Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: INTRODUCTION THE SECOND ORATION. To the first Philippic oration Antonius made no reply for several days, but on September 19 he held a meeting of the senate, at which he delivered a violent invective against Cicero, which was evidently meant as an open declaration of war against him. Taking it as such, and not feeling strong enough for immediate opposition, Cicero shortly afterwards retired from Rome, and spent his time in composing the second oration, which was never spoken, but was published about the end of November, when Antonius was obliged to leave Rome, on account of a mutiny among his troops at Alba. Its effect was immediately apparent, the people being shaken by it in their allegiance to the consul; while the senate, with Cicero at their head, were stimulated to repudiate his authority, and take active steps for the maintenance of their liberty. The speech, which has been accepted in all ages as the masterpiece of Roman oratory, professes to be delivered on September 19, as an immediate answer to Antonius’s invective, and it is noticeable how the delusion is maintained by appeals to the feelings of the supposed audience, and acknowledgment of imaginary answers on their part. Beginning with a reply to the several charges brought against him by Antonius, Cicero proceeds to give the history of his opponent’s life from his boyhood upwards, sparing no detail of his private or his public faults, and holding him up to general scorn as possessed of almost, every vice. It is little wonder that an invective of such bitterness22 INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND ORA.TIOX. closed the door to all reconciliation between Cicero and Antonius, the substantial truth of the charges contained in the speech making it all the more impossible for Antonius to forgive them; and from th…
