was probably the earliest. As to that, we have his speech nearly entire,
as we have also one for Publius Quintius, which has generally been
printed first among the orator's works. It has, however, I think, been
made clear that that spoken for Sextus Roscius came before it. It is
certain that there had been others before either of them. In that for
Sextus he says that he had never spoken before in any public cause,[61]
such as was the accusation in which he was now engaged, from which the
inference has to be made that he had been engaged in private causes;
and in that for Quintius he declares that there was wanting to him in
that matter an aid which he had been accustomed to enjoy in others.[62]
No doubt he had tried his 'prentice hand in cases of less importance.
That of these two the defence of Sextus Roscius came first, is also to
be found in his own words. More than once, in pleading for Quintius, he
speaks of the proscriptions and confiscations of Sulla as evils then
some time past. These were brought nominally to a close in June, 81;
but it has been supposed by those who have placed this oration
first that it was spoken in that very year. This seems to have been
impossible. "I am most unwilling," says he, "to call to mind that
subject, the very memory of which should be wiped out from our
thoughts."[63] When the tone of the two speeches is compared, it will
become evident that that for Sextus Roscius was spoken the first. It
was, as I have said, spoken in his twenty-seventh year, B.C. 80, the
year after the proscription lists had been closed, when Sulla was
still Dictator, and when the sales of confiscated goods, though no
longer legal, were still carried on under assumed authority. As to
such violation of Sulla's own enactment, Cicero excuses the Dictator
in this very speech, likening him to Great Jove the Thunderer. Even
"Jupiter Optimus Maximus," as he is whose nod the heavens, the earth,
and seas obey--even he cannot so look after his numerous affairs but
that the winds and the storms will be too strong sometimes, or the