Then you ought to have wept, when our arms were taken from us, our ships burnt, and we were forbidden to engage in foreign wars, for that was the wound by which we fell.

Nor is it just that you should suppose that the measures which the Romans have adopted towards you have been dictated by animosity.

No great state can remain at rest long together.

If it has no enemy abroad it finds one at home, in the same manner as over-robust bodies seem secure from external causes, but are encumbered with their own strength.

So far, forsooth, we are affected with the public calamities as they reach our private affairs; nor is there any circumstance attending them which is felt more acutely than the loss of money.
Accordingly, when the spoils were torn down from vanquished Carthage, when you beheld her left unarmed and defenceless amid so many armed nations of Africa, none heaved a sigh.