of man, and the power of fortune, and that whatever we enterprise is subject to a thousand chances. If, before the Romans passed into Africa, you had of your own accord quitted Italy, and made the offers you now make, I believe they would not have been rejected. But as you have been forced out of Italy, and we are masters here of the open country, the situation of things is much altered. And, what is chiefly to be considered, the Carthaginians, by the late treaty, which we entered into at their request, were, over and above what you offer, to have restored to us our prisoners without ransom, delivered up their ships of war, paid us five thousand talents, and to have given hostages for the performance of all. The senate accepted these conditions, but Carthage failed on her part; Carthage deceived us. What then is to be done? Are the Carthaginians to be released from the most important articles of the treaty, as a reward of their breach of faith? No, certainly. If, to the conditions before agreed upon, you had added some new articles to our advantage, there would have been matter of reference to the Roman people; but when, instead of adding, you retrench, there is no room for deliberation. The Carthaginians therefore must submit to us at discretion, or must vanquish us in battle. From Hooke.

SPEECH OF TITUS QUINCTIUS TO THE ROMANS, WHEN THE ÆQUI AND VOLSCI, TAKING ADVANTAGE OF THEIR INTESTINE COMMOTIONS, RAVAGED THEIR COUNTRY TO THE GATES OF ROME.

THOUGH I am not conscious, O Romans, of any crime by me committed, it is yet with the utmost shame and confusion that I appear in your assem bly. You have seen it-posterity will know it!-in the fourth consulship of Titus Quinctius, the Æqui and Volsci (scarce a match for the Hernici alone) came in arms to the very gates of Rome, and went away again unchastised! The course of our manners, indeed, and the state of our affairs, have long been such, that I had no reason to presage much good; but, could I have imagined that so great an ignominy would have befallen me this year, I would, by banishment or death, (if all other means had failed) have avoided the station I am now in. What! might Rome then have been taken, if those men who were at our gates had not wanted courage for the attempt?-Rome taken, whilst I was consul!-Ofhonours I had sufficientof life enough-more than enough—I should have died in my third consulate.

But who are they that our dastardly enemies thus despise?-the consuls, or you, Romans? If we are in fault, depose us, or punish us yet more severely. If you are to blame-may neither gods nor men punish your faults! only may you repent! No, Romans, the confidence of our enemies is not owing to their courage, or to their belief of your cowardice; they have been too often vanquished,

not to know both themselves and you. Discord, discord, is the ruin of this city! The eternal disputes between the senate and the people are the sole cause of our misfortunes. While we will set no bounds to our dominion, nor you to your liberty; while you impatiently endure patrician magis. trates, and we plebeian; our enemies take heart, grow elated and presumptuous. In the name of the immortal gods, what is it, Romans, you would have? You desired tribunes; for the sake of peace, we granted them. You were eager to have decemvirs; we consented to their creation. You grew weary of these decemvirs; we obliged them to abdicate. Your hatred pursued them when reduced to private men; and we suffered you to put to death, or banish, patricians of the first rank in the republic. You insisted upon the restoration of the tribuneship; we yielded: we quietly saw consuls of your own faction elected. You have the protection of your tribunes, and the privilege of appeal the patricians are subjected to the decrees of the commons. Under pretence of equal and impartial laws, you have invaded our rights; and we have suffered it, and we still suffer it. When shall we see an end of discord? When shall we have one interest, and one common country? Victorious and triumphant, you show less temper than we under defeat. When you are to contend with us, you can seize the Aventine hill, you can possess yourselves of the Mons Sacer.

The enemy is at our gates, the Esquiline is near being taken, and nobody stirs to hinder it. But against us you are valiant, against us you can arm with diligence. Come on then, besiege the se

nate house, make a camp of the forum, fill the jails with our chief nobles; and when you have achieved these glorious exploits, then, at last, sally out at the Esquiline gate, with the same fierce spirits, against the enemy. Does your resolution fail you for this? Go then, and behold from our walls your lands ravaged, your houses plundered and in flames, the whole country laid waste with fire and sword. Have you any thing here to repair these damages? Will the tribunes make up your losses to you? They will give you words as many as you please; bring impeachments in abundance against the prime men in the state; heap laws upon laws; assemblies you shall have without end: but will any of you return the richer from those assemblies? Extinguish, O Romans, these fatal divisions; generously break this cursed enchantment, which keeps you buried in a scandalous inaction. Open your eyes, and consider the management of those ambitious men, who, to make themselves powerful in their party, study nothing but how they may foment divisions in the commonwealth.-If you can but summon up your former courage, if you will now march out of Rome with your consuls, there is no punishment you can inflict which I will not submit to, if I do not in a few days drive those pillagers out of our territory. This terrour of war, with which you seem so grievously struck, shall quickly be removed from Rome to their own cities.

From Hooke.

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SPEECH OF PUBLIUS SCIPIO TO THE ROMAN ARMY, BEFORE THE BATTLE OF THE TICIN.

WERE you, soldiers, the same army which I had with me in Gaul, I might well forbear saying any thing to you at this time: for what occasion could there be to use exhortation to a cavalry that had so signally vanquished the squadrons of the enemy. upon the Rhone; or to legions, by whom that same enemy, flying before them to avoid a battle, did in effect confess themselves conquered? But, as these troops, having been enrolled for Spain, are there with my brother Cneius, making war under my auspices, (as was the will of the senate and people of Rome) I, that you might have a consul for your captain, against Hannibal and the Carthaginians, have freely offered myself for this You, then, have a new general; and I a new army. On this account, a few words from me to you will be neither improper nor unseasonable.

war.

That you may not be unapprized of what sort of enemies you are going to encounter, or of what is to be feared from them, they are the very same whom, in a former war, you vanquished both by land and sea; the same from whom you took Sicily and Sardinia, and who have been these twenty years your tributaries. You will not, I presume, march against these men, with only that courage with which you are wont to face other enemies; but with a certain anger and indignation, such as you would feel if you saw your slaves on a sudden rise up in arms against you. Conquered and enslaved, it is not boldness, but neces