This he did simply as an advocate, without political motive of any kind--in the days in which he was supposed to be currying favor with democracy--governed by private friendship, looking forward, probably, to some friendly office in return, as was customary.

It was thus that afterward he defended Antony, his colleague in the Consulship, whom he knew to have been a corrupt governor.

Autronius had been a party to Catiline's conspiracy, and Autronius had been Cicero's school-fellow; but Cicero, for some reserved reason with which we are not acquainted, refused to plead for Autronius.

There is, I maintain, no ground for suggesting that Cicero had shown by his speeches before his Consulship any party adherence.

The declaration which he made after his Consulship, in the speech for Sulla, that up to the time of Catiline's first conspiracy forensic duties had not allowed him to devote himself to party politics, is entitled to belief: we know, indeed, that it was so.