I know that some may be disturbed by what follows from here on, because Roman victories grow ever more frequent through the slaughter of many nations and cities. And yet, if they weigh the matter carefully, they will find that more harm than advantage came of it. For so many wars are not to be lightly regarded — servile, social, civil, and against fugitives — which certainly bore no fruits, and yet great miseries.
1 Scio aliquantos post haec deinceps permoueri posse, quod uictoriae Romanae multarum gentium et ciuitatum strage crebrescunt. quamquam, si diligenter appendant, plus damni inuenient accidisse quam commodi. neque enim parui pendenda sunt tot bella seruilia, socialia, ciuilia, fugitiuorum, nullorum utique fructuum et magnarum tamen miseriarum.
But I close my eyes to this, so that it may seem to have been just as they wish; and so I think they will say: what could be more blessed than those times, in which there were continual triumphs, celebrated victories, rich spoils, noble processions, and in which great kings were driven before the chariot, and conquered nations in long array?
2 sed coniueo, ut quemadmodum uolunt ita fuisse uideatur; unde arbitror esse dicturos: ecquid his temporibus beatius, quibus continui triumphi, celebres uictoriae, diuites praedae, nobiles pompae, magni ante currum reges et longo ordine uictae gentes agebantur?
To them the brief answer will be that they themselves are accustomed to complain about the times, and that we have undertaken our discourse on behalf of those same times — times which, as is agreed, were not allotted to one city alone but are common to the whole world. See: as happily as Rome conquered, so unhappily was whatever lay outside Rome conquered.
3 quibus breuiter respondebitur et ipsos de temporibus solere causari et nos pro isdem temporibus instituisse sermonem, quae tempora non uni tantum urbi adtributa sed orbi uniuerso constat esse communia. ecce quam feliciter Roma uincit tam infeliciter quidquid extra Romam est uincitur.
How much, then, is this drop of toilsome happiness to be valued, to which is ascribed the blessedness of a single city amid so great a mass of unhappiness, through which the overthrow of the whole world is brought about? Or if those times are thought happy because the wealth of one state was increased, why should they not rather be judged most unhappy, in which, through the wretched devastation of many well-ordered nations, the mightiest kingdoms fell?
4 quanti igitur pendenda est gutta haec laboriosae felicitatis, cui adscribitur unius urbis beatitudo in tanta mole infelicitatis, per quam agitur totius orbis euersio? aut si ideo felicia putantur, quia unius ciuitatis opes auctae sunt, cur non potius infelicissima iudicentur, quibus miserabili uastatione multarum ac bene institutarum gentium potentissima regna ceciderunt?
Or did it perhaps seem otherwise to Carthage then, when, after 120 years in which — dreading now the disasters of war, now the terms of peace — she exchanged, now with rebellious intent, now in supplication, peace for wars and wars for peace, at the last, as her wretched citizens everywhere flung themselves into the fire in final despair, the whole city became a single pyre? For her, even now, small in extent and stripped of her walls, it is part of her miseries to hear what she once was.
5 An forte aliud tunc Carthagini uidebatur, cum post annos centum uiginti, quibus modo bellorum clades modo pacis condiciones perhorrescens, nunc rebelli intentione nunc supplici bellis pacem, pace bella mutabat, nouissime miseris ciuibus passim se in ignem ultima desperatione iacientibus unus rogus tota ciuitas fuit? cui etiam nunc, situ paruae, moenibus destitutae, pars miseriarum est audire quid fuerit.
Let Spain give her verdict: when for two hundred years she watered her fields everywhere with her own blood, and could neither repel nor withstand a relentless enemy who harassed her unprovoked from door to door; when, in her various cities and places, broken by the slaughter of wars and drained by the famine of sieges, her people killed their wives and children and, as a remedy for their miseries, cut one another’s throats in wretched encounter and mutual slaughter — what did she then think of her own times?
6 edat Hispania sententiam suam: cum per annos ducentos ubique agros suos sanguine suo rigabat inportunumque hostem ultro ostiatim inquietantem nec repellere poterat nec sustinere, cum se suis diuersis urbibus ac locis, fracti caede bellorum, obsidionum fame exinaniti, interfectis coniugibus ac liberis suis ob remedia miseriarum concursu misero ac mutua caede iugulabant, - quid tunc de suis temporibus sentiebat?
Finally, let Italy herself say: why for four hundred years did she contradict, withstand, and resist the Romans — her own Romans, at that — if their happiness was not her unhappiness, and if the Romans’ becoming masters of the world did not stand in the way of the common good?
7 ipsa postremo dicat Italia: cur per annos quadringentos Romanis utique suis contradixit obstitit repugnauit, si eorum felicitas sua infelicitas non erat Romanosque fieri rerum dominos bonis communibus non obstabat?
I do not ask of the countless peoples of diverse nations — long free before, then conquered in war, carried away from their homeland, sold for a price, scattered in slavery — what they would then have preferred for themselves, what they thought of the Romans, what they judged of the times.
8 non requiro de innumeris diuersarum gentium populis diu ante liberis, tunc bello uictis, patria abductis, pretio uenditis, seruitute dispersis, quid tunc sibi maluerint, quid de Romanis opinati sint, quid de temporibus iudicarint.
I pass over the kings of great wealth, great strength, and great glory, long most powerful, at length captured, chained like slaves, sent under the yoke, driven before the chariot, butchered in prison: to inquire into whose opinion is as foolish as it is hard-hearted not to grieve at their misery.
9 omitto de regibus magnarum opum, magnarum uirium, magnae gloriae, diu potentissimis, aliquando captis, seruiliter catenatis, sub iugum missis, ante currum actis, in carcere trucidatis: quorum tam stultum est exquirere sententiam, quam durum non dolere miseriam.
Let us, let us, I say, consult ourselves and the choice of life in which we have acquiesced. Our ancestors waged wars; wearied by wars and seeking peace, they offered tributes: tribute is the price of peace.
10 Nos, nos inquam ipsos uitaeque nostrae electionem, cui adquieuimus, consulamus. maiores nostri bella gesserunt, bellis fatigati pacem petentes tributa obtulerunt: tributum pretium pacis est.
We pay tributes so as not to suffer wars, and thereby we stand and remain in the harbour to which they at last fled to escape the storms of evils. Whether our times are happy, then, I leave open; certainly we consider them happier than theirs, since what they chose at the very last we possess continually.
11 nos tributa dependimus, ne bella patiamur, ac per hoc in portu, ad quem illi tandem pro euadendis malorum tempestatibus confugerunt, nos consistimus et manemus. igitur nostra tempora uiderim utrum felicia; certe feliciora illis ducimus, qui quod illi ultime delegerunt nos continue possidemus.
For the turmoil of wars by which they were worn down is unknown to us. In the peace which they tasted only slightly after the rule of Caesar and the birth of Christ, we are born and grow old; what was for them the due payment of servitude is for us a free contribution towards defence;
12 inquietudo enim bellorum, qua illi attriti sunt, nobis ignota est. in otio autem, quod illi post imperium Caesaris natiuitatemque Christi tenuiter gustauerunt, nos nascimur et senescimus; quod illis erat debita pensio seruitutis nobis est libera conlatio defensionis,
and so great is the difference between past and present times that what Rome used to wrest from our people by the sword for the use of her luxury, she now contributes together with us for the use of the commonwealth we share. Or if anyone says that the Romans were more tolerable enemies to our forefathers than the Goths are to us, let him listen and understand how very differently things would appear to him from the way they are now done around him.
13 tantumque interest inter praeterita praesentiaque tempora, ut quod Roma in usum luxuriae suae ferro extorquebat a nostris, nunc in usum communis reipublicae conferat ipsa nobiscum. aut si ab aliquo dicitur tolerabiliores parentibus nostris Romanos hostes fuisse, quam nobis Gothos esse, audiat et intellegat, quanto aliter quam circa se ipsum agitur sibi esse uideatur.
Formerly, when wars blazed across the whole world, each province had its own kings, its own laws, and its own customs, and there was no fellowship of affections where a diversity of powers caused division; and finally, what could at last bring into fellowship loose and barbarous nations which, instituted in diverse rites of worship, religion too kept apart?
14 Olim cum bella toto orbe feruebant, quaeque prouincia suis regibus suis legibus suisque moribus utebatur, nec erat societas adfectionum, ubi dissidebat diuersitas potestatum; postremo solutas et barbaras gentes quid tandem ad societatem adduceret, quas diuersis sacrorum ritibus institutas etiam religio separabat?
If anyone, then, overcome by the bitterness of evils, abandoned his homeland and the enemy with it, what unknown place did he, unknown, at last approach? What nation, hostile to all alike, did he, an enemy, entreat? To whom did he entrust himself at the first meeting — not invited by fellowship of name, not drawn by community of law, not secure in unity of religion?
15 si quis igitur tunc acerbitate malorum uictus patriam cum hoste deseruit, quem tandem ignotum locum ignotus adiit? quam gentem generaliter hostem hostis orauit? cui se congressu primo credidit, non societate nominis inuitatus, non communione iuris adductus, non religionis unitate securus?
Or did they give too little example — Busiris in Egypt, the most impious sacrificer of strangers who had the misfortune to fall in his way; the shores of Taurian Diana, most cruel towards newcomers, but still more cruel in their rites; Thrace, with her Polymestor, criminal even towards guests who were kinsmen? And lest I seem to linger over antiquities, Rome is witness concerning the murdered Pompey, and Egypt witness concerning his murderer Ptolemy.
16 an parum exempli dederunt Busiris in Aegypto peregrinorum infeliciter incurrentium impiissimus immolator, crudelissima circa aduenas Dianae Tauricae litora sed magis sacra crudelia, Thracia cum Polymestore suo usque ad propinquos hospites scelerata? et ne antiquitatibus uidear immorari, testis est Roma de Pompeio interfecto, testis Aegyptus de interfectore Ptolemaeo.