes, which would be certain if you were not in being? These are the thoughts of Perseus, though he does not express them; these make that man my enemy, these create my accuser; these fill your house, these your kingdom, with accusations and suspicions. But, father, as I ought not now either to hope for the crown, or perhaps ever to contend for it, because I am the younger brother, and because you wish that I should yield to the elder; so neither ought I at any former time, or at the present, to act in such a manner as to appear undeserving of you my father, and of all. For I should attain that by my own vices, not by yielding to him on whose side is law both human and divine, not by moderation. You upbraid me with the Romans; and what ought to be deemed an honour, you convert into a crime. I did not request, that I should either be delivered a hostage to the Romans, or sent as an ambassador to Rome. Being commissioned by you, I did not refuse to go. On both occasions, I conducted myself in such a manner, as to be no disgrace to you, to your kingdom, or to the Macedonian nation. You, therefore, father, have been the cause of my friendship with the Romans. As long as peace shall subsist between you and them, so long will I also continue in friendship with them; but, if war should arise, I, the same who have been there a hostage, and no unprofitable ambassador in my father’s behalf, will be their most determined enemy. Nor do I, this day, require that the favour of the Romans should be any advantage to me; I only entreat that it be not detrimental. It neither commenced in war, nor is it reserved for war. I have been a pledge of peace; and, to procure a continuance of peace, I was sent ambassador. Let neither be esteemed an honour or a crime. Father, if I have been guilty of any undutiful behaviour towards you, or any criminal behaviour towards my brother, I beg to be freed from no punishment. If I be innocent, let me not, I beseech you, be destroyed by envy when I cannot by crime. My brother’s accusation, this day, is not the first that he has brought against me; but it is the first made openly, and owing to no offence given him by me. If my father were angry with me, it would become you, the elder brother, to intercede for the younger, you to obtain pardon for his youth, and you for his error; but in the very person from whom I ought to receive protection, in him I meet my ruin. From a feast and revelry I have been hurried, almost half asleep, to plead my cause on a charge of fratricide. Without advocates, without patrons, I am compelled to plead my own cause. If I were to