1Or does it seem a shameful crime to you that he is diligently defended? 1Believe me, if, in keeping with the ties of hospitality and the influence of this man's father, all his guest-friends were willing to stand by him and dared to defend him freely, he would be defended abundantly enough; 1but if all of them were avenging these wrongs in proportion to the size of the injury and to the fact that the highest interests of the commonwealth are being assailed in this man's danger, then, by Hercules, you would not be allowed to stand in that place. 1As it is, he is defended in such a way that his opponents certainly ought not to be aggrieved, nor think that they are being overcome by power.
149What must be managed at home is handled through Caecilia; the conduct of the case in the forum and in court, as you see, judges, Marcus Messala has undertaken; 149who, if he now had enough years and strength, would himself be speaking for Sextus Roscius. 149Since his age and the modesty which graces his age are a hindrance to his speaking, he has handed the case to me, whom he knew to be eager and bound to take it for his sake, and he himself, by his constant attendance, counsel, influence and diligence, has brought it about that the life of Sextus Roscius, snatched from the hands of the buyers of confiscated goods, has been entrusted to the votes of the judges.
149Of course, judges, it was for this nobility that the greatest part of the citizen body was in arms; 149the aim of that struggle was that those nobles should be restored to the state who would do what you see Messala doing, who would defend the life of an innocent man, who would resist injustice, who would rather show how much power they had in another's safety than in his ruin; 149and if all who were born in the same rank did this, both the commonwealth would suffer less from them and they themselves less from ill will.