Rome (TV Series)

How Titus Pullo Brought Down the Republic (2005)

Paul Jesson: Scipio

Quotes 

• Pompey Magnus : Speak, young Marcus. What have you to tell us?

  Mark Antony : I have been delegated by Caesar to negotiate a compromise. Caesar wishes to avoid bloodshed. He wishes to be seen as a man of reason and probity. Therefore, when his present term as governor of Gaul has ended, he is willing to accept command of a single legion province. Illyria, by preference.

  Pompey Magnus : I don't understand.

  Mark Antony : Command of a province. So he will have legal immunity. And so that none of you rascals can go dragging him through the courts.

  Pompey Magnus : We're here to discuss the terms of Caesar's resignation. He could've avoided prosecution by accepting a few years' banishment.

  Mark Antony : [amused]  Banishment for what?

  Porcius Cato : For fomenting a tyranny! Illegal warfare! Theft! Murder! Treason!

  Mark Antony : And what shall be your punishment, Pompey? For betraying a friend, for deserting the cause of your people, for allying yourself with these so-called "noblemen," what punishment for you?

  Pompey Magnus : Impudent whelp!

  Marcus Tullius Cicero : The man's term of office ends in two weeks.

  Mark Antony : We say six months.

  Pompey Magnus : Two weeks! He sits alone in Ravenna with one mutinous skeleton of a legion, and he dares to dictate terms to me?

  Mark Antony : Caesar has many more legions than the Thirteenth.

  Scipio : On the far side of the Alps.

  Mark Antony : Winter does not last forever. Spring comes, snows melt.

  Scipio : That's a threat!

  Mark Antony : [seriously]  I assure you, it is no threat. Snows always melt.

  [Pompey thinks for a moment] 

  Pompey Magnus : If he does not get a province?

  Mark Antony : Caesar will take all measures required to protect both his interests and those of the Republic.

  Pompey Magnus : I am grieved and surprised. I had hoped we would have a rational negotiation. If that is his last word, we shall go.

  [pause] 

  Mark Antony : Then we have no more business.