1Next comes the claim which Milo's enemies make most often, that the senate judged that the killing in which Publius Clodius was slain was done against the interest of the state. 1But the senate approved that deed not only with its votes but also with its sympathies. 1For how often was that case pleaded by me in the senate, and with what assent from the whole order, and how far from silent or hidden! 1For when, in the fullest senate, were four or at most five found who did not approve of Milo's cause? 1This is shown by those half-dead harangues of this scorched tribune of the plebs, in which he daily attacked my power with malice, saying that the senate decreed not what it thought but what I wished.
1If indeed this is to be called power, rather than a moderate influence in good causes because of great services to the state, or some favour among good men because of these dutiful labours of mine, then let it be so called by all means, provided that we use it for the safety of the good against the madness of the abandoned. 13But this inquiry, although it is not unfair, the senate nevertheless never thought should be set up; 13for there were laws, there were courts, whether for murder or for violence, nor did the death of Publius Clodius bring the senate such grief and mourning that a new court should be set up.
13For when the senate had been robbed of the power of decreeing a trial for his incestuous adultery, who can believe that it thought a new trial should be set up concerning his death? 13Why then did the senate decree that the burning of the senate house, the storming of the house of Marcus Lepidus, and this very killing were done against the state? 13Because no violence has ever been undertaken among citizens in a free state that was not against the state — for no defence against violence is ever to be wished for, though it is sometimes necessary — unless indeed the day on which Tiberius Gracchus was slain, or that on which Gaius was, or the armed rising of Saturninus, even if they were put down in the interest of the state, did not nevertheless wound the state.