Laudator Temporis Acti

C. Matius, letter to Cicero, in Cicero, Letters to His Friends 11.28.3 (on the assassination of Julius Caesar and its aftermath; tr. W. Glynn Williams):

"You will smart for it then," they say, "since you dare to condemn what we have done." What unheard of insolence, that some men may boast of a crime, which others may not even deplore without being punished for it! Why, even slaves have always had this much freedom, that their fears, their joys, and their sorrows were subject to their own control, and not that of another; and now even those privileges they are trying to wrest from us by intimidation—that at any rate is what your "champions of liberty" are perpetually saying.

'plecteris ergo' inquiunt 'quando factum nostrum improbare audes.' o superbiam inauditam! alios in facinore gloriari, aliis ne dolere quidem impunite licere! at haec etiam servis semper libera fuerunt, timerent, gauderent, dolerent suo potius quam alterius arbitrio; quae nunc, ut quidem isti dictitant, 'libertatis auctores' metu nobis extorquere conantur.

ante timerent add. ut sperarent vel ut cuperent C.A. Lehmann, Quaestiones Tullianae, Pars I: De Ciceronis Epistulis (Prague: F. Tempsky, 1886), p. 60

Id. 11.28.5:

Am I then, in the evening of my life, to effect a radical change in the principles I maintained in the heyday of my youth, when even a serious error might have been excused, and with my own hands unweave the texture of my life? That I will not do, nor on the other hand make the mistake of doing anything to cause offence, except being pained at the grievous fall of one who was very closely bound to me, and a most illustrious man. But even if I were otherwise minded, I should never disavow my own actions, and thereby get the reputation of being a rogue in wrongdoing, and a coward and hypocrite in concealing it.

an, quod adulescens praestiti, cum etiam errare cum excusatione possem, id nunc aetate praecipitata commutem, ac me ipse retexam? non faciam; neque, quod displiceat, committam, praeterquam quod hominis mihi coniunctissimi ac viri amplissimi doleo gravem casum. quod si aliter essem animatus, numquam, quod facerem, negarem, ne et in peccando improbus et in dissimulando timidus ac vanus existimarer.

Id. 11.28.7:

But what arrogance is this, that whereas Caesar never put any restriction upon my associating with whomsoever I pleased, yes, even those for whom he had no liking himself, those who have robbed me of my friend should endeavour, by calumniating me, to prevent my choosing my own friends!

sed quae haec est arrogantia, quod Caesar numquam interpellavit, quin, quibus vellem, atque etiam quos ipse non diligebat, tamen iis uterer, qui mihi amicum eripuerunt, carpendo me efficere conari, ne, quos velim, diligam?

T. Rice Holmes, The Roman Republic and the Founder of the Empire, Vol. III: 50-44 B.C. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1923), p. 349, called Matius' letter "the noblest that has come down from antiquity."