“A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear. The traitor is the plague.”

M. TULLII CICERONIS ORATIONUM PARS I.[-III] CUM…
Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BCE)
Venetiis : Apud Paulum Manutium, Aldi filium, MDLIII…etc. (1554-1559)
PA6279 A2 1554

Paoli Manutii led his father’s famous Aldine Press from a concentration on ancient Greek texts, his father’s love, to a concentration on classical Latin texts, his own love. In particular, Paoli maintained a life-long passion for Cicero. He restored the reputation of the Aldine Press by publishing scholarly editions of Cicero’s letters and orations. Much of the correcting and editing was his own. He continued with his work on Cicero by adding commentary. He published his first edition of Cicero’s work in 1540, adding another edition in 1547. This is the first complete edition of Cicero’s orations, published in three volumes. From the Kenneth Lieurance Ott Collection donated to the Okanangan County Museum, Washington.