Kitap 30
30
"It is for him who grants peace, not for him who seeks it, to name the terms, but perhaps it may not be presumptuous in us to assess our own penalty. We consent to everything remaining yours for which we went to war-Sicily, Sardinia, Spain and all the islands that lie between Africa and Italy. We Carthaginians, confined within the shores of Africa, are content, since such is the will of the gods, to see you ruling all outside our frontiers by sea and land as your dominions. I am bound to admit that the lack of sincerity lately shown in the request for peace and in the non-observance of the truce justified your suspicions as to the good faith of Carthage. But, Scipio, the loyal observance of peace depends largely upon the character of those through whom it is sought. I hear that your senate have sometimes even refused to grant it because the ambassadors were not of sufficient rank. Now it is Hannibal who seeks it, and I should not ask for it if I did not believe it to be advantageous to us, and because I believe it to be so I shall keep it inviolate. As I was responsible for beginning the war and as I conducted it in a way which no one found fault with until the gods were jealous of my success, so I shall do my utmost to prevent any one from being discontented with the peace which I shall have been the means of procuring."
