Latin
Lines 1.37-1.38
Greek and Roman Historians, The Conspiracy of Catiline 1.37-38
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On the next day, the 8th of November, Cicero convened the Senate in the temple of Jupiter Stator at the foot of the Palatine Hill. The site was easier to protect than the Senate house itself, and Cicero had surrounded the building with armed knights. To Cicero's astonishment Catiline took his place, but as he sat down the other senators slipped away from the seats around him and left him in isolation. Cicero then delivered his First Speech Against Catiline.
When Cicero had finished, Catiline rose to reply. Far from being cowed by the onslaught upon him he rallied to the attack: his family had rendered great service to Rome over the centuries and he, a patrician, had followed their example and had nothing to win from revolution; Cicero, the city's would be savior was a resident alien. Shouted down by the Senate he rushed from the House and went straight home. There he urged Lentulus, Cethegus and the others to carry out the instructions issued at Laeca's house on the 6th, and then with a few followers he left Rome at the dead of night to join Manlius. Resourceful as ever, he wrote to leading figures at Rome to say that he was the victim of his enemies' malice and was going into voluntary exile at Massillia (Marseilles) in order to spare his country the horrors of civil war. His accomplices who had been left behind at Rome spread a similar report with the object of discrediting Cicero and casting doubt upon the necessity of his measures against Catiline. He also sought to justify himself in a letter to Quintus Catulus which Catulus read out in the Senate and which Sallust claims to reproduce.