M. Tullius Cicero, De Imperio Cn. Pompei Ad Quirites, ed. Albert Curtis Clark, 50

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[50] 17 Pompeius privatus esset hoc tempore, tamen ad tantum bellum is erat deligendus¹ atque mittendus; nunc cum ad ceteras summas utilitates haec quoque opportunitas adiungatur ut in eis² ipsis locis adsit, ut habeat exercitum, ut ab eis qui habent accipere statim possit, quid exspectamus? aut cur³ non ducibus dis immortalibus eidem cui cetera summa cum salute rei publicae commissa sunt hoc quoque bellum regium commendamus⁴?

De Imperio Cn. Pompei Ad Quirites. M. Tullius Cicero. ed. Albert Curtis Clark. Oxford. 1908.

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Funding provided by National Endowment For The Humanities (NEH).

Current edition Perseus

De Imperio Cn. Pompei Ad Quirites (Latin) (Cicero. M. Tulli Ciceronis Orationes, Volume 1. Clark, Albert Curtis, editor. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1908.)

Translations (1)

In Defense of the Proposed Manilian Law Perseus (Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 2. Yonge, Charles Duke, translator. London: Bell, 1856.) — 50 focus

[50]
But, if Cnaeus Pompeius were a private individual at Rome at this present time, still he would be the man who ought to be selected and sent out to so great a war. But now, when to all the other exceeding advantages of the appointment, this opportunity is also added,—that he is in those very countries already,—that he has an army with him,—that there is another army there which can at once be made over to him by those who are in command of it,—why do we delay? or why do we not, under the guidance of the immortal gods themselves, commit this royal war also to him to whom all the other wars in those parts have been already entrusted to the greatest advantage, to the very safety of the republic?

Notes on the current edition

De Imperio Cn. Pompei Ad Quirites

1. deligendus adigendus T

2. eis om. H

3. cur quid H

4. commendamus H: committamus (-imus ψ1) cett.

Commentary

Notes on The Manilian Law (Select Orations of Cicero (Allen and Greenough's Edition). Greenough, James Bradstreet; Kittredge, George Lyman, editors. Boston, London: Ginn & Company, 1897.) focus

ac ne , etc., nor must you neglect this point either.

cum essem . . . dicturus : see above, sect. 6 , where the divisions of the subject are specified.

quod . . . pertinet , which bears upon, etc. The antecedent is

illud .

nam et corresponds to deinde (sect. 18 ). Two classes are mentioned: (1) the publicani or tax-farmers, and (2) other citizens who have money invested in Asia (sect. 18 ).

rationes , business enterprises;

copias , fortunes.

in illam provinciam , i.e. the farming of the revenues there.

ipsorum per se , for their own sake (i.e. apart from all question of the safety of the revenues).

nervos : the same figure is seen in our phrase "the sinews of war."

eum . . . ordinem , i.e. the equites these not only farmed the taxes, but they were, in general, the capitalists and bankers of Rome.

M. Tullius Cicero De Imperio Cn. Pompei Ad Quirites 50

ed. Albert Curtis Clark

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