At present emulation and the various causes of dispute existing between them incite them against each other, because the fear of any foreign enemy is remote.
But show them the Roman arms and a body of troops, natives of another country, and they will run together as if to extinguish a common conflagration.

These same Carthaginians defended Spain in a different manner from that in which they will defend the walls of their capital, the temples of their gods, their altars, and their hearths; when their terrified wives will attend them on the way to the battle, and their little children will run to them.

What, moreover, if the Carthaginians, feeling sufficiently secure in the harmony subsisting in Africa, in the attachment of the sovereigns in alliance with them, and their own fortifications, should, when they see Italy deprived of the support of yourself and your army, themselves assuming an offensive attitude, either send a fresh army out of Africa into Italy, or order Mago, who, it is certain, having passed over from the Baleares, is now sailing along the coast of Liguria and the Alps, to form a junction with Hannibal.

Without doubt, we should be thrown into the same state of alarm as we were lately, when Hasdrubal passed over into Italy; that Hasdrubal, whom you, who are about to blockade, not Carthage only, but all Africa with your army, allowed to slip out of your hands into Italy.

You will say that he was conquered by you.
For that very reason I should be less willing, not on account of the commonwealth only, but of yourself, that, after having been defeated, he should be allowed to march into Italy.