5
Why, then, am I making all those statements? To what purpose are they? I wish to make you understand that no man ever existed of such eloquence, or of such a god-like and incredible genius in oratory, as to be able (I will not say to exaggerate or embellish by his language, but even) to count up and describe the importance and number of the kindnesses which I, and my brother, and my children, have received from you. I (as was necessarily the case) was born of my parents but a little child; it is of you that I am born a man of consular dignity. They gave me a brother, without knowing how he would turn out; you have restored him to me after he has been tried and proved to be a man of incredible piety. I received the republic from them, when it was almost lost; I have recovered it by your means, after every one had acknowledged that it had been saved by the labours of one man. The immortal gods gave me children; you restored them to me. Besides these things, I have received many things which I wished for from the immortal gods; but if it had not been for your good-will, I should have lost all those divine gifts. Last of all, those honours which I obtained separately and step by step, I now receive again from you all together. So that all that we owed of old to our parents, all that we owed to the immortal gods, and all that we owed to you,—all that put together we now owe at this time to the entire Roman people.
