His nod has decided all causes in Sicily for these three years. And his decisions | have broken all law', { all pre'cedent, all right. The sums he has, by arbitrary taxes, and unheard-of impositions, extorted from the industrious poor, are not to be computed. The most faithful allies of the commonwealth, | have been treated as enemies. | Roman citizens, like slaves', | have been put to death with tortures. The most atrocious criminals | have been exempted, for money, | from deserved punishments; and men, of the most unexceptionable char'acters, | condemned, and banished, unheard. |

The harbours, though sufficiently fortified, and the gates of strong towns', have been opened to pirates, and ravagers. | The soldiery, and sailors, | belonging to a province under the protection of the commonwealth, have been starved to death; | whole fleets', | to the great detriment of the prov'ince, | suffered to perish. | The ancient monuments of either Sicilian, or Ro'man greatness, the statues of heroes, and princes, have been carried off'; and the temples stripped of the images.

Having, by his iniquitous sentences, filled the prisons with the most industrious, and deserving of the people, he then proceeded to order numbers of Roman citizens to be strangled in the jails; so that the exclamation, “I am a citizen of Rome!" | which has often, in the most distant regions, and among the most barbarous people, been a protection, I was of no service to them; but, on the contrary, | brought a speedier, and more severe pun'ishment upon them. |

I ask now, Verres, what thou hast to advance against this charge? | Wilt thou pretend to deny' it? | Wilt thou pretend that any thing false, that even any thing aggravated, has been urged against thee? | Had any prince, or any state', committed the same outrage against the privilege of Roman citizens, | should we not think we had sufficient ground for demanding satisfaction? |

What punishment ought, then, to be inflicted upon a tyrannical, and wicked prætor, who dared, at no greater distance than Sicily, within sight of the Italian coast', to put to the infamous death of crucifixion, | that unfortunate, and innocent citizen, | Publius Gavius Cosa nus, only for his having asserted his privilege of citizenship, and declared his intention of appealing to the justice of his country, against the cruel oppressor | who had unjustly confined him in prison at Syracuse, | whence he had just made his escape? |

The unhappy man, | arrested as he was going to embark for his native country, is brought before the wicked prætor. With eyes darting fury, and a countenance distorted with cruelty, he orders the helpless victim of his rage to be stripped, and rods' to be brought accusing him, but without the least shadow of evidence, or even of suspicion, of having come to Sicily as a spy. It was in vain that the unhappy man cried out, "I am a Roman citizen | I have served under Lucius Pre'tius who is now at Panor`mus, and will attest my innocence."

The blood-thirsty prætor, deaf to all he could urge in his own defence, ordered the infamous punishment to be inflicted. Thus, Fathers, was an innocent Roman citizen publicly mangled with scourging; | while the only words he uttered, amidst his cruel sufferings, were, "I am a Roman citizen!" | With these he hoped to defend himself from violence, and infamy. | But of so little service was this privilege to him, that, while he was thus asserting his citizenship, the order was given for his execution, — for his execution upon the cross. !|

1

O liberty! O sound once delightful to every Roman ear! O sacred privilege of Roman citizenship! once sacred! - now trampled upon!— | But what then, ! | Is it come to this'? | Shall an inferior magistrate, a governor, who holds his whole power of the Roman people, in a Roman province, |

within sight of Italy, bind, scourge, torture with fire, and red hot plates of iron, and at last put to the infamous death of the cross, a Roman citizen? | Shall neither the cries of innocence expiring in agony, nor the tears of pitying spectators, nor the majesty of the Roman com'monwealth, nor the fear of the justice of his country, restrain the licentious, and wanton cruelty of a monster, who, in confidence of his riches, | strikes at the root of liberty, and sets mankind at defiance?

I conclude with expressing my hopes, that your wisdom, and justice, Fathers, will not, by suffering the atrocious, and unexampled insolence of Caius Verres | to escape due punishment, leave room to apprehend the danger of a total subversion of authority, and the introduction of general anarchy, and confusion. |

CATO'S SOLILOQUY.
(ADDISON.)

SCENE CATO sitting in a thoughtful posture, with Plato's book on the Immortality of the Soul in his hand; and a drawn sword on the table by him.

It must be so Plato, thou reasonest well! 1
Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire', |
This longing after immortality? |

Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror, |
Of falling into nought? | why shrinks the soul |
Back on herself, and star'tles at destruction? |
'Tis the divinity that stirs within us; |

"T is heaven itself that points out an hereafter, |
And intimates eternity to man.

Eternity! thou pleas'ing, dreadful thought!|
Through what variety of untried being, |
Through what new scenes, and changes must we pass ! |
The wide', the unbounded prospect lies before me; |
But shad'ows, clouds', and darkness rest upon it. Į

Here will I hold. If there's a power above us, |
And that there is all nature cries aloud
Through all her works, | he must delight in virtue; |
And that which he delights in, must be happy. |
or where! this world was made for

But when!
Cæsar.
I'm weary of conjectures
Thus am I doubly arm'd: | my death, and life,
My bane', and antidote | are both before me: |
This in a moment brings me to an end; |
But this informs me, I shall never die. !

The soul, secured in her existence, smiles
I
At the drawn dagger, and defies its point. [
I
The stars shall fade away, the sun himself
Grow dim with age, and nature sink in years, ; |
But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth', |
Unhurt amidst the war of elements, |
The wreck of mat'ter, and the crush of worlds. |

this must end, them. I

[Laying his hand on his sword.

HAMLET'S SOLILOQUY.

(SHAKSPEARE.)

To be,
or not to be that is the question: |
-1
Whether 't is nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings, and arrows of outrageous fortune; |
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, |

And, by opposing, end them? | To die' to sleep - |
No more
and, by a sleep, | to say we end
The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks |
That flesh is heir to: 't is a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. |

To die' to sleep,- | To sleep! perchance to dream-ay, there's the rub; | For, in that sleep of death, what dreams may come, | When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,a

a Stir, bustle.

Must give us pause. There's the respecta |
That makes calamity of so long life: |

For who would bear the whips, and scorns of time', |
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay, |
The insolence of office, and the spurns,
That patient merit of the unworthy takes, |
When he himself might his quietus make |
With a bare bod.kin? |

Who would far delsd bear, I To groan, and sweat under a weary life, | But that the dread of something after death | (That undiscover'd country | from whose bourn® No traveller returns), puzzles the will; | And makes us rather bear those ills we have', | Than fly to others that we know not of? |

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all; |
And thus the native hue of resolution, |
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought、 ; |
And enterprises of great pith, and moment, |
With this regard, their currents turn awry, I
And lose the name of action. |

BRUTUS' ORATION ON THE DEATH OF CÆSAR.
(SHAKSPEARE.)

Ro'mans, coun'trymen, and lovers! | hear me for my cause; and be silent that you may hear. | Believe me for mine hon.our; and have respect' unto mine honour that you may believe. | Censure me in your wisdom; and awake your senses that you may the better judge. |

a Consideration.

+ Kôn′tủ-me-lẻ, rudeness. for a small dagger. Packs, burdens. Mine honour; not mine-non'nur.

e

C

c The ancient term

Born, boundary, limit.