[Macaulay's marginalia on Cicero's Third Philippic]: "The close of this speech is very fine. His later and earlier speeches have a freedom and an air of sincerity about them which, in the interval between his Consulship and Caesar's death, I do not find. During that interval he was mixed up with the aristocratical party, and yet afraid of the Triumvirate. When all the great party-leaders were dead, he found himself at the head of the state, and spoke with a boldness and energy which he had not shown since his youthful days."