We are no fewer in number; nor will the expense of redeeming us be greater than that of purchasing these.

Should I compare ourselves with them, I should injure the name of Roman.

I should think also, conscript fathers, that in deliberating on such a measure, it ought also to be considered, (if you are disposed to be over severe, which you cannot do from any demerit of ours,) to what sort of enemy you would abandon us.

Is it to Pyrrhus, for instance, who treated us, when his prisoners, like guests; or to a barbarian and Carthaginian, of whom it is difficult to determine whether his rapacity or cruelty be the greater?
If you were to see the chains, the squalid appearance, the loathsomeness of your countrymen, that spectacle would not, I am confident, less affect you, than if, on the other hand, you beheld your legions prostrate on the plains of Cannae.

You may behold the solicitude and the tears of our kinsmen, as they stand in the lobby of your senate-house, and await your answer.