Book 4
Hortensius endeavoured to defend Verres from the charge of having stolen these statues, &c. of which he admits that he had become the possessor, by contending that he had bought them. But it was contrary to the laws for a magistrate to purchase any such articles in his province; and Cicero shows also that the prices alleged to have been given are so wholly disproportionate to their value, that it is ridiculous to assert that the things had been purchased and not taken by force.
1
I come now to what Verres himself calls his passion what his friends call his disease, his madness; what the Sicilians call his rapine; what I am to call it, I know not. I will state the whole affair to you, and do you consider it according to its own importance and not by the importance of its name. First of all, O judges, suffer me to make you acquainted with the description of this conduct of his; and then, perhaps, you will not be very much puzzled to know by what name to call it. I say that in all Sicily, in all that wealthy and ancient province, that in that number of towns and families of such exceeding riches, there was no silver vessel, no Corinthian or Delian plate, no jewel or pearl, nothing made of gold or ivory, no statue of marble or brass or ivory, no picture whether painted or embroidered, that he did not seek out, that he did not inspect, that, if he liked it, he did not take away.
