Rome had a leader then; and if they had one now like he was then, the
same fate would befall you which did overtake them.

He asserts that the body of his stepfather was not allowed burial by
me. But this is an assertion that was never made by Publius Clodius,
a man whom, as I was deservedly an enemy of his, I grieve now to see
surpassed by you in every sort of vice. But how could it occur to you
to recal to our recollection that you had been educated in the house
of Publius Lentulus? Were you afraid that we might think that you
could have turned out as infamous as you are by the mere force of
nature, if your natural qualities had not been strengthened by
education?

VIII. But you are so senseless that throughout the whole of your
speech you were at variance with yourself; so that you said things
which had not only no coherence with each other but which were most
inconsistent with and contradictory to one another; so that there was
not so much opposition between you and me as there was between you and
yourself. You confessed that your stepfather had been duplicated
in that enormous wickedness, yet you complained that he had had
punishment inflicted on him. And by doing so you praised what was
peculiarly my achievement, and blamed that which was wholly the act of
the senate. For the detection and arrest of the guilty parties was my
work, their punishment was the work of the senate. But that eloquent
man does not perceive that the man against whom he is speaking is
being praised by him, and that those before whom he is speaking
are being attacked by him. But now what an act, I will not say of
audacity, (for he is anxious to be audacious,) but (and that is what
he is not desirous of) what an act of folly, in which he surpasses
all men, is it to make mention of the Capitoline Hill, at a time when