[102] Oh, miserable man that I am! Oh, unhappy man that I am! Were you, O Milo, able through the instrumentality of these men to recall me to my country, and cannot I through the agency of the very same men even retain you in yours? What answer shall I make to my children, who consider you a second father? What answer shall I make to you, O my brother Quintus, you who are now absent, you who were my companion in that cruel time? Shall I reply, that I was unable to preserve the safety of Milo by the instrumentality of those very men by whose means he had preserved mine? And what is the cause in which I shall have failed to do so? One which is sanctioned by all the nations of the earth. From whom must I say that I failed to procure it? From those very men who of all others have gained the greatest tranquillity by the death of Publius Clodius. And who will it be who has entreated in vain? I. [103] What great wickedness is it that I planned, what enormous crime did I commit, O judges, when I traced out, and laid open, and revealed, and for ever crushed those beginnings and signs of the general destruction that was intended? For that is the spring from which all the distresses of myself and my friends arise. Why did you wish me to return to my country? Was it in order that I might look on while those men were being driven out, by whose efforts I had been restored? Do not, I entreat you, suffer my return to be more miserable than even my departure was. For how can I think that I have been restored if I am torn from those men by whom I was restored? [cap.38]