The History of Rome, Vol. 2

“I am very confident that whatever deities they were whose will it was that you should be reduced to the necessity of making the restitution demanded by the treaty, it was not agreeable to them that our atonement for the breach of that treaty should be so haughtily spurned by the Romans. For what more could possibly be done to appease the gods and soften the anger of men than we have done? The possessions of the enemy, taken among the spoils and which appeared to be our own by the right of war, we restored. The authors of the war, since we could not deliver them up alive, we delivered to them dead. Their goods we carried to Rome, lest by retaining them any guilt should remain among us. What more, Roman, do I owe to you? What to the treaty? What to the gods, the guarantors of the treaty? What umpire shall I call in to judge of your resentment and of my punishment? I decline none; neither nation nor private person. But if nothing in human law is left to the weak against a stronger, I will appeal to the gods, the avengers of intolerable arrogance, and will beseech them to turn their wrath against those for whom neither the restoration of their own effects, nor additional heaps of other men's property, can suffice; whose cruelty is not satiated by the death of the guilty, by the surrender of their lifeless bodies, nor by their goods accompanying the surrender of the owner; who cannot be appeased otherwise than by giving them our blood to drink and our entrails to be torn. Samnites, war is just to those for whom it is necessary, and arms are clear of impiety for those who have no hope left but in arms. Therefore, as in every human undertaking it is of the utmost importance what matter men may set about with the favor, or under the displeasure of the gods, be assured that while you waged former wars in opposition to the gods more than to men, in this one which is now impending, you will act under the immediate guidance of the gods themselves.”