As an advocate, Consul though he was, he continued to perform his work; from whence we learn that no State dignity was so high as to exempt an established pleader from the duty of defending his friends.

Hortensius, when Consul elect, had undertaken to defend Verres.

Cicero defended Murena when he was Consul.

He defended C.
Calpurnius Piso also, who was accused, as were so many, of proconsular extortion; but whether in this year or in the preceding is not, I think, known.[156] Of his speech on that occasion we have nothing remaining.

Of his pleading for Murena we have, if not the whole, the material part, and, though nobody cares very much for Murena now, the oration is very amusing.