present here without his usual friends," he adds, alluding to his armed satellites. "He would tell us after what manner he would maintain those acts of Caesar's. Are they to be found in notes and scraps and small documents brought forward by one witness, or not brought forward at all but only told to us? And shall those which he engraved in bronze, and which he wished to be known as the will of the people and as perpetual laws--shall they go for nothing?"[198] Here was the point in dispute. The decree had been voted soon after Caesar's death, giving the sanction of the Senate to his laws. For peace this had been done, as the best way out of the difficulty which oppressed the State. But it was intolerable that, under this sanction, Antony should have the power of bringing forth new edicts day after day, while the very laws which Caesar had passed were not maintained. "What better law was there, or more often demanded in the best days of the Republic, than that law," passed by Caesar, "under which the provinces were to be held by the Praetors only for one year, and by the Consuls for not more than two? But this law is abolished. So it is thus that Caesar's acts are to be maintained?"[199] Antony, no doubt, and his friends, having an eye to the fruition of the provinces, had found among Caesar's papers--or said they had found--some writing to suit their purpose. All things to be desired were to be found among Caesar's papers. "The banished are brought back from banishment, the right of citizenship is given not only to individuals but to whole nations and provinces, exceptions from taxations are granted, by the dead man's voice."[200] Antony had begun, probably, with some one or two more modest forgeries, and had gone on, strengthened in impudence by his own success, till Caesar dead was like to be worse to them than Caesar living. The whole speech is dignified, patriotic, and bold, asserting with truth that which he believed to be right, but never carried into invective or dealing with expressions of anger. It is very short, but I know no speech of his more closely to its purpose. I can see him now, with his toga round him, as he utters the final words: "I have lived perhaps long enough--both as to length of years and the glory I have won. What little may be added, shall be, not for myself, but for you and for the Republic." The words thus spoken became absolutely true. CHAPTER IX. _THE PHILIPPICS._ [Sidenote: B.C. 44, aetat. 63.]