Mil. 26.1Vidēs quam sit varia vītae commūtābilisque ratiō, quam vaga volūbilisque fortūna, quantae īnfidēlitātēs in amīcitiīs, quam ad tempus aptae simulātiōnēs, quantae in perīculīs fugae proximōrum, quantae timiditātēs.You see how varied and changeable is the course of life, how wandering and fickle fortune is, how great the faithlessness in friendships, how pretences are fitted to the occasion, how great the flight of those nearest to us in times of danger, how great their timidity. Mil. 26.1Erit, erit illud profectō tempus et inlūcēscet ille aliquandō diēs, cum tū salvīs, ut spērō, rēbus tuīs, sed fortasse in mōtū aliquō commūnium temporum, quī quam crēbrō accidat expertī scīre dēbēmus, et amīcissimī benevolentiam et gravissimī hominis fidem et ūnīus post hominēs nātōs fortissimī virī magnitūdinem animī dēsīderēs.There will come, there will surely come that time, and that day will one day dawn, when you, with your affairs safe, as I hope, but perhaps in some upheaval of our common times — and how often that happens, experience ought to have taught us — will long for both the goodwill of a very close friend and the loyalty of a most steadfast man and the greatness of spirit of the one bravest man since the human race was born.
Mil. 26.70Quamquam quis hoc crēdat, Cn. Pompeium, iūris pūblicī, mōris maiōrum, reī dēnique pūblicae perītissimum, cum senātus eī commīserit ut vidēret nē quid rēs pūblica dētrīmentī caperet, quō ūnō versiculō satis armātī semper cōnsulēs fuērunt etiam nūllīs armīs datīs, hunc exercitū, hunc dīlēctū datō, iūdicium exspectātūrum fuisse in eius cōnsiliīs vindicandīs quī vī iūdicia ipsa tolleret?And yet who would believe this: that Gnaeus Pompey, most expert in public law, in the customs of our ancestors, in short in the affairs of state, when the senate had charged him to see that the state should suffer no harm — a single short clause by which the consuls have always been armed enough even when no arms were given — that he, given an army, given a levy, would have waited for a trial in punishing the designs of a man who was abolishing the courts themselves by violence? Mil. 26.70Satis iūdicātum est ā Pompeiō, satis, falsō ista cōnferrī in Milōnem, quī lēgem tulit quā, ut ego sentiō, Milōnem absolvī ā vōbīs oportēret, ut omnēs cōnfitentur, licēret.It has been judged sufficiently by Pompey, sufficiently, that these charges are falsely brought against Milo, since he passed a law under which, as I think, you ought to acquit Milo, and, as all admit, you may.
Mil. 26.71Quod vērō in illō locō atque illīs pūblicōrum praesidiōrum cōpiīs circumfūsus sedet, satis dēclārat sē nōn terrōrem īnferre vōbīs—quid enim minus illō dignum quam cōgere ut vōs eum condemnētis in quem animadvertere ipse et mōre maiōrum et suō iūre possit?—, sed praesidiō esse, ut intellegātis contrā hesternam illam contiōnem licēre vōbīs quod sentiātis līberē iūdicāre.And the fact that he sits in that place, surrounded by those forces of public guards, declares clearly enough that he is not bringing terror upon you — for what would be less worthy of him than to compel you to condemn a man whom he himself could punish both by ancestral custom and by his own right? — but is there for protection, so that you may understand that, in spite of that meeting of yesterday, you are free to judge as you think.