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BOHN'S CLASSICAL LIBRARY CICERO
ON
ORATORY AND ORATORS.
GEORGE BELL & SONS
LONDON : YORK ST, COVENT GARDEN AND NF:W YORK : 66 FIFTH AVENUE BOMBAY : 53 ESPLANADE ROAD CAMBRIDGE : DEIGHTON BELL & CO.
CICERO
ON
ORATORY AND ORATORS:
HIS LETTERS TO OUINTUS AND BRUTUS.
TRANSLATED OR EDITED
BY J. S. WATSON.
LONDON: GEORGE BELL AND SONS, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN.
1896.
[lieprinted from Stereoiype plates.'}
PREFACE
A Translation of the Dialogues De Oratore was published in 1762, by George Barnes, a Barrister of the Inner Temple. Mr. Barnes's version was made with great care, and, though less known than Guthrie's, was far superior to it. If he occasionally mistock the sense of his author, he seems to have been always diligent in seeking for it. He added some notes, of which those deemed worth preserving are distin- guished by the letter B.
Barnes's translation is the groundwork of the present j but every page of it has been carefully corrected, and many pages re- written. The text to which it is made conformable is that of Orellius, which differs but little from EUendt's, the more recent editor and illustrator of the work, from whom some notes have been borrowed.
No labour has been spared to produce a faithful and readable translation of a treatise which must always be interesting to the orator and the student.
The translation of Cicero's "Brutus; or, Eemarks on Eminent Orators," is by E. Jones, (first published in 1776,) •which has long had the well-deserved reputation of com- bining fidelity with elegance. It is therefore reprinted with but little variation.
J.S.W,
CONTEJS TS.
PACK
OiCEBo's Letters to his Bbothee Quintus 1
Cicero's Letters to Bkutus 90
DE ORA.TORE; or, on the Character of an Orator . . 142
BRUTUS; or, Remarks on Eminent Orators 402
CICEEO'S LETTEES
TO
HIS BEOTHEE QUINTUS-
BOOK I.
LETTER I.
This Letter was written in the year 694 a.u.c, in the consulship of Afranius and Metellus, by Cicero to his brother Quintus, who was commanding in Asia, to inform him that his i^eriod of command was extended for a third year ; a year fraught with such im- portant events to the republic, that we learn from Horace tha.t Pollio began his history of the civil wars from this date.' The consuls themselves were men of no very great importance ; they were both creatures of Pompey, who had assisted them to obtain the office by the most open corruption : but he was mistaken in reckoning on the adherence of Metellus, whom he had offended by divorcing his sister Mucia ; while Afranius was a man of no character, and of very moderate abilities; so weak, according to Cicero, as to be ignorant of the value of the consulship which he had bought.^ With such men for its rulers, the city speedily became a scene of universal dissension. Pompey, who had just celebrated his triumph over Mithridates with unprecedented magnificence, was instigating Flavius, one of the tribunes, to bring forward an agrarian law similar to that of RuUus, for a division of lands in Italy, — partly consisting of some of the public domains, and partly of estates to be bought
Motum ex Metello consule civicuia Bellique causas, et vitia, et modos, Ludumque Fortunae, gravesque Principum amicitias, et arma Nondum expiatis uncta cruoribua; Periculosse plenum opus aleae Tractas. — Hoa. Carm. IL i. Bp. ad Atfc. i. 19.
B
OV
2 CICERO'a LETTERS
with the spoils of the war in which he had been so victorious, — among the veterans of his army, and the poorer classes in Italy. The senate opposed this measure violently, but Cicero, though he had rcBisted the former proposition, was now inclined to support this, — taking care, indeed, to preserve the vested interests of the possessors; and thinking that when this was provided for, the bill would supply a means for relieving the city of some of its most dangerous inhabitants, and at the same time peopling parts of Italy which were hitherto little better than a desert.' No doubt he was partly influenced by his desire to obtain the protection of Pompey in the struggle which he foresaw for himself with Clodius, who was now seeking to be adopted into a plebeian family, in order to be elected a tribune of the people, so as to attack Cicero with greater power of injuring him — for the gi-eat Catulus died at this time, and Cicero complains to Atticus, that his death had left him without an ally in the dangers which threatened him, and without a companion in his course of defending and upholding the interests of the nobles.^
AboTit the beginning of this year also, news arrived from Gaul of com- motions in that province, which was always in great danger from the frequent inroads of the Helvetii, from whom an invasion on a larger scale was now apprehended. The senate decreed that the consuls should undertake the defence of the Cisalpine and Transalpine pro- vinces, and sent men of consular rank to different districts to levy armies ; but Pompey and Cicero remained at Rome, being, as he tells Atticus, retained by the express command of the senate, as pledges of the safety of the republic.^
In the meantime Caesar, who had been serving in Spain as propraetor, wrote letters to the senate to demand a triumph ; but wishing also to obtain the consulship for the succeeding year, he relinquished the idea of the triumjDh, (which would have prevented him from entering the city till after its celebration,) in order to canvass the citizens for the more substantial honour. Perceiving, on his ari-ival in Rome, the true posture of affairs, — the power which Crassus possessed, de- rived from his character and riches ; the authority with which his military renown, and his position as the acknowledged leader of the aristocratic party, invested Pompey ; and his own need of such coadjutors for the project, which he had already begun to conceive, of finally making himself master of the republic, — he re- conciled Pompey and Crassus, who had previously been on no very friendly terms ; and then formed that intimate connexion with them both, which is known in history as the fii-st triumvirate ; the three chiefs coming to an agreement to prevent measures of any kind being adopted in the republic without the united consent of them all. Cffisar obtained the consulship, but the senate gave him Bibulus for his colleague, and made a further attempt to prevent any great increase to his power or popularity, by assigning to the new consul?
' Qua constitute diligenter et sentinam nobis exhaurior ; et Italise solitudinem frequentari posse arbitrabar.^Ep. ad Att. i. 19. * Ep. ad Att. i. 20. » Idem, i. 19.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 6
only the supervision of the roads and forests : a char/re, as Suetonius calls it, of the slightest possible importance. This was the posture of affairs at Rome, at, and soon after, the time when Cicero addressed this first letter to his brother.
Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
I. 1. Although I had no doubt that njany messengers, and common r^ort too, with its invariable rapidity, would out- strip this letter; and that, before its arrival, you would hear from others that a third year has been added to the period during which I have to regret your absence, and you are to continue your labours; still I thought that direct informa- tion of this trouble ought to be conveyed to you from me also. For in my former letters, — and that not once only, but repeatedly, even after the matter was despaired of by others, — I still gave you hope of an early removal; not merely that I might gratify you as long as possible with the pleasing expec- tation, but also because such great exertions were made both by the praetors and by myself, that I would not give up all hope that the matter might be managed,
2. But now, since it has so turned out, that the praetors have not been able to do any good by their influence, nor I by my own zeal, it is extremely difficult to avoid feeling great vexation ; but still it is not fit that our spirits, which have been tried in managing and supporting matters of the greatest moment, should be crushed and rendered powerless by a petty annoyance. And since men are naturally most concerned at misfortunes which have been incurred by their own fault, there is something in this business that must be borne with more vexation by me than by you. For it hap- pened through my fault, and through acting in opposition to what you had represented to me, both when setting out and afterwards by letter, that a successor was not appointed the year before. In that matter, while I was consulting the safety of the allies, while I was resisting the impudence of some commercial people, and while I was desirous that my reputation should be advanced by your merit, I acted unwisely ; especially as I have given occasion that that second year of your command may draw on a third after it. ,
3. Since, then, I confess that the fault if mine, it will be the task of your wisdom and kindness to take care and manage that thi« matter, too incautiously considered by me, may bo
b2
4 CICERO 8 LETTERS
corrected by your own diligence. And if you arouse yourself with fresh energy to cultivate a good reputation in every respect, so as to rival, not others, but yourself ; if you direct all the faculties of your mind, all your care and thoughts, to the pre-eminent object of obtaining praise in all things, — take my word for it, that one year added to your labour will bring happiness for many years to us, and glory to our posterity.
4. I therefore entreat you above all things not to diminish or lower your spirit, nor to allow yourself to be overwhelmed by the magnitxide of the affair, as by a wave of the sea ; but, on the other hand, to bear yourself erect to resist, and even of your own accord to meet difficulties. For you do not manage a department of the public of such a nature that for- tune has the rule in it, but one in which method and dili- gence have the greatest influence. If indeed 1 saw that your period of command was prolonged while you were engaged in any great and perilous war, I should feel misgivings in my mind, because I should know at the same time that the power of fortune over us was also prolonged.
5. But at present, that part of the commonwealth is com- mitted to you, in which fortune has no share, or only an ex- ceedingly insignificant one, and which appears to me to depend wholly on your own virtue and moderation of dispo- sition. We apprehend, I think, no insidious attacks of enemies, no struggle in the field, no revolt of our allies, no want of pay or provisions, no mutiny in the army ; accidents which have very often happened to men of the greatest pru- dence: so that, as the most skilful pilots cannot overcome the violence of a storm, they in like manner have been unable to subdue the violent hostility of fortune. To your lot has fallen the most complete peace, the most entire tranquillity, though in such a way that it may even ^ overwhelm a sleeping pilot, or even delight a wakeful one.
6. For that province of yours consists in the first place of that class of allies which is the most civilized of all the human race; and secondly, of that class of citizens who either, be- cause they are farmers of the revenue,^ are bound to us by
' Vel. Emesti condemns this word, and Matthise has ejected it.
* The farmers of the public revenue were generally of the equestrian order, to which Cicero himself belonged ; and in his public character and speeches he had always taken care to maintain the connexion, by wizing every cpportunity of extolling and defending them.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 5
lies of the closest connexion, or who, because they manage their dealings so as to become wealthy, think that they po* sess their fortunes in safety through the beneficial effects c^ my consulship.
II. 7. But, you will urge, between these very men them- selves there are grave disputes : many injuries arise, and great contests follow ; as if I supposed that you also do not sustain a considerable weight of business. I am aware that your affairs are of very great importance, and require consummate prudence; but remember that I consider this affair depends more upon prudence than upon fortune ; for what difficulty is there in restraining those over whom you have authority, if you also restrain yourself? This may be a great and arduous task for others, as it is indeed most arduous, but it has always been a very easy one for you ; and in truth sc it ought to be, since your natural disposition is such that, even without instruction, it would appear that it might have been excellently regulated, and such an education has been bestowed upon it as might exalt even the most vicious natura. While you yourself resist the temptations of money and of' pleasure, and of every sort of desire, as you do resist them, there will be, I suppose, danger lest you may not be able to check the worthless trader, or the somewhat too covetous farmer. The Greeks,^ indeed, will look upon you, while you live in such a manner, as some [hero revived] from the old traditions of their annals, or even as some divine being descended from heaven into the province.
8. And I write this now, not that you may act thus, [for that you do,] but that you may rejoice in acting and having acted thus. For it is a glorious thing for you to have lived three ^ years in Asia, invested with the highest military au- thority, in such a manner that no statue, uo picture, no vase,^
' Cicero calls them Greeks, because all the coast of Asia Minor was colonized by Greeks, and the language had gi-adually come to prevail throughout the whole peninsula.
^ The text has triennium ; Ernesti and others would read hiennivm, to suit the commencement of the letter ; a change rendered necessary, indeed, by the verb fuisse.
* How irresistible such temptations were to Roman governors in general, may be seen in Cicero's orations against Verres ; who was pro- bably only pre-eminent among them for rapacity, because the richneaa of his province gave him pre-eminent opportunities for displaying it.
6 OICEROS LETTERS
riO present of robes or slaves, no allurement of pei"Sonal beauty, no opportunity of extorting money, (of all which fonns of corruption that province is most prolific,) has been able to turn you aside from perfect integrity and moderation.
9. And what can be found so admirable, or so thoroughly desirable, as that that virtue, that moderation of mind, that well-regulated abstinence, should not lie hid and be buried in darkness, but should be displayed in the light of Asia, and before the eyes of a most splendid province, and cele- brated in the hearing of every nation and people on the earth ? That men should not be alarmed at your progresses, or exhausted by your expenses, or agitated at your arrival among them ; but that, wherever you come, thoi-e should be both publicly and privately the greatest possible joy, while every city looks upon itself as entertaining a protector, not a tyrant, and every family feels that it receives a guest, and not a plunderer 1
III. 10. But in all these matters experience itself has already, doubtless, taught you, that it is by no means enough for you to have these virtues yourself, but that you must also take diligent care, in this guardianship of the province, that you may appear to be answerable, not for yourself only, but , for all the officers under your government, to the allies, t(>,r^ your fellow- citizens, and to the commonwealth. Although indeed you have lieutenants of such a character that they will of themselves have regard to their own dignity ; among whom Tubero is the first in honour and dignity and age, — a man who, I imagine, especially as he is a writer of history, can find many in the annals of his own family whom he may be both inclined and able to imitate ; and Alienus is completely one of us, not only in his general disposition and benevolence, but also in his imitation of our habits of life. For why need I speak of Gratidius? a man whom I know for certain to be so anxious about his own character, that out of his brotherly love for us, he is anxious also aboui ours.
11. You have a quaestor, indeed, not chosen by your owu judgment, but the one whom the lot assigned you. It is necessary that he should be moderate in his own inclinations, and obedient to your regulations and precepts. If by chance any one of these men be somewhat sordid, you may bear with bim so far as he merely neglects, of himself, those rules by
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 7
is'hich you yourself are bound ; but not so far that he should abuse, for his own private gain, that power which you con- ceded to him for the support of his dignity : for I am not indeed of opinion, especially as the habits to which I allude have had such a tendency to excessive lenity and to a courting of popularity, that you should look too closely into every bit of meanness, and get rid of every one guilty of it; but I think that you should trust just so much to each as there is trustworthiness in each. And of these men, those whom the republic itself has assigned to you as supporters and assistants in the discharge of the public business, you will confine to those limits which I have already laid down.
IV. 12. But as to those whom you have selected to have about you as your domestic companions, or your necessary attendants, and who are generally termed a sort of court of the praetor, not only their actions, but even their whole language, must be answered for by us. But you have such people about you as you can easily love if they act rightly, and with the greatest ease restrain, if they show too little regard for your character ; by whom, when you were inex- perienced, your own ingenuous disposition seems likely to have been deceived ; for the more virtuous any one is himself, the more unwillingly does he suspect others of being wicked ; but now this third year of office should display the same integrity as those preceding, with even more caution and diligence.
13. Let your ears be such as are thought to hear openly what they do hear, and not such as those into which anything may be whispered falsely and hypocritically for the sake of gain. Let your signet ring be not like a piece of furniture, but as it were another self; not the agent of another person's will, but the witness of your own. Let your sergeant^ be kept in that station in which our ancestors wished him to be; who bestowed the place not as a lucrative appointment, but as one of labour and duty, and not readily to any but their own freedmen, to whom they gave their orders, indeed, in a man- ner not very diflferent from that in which they gave them to
' The Latin is accensus, ■which was the name of a public officer attending on several of the Roman magistrates. He anciently preceded the consul who had not the fasces; a custom which, having been long disused, was restored by Cffisar the very next year. VaiTO de- rives this title from acdeo, because they siunmoned the people to th« aesemblieB.
8 CICERO's LETTERS
their sUves. Let your lictor be the officer, not of his own lenity, but of yours ; and let your fasces and axes give him greater insignia of dignity than power. Lastly, let it be known to tlie whole province, that the safety, the families, the fame, and the fortunes of all those over whom you act as governor, are objects of the dearest interest to you. Moreover, let the opinion prevail, that you will be dis- pleased, not only with those who have accepted any biibe, but with those also who have given one, if you discover the ftict. Nor indeed will any one offer a bribe, when it is once clearly ascertained, that nothing is ever obtained from you by the influence of those who pretend to have great weight with you.
14. Not, indeed, that this advice of mine to you is meant to have such an effect as to make you too harsh or suspicious towards your officers ; for if there be among them any one who during two years has never fallen under any suspicion of avarice, (as I hear that both Csesius and Chserippus and Labeo have not. and because I know them, I believe it;) there is nothing that I should not think might be most judiciously and properly committed to them, and to whoever else is of the same character; but if there be any one in whom you have detected anything, or in whom you have noticed anything unfavourable, trust him with nothing ; do not put any part of your own character in his power.
V. 15. But in the province itself, if you have met with any one who has entered closely into friendship with you, and who was previously unknown to us, take great care hew far you ought to trust such a one ; not but that there may be many honest men among the provincials ; but though we may entertain this hope, it is hazardous to judge that it is so ; for the natural character of each individual is concealed under numerous wrappings of disguise, and shrouded, as it were, under veils ; the forehead, the eyes, the whole counte- nance are often false, and the language most frequently of all. On which account, how are you to find out, among that class of men, persons who, influenced by desire for money, can yet do without all those things from which we cannot fleparate ourselves, and who will love you, a foreigner, with all their heart, and not pretend to do so merely for their own advantage 1 To me indeed this seems a consideration o<
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTTJS. 9
great importance, especially if those very same people scarcely ever profess a regard for any private individual, but do so at all times for every governor ; therefore, if of this class you have by chance met with any one really more attached to yourself than to the opportunity, (for this may have been possible,) gladly count that man in the list of your friends; but if you do not discover such a disposition, there is no sort of men more carefully to be guarded against in respect to intimacy; because they are acquainted with every avenue of corruption, and do everything for the sake of money, and have no notion of regard for the character of a man with whom they are not going to live permanently.
16. And even among the Greeks themselves, intimacies must be formed with strict care, excepting [those with] a very few men, such as may be worthy of ancient Greece; so deceitful, indeed, are the greater number of them, and fickle, and through long slavery inured to excessive flattery; the whole body of whom I admit ought to be treated with libe- rality, and all the most deserving of them admitted to hos- pitality and friendship ; but an excessive intimacy with them is not sufficiently to be trusted, for they do not dare to oppose our inclinations, and are envious, not only of our people, but also of their own countrymen.
VI. 17. If I then desire to be so cautious and diligent in matters of that sort, in which I am afraid lest I may appear even somewhat over-rigid ; of what opinion do you conceive me to be with respect to slaves'? whom indeed we ought to rule strictly everywhere, and most especially in the provinces. With respect to this class of persons, many rules may be given, bxit this is the shortest of all, and one which may the most easily be kept in memory, that they are to behave themselves in your Asiatic progresses, as they would if you were travelling along the Appian road,^ and that they are not to think that it makes any difference whether they arrive at Tralles or at Formise. But if among your slaves there should be any one of exemplary fidelity, let him be employed in your domestic and private affairs; but as to matters which relate %o the duties of your command, or to any of the affairs of the
■ The Via Appia, or Appian road, was made by Appius Claudiua Csecus as censor, about 442 a.u.c, from Rome to Capua. At a later period it was continued from Capua to Brundusium.
10' CICEBO'S LETTERS
commonwealth, let him have no concern with any of them : for there are many things which may without impropriety to entrusted to faithful slaves, but which, for the sake of avoid- ing talk and censure, must not be entrusted to them.
18. But this letter of mine, I know not how, has run into a process of laying down precepts, though such was not at first my intention. For why should I give precepts to one, whom, particularly in business of this kind, I know to be not at all inferior in prudence to myself, and in practice even superior? But still if my authority were added to enforce the line of conduct which you were already pursuing, I thought that such line of conduct would be more agreeable to you. Let these then be your foundations for dignity of character ; first of all, your own personal integrity and mode- ration; next, self-respect in all those who are about you; and, also, an extremely cautious and most diligent selection in forming intimacies, both with men of the province, and with Greeks ; and the maintenance of a steady and consistent discipline in your household.
19. As these observances are honourable in our private and daily habits, they must of necessity appear almost divine in so high a command, amid manners so depraved, and in a province which is such a school of corruption. Such a system and such a discipline can maintain that severity in deciding and determining on measures, which you have dis- played in things from which, to my great joy, we experience some enmity; unless perchance you fancy that I am moved by the complaints of I know not what fellow called Paconius, a person who is not even a Greek, but rather a Mysian or Phrygian, or by those of Tuscenius, a raving fellow, foul in his language, out of whose most impure jaws you wrested the prey of his most disgraceful covetousness with consummate justice.
VII. 20. These and other regulations, fuU of strictness, which you have appointed in that province, we could not easily maintain without the most complete integrity. Let there be the most rigorous severity, therefore, in administer- ing the law, provided that it be never varied from favoiir, but observed with uniformity. But still it is of little benefit that the law be administered with uniformity and care by you yourself, unless the same rule of conduct be also observed
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. H
py those to whom you entrust any share of the same duty. And to me, indeed, there appears to be no great variety of Dusiness in the government of Asia, but it seems to be all supported, for the most part, by the exposition of the law ; in which, above all other things, the very system of knowledge for the regulation of a province lies. But consistency must be observed, and a dignified gravity, which can resist, not only all influence, but even suspicion.
21, There is to be added likewise affability in listening to others, gentleness in pronouncing one's decisions, and diligence in satisfying people, and in discussing their claims. It was by such qualifications that Cneius Octavius lately became very popular, as it was under him that the lictor first had nothing to do, the sergeant was reduced to silence, and every one who Lad a suit before him spoke as often and as long as he pleased. In which particulars he might perchance be looked upon as too remiss, if this very remissness had not been the support of that severity. Sylla's men were compelled to make restitution of the things which they had taken away by violence, and through the influence of fear; and those who in their ofl&ces had given unjust decisions, had, when reduced to the rank of private individuals, to bow beneath similar law. This severity of his might appear to have been in- tolerable, had it not been softened by many seasonings of humanity.
22. But if this kind of lenity is agreeable at Rome, where there is such excessive aiTogance, such immoderate liberty, such boundless licentiousness among men; and besides such a number of magistrates, so many sources of help, such great power, such absolute authority belonging to the senate ; how attractive surely may the courtesy of a praetor be in Asia, in which such a multitude of citizens, such a number of allies, 80 many cities, and so many states, look to the nod of one man ; where there is no help, no power of making complaints, no senate, no assembly of the people ! It is therefore the part of a very great man, and of one who is both moderate by natural disposition, and who has also been trained by education, and by the study of the most excellent accomplish- ments, to conduct himself, when invested with so great power, in such a manner that no other authority may b« wished for by those over whom he is appointed governor.
12 CICERo'S LETTERS
VIII. 23. The "Cyrus" of Xenophon is written not in accordance with the truth of history, but to exhibit a represen- tation of a just government ; in whose character the greatest gravity is united by that philosopher with singular courtesy. These books our own countryman, the illustrious Africanus, was accustomed, not without reason, scarcely ever to lay out of his hand, for in them is omitted no duty belonging to careful and moderate government; and if he, who was never to become a private individual, paid such attention to those precepts, how ought they to be observed by those to whom authority has been given on condition of laying it down again, and given them too by those laws to the observance of which they themselves must again return?
24. To me, indeed, everything seems necessary to be re- ferred, by those who rule others, to this principle, that those who shall be under their government may be as happy as possible ; an object which has been established by unvarying fame, and the report of all men, as being of primary import- ance with you, and as having been so from the commence- ment, since you first arrived in Asia. And it is the duty, not only of the man who governs allies and fellow-citizens, but even of him who manages slaves, or dumb animals, to liave a regard to the comforts and advantage of those beings over whom he presides.
25. In this respect I find it agreed by all men that the greatest assiduity is exerted by you; that no new debt is contracted by any state, and that many cities have been freed by you from old, great, and heavy debt; that many cities previously in ruins and almost deserted, among which I may mention one, the most eminent city of Ionia, another, the most eminent city of Caria, Samos and Halicarnassus, have been restored by you; that there are no seditions in the towns, no discord; that provision is made by you that the difierent states shall be regulated by the counsels of the most respectable citizens; that depredations in Mysia are stopped ; that bloodshed has been suppressed in many places ; that peace is established throughout the whole province ; that not only the thefts and robberies on the roads and in the fields, but the more numerous and greater ones in the towns and in the temples, are brought to an end throughout the country; that that most spiteful minister to the avarice ol
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS, 13
governors, false accusation, has been repelled in its attacks on the fame and fortune and ease of the wealthy; that the ex- penses and tributes levied on the different cities are borne with equanimity by all who inhabit the territories of those cities; that access to you is most easy; that your ears are open to the complaints of all men; that no man's poverty or desolateness is excluded by you, not merely from access to you in public and on the tribunal, but even from your house, and your private chamber; that, in short, throughout your whole government, there is nothing severe, nothing cruel; but that everything is full of clemency, and gentleness, and humanity,
IX. 26. Again, how great a benefit is it on your part, that you have delivered Asia from that iniquitous and heavy tax imposed upon it by the aediles,-'- though at the expense of great enmity to us. In truth, if one man of noble birth makes a complaint openly that you, by issuing an edict " that money should not be voted for the games at Rome," caused him a loss of two hundred sestertia; how great a sum of money must have been paid, if, as had become the custom, it was exacted in the name of all, whoever they were, that exhibited games at Romel Although we checked these com- plaints of our citizens with this design, (which is extolled in Asia, I know not to what extent, and at Rome with no ordi- nary admiration,) inasmuch as when the cities had voted sums of money to erect a temple and monument in our honour, and when they had done so of their own extreme good-will, in return for my great services, and for your excessive kind- nesses, and when the law made an exception in our favour by name, providing that " it might be permitted to receive money for a temple and a monument;" and that which was then given was not likely to perish, but to remain among the ornaments of the temple, so as to appear to have been given, not more for my sake than that of the Roman people and the immortal gods ; nevertheless I did not think that even that, in which concurred merit, a special law, and the good-will of those who made it, ought to be accepted by me, both for
' The expense of the games exhibited by the aedileu had grown to be 60 enormous that they had established a custom of extorting vast sums from the provinces to meet it. The exact sum mentioned in the text would be 161,458^ 68. id.
14 CIGERO'S LETTERS
other reasons, and in order that others to whom nothing was due, and in whose favour no permission was given, might bear the matter with more equanimity,
27, Apply yourself, therefore, with all your heart and witli all your zeal to the course of conduct which you have hitherto pxirsued, that you may love, and in every way protect, those whom the senate and people of Rome have committed and entrusted to your good faith and power, and that you may take thought for their being as happy as possible. But if chance ^ had set you over Africans, or Spaniards, or Gauls, savage and barbarous nations, it would still have become your humanity to consult their advantage, and to show a regard for their comfort and safety. Since, however, we govern that race of mankind, among whom not only humanity itself pre- vails, but from whom it is even thought to have spread to other nations, we certainly ought, in the gi-eatest possible degree, to exhibit it to those from whom we received it.
28. For I shall not now be ashamed to assert this, (espe- cially amidst such a course of life, and after performing such actions, on which no suspicion of indolence or levity can afl&x itself,) that we have attained those successes which we have achieved, by the aid of those studies and arts which have been handed down to us by the records and discipline of Greece. On those accounts, besides that common good faith which is due to all mankind, we also appear to be in an especial manner the debtors of that race of men, so that we may show a readiness to display in action those principles in which we have been instructed before that very people from which we have learned them.
X. 29. And, indeed, that chief of all genius and learning, Plato, thought that republics would then at last become happy, if either learned and wise men began to govern them, or if those who governed them devoted all their attention to learning and wisdom. This union of power and wisdom he assuredly thought would be security to a state; a union which may have at some time fallen to the lot of our whole republic, but which has certainly, at this present time, fallen to that province of yours; so that he might have the chief power in it, by whom, from his childhood, the most
* The Latin is sors, lot. The different Roman magistrates had theii provinces aasigned to them by lot.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS.
15
studj and tiiiie has been bestowed on acquiring a thorough understanding of virtue and humanity.
30. Be ciireful, therefore, that this year which is added to your labour may appear at the same time to have been added for the prosperity of Asia. Since Asia has been more for- tunate in her efforts to detain you than we have been in oura to recal you, take care that our regret may be mitigated by the gladness of the province. For if you have been the most diligent of all men in deserving that such great honours should be paid to you as I know not whether any one has received, you ought to exert far greater diligence in preserving those honours.
31. I have, indeed, written to you before what I think of honours of that kind. I have always thought them, if they were common, worthless; if they were appointed for some temporary occasion, trifling; but if, as has been the case now, they were granted to your merits, I thought that much exertion should be used by you to pi-eserve them. Since, therefore, you reside with supreme power and authority in those cities in which you see your virtues consecrated and ranked in the number of [those of] the gods, in everything which you shall determine, or decree, or do, you will ■ recol- lect what you owe to such high opinions of mankind, such favourable judgment concerning you, such exalted honours. This resolution will be of such influence, that you will consult the welfare of all, will remedy the distresses of the people, and provide for their safety, and that you will wish to be both caUed and thought the father of Asia.
XI. 32. No doubt the farmers of the public revenue offer great obstacles to your desires and efibrts. But if we oppose them, we shall separate both from ourselves and from the republic an order of men which deserves well of ourselves per- sonally, and which is by our means attached to the republic. Yet, if we comply with their wishes in everything, we shall be allowing those persons to be utterly ruined, not only whose safety, but whose advantage, we are bound to consult. This, if we would form a correct judgment, is the one difficulty which pervades your whole government. For to be disin- terested, to restrain all one's desires, to keep s check upon one's people, to maintain an equitable system of law, to show oneself courteous in inquiring into matters of business, and
16 CICEEO'S LETTERS
afifable in listening and giving access to people, is honourable I'ather than difficult : for it does not depend on any labour, but rather on a certain inclination and willingness of mind.
33. How great distress the line of conduct adopted by the farmers causes the allies, we have learned from those citizens of our own, who lately, in the matter of the removal of the harbour-dues of Italy, complained not so much of the tax itself, as of certain wrongs committed by the tax-collectors. So that I cannot be ignorant what of happens to the allies in remote districts, when I hear the complaints of my own countrymen in Italy, That you should so conduct yourself, in such circumstances, as both to satisfy the farmers, (espe- cially if they made an unlucky contract for the revenues,) and not to allow the allies to be ruined, appears an achievement "worthy of some divine virtue, that is, of your own.
And in the first place, that which to the Greeks is a most bitter consideration, namely, that they are liable to pay taxes, ought not to appear so bitter; because, without any inter- ference of the power of the Roman people, while they lived under their own laws, they were themselves, and of them- selves, in the same condition; and they have no right to disdain the name of farmei*, as they themselves could not pay the tax which Sylla had, with perfect fairness, levied upon them, without a farmer. And that, in exacting the taxes, the Greek farmers are not more lenient than our own, may be seen from this fact, that a little while ago the Caunians, and all the inhabitants of the islands which had been made over to the Rhodians by Sylla, fled to the senate with entreaties to be allowed to pay tribute to us rather than to the Rhodians. Those, therefore, have no right to express any horror of the name of farmer, who have always been liable to the payment of taxes; nor ought those who by themselves could not pay the taxes, to disdain him; nor ought those to object to him, who have actually asked for his appointment.
34. Let Asia at the same time recollect, that no calamity of foreign war, or of domestic dissension, would have been absent from her, if she were not held under the dominion of this country. And as that dominion can by no means be upheld without taxes, let her contentedly purchase for herself perpetual peace and tranquillity with a certain portion of her revenues.
TO mS BROTHER QUIJTTUS. 17
XII. 35. And, if they -will endure that class of men, and the name of farmer, with patience, other grievances, through your wisdom and prudence, may possibly appear lighter to them. They may, in making contracts, regard, not the mere Censorian law,^ but rather the convenience of transacting business, and their freedom from trouble. You, too, may do, what you have already done admirably, and what you still are doing, namely, to take frequent occasions to mention how great worth there is in the farmers, and how much we owe to that order ; so that, laying aside authority, and the exertion of power and of the fasces, you may bind the farmers to the Greeks by aflfection and influence. But you may also beg of those of whom you have deserved extremely well, and who indeed owe everything to you, to allow us, by good-temper on their part, to secure and maintain that connexion which already exists between us and the farmers.
3(). But why do I exhort you to this course of conduct, which you can not only pursue of your own accord without directions from any one, but have already to a great extent practised 1 For highly honourable and important companies do not cease to address their thanks to us, and this is the more acceptable to me, because the Greeks do the same. And it is difficult to unite in good-will those things which in interests, utility, and almost in their very nature, are dif- ferent from each other. But I have written what is written above, not for the purpose of instructing you, (for your wisdom stands in need of no instructions from any one,) but because, while thus writing, the commemoi'ation of your virtues was a pleasure to me, although I have been more prolix in this letter than I either intended or expected to be.
XIII. 37. There is one thing to which I shall not cease to exhort you ; nor will I allow your praises to be spoken, as far as shall be in my power, with any abatement ; for all who come from those regions speak in such a manner of your virtue, integiity, and humanity, as to make, among your great praises, proneness to anger the only exception. This
* The terms on which the revenues of the provinces were let wert fixed by the censors, in the edicts called Leges Censorice; but these wert sometimes modified to raise the credit or popularity of the publicans. In the censorship of Cato, 5(38 a.u.c, the senate itself interfered to lower the terms which his rigour Lad sought to impose. — Liv. xxxis. 44.
U
18 CICERO's LETTERS
fault, even in our private and daily life, appears to be tliat of au unsteady and weak mind ; but nothing is so unseemly as to unite the acerbity of natural ill-temper to supreme power. For this reason I will not now proceed to set before you the observations which are commonly made on passionateness, both because I am unwilling to be too prolix, and because you can easily learn them from the writings of many authors; but that which peculiarly belongs to a letter, I mean that he, to whom it is written, should be informed of matters of which he is ignorant, I think that I ought not to omit.
38. Every one makes us almost the same report, that, when ill-temper does not affect you, nothing can be more agreeable than your behaviour; but that, when any one's dishonesty or perverseness has provoked you, you become so excited that your natural kindness is missed by every one. Since, there- fore, it is not so much any thirst for glory as mere circum- stances and fortune that have brought us into that station of life in which we are, so that the conversation of mankind respecting us will be incessant, let us, as far as we can pos- sibly achieve and succeed, take care that no remarkable vice may be said to have been in us. Nor do I now insist upon that which is perhaps difficult in every disposition, and is certainly so at our time of life, namely, to change the temper, and suddenly to pluck out whatever is deeply implanted in the character; but I give you this admonition, that if you cannot -wholly avoid this habit, because your mind is occu- pied by anger before reason can prevent it from being so occupied, you should still prepare yourself beforehand, and meditate every day that you must resist this proneness to anger, and that, when it has the greatest effect upon your mind, your tongue miist then be most carefully restrained ; for this appears to me at times a virtue not inferior to that of never being angry. For the latter is the conseqnence, not merely of gravity of temper, but sometimes even of dulness; but to restrain your passion and language when you are provoked, or even to be silent, and to keep your agitation of mind and indignation under control, although it be not a pi'oof of perfect wisdom, is certainly an indication of no moderate mental power.
39. In this respect men report that you have already become much more moderate and gentle. No extremely
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 19
violent bursts of passion, no reproaches, no insults, are reported to us ; faults which are not only inconsistent with learning and politeness, but at variance with authority and dignity : for if our anger is implacable, it is extreme rancour ; but if easily appeased, it is extreme levity; which, however, in a choice of evils, is to be preferred to rancour.
XIV. 40. But since it was your first year that caused the most talk on this subject of censure (I imagine because injustice, and avarice, and insolence in men occurred to you contrary to your anticipation, and on that account appeared intolerable); while the second year was much more quiet, because habit, and reason, and, as I flatter myself, my letters also, have rendered you more patient and gentle; the third year ought to be so corrected that no one may be able to find even the slightest cause for censure in it.
41. And now, on this topic, I speak to you not with ex- hortation and precepts, but with brotherly entreaty, beseech- ing you to devote all your thought, care, and meditation to securing the praise of all men in all quarters. If our rank in life were in a moderate position for talk and dis- cussion about us, nothing extraordinary, nothing beyond the common conduct of other men, would be required of you: but now, by reason of the splendour and importance of the circumstances in which we are placed, unless we secure the highest possible praise from that province, we seem scarcely in a condition to escape extreme censure. Suah is our posi- tion, that while all good men look with favour on us, they at the same time require and expect from us all imaginable diligence and virtue; but all the unprincipled, because we have engaged in everlasting war against them, seem to be contented with the very smallest pretext for censuring us.
42. Since, therefore, a theatre of such a kind, that of all Asia, has been presented for the display of your virtues — a theatre crowded with a numerous body of spectators, most ample in size, with an audience of most cultivated judgment; and so well adapted for sound, that the sense and expressions of the actors reach even to Rome ; strive, I entreat you, and labour, not only to appear worthy of the circumstances in which you are placed, but even superior to them by youi own good qualities.
XV. 43. And since, among the different ofiQces of the state,
o2
20 CICERO's LETTERS.
chance has aaeigned to me the domestic administration of the republic, but to you a provincial governraent, if my part is inferior to none, take care that yours may surpass that of others. At the same time reflect that we are not now labouring for a reputation as yet unattained, and only ex- pected; but that we are striving for the preservation of one already earned, which indeed was not so much to be desired previously, as it is now to be maintained by us. And if I could have any interests separate from yours, I should desire for myself nothing more honourable than this position which has been already acquired by me. But such is now the state of affairs, that unless all your actions and expressions in that quarter harmonize with my conduct, I shall think that I have gained nothing by such toils and such dangers on my part, in all of which you were a sharer. But if you alone, above all others, assisted me in obtaining a most honourable fame, you will now assuredly strive beyond all others that I may retain it. You must not regard only the opinions and judgments of men who are now living, but also of those who will live hereafter, though indeed their judgment will be more just, as being free from all detraction and malevolence.
44. Lastly, you ought to remember this too, that you are not seeking gloiy for yourself alone ; though, even were that the case, you would not neglect it, especially when you had desired to consecrate the memory of your name by the most honourable records ; but it is also to be shared with me, and to be handed down to our children. In regard to it, therefore, you must take care lest, if you are too remiss, you should seem, not merely to have managed ill for yourself, but even to have grudged reputation to your relations.
XVI. 45. These remarks are not made with this view, that my words may seem to have roused you when asleep, but rather to have given you an impulse while running ; for you will always give all men cause, as you have done, to praise your equity, your moderation, your strictness, and your integrity. But from the singular love which I bear you, an insatiable eagerness for your glory possesses me; although I am of opinion, that when Asia ought now to be as well known to you as his own private house is to every man, and when such great experience is added to your excel- lent natural sense, there is nothing which can contribute to
TO HIS BUOTHER QUINTUS. 21
glory that you do not thoroughly appreciate, and that does not present itself daily to your mind without exhortation from any one. But I, who, while I read your letters, think tliat I am listening to you, and while I am writing to you, think that I am conversing with you, am consequently most delighted with your longest letters, and am myself often Bomewhat prolix in addressing you.
46. In conclusion, I entreat and exhort you, that as good poets and careful actors are accustomed to do, so you, at the end and termination of your office and administration, should be especially careful, that this third year of your command may, like the third act of a play,^ appear to be the most highly-finished and ornate of the whole. This you will do most easily if you shall imagine that I, whom you have always desired to please more than all the rest of the world, am always present with you, and take part in every- thing which you shall say and do.
It only remains for me to beg you to take most diligent care of your health, if you wish me and all your friends to be well. Farewell.
LETTER II.
The following letter was written in the year after Letter I. Caosar had begun his contests with the aristocratic party ; and had brought in an agrarian law substantially the same as that of llullus : proposing among other enactments, to plant 20,000 colonists in the public domain in Campania ; and the appointment of the commissioners to superintend the distributions of these lands was to be vested in Caesar himself. Cato opposed the bill in the senate, and Caesar ordered his lictors to seize him and carry him to prison, though he was deterred from executing this menace by the indignation of the whole senate. His colleague Bibulus was resolute in his opposition ; but when he endeavoured to resist the passing of the measure in the comitia, he was thrown down the steps of the temple
' Why does Cicero say the thi7-d act, which is the middle act of a play ? Does he mean by acts those three parts of a play to which the poets paid so much attention, the protasis, epitasis, and catastrophe, and on the last of which they bestowed the utmost art and industry to Becure the applause of the audience? He has used the same com- parison, in almost the same words, in his Cato. If this explanation satisfy the learned, there is no reason why we should read, as has been proposed, extremus or uhimus, contrary to the old copies. — Malesjnna.
Cicero speaks as if Quintus were engaged in a play consisting only of three acts ; assigning one year to each act. - Ft. Hotemanntts.
22 CICERO S LETTERS
of Caator and Pollux, his fasces were broken, and he himself and some of his attendants wounded. Caesar now released the farmers of the public revenues in Asia from some of the conditions of their contracts, with which they were dissatisfied. (See preceding Letter.) And on the motion of Vatinius, the province of Cisalpine Gaul and lUyricum was assigned to him for five years ; to which Transalpine Gaul was afterwards added, through the influence of Pompey, who married Julia, Coesar's daughter. Clodius was carrying on the mea- sure of his adoption into a plebeian family, and openly threatening Cicero with impeachment. The consuls-elect for the ensuing year, 696 A.U.C., were Aulus Gabinitis, and L. Calpumius Piso, whose daughter Casar had just married.
Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
I. 1. Statius^ arrived at my house on the 2oth of October. His arrival, as you had written that you should be torn td pieces by your people while he was away, was a disagreeable one to me. But as it put aside the expectation of yourself, and that concourse of people which would have occurred if he had departed at the same time with you, and had not appeared till you did yourself, it seemed to me to have hap- pened not altogether disadvantageously ; for the talk of men is now exhausted, and expressions of this kind are uttered by many,
'AAA' aei riva, (pSra fxeyav,^
which I am glad is accomplished in your absence.
2. But whereas he seems to have been sent by you for the purpose of clearing himself in my opinion, that was not at all necessary: for, in the first place, he never was sus- pected by me ; nor, in what I wrote to you about him, did I write on my own judgment : but as the estimation and safety of all of us who have joined in the affairs of the common- wealth depended not only on truth, but also on reputation, I
^ A freedman of Quintus Cicero, and one who had had far too much
influence over him.
* The lines in Homer, Od. ix. 613, are —
'AK\' dil Tiva (poSra fieyav koI KaXou iSiyfiriv 'Ej/OoS' iKevaeaOai, fieyd\r)v iirififiei/ov d\Ki^u. NO)/ Se fj.' ewv ()\iyos re Kol oirtSavos Kal &kucv5 O(p6a\ixov jx aXduffev eTrei fi iSajxaffcraTO oXvw.
Thus translated by Pope : —
I deem'd some godlike giant to behold, Or lofty hero, haughty, brave, and bold ; Not this weak pigmy-wretch, of mean design. Who not by strength subdued me, but by wme.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTU8. 23
have constantly written to you the reports of others, and not my own opinions. How common, indeed, and how un- favourable, such reports were, Statius himself learned on his arrival ; for he came just in time to hear the complaints of certain persons, which were made to me concerning himself, and had an opportunity of experiencing that the conversation of the disaffected broke forth especially against his name.
3. But that which used to move me most, was when I heard that he had greater influence with you than the gravity of your age, or the prudence requisite for such a command required; (for how many people do you think have applied to me to recommend them to Statius? how many things do you think he has himself made known, without intending it, in conversation to the same effect?) that did not please me; I warned, advised, deterred you. In such proceedings, even if there is the greatest fidelity in him, (as, indeed, I fully believe, since such is your opinion of him,) yet the mere appearance of a freedman or of a slave having so much influence over you, can contribute nothing to your dignity. And you may be assured, (for I feel bound neither to say anything without reason, nor to suppress anything through policy,) that Statius has furnished entire matter for the con- versation of those who seek to disparage you : previoualy, it could only have been understood that some persons were ofiended with your severity; but since he has been emanci- pated, there has not been wanting to those who were ofiended a subject on which they might enlarge.
II. 4. I will now reply to those letters which L. Csesius delivered to me, (whom, as I understand that such is your wish, I will on no occasion fail to support,) one of which relates to Zeuxis of Blandus,^ who, you write, is urgently recommended by me to you, while he has most unques- tionably murdered his mother. On this subject, and con- cerning this whole class of persons, attend to a few words from me, lest you should, perchance, be surprised that I am become so solicitous of pleasing the Greeks. As I perceived that the complaints of the Greeks had too much weight, owing to the natural talent of that nation for deceiving, I sought to pacify, by every means in my power, whomsoever I heard make any complaint of you. In the first place, I 1 A town of Phrygia,
S4 CICEBO'S LETTERS
soothed the people of Dionysopolis, who were most bitter enemies of mine; and their chief man, Hermippus, I won over, not merely by talking to him, but by admitting him to intimacy. I received, with all the courtesy and friend- ship in my power, Hephaestus of Apamea, and that most contemptible of men, Megaristus of Antandros, and Nicias of Smyrna, and all the despicable fellows of the district, even Nymphon of Colophon. AH this I did, not because those men, or their whole nation, gave me any pleasure ; for I am thoroughly weary of their levity, their flattery, and their minds that regard no duty but merely time-serving.
5. But, to return to Zeuxis, when he repeated the very same things which you write, about a conversation held by Marcus Cascellius with him, I objected to what he said, and admitted the man to my intimacy. But I know not what strong desire there was in you, when you say that you wished, since you had sewn up two Mysians in a sack at Smyrna, to give a similar example of your severity in the upper part of the province, and therefore desired by all means to draw forth Zeuxis, — who, if brought before tlie tribunal, ought perhaps not to have been let go ; but it was not necessary that he should be sought out and enticed by blandishments, as you write, before the court, especially being a man of such a character, that I know him, from tlie reports of his fellow- citizens, and, every day more and more, from those of many other persons, to be almost of greater respectability than his native city.
6. But, you will say, I am partial to Greeks only. What? did I not pacify Lucius Caecilius by eveiy means in my power? and what a man he was! of what anger! of whai pride ! Whom, indeed, except Tuscenius, whose case cannot be mended, have I not pacified] There just occurs to me Catienus, a fickle and sordid man, though of the equestrian order: even he shall be smoothed down. That you were somewhat severe to his father, I do not blame you, for I well know that you acted with sufficient reason. But what need was there of letters of such a character as you sent to him? telling him that he was of his own accord erecting a cross for himself, fi'om which you had already taken him down; and that you would now take care that he should be burnt dive with the applause of the whole province. Agam, what did
TO HIS BBOTHEB QUIXTCS. 2fl
rou write to an unknown follow called Caius Fabius, (fox Titus Catienus carries about that letter too,) telling him that it was reported to you that Licinius, the kidnapper, with his young chick of an extortioner, is exacting tribute? You then ask Fabius to bum both father and son alive if he can, and if not, to send them t© you, that they may be burnt by judicial sentence. These letters, sent doubtless in joke by you to Caius Fabius, if indeed they are yours at all, appear, when they are read, to contain a barbarity of language cal- culated to excite odium.
7. And if you look back at the precepts contained in all my letters, you will see that there is nothing censured by me except the bitterness of your language and your proneness to anger, and perhaps, in one or two instances, your care- lessness as to letters sent by you. If in these matters my authority had had a little more influence over you than either your own natural disposition, which is somewhat too hasty, or a certain pleasure which you find in passionateness, or wit and facetiousness in speaking, there would really be nothing whatever for us to regret. And do you think that I feel only a trifling concern, when I hear in what estimation Yergilius, and your neighbour Caius Octavius, are held? for if you prefer yourself to your inland neighbours, the Cihcian and the Syrian, you do something very gi-eat ! And it is a bitter feeling, that while those men whom I have mentioned are not superior to you in innocence, they yet surpass you in the art of conciliating good-will j men who have never read either the Cyrus of Xenophon or his Agesilaus, kings from whom, though possessed of absolute power, no one ever heard a single harsh word. But how much good I have done in recom- mending this conduct to you from the firet, I am not unaware.
III. 8. Now however that you are departing, as you seem to me to be already doing, leave behind you, I entreat, as pleasant a recollection of yourself as possible. You have an exceedingly courteous successor. Your other qualities will be much regretted on his arrival. In sending letters, as I have often written to you, you have shown yourself too easy. Put out of the way, if you can, all that are unjust, all tliat are of an unusual character, all that are inconsistent one with another. Statius has told me that the letters written to you are often brought, and read by him, and that, if they are
26 CICERO'S LETTERS
uujust, you are informed of it; but that, before he cama to you, there was no selection of your letters, though since that time there have been rolls of selected letters which commonly met with reprobation.
9. On this subject, indeed, I do not give you any advice now, for it is too late, and you must be aware that I have given you much advice, in various ways, and with great care. Attend to that, however, which I bade Theopompus tell you, when I was reminded of the circumstance by himself, namely, that by means of men well affected to you, these dif- ferent kinds of letters, as is easy, may be put out of the way ; in the first place, those which are unjust; next, those which are contradictory ; then those written in an absurd and un- usual manner; and lastly, all that are insulting to any one. I do not indeed believe that these are exactly such as they are stated to be, and if they have escaped observation through the pressure of your business, at least examine them now, and get rid of them. I have read a letter which your nomen- clator Sylla was said to have written himself, and which cannot be approved; I have read some very angry ones.
10. "We will speak, however, of the letters at a fitting time. For while I had hold of this page, Lucius Flavins the praetor-elect came in to me, a man with whom I am on terms of great intimacy. He told me that you had sent letters to his agents which appeared to me most unreasonable, com- manding them to take nothing from the property which had belonged to Lucius Octavias Naso, to whom Lucius Flavins is heir, until they had paid a sum of money to Caius Fundanius ; and that you had sent also to the people of Apollonia not to allow any portion of the property which had belonged to Octavius to be taken away, until the debt due to Fundanius was paid. These things do not seem to me to be probable, for they are wholly inconsistent with your usual prudence. That the heir shall take none of the property ! What if he demurs 1 What if there is no debt at all owing 1 What ! is the prtetor accustomed to decide that there is a debt owing ? What ! (you will say) shall T not desire to serve Fundanius 1 Am I not his friend 1 Am I not moved with compassion for him 1 — No one more so, but in some cases the path of law is of such a character that there is no room for favour. And Flavins told me that it was so expressed in that letter which
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 27
he affirmed to be yours, that you would either give the people thanks as your friends, or bring trouble on them as enemies.
11. In short, he was greatly concerned; he addressed vehement complaints to me on the subject, and entreated me to write to you with all the earnestness possible ; as I now do, and entreat you most earnestly again and again, to allow the agents of Flavius to use their own discretion as to taking the property, and to write nothing to the people of Apollonia that is contrary to the interest of Flavius, and, besides, to do everything to gratify Flavius, and consequently Pompey. I should, in truth, be reluctant to appear to you over liberal, because of your injustice to him; but I entreat you to leave of your own accord some authority and some record of a decree or paper in your own hand-writing, which may have a fevourable bearing on the business and cause of Flavius. For the man being at the same time one who pays me great respect, while he is tenacious of his own rights and dignity, is dissatisfied that he had no influence with you, either from considerations of friendship or of right. And, I believe, on some occasion or other, both Pompey and Csesar recommended Flavius's interest to you, and Flavius had written to you himself on the subject, and so, I am sure, did I. If, therefore, there is any one thing which you think you ought to do at my request, let this matter be that one. If you have any regard for me, take care, strive, and maiiiige, that Flavius may feel all the gratitude possible both to you and to me. I ask this of you with such earnestness that I cannot ask any- thing with greater solicitude.
IV. 12, As to what you write to me about Hermias, it was indeed a matter of great annoyance to me. I had written you a letter, by no means in a brotherly style, which I wrote in excessive anger, when I was provoked by a com- munication from Diodotus, the freedman of LucuUus, stating what I had heard at the moment about the agreement ; and I wished to recal it. This letter, written in au unfraternal spirit, you ought in a fraternal spirit to forgive.
13. With respect to Censorinus and Antonius, Cassius and Scsevola, I am very glad indeed that you are, as you write, beloved by them. The other matters in that letter were of a graver character than I wished : 6p6dv rdv vaw, and oTra^ Oav€LV.
28 CICERO'S LETrERS
Those matters will be more serious. My reproofs were full of affection ; they were not absolutely of no importance, but moderate and light.^ I should never have thought you de- serving of the very slightest reprehension in anything, wliile you were conducting yourself with the most rigid propriety, if we had not many enemies. Wiiatever I wrote at all in the tone of admonition or reproof, I wrote from the anxiety of my caution, in which I still continue, and shall continue, and shall not cease to press you to act in a similar way.
14. Attalus the Iphemian has applied to me to prevail on you not to hinder the money which has been voted for the statue of Quintus Publicenus from being levied; and I do beg this of you, and exhort you not to allow the honour of a man of such a character, and so intimately connected with us, to be at all diminished or obstructed by your means. In the next place, Licinius, the slave of ^sop the tragedian, my great friend, with whose person you are acquainted, has fled; he was at Athens, staying with Patro the Epicurean, as a free man : from thence he proceeded into Asia. After- wards, a man called Plato, a citizen of Sardis, and an Epi- curean, who is accustomed to be a good deal at Athens, and who was at Athens at the time when Licinius went thither, arrested the man, when he subsequently learned from ^sop's letters that he was a runaway slave, and delivered him into custody at Ephesiis ; but whether he put him in the public prison, or in the private house of correction, I could not well understand from his letter. As he is at Ephesus, I should wish you, by some means or other, to search for the man, and use all your diligence to bring him over with you. Dc not consider of what value he is, for he is of little value who has now proved himself worthless ; but ^Esop is so con- cerned and indignant at the wickedness and audacity of the slave, that you can do him no greater favour than to be the means of his recovering him.
V. 15. Attend now to what you are most desirous to hear.
' This is rather obscure. Manutius interprets it, that the meaning of the Greek quotations in the letter which Cicero repented of, was, — Let us keep the vessel straight on her course ; if we fail, we can die but once. And now he says, the advice which I am giving you is of greater consequence than the affairs which impelled me then to use that language, in which despondency was mingled with reproof.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTCS. 29
The republic we have utterly lost; insomuch, that Gate, a young man of no wisdom, but still a Komau citizen and a Cato, scarcely escaped with his life, because, when he was resolved to impeach Gabinius for corruption, and the prsetors would not grant access for some days, or give him any oppor- tunity of addressing them, he made his way to the rostrum, and called Pompey a "private dictator." Nothing was ever more nearly happening, than that he should be killed. From this circumstance you may see what the state of the whole republic must be.
16. Still men are not likely to be wanting to my own cause.^ They make professions of adherence to me to a wonderful extent, and offer themselves, and make promises. In truth, I am in the greatest hopes, and even in greater confidence. I hope that we shall get the upper-hand. I feel confident that I need fear no misfortune in this state of affairs. But still this is the condition of things. If Clodius impeaches me, all Italy will throng around me to secure my coming off' with increased glory ; but if he attempts to carry his point by violence, I then hope that we shall resist him with force, not only through the efforts of oiir friends, but even those of strangers. All men promise me the aid of themselves, and their friends, and freedmen, and slaves, and even of their money. Our ancient band of worthies glows with zeal and love for me. If in times past any of them have been at all alienated, or cool, they now, from hatred to these kings,^ unite themselves with the good citizens. Pompey promises everything, and so does Csesar; whom I trust so far as to abate nothing of my own preparation. The tribunes of the people elect are my friends ; the consuls show themselves in a very favourable light. I find the prsetors most excellent friends, and most energetic citizens, especially Domitius, Nigidius, Memmius, and Lentulus; I find the others^ also good, but these particularly so. Study there- fore to cherish much courage and good hope. Of everything, however, which takes place from day to day I will keep you continually informed.
' The attack with which Clodius was threatening him.
* The triumvirs.
' There were eight prtetors altogether.
so CICERO S LETTERS
LETTER III.
This letter was written in the next year, 696 a.tj.c. Cseaar, on the expiration of his consulship, did not depart at once for his province, but remained outside the city with his legions. Clodius, through his influence, obtained the tribuneship, and having won over the consuls by his promises, began a set of revolutionary measures ; introducing a bill to limit the power of the censors, and another to restore the colleges or guilds which had been suppressed a few years before ; and a third to repeal the Lex ^Elia Fufia, which gave the consuls a power of dissolving the comitia by declaring the auspices unfavourable. Having strengthened himself by these measures, he proceeded in his 'threatened attack upon Cicero. Caesar offered him one of his Cam- panian commissionerships as a means of withdrawing in honour for a while; or a lieutenancy in Gaul under himself; but he refused these offers, trusting to the attachment of the people and Pompey. When he found them likely to fail him, he, and the greater part of the senate and knights, put on black garments, as a dress of suppli- cation ; and Cicero made personal application to Piso for his protec- tion. At last, in the beginning of April, by the advice of his friends, Cicero withdrew from the city, taking an image of Minerva, and placing it in the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus as a deposit ; and this letter was written while he was in exUe at Thessalonica.
Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
I. 1. My brother, my brother, my brother, were you afraid that, under the influence of some angry feeling, I had sent to you slaves without any letters ; or that I was even unwilling to see you? I angry with you! How could I have been angiy with you? I dare say; for you, I suppose, have crushed me ; your enemies, your unpopularity has ruined me ; and it is not I who have miserably undone you. That consulship of mine, so mxich extolled, has torn from me you, my children, my countxy, my fortunes; would that it may have taken nothing from you but me alone ! But certainly, on your part, everything honourable, agreeable, has befallen me , from me there arises to you only sorrow for my ill-fortune, fear for your own, regret, grief, and s®litude. Could I be un- willing to see you? Nay, rather I was unwilling to be seen by you.^ For you would not have seen your brother ; you
^ Quintus was just quitting his government in Asia, and returning to Rome, where his enemies were preparing to impeach him. He pro- posed to come out of his way to Thessalonica, to see his brother ; but Cicero urged him rather to hasten to Rome. He says to Atticus, (Ep. iii. 19,) that it was necessary for his brother "to hasten to Home with all speed, lest any injury should be done to him in his absence." . . .
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 31
VTOvJd not have seen him whom you had left, him whom you had known, him to whom, weeping, you had bidden farewell, yourself weeping, of whom you, when departing, had taken leave, after he had attended you some way on your journey: you would have seen not even a trace or image of him, but a sort of effigy of a breathing corpse. And I wish that you had rather seen or heard that I was dead ; I wish that I had left you surviving, not only my life, but my dignity.
2. But I call all the gods to witness, that I have been re- called from death by this single expression alone, that all men declared that a part of your life also was laid up in my life. I have therefore erred and acted wrongly: for if I had died, my death of itself would have been an ample proof of my love and aflfection for you j but I have been the cause, that though I am alive, you are without me, and that while I am alive, you are in need of the assistance of others; and that my voice is silent above all in our domestic dangers, after having often been a protection against perils which did not at all affect ourselves. For as to the fact of slaves having come to you without any letters, since you see it did not happen through anger, the cause was assuredly indolence, and an infinite multitude of sorrows and miseries.
3. With what sorrow do you think that these very words are written? with as much as I know that you read them. Can I ever cease to think of you, or ever think of you without tears? For when I regret your absence, is it a brother alone that I am regretting? Nay, I rather regret one who is almost a contemporary in affection;^ a son in reverential
"Therefore I preferred that he should hasten to Rome, instead of coming to see me ; and at the same time, (for I will tell the plain truth, by which you will be able to see the greatness of my distress,) I could not bring my mind to see him who is so greatly attached to me in such trouble ; nor to exhibit to him my own misery and grief, and the utter ruin of my fortune ; nor could I endure to be seen by him. And I feared, too, what no doubt would have been the case, that he would not be able to tear himself from me." This letter to Atticus bears the same date as the one in the text to Quintus.
' Suavitate prope cequalem. Cicero's meaning (if the text be aa Cicero wrote it) seems to be, that his brother is almost his equal, not merely in length of life, but in length of affection. Marcus has loved Quintus longer than Quintus has loved Marcus, because Marcus loveu Quintus in his infancy before Quintus could return his love. In saying this, I have some doubt whether I am giving the right sense to either
32 CICERO'S LETTERS
obedience ; a father in wisdom. What has ever been agreeabli to me without you, or to you without me 1 Why need I add that at the same time I regret tlie absence of my daughter' A maiden of what affection, what modesty, what abihty ! tlie image of my own countenance and conversation and disposi tion. Why need I add, that I regret also my son, that most graceful youth, and most dearly loved by me ! whom I. like a cruel and hard-hearted man, dismissed from my embrace, a youth of greater wisdom than I could have wished ; for the unhappy boy had sense to feel what was going on. Why too should I speak of your son, your own image, whom my boy Cicero both loved as a brother and respected even as an elder brother? Why should I observe that I did not permit that most miserable woman, my most faithful wife, to attend me in my exile, in order that there might be some one to protect the relics left from our common calamity, our common children 1
4. But still, I did write you a letter, in such a way as I could, and gave it to Philogonus your freedman, and I imagine that it was subsequently delivered to you ; in which I continued to exhort and entreat you, as your slaves told you in the verbal message which they gave you from me, to go straight to Rome, and to go with speed. For, in the first place, I wished you to be there to protect yourself, in case there were still any enemies of ours whose cruelty was not yet satisfied with the calamities which had befallen me ; and, in the second piace, I dreaded the lamentations which must have broken out at our meeting, and I could not have en- dured your departure; I feared too that very thing which you mention in your letter, that you would not have been able to tear yourself from me. For these reasons, this great misfortune of not seeing you- at all, than which it does not
siiavitas or cequalis. But we can hardly take cequalis in the sense of " equal," for Cicero would have offered poor praise to his brother if he had said to hiui, '" You are almost my equal in suavitas." " Suavitas," says Malespina, " est inter amicos." But the soundness of the text ia extremely doubtful. The old editions have suavitate prope cequalem, prope fratrem; the modem editors omit prope fratrem. Lambinua wovdd read suavitate fratrem, setate prope cequalem, which Gruter calla a frigid emendation, but which would materially improve the passageii jEtate, however, is by no means necessary ; for, if it were omitted, (cqualis would still be taken in the sense of '' equal in age."
TO HI3 BROTHER QUINTU8. 33
seem possible for any more painful and bitter grief to have befallen affectionate and devoted brothers, was less bitter and less distressijig than our meeting and our separation would have been.
5. Now, if you can, do what I, who have always appeared to you to be a man of fortitude, cannot; raise and strengthen yourself if there is any contest to be encountered. I hope, if my hope has any weight, that your own integrity, and the affection which the city bears you, and even pity for me, will bring you some protection. But if you find yourself free from that danger, you will do, I am sure, anything which you shall think possible tu be done in my behalf. On this Eubject many of my friends write me many letters, and show that they still entertain hopes ; but I myself do not see clearly what to hope, as my enemies have very great power ; and of my friends, some have deserted me, and some have even betrayed me, as they fear perhaps in my return a reproof to their own wickedness. But what is the real position of affairs in that respect, I should wish you to examine thoroughly, and to let me know. For myself, as long as it shall be of any use to you, if you shall see that there is danger to be met, I will continue to live ; longer than that I cannot exist : for no prudence and no learning has power enough to endure such a weight of sorrow.
6. I know that there has been a more honourable and a more useful opportunity of dying, but I not only let that slip, but many other things too; but, if I chose to waste time in lamenting what is past, I should be doing nothing but increasing your sorrow, and exhibiting my own folly. What, however, neither ought to be done nor can be done, i^ for me to remain in so miserable and dishonourable an ex- istence as this any longer than the chance of an opportunity of serving you or any well-grounded hope shall require ; so that I, who was formerly most happy in my brother, in my children, my wife, my resources, and even in respect of riches,^ and in dignity, authority, repute, and favour, not inferior to the greatest men who have ever existed, now, in these crushed and ruined circumstances, am no longer able even to lament myself and my friends,
^ Genere ipso vecunice, Paul Maautius would rea<3, genere ipso vecunid.
D
34 CICERO's LETTERS
7. Why, therefore, have you written to me about any billa of exchange? As if your resources did not now support me. in which very matter, miserable that I am, I both see and feel how great an error I have committed : while you have to satisfy those in whose debt you are, out of your own means and those of your son, I have 8quandered to no pur- pose money drawn out of the treasury in your name. But still, the sum which you mentioned in your letters has been paid to Mark Antony, and the same amount to Csepio. And what I have with me is quite sufficient for the objects which I have in view ; for whether I am restored, or whether I am forced to abandon all hope, I want nothing more here ; and as for you, if perchance any annoyance should arise, I advise you to apply to Crassus and to Calidius.
8. How much trust may be placed in Hortensius I do not know. He treated me with the greatest possible dishonesty and treachery, though with the greatest pretences of affection, and with unremitting attention day after day, Arrius being also in league with him ; and it was from being deceived by their advice, and promises, and recommendations, that I fell into this misfortune. But you will take no notice of this, that they may not injure you ; only be on youi' guard on this point, (and with this view I would have you cultivate the friendship of Hortensius himself through the instru- mentality of Pomponius,)^ that that verse ^ which was quoted against you with reference to the Aurelian law, when you were a candidate for the sedileship, may not be confirmed by false witness. For there is nothing that I am so much afraid of as that, when men find out how much pity for me, your prayers, and a regard for your safety, is likely to excite, they will oppose you with greater violence.
9. I believe that Messala is well affected towards you ; and I think that even Pompey pretends to be so ; but I wish that you may have no occasion to experience this. And 1 would pray to the gods that you might not, if they had not given
• Titus Pomponius Atticus.
' Cicero was afraid, I imagine, that his brother Quintus might be accused of bribeiy, because, when he was a candidate for the sedileship, he had given away money contrary to the laws ; on which occasion some verse had beet quoted about him, in reference to the Aurelian law, touching upon bribery. We may suppose that by the Aurelian law Bome provisions were made regarding bribery. — Paul Manutius.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 3d
uj) attending to my prayers. But still, I do pray that they may be content with the infinite misfortunes which have fallen upon me ; in which, however, there is not only no dishonour from wickedness, but my whole sorrow is that most severe punishments are inflicted upon the most virtuous actions.
10. Why, my brother, need I recommend to you my daughter and yours, and my little Cicero? One of my sorrows is that their orphaned state will cause you no less grief than it causes me. But, as long as you are safe, they will not be orphans. As to the rest, so may some safety be granted me, and an opportunity of dying in my native laud, as tears suffer me to write no more. I would have you also take care of Terentia, and write me an answer with a full account of everything. Keep up your courage as far as the nature of circumstances will allow.
Dated on the 13th of June at Thessalonica.
LETTER IV. Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. I ENTREAT you, my brother, if you and all my finends are involved in my individual ruin, do not attribute it to any dishonesty or evil-doing of mine, but rather to my impru- dence and ill-fortune. There is no error on my part, except that I have believed those men, by whom I thought it would be impious for me to be deceived, or even for whose very interests I did not think it would be advantageous. But every one of my most intimate friends — every one most nearly connected with me, and most dear to me, either feared for himself or envied me; and so, wretched that I was, I had nothing but the good faith of my friends. * * * My own prudence was at fault.
2. But if your own innocence, and the pity which men feel, sufficiently protect you at this moment from annoyance, you no doubt see clearly whether there is any hope of safety left for me. For Pomponius and Sestius, and my friend Piso, have hitherto detained me at Thessalonica, as they prevented me from departing to a greater distance from the city, on
]>2
36 CICERo's LETTERS
account of I know not what changes ; but I looked for seme result, more because of their letters, than from any well- founded hope of ray own. For what could I hope, with my enemy in full power, under the rule of mj'^ detractors, with my friends faithless, and numbers envious of me ?
3. Of the new tribunes of the people,^ Sestius indeed is fall of wishes to serve me, and so, as I hope, are Curius, Milo, Fadius, and Fabricius ; though Clodius is most bitter against a man who, even when out of office, will be able to exert the same power to stir up the assembly : and then, some one will also be prepared to interpose his veto.
4. These things were not set before me when I was leaving the city, but I was constantly told that I should be brought back in three days with the greatest honour. How did you act then? you will ask me. — How? Many things came together to disturb my mind; the sudden defection of Pompey, the alienation of the consuls, also that of the praetors, the fears of the farmers of the public revenues, the dread of civil war. The tears of my friends prevented me from going forth to encounter death; a course which cer- tainly would have been best suited to my honour, and the best calculated to afford me a refuge from my intolerable miseries. But on this subject I wrote to you in that letter which I gave to Phaethon. Now, since you too are sunk down into such grief and perplexity as no one else ever suflfered, if the pity of men can afford any relief in our common calamity, you will certainly gain an incredible advantage ; but if we are utterly ruined (alas, me !) then I shall have been the destruction of all my friends, to whom I was previously no disgrace.
5. But do you, as I wrote to you before, examine the matter in all its bearings, and acquaint yourself with it thoroughly, and write me the exact truth, as the state of the time with reference to me, and not as your affection for me, dictates. I will cling to life as long as I shall think that it is for your advantage, or that it is possible to retain any hope ; you will know Sestius, who is most friendly to me ; and I imagine you will wish, for your own sake, to know
' The election of tribunes took place in the middle of July, and thia letter was apparently writte: soon afterwards, in the same year as the preceding one.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 37
Lentulus, who is going to be cocsnl ; althougli facts are more stubborn things than words. You will see fully what is required, and what is the state of affairs ; if no one shall despise your solitary condition and our common distress, something Avill be able to be effected by you, or else not by any means. But if your enemies begin to attack you, do not be idle,; for against me they will not proceed with swords, but with law-suits. However, I trust that there may be nothing of this. I entreat you to write me full information of every- thing; and to think, if you please, that there is in me less courage or wisdom than before, and but less love and affection for you.
38 CICERO S LETTERS
BOOK 11.
LETTER I.
This letter was written at the end of the year 697 a.tj.c, in the consul- ship of Lentulus Spinther and Metellus Nepos. Cicero had never been formally banished ; for though Clodius had prevailed to inter- dict him from fire and water, he yet did not propose any vote that he should be banished, nor did he attempt to have his name removed from the roll of the senate. He did indeed destroy his house, and dedicate the site to the goddess Liberty ; and the consuls seized his Tusculan villa ; but stiU no legal sentence had ever been pro- nounced against him. At the end of the year 696, when his enemy Piso, the late consul, was coming to Macedonia, which had been allotted to him as his province, Cicero moved to Dyrrhachium, in order to be nearer Italy, where his brother, and Pomponius Atticus (mentioned in the last letter), were making great exertions to render the people favourable to his return. Pompey had become alienated from Clodius by his violence and insolence ; and Lentulus, one of the consuls, was wholly devoted to Cicero. The consuls formally proposed that Cicero should be invited to return. One of the tri« bunes, Serranus, prevented the formal adoption of any such measure for a time; but in August it was carried, and in September Cicero returned to Rome, where he was received with acclamations. He immediately began to cultivate the good-will of Pompey, by pro- posing his appointment to an extraordinary commission for supplying the city, which was iu great distress from scarcity ; and^he himself accepted a subordinate commissionership. The site of his house on the Palatine hill was restored to him, it being declared to have been illegally and informally consecrated ; and a sum of money was voted to him to recompense him for his other losses, though Cicero was not at all satisfied with the amount of compensation. The consuls- elect for the ensuing year were Lentulus Mircellinus, and Marcius Philippus.
Marcus to his hrother Quintus, greeting.
1, The letter which you read I had written in the morning, but Licinius acted with kind consideration in coming to me in the evening as soon as the senate was adjourned, in order that, if I chose, I might write you an account of all that had taken place. The senate was more numerous than we
TO HIS BnOTHER QUINTUS. 39
had thought it could possibly have been in the mcnth of December, close upon the festival days.^ Of the men of consular dignity, we were there ourselves, and the two con- suls-elect; and Publius Servilius, and Marcus Lucullus, and Lepidus, and Volcatius, and Glabrio, praetors. We certainly were a very numerous assembly, in aU about two hundred. Lupus had excited our expectations; he discussed the ques- tion of the Campanian land with sufficient accuracy. He was listened to with profound silence. You are not ignorant of the subject. He did not pass over a single one of our actions. Some sharp things were said against Caius Caesar ; some insulting observations were made on Gellius ; and some expostulations addressed to Pompey in his absence. When he had summed up the whole matter at a late hour, he said he would not ask us for our votes, lest he should lay on us the burden of incurring any one's enmity; from the reproaches which had been uttered on previous occasions, and from the present silence, he was well aware what the feelings of the senate were. Immediately he began to adjourn the senate. Then Marcellinus said, "Do not. Lupus, from our silence attempt to judge what on this occasion we either approve or disapprove; I, as far as I myself am concerned, and I believe that the same feelings influence the rest, am silent, because I do not think that, as Pompey is absent, it is proper for the question of the Campanian land to be dis- cussed." Then he said that he had no wish to detain the senate any longer,
2. Racilius rose, and began to make a motion with respect to the threatened impeachments. And, first of all, he asked Marcellinus's opinion. He, after having complained with great bitterness of the conflagrations, and murders, and stonings perpetrated by Clodius, gave his o^pinion that he himself should assign the judges by lot with the assistance of the city praetor; that when the business of assigning of the judges was finished, the comitia should be held; and that whoever offered any obstacle to the tribunals would act con- trary to the interests of the republic. After his opinion had been received with great approbation, Caius Cato spoke against
* From the middle of December to the end of the year, the whola time waa taken up with the different festivals, — Saturnalia, Opalii Angeronalia, Larentinalia, and Juvenalia.
•to * CICEK0 8 LETTERS
it, and so did Cassius, calling forth great acclamations from the senate, as he expressed his opinion that the comitia ought to take precedence of the impeachments. Philippua agreed with Lentulus.
3. Afterwards Racilius asked me my opinion, first of all the senators out of office. I made a long speech about the whole frenzy and piratical wickedness of Publius Clodius ; I accused him as if he had been on his trial, with incessant and favour- able murmurs of assent from the whole senate. Severus Autistius praised my speech at tolerable length, and in lan- guage far from ineloquent; and he supported the cause of the courts of justice, and said that he should always consider it of the greatest importance. That opinion was adopted. Then Clodius, when he was asked his opinion, began to take up all the rest of the day with his speech ; he declared in furious language, that he had been attacked by Racilius in a most insulting and discourteous manner. And then his factious mob on a sudden, in the space in front of the senate- house, and on the steps, raised a very great disturbance, being excited, I imagine, against Quintus Sextilius, and the friends of Milo. The fear of this uproar spreading abroad, we im- mediately broke up, with great complaints from all parties.
You have an account of the transactions of one day. The rest of the business, I imagine, will be postponed till the month of January. Of the tribunes of the people, we find Racilius by far the best. Antistius, too, seems likely to be friendly to us. As for Plancius, he is wholly devoted to us. If you love me, be very considerate and careful how you put to sea in the month of December.
LETTER 11.
Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. It is not from pressure of business, with which, how- ever, I am pretty much hindered, but from a slight attack of weak eyes, that I am led to dictate this letter, instead of writing with my own hand, as I usually do to you. And in the first place I excuse myself to you in the very par- ticular in which I accuse you ; for no one has ever yet asked me, "Whether I wished to send anything to Sardinia?" but
TO HIS BROTHER QUI1TTU8. 4 1
I suppose you often find people ask you, "Whether you wish to send anything to Rome ?" As to what you wrote tc me in the name of Lentulus and Sestius, I spoke on that matter with Cincius. However the business stands, it is not a veiy easy one ; but in truth Sardinia has something very well suited to recal to people's mind a circumstance which had escaped their recollection. For as the great Grac- chus, when he was augur, after he arrived in that province, recollected what had happened to him contrary to the auspices, when holding the comitia in the Campus Martins for the election of consuls, so you, too, seem to me, now that you are in Sardinia,^ to have reflected again at your leisure on the shape of the house of Minucius, and on the debt which you owe to Pomponius. But as yet I have bought nothing. The auction of CuUeo's property has taken place. There was no one to purchase the property ; if the terms should be very favourable, perhaps I may not let it slip myself.
2. About your building, I do not cease to press Cyi'us, and I hope that he will attend to his duty; but everything is a little slow, because of the expectation which is entertained of a frantic sedileship,^ For the comitia seem likely to take place without delay; they have been given out for the 22d of January. However, I would not wish you to be uneasy about them ; every kind of caution shall be practised by us.
3. A vote of the senate has been passed about the king of Alexandria,^ that it appears dangerous to the republic for him to be restored with a multitude; and when there fol- lowed a contest in the senate, whether Lentulus or Pompey should be appointed to restore him, Lentulus appeared to have the majority. In this transaction I satisfied my sense of obligation to Lentulus to admiration, and that of good-
' Quintus was in Pardinia, as one of Pompey's commissioners to procure com for the city.
* Clodius was standing for the sedileship.
' This was Ptolemy Auletes, who was now at Rome, and who had prociired a vote to be passed that he should be restored to his king- dom. The vote that he should not be restored with a multitude, waa caused by a verse which Caius Cato, a tribune, professed to have found in the Sibylline verses, and which he interpreted to mean that an army ought not to be employed in the matter ; while one of tha reasons which made so many desirous of the appointment to rest ou him, was, that it would furnish a pretext for levying an army.
42 CICERO's LETTERS
will to Pompey with honour. But, by those who wished to disparage Lentulus, the matter was protracted by meaus of false accusations. The days of the comitia followed, during which a senate could not be held. What will be the result of the bandit-like conduct of the tribunes, I cannot conceive; but still I suspect that Caninius will carry his motion by force. What Pompey's wishes in that matter are, I do not clearly see ; but every one discerns what his friends want : and the creditors of the king, without any disguise, furnish money to be used against Lentulus. Beyond all doubt, the matter now appears to be out of the reach of Lentulus, to my great sorrow, although he has done many things for which, if it were proper, we might fairly feel angry with him.
4. I should wish you, if it is convenient, as soon as the weather is fine and settled, to embark on board ship, and come to me ; for there are great numbers of things in which I want you daily in every way. Your family and mine are well. 19 th January.
LETTER IIL Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. I WROTE to you already what happened before; learn now what took place afterwards. The business of embassies was postponed from the 1st of February to the 13th. On that day the matter was not settled. On the 2d of February, Milo was present; and Pompey came to give him his coxxnte- nance. Marcellus spoke, being asked by me. We came off very respectably. The day of trial was put off to the 6th of February. In the meantime, as the business of the embas- sies was postponed till the 13th, a motion was made about the provinces of the quaestors, and about some compliments to be paid to the praetors; but, from the introduction of frequent complaints about the general state of affairs, no business was transacted. Caius Cato proposed a law to take away his command from Lentulus. His son changed his dress.
2. On the 6th of February Milo appeared; Pompey spoke, or rather, intended to speak ; for as soon as he was on his legs, the mob in Clodius's pay raised a disturbance, which lasted throughout his whole speech ; and in such a manner
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 43
that he was hindered from being heard, not merely by the noise, but by reproaches and abuse. When he had summed up what he had been saying, (for in that matter he behaved with courage enough; he was not detei-red from proceeding; he said all that he meant to say; and, indeed, there were moments when he was heard in silence ; and he continued to the end with great authority ; but when he had summed up,) up rose Clodius, when such a shout was raised against him by our party, for we determined to pay him off, that he was master neither of his senses, nor of his expressions, nor of his countenance. This scene was continued till two o'clock, Pompey having scarcely finished his peroration at twelve, while every sort of abuse, and even the most obscene verses, were uttered in the way of attack upon Clodius and Clodia. He, furious with passion, and pale with terror, amid the uproar, addressed questions to his mob: "Who waa it that was killing the people with famine?" The mob replied, " Pompey." " Who was it that wanted to go to Alexandria?" They replied again, " Pompey." "Whom did they wish to go ?" They answered, " Crassus." And he, on this occasion, was present with Milo ; but with a disposition far from friendly. At about three o'clock, as if a signal had been given, Clodius's mob began to spit upon our party. Indignation rose to a great height; they began to press on in order to drive us from our seats. A rush was made upon them by our party; and a flight of the mob took place. Clodius was driven from the rostrum, and we too then fled, lest we should meet with any accident in the confusion. The senate was summoned to the senate-house; Pompey went home. Nor did I indeed attend the senate, that I might neither be silent on matters of such importance, nor offend the feelings of the well-affected citizens, by defending Pompey; for he was attacked by Bibulus, and Curio, and Favonius, and the younger Servilius. The matter was put off till the next day. Clodius deferrred the day of impeachment to the Quirinalia. 3. On the 9th of February, the senate met in the temple of Apollo, in order that Pompey might be present. The matter was handled by him with great gravity. On that day nothing was done. On the 10th of February, a decree of senate was made in the temple of Apollo, " That what had been done on the 6 th of February had been contrary to the interests of the republic." On that day Cato inveighed
44 CICERO's liBTTERS '
against Pompey with great vehemence ; and throughout his whole speech accused him as if he had been upon his trial. or me, much against my willj he said a great deal; extolling me very highly; and when he exposed Pompey's treachery towards me, he was listened to with profound silence by the disafifected, Pompey replied to him with great energy, and gave a character of Crassus, and said in plain words, that he would be better prepared to defend his life than Africanus had been, whom Caius Carbo had killed.
4. Thus great matters appeared to me to be in agitation; for Pompey understands these things, and communicates them to me, being well aware that plots are formed against his life; that Caius Cato is supported by Crassus, that money is fur- nished to Clodius, and that both of them are encouraged by him, by Curio, and Bibulus, and the rest of those who are always disparaging him; and that he has to take the most diligent care not to be overwhelmed, while the populace which attends all the assemblies is almost entirely alienated from him; while the nobility is hostile to him, the senate un- favourable, and the youth of the city corrupted. He is, therefore, preparing himself, and sending for people from tha country. And Clodius is strengthening his mob of artisans. A strong force is being prepared for the Quirinalia, and in that respect we are much superior to the number of Pompey's adherents. But a great body of men is also expected from Picenum and Gaul, that we may also resist Cato's motion* about Milo and Lentulus.
5. On the 10th of February, Sestius was impeached under the Pupiuian law by Cnseus Nerius the informer, on a charge of corruption, and on the same day by a certain Marcus TuUius for violence. He was sick. Immediately, as it was o\ir duty to do, we went to see him at his house, and pro- mised our entire energies to his service ; and we did this con- trary to the general expectation, (as men thought that we were with reason offended with him,) in order to appear both to him and to all men to be of a most humane and grateful disposition. And so we shall continue to do.
But this same informer, Nerius, add3d to the number of those whom he affirmed to be his accomplices, Cuajus Lentulus Vaccias, and Caius Cornelius. On the same day, a vote of the senate was passed, that all the different com- panies, and those who belonged to the different decurisB,
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTT78. 45
should depart; and that a law should be enacted respecting them, to the effect, that those who should not depart, should be liable to the punishment which is inflicted for violence.
6. On the 11th of February I made a speech in defence of Bestia, who was accused of corruption before Cnseus Domitiua the praetor, in the middle of the forum, in the presence of a vast crowd of people, and while speaking, I happened to touch upon that occasion when Sestius, after receiving many wounds in the temple of Castor, was saved by the assistance of Bestia. Here I very seasonably made the best of those things which were imputed to Sestius as crimes, and I extolled him with well-deserved praises, with the great approbation of all men. The affair was exceedingly grateful to the man. And I mention this to you now, because in your letters you have often given me a hint on keeping well with Sestius.
7. On the 12th of February I wrote this letter before daybreak; on that day I was going to sup with Pomponius on the occasion of his marriage. Everything else in our affairs of this nature is, as you described to me, though I could hardly believe you, full of dignity and influence, which have been restored both to you and to me, my brother, in consequence of your prudence, patience, integrity, piety, and courteousness. The house of Licinius at the gro\e of Pis: is hired for you ; but I hope that within a few months after the 1st of July, you will move into your own. Those elegant tenants, the Lamise, have hired your house in the Cazinae. I have never received any letter from you since that which waa dated at Olbia. I want to know what you are doing, and how you are amusing yourself ; and above all things, I want to see you as soon as possible. Take care to preserve your health, my brother, and though it is winter, recollect that it is r, Sardinian^ winter.
15th February.
LETTER IV.
Marcus to His brother Quintus, greeting.
1. Our friend Sestius was acquitted on the 14th of March, and ho was acquitted unanimously; a point which was o
' Sardinia had a bad character as an tinhealthj island.
46 ClCERO's LETTERa
very great importance to the republic, that there should appear to be no difference of opinion in a cause of that kind. As to that other object too, which I knew was often a cause of anxiety to you, namely, that we should give no oppor- tunity to any ill-disposed person to censure us, (who might say that we were ungrateful if we did not bear with that man's perverseness in some particulars as patiently as pos- sible,) you may be assured that we completely attained it in that trial, so that I was considered to have displayed the greatest possible sense of gratitude; for in defending the ill-tempered man I abundantly satisfied him; and, for my own gratification, I, as he was above all things desirous should be done, cut up Vatinius, by whom he was openly attacked, amid the applause of gods and men. Moreover, when our friend PauUus was produced as an evidence against Sestius, he confirmed the statement that he was going to lay an information against Vatinius, if Macer Licinius delayed to do so; when Macer rose from the seats occupied by the friends of Sestius, and declared that he would not fail to stand by him. Would you know the result? Vatinius, petulant and audacious as he is, went away in great agitation, and greatly weakened in his influence.
2. Your son Quintus, a most excellent boy, is going on with his education remarkably well ; and I have now the more opportunity of noticing this, as Tyrannio gives him lessons at my house. The building of both our houses is going on vigorously. I have provided for the payment of half his money to your contractor ; and I hope that before the winter we shall be both living together under one roof. Kespecting my daughter TuUia, a girl who is really very much attached to you, I hope that I have concluded matters with Crassipes.^ There were two days after the Latin holidays which are accounted sacred, or else it would have been settled. Latiar^ was going ****••
^ Tullia was a widow now. Her first husband had been Lucina Calpumius Piso Frugi. She now married Junius Crassipes. After hia death, she married Dolabella.
* There is some error in the MS. here. This name is most likely wrong; and the end of the letter seems to be lost. There is some diflference of opinion between the various editors, as to the division of this, and one or two of the subsequent letters. I have fallowed the old armngement. which la ako adopted by Nobbe.
TO HIS BROTHER QU1NTU8. 47
LETTER V. Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. I HAD written you a letter before, in -whicli it was men- tioned that my daughter TuUia was betrothed to Crassipes on the 4th of April; and I gave you also other details of the affairs of the republic, and of my own private matters. The following particulars have taken place since: — On the 5th of April, a sum of money, to the amount of more than three hundred and twenty thousand pounds,^ was voted to Pompey, by a decree of the senate, to purchase corn for the city. But on the same day there was a violent discussion about the lands in Campania, with an uproar in the senate almost equal to that of an assembly of the people. The want of money, and the high price of corn, made the dispute sharper.
2. I must not omit to mention this either. The Capitoline" college, and the priests of Mercury, have expelled Marcus Furius Flaccus, a Roman knight, and a most worthless fellow, from the college, though he was present when they came to the decision, and threw himself at the feet of every one of them.
LETTER VL
Marcus Cicero to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. On the 6th of April I gave the wedding-feast to Cras- fiipes. But at this banquet that excellent boy, your and
^ HSCCCC. Paul Manutivis considers that quadringenties centena millia nummUm is meant, i.e. 40,000 sestertia, or something more than £320,000. Let it be obBoired, however, that with regard to most, or all,. of the sums of money mentioned in these letters, there is very great uncertainty.
* The Cftpitoline college consisted of men dwelling in the Capitol and in the citadel, of whom Camillus made a college, for the purpose of superintending the games in honour of Jupiter Capitolinus, which were instituted for the preservation of the CapiloL See Livy, v. 50.
48 CICERO'S LETTERS
my Quintus, was not present, because he had taken some slight offence; and therefore, two days afterwards, I went to Quintus, and found him quite candid; and he held a long conversation with me, full of good feeling, about the quarrels of our wives. What would you have more? Nothing could be in better taste than his language. Pomponia, however, made some complaints of you; but these mattei's we will discuss when we meet.
2. When I left the boy I went into your gi'ounds ; the business was going on with plenty of buildei"s. I urged Longilius, the contractor, to make haste. He assured me positively that he was anxious to give us satisfaction. It wiK be a very fine house, for a better notion could now be formed of it than we had conceived from the plan. At the same time, my house, too, was going on with great speed. That day I supped with Crassipes ; and after supper I went in a litter to see Pompey at his villa. I had not been able to meet Lucceius, because he was away, and I was very anxious to see him, because I was going to leave Rome the next day, and because he was going to Sardinia. At last I found the man, and begged him to send you back to us as soon as possible. He said he would do so immediately. And he was going to set out as he said on the 11th of April, with the intention of embarking either at Leghorn or at Pisa.
3. As soon as he shall have arrived, my brother, do not let slip the first opportunity for sailing, provided the weather be favourable. That abundance (afiffaXafjiia) which you ars in the habit of talking of, I desire sufficiently ; that is to say, so as to receive it willingly if it comes, but not so as now to hunt for it if it keeps out of my way. I am building in three places; restoring and embellishing in others; I live a little more liberally than I used to do. If I had you with me, I should be forced to give a little play to the masons ; but, as I hope, we shall soon talk these things over together.
4. Affairs at Rome, however, arc in the following con dition : — Lentulus makes a very good consul, his colleague offering no hindrance ; indeed ne is, I repeat, so good, that I never saw a better. He prevented anything whatever being done in the day? of the comitia ; for even the Latin holidays are renjwed; and yet supplications were not wanting.
TO HIS BROTHER QUIN'TUS. 49
5. In this manner some most pernicious laws are success- fully resisted, especially those proposed by Cato, whom our friend Milo has admirably baffled. For that avenger of gladiators and matadors had bought some matadors from Cosconius and Pomponius, and never appeared in public without a troop of them armed. He could not maintain them, so that he could scarcely keep them about him. Milo became aware of this; and gave a commission to a man who was no particular friend of his, to buy the whole establish- ment from Cato without any suspicion; and as soon as it was removed from Cato's house, Racilius, who at this moment is the only real tribune of the people, divulged the whole matter, and said that those men had been bought for him, (for so it had been agreed upon,) and stuck up a notice, that he was going to sell the establishment of gladiators and matadors belonging to Cato. Much laughter followed this announcement. So now Lentulus has tired Cato of proposing new laws, as well as those persons who proposed those mon- strous enactments with reference to Csesar, which no one chose to impede by his veto. For as to what Caninius intended about Pompey, that has doubtless cooled consider- ably ; since the thing itself is disapproved ; and our friend Pompey is much blamed for his conduct with respect to Lentulus,^ who had behaved to him in a friendly manner. And indeed he is not the same person that he used to be; for he has given no slight offence by his exertions on behalf of Milo to those most infamous and despicable dregs of the people that adhere to Clodius ; and the well-disposed citizens, too, want a good deal which they do not find in him, and blame a good deal which they do.
In one respect Marcellinus indeed does not satisfy me; which is this, that he treats him with too much asperity ; although he does this not at all against the will of the senate. On this account I withdraw with the less reluctance from the Benate-house and from all connexion with public affairs.
6. With respect to law proceedings, we are much in the same state that we were ; my house is thronged by the
' Lentulus had been the principal means of the commission to supply Rome with food being entrusted to Pompey; -who, however, endeavoured to deprive liim of the honour of being appointed to restore Ptolemy to his kingdom.
E
58 CIUEUOS LETTERS
greatest crowds of people imaginable. One thing has hap- pened unpleasantly, through the imprudence of Milo, with respect to Sextus Coelius, whom I did not wish to be prose- cuted at this time, or by accusers who wanted influence. He just wanted three votes of the most worthless men on the bench ; and so the people insist upon it that the man shall be tried again ; and tried again he must be, for men will not bear it. And because he was almost convicted while pleading his cause before his own friends, they look upon him as vir- tually convicted. In that matter also the unpopularity of Pompey was a hindrance to us : for the votes of the senators acquitted him by a majority; those of the knights were equally balanced ; those of the tribunes of the treasiu-y con- demned him. But the daily convictions of some or other of my enemies console me for this disappointment, among whom Servius had a very narrow escape, to my great joy. the rest are entirely crushed. Caius Cato made a speech, to the effect that he would not permit the comitia to be held if the days for doing business were taken away from the people. Appius had not yet returned from Csesar.
7. I am amazingly anxious for a letter from you. And I am aware that till this time the sea has been impassable; but still people said that some persons had come from Ostia, who extolled you in an extraordinary degree; and said that you were very highly esteemed in the province. They added, that the same persons brought word, that you intended to cross at the first opportunity for sailing. I hope you will : but although I am most desirous of all to see yourself, still I hope for a letter from you first. My brother, farewell.
LETTER VII.
Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
On the 11th of April I dictated this letter to you before daybreak, and wrote on the road, with the purpose of staying that day with Titus Titius in the neighbourhood of Anagnia. But I thought of staying the next day at Laterium,^ and from thence, after remaining four or five days in the neigh-
' Ijaterium was a couutry-houae of Quintiis Cicero, in the nnigliboup hood of Arpinum.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTU8. 51
bourhood of Arpinum, to go to the neighbourhood of Pompeii, and on my return to view the countiy about Cumse, in order that, as Milo's trial is fixed for the 7th of May, I might arrive at Rome the day before, and on that day, as I hoped, might see you, my dearest and most beloved brother. It has seemed well to me that the beginning of the building at Arcanum^ should be stopped till you arrive. Take care of your health, my brother, and come as soon as possible.
LETTER VIII.
\Marcus Cicero to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. 0 LETTER of yours, most acceptable to me, long ex- pected, at first indeed with eager desire, but now even with Bome apprehension. Know, too, that this is the only letter which I have received since that which your sailor brought me, and dated from Olbia. But let everything else, as yoti say in your letter, be reserved till we can talk it over toge- ther. Yet this one thing I cannot forbear to mention. On the 15th of May the senate, being very crowded, was most admirably disposed, as it showed by refusing a supplication in honour of Gabinius.'' Racilius swears that such a thing never happened to any one before. It is very well received out- of-doors. To me it is agreeable on its own account, and more agreeable, because the decision was made in my absence, (for it expresses the real sentiments of the senate,) and without any opposition or influence of mine. 1 was at Antium at the time.
2. As to what was said, namely, that there would be a dis- cussion, on the fifteenth and the day after, on the subject of the lands in Campania, there was no discussion. What I myself should say on the subject, I am in doubt; but I shall probably say more than I had intended, for he will be present. Farewell, my most excellent and most wished-for brother, and hasten to me. Our children make you the same request; begging you to be sure to mind this, that you will sup hero when you come.
^ Arcanum was another villa belonging to Quintus. ^ Gabinius, as proconsul of Syria, had gained some trifling advan- tivges over the Arabs on the frontiers of the province.
v2
52 CICEKO'S LETTERS
LETTER tX.
Tina letter wss -written the year after those preceding, in the consul ship of tompey and Crassus; both for the second time. Theii election had been carried against the senate by the most open vio- lence. Cicero, who had offended the triumvirs by his opposition to Cajsar's agrarian law, was anxious to reunite himself to them.
Marcus Cicero to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. I HAD a suspicion that my book would please you; that it has pleased you so much as you -write that it has, I am greatly delighted. As to what you remind me about our Urania, and advise me to remember the speech of Jupiter, which is at the end of that book, I remember it well enough, and have written all those things more to please myself than others.
2. But still, the day after you went, I went, late at nighty with Vibullius to call upon Pompey ; and when I had talked to him about these works and inscriptions, he answered me with exceeding kindness, and gave me great hopes. He said that he should like to talk with Crassus, and advised me to do the same. I attended Crassus as consul home from the senate ; he undertook the business, and said that there was a point which Clodius, at this moment, was very desirous to carry by means of his and Pompey's assistance; and that he thought, if I threw no obstacle in his way, that I might obtain what I wished without any struggle. I entrusted the whole affair to him, and said that I would leave myself entirely in his hands. Publius Crassus was present at this conversation; a young man, as you are aware, devotedly attached to me. Now, what Clodius wants is some embassy ; and if he cannot obtain it from the senate, he would have it by means of the people; a free embassy-^ to Bvzantium, or
' The Latin is legatio libera. "During the latter period of the republic it had become customary for senators to obtain from the senate permis- sion to travel through or stay in any province, at the expense of the pro- vincials, merely for the purpose of managing and conducting their o-vvn personal affairs. There was no restraint as to the length of time the sena- tors were allowed to avail themselves of this privilege, which was a heavy burden on the provincials. This mode of sojourning in a province was •ailed legatio libera, because those who availed themselves of it enjoyed
TO HIS BROTHER QU1NTU8. 53
to Brogitarus, or to both. It is a means for making a great deal of money. I shall not give myself much trouble on the subject, even though I do not obtain what I want myself. However, Pompey talked the matter over with Crassus ; and they seem to have undertaken the business. If they do so, well ; if not, then we will return to our Jupiter.^
3. On the 13th of May, a decree of the senate was passed on the subject of corruption, in accordance with the opinion of Afranius, on which I spoke when you were pre- sent; but with great indignation on the part of the senate. The consuls did not follow up their opinions; and when they had expressed their assent to Afranius's proposal, they added a wish that the pi-8Btors should be created in such a manner as to leave them private individuals for sixty days. On that day they plainly repudiated Cato. In short, they are absolute masters of everything, and they wish every one to be aware that that is the case.
LETTER X. Marctis to his brother Quinius, greeting.
1. You are afraid of interrupting me. In the first place, if I were as much occupied as you fancy, you know what alone can be properly called interruption. Does Ateius ever interrupt you? In truth, you seemed to me to teach me a degree of politeness on that head which I certainly never practise towards you. I would wish you to summon me, and interrupt me, and put in your word, and converse with me ; for what can be more agreeable to me ? Upon my word, no Muse-stricken poetaster more gladly reads his last poem than I listen to you on every subject, public or private, rural or civil. But it happened through my own stupid shamefaced- aess, that when I was going away, I did not take you with
kll the privileges of a public ambassador, without haviug any of hia duties to perform. In Cicero's time this practice was greatly abused ; and in his consulship he endeavoured to put an end to it, but only succeeded in limiting its duration to one year. And Ctesar afterwards extended the time again to five years, which enactment lasted lown t» • very late period." — Smith, Diet. Ant. ' It is not known what this book was.
54 CICEBO'S LETTERS
.ae. On one occasion, you opposed to my wishes an excuse which there was no gainsaying — the delicate health of our dear Cicero: I had nothing to say. A second time you urged the Ciceros : again I ceased to press you.
2. But now this letter of yours, so full of agreeableness, has caused me this trifle of annoyance, that you seem to me to have feared, and still to fear, lest you should be trouble- some to me. I could quairel with you, if it were allowable ; but in truth, if I ever suspect anything of the sort, I will say nothing further, but that I shall be afraid lest I should ever be troublesome to you, when I am with you. I see that you groan. This is the case —
for I will never say,
(a irdcras.
And I would, indeed, have forced my friend Marius into the litter with me ; not that Anician one of king Ptolemy. For I recollect when I was taking the man to Baise from Naples, in the litter given by the king to Anicius, which was borne by eight men, with a hundred guards following us, we were laughing exceedingly, when he, not aware of the escort which was accompanying him, suddenly opened the litter, and almost fell to the ground with fear, while I did the same with laughing. On that occasion, I say, I should certainly have taken him with me, so as at last to enjoy some of the subtlety of his antique wit, and most agreeable conversation ; but I did not like to invite a man in a weak state of health, and who is not even now very strong, to a villa which was hardly covered in.
3. But this indeed will be a peculiar pleasure to me, to enjoy his society here too : for you must know that the light of Marius^ is in the neighbourhood of those farms of mine; we shall see at Anicius's house in what state of forwardness his affairs are. For as for ourselves, we are so desirous to acquire information of any sort, that we can even endure living among masons. We have this philosophy, not from Hymettus, but from the Syrian school. Marius is weak both in health and by nature.
' It ia not known whence these quotations come, or to what Cicero alludes in them. * I.e., says Mauutios, Marius, who is as welcome as the light.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTCS. 55
4. In regard of your interruptions, I will take f..s much time from your visit, for the purpose of writing, as you will give me. I wish you would give me none, so that I may be idle rather from your ill-treatment, than from my own indolence. I am sorry that you are so anxious about the commonwealth, and that you are a better citizen than Phi- loctetes, who, after he had received an injury, sought those sort of spectacles which I see are disagreeable to you. I entreat you hasten to me ; I will comfort you, and wipe away all your sorrow. And, if you love me, bring Alariu^i with you; but come quickly. I have a garden at home.
LETTER XI.
This letter was written in the year 700 A.u.c, in the consulship of Domitius and Appius Puleher. In the preceding year, Cicero had done his best to ingratiate himself with Pompey, who had paid him a visit : and after Crassus had departed for his province of Syria, he studied also to gain his good-will ; but he applied himself at this time more to philosophy than to politics. Quintus went this year into Gaul as one of Cscsar's lieutenants.
Marcus Cicero to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. Your little notes have wrung this letter from me by their reproaches ; for the circumstance itself, and the day in which you set out, gave me no subject for writing; but as, when we are together, conversation is not wont to fail us, so too our letters ought at times to have something sparkling in them.
2, The liberty of the Tenedians,^ therefore, has been cut down with a Tenedian axe, as no one, except Bibulus, and Calidius, and Favonius, and me, was found to defend them.
3. Mention has been made of you by the Magnesians of Sipylus, the more honourable as they said that you were the only person who resisted the demands of Lucius Sextius Pansa.
' The people of Tenedos had petitioned to be allowed to live under their own laws. The expression, " a Tenedian axe," is said to refer to a story of their ancient king Tennes, who gave his name to the island ; and one of whose laws was, that if any one detected an adulterer iu the fact, he waa to be slain with an axe.
56 CICEBO'S LETTERS
4. For the rest of the time, if there should be anything which it is desirable for you to know, or even if there ia nothing of the sort, still I will write something every day. On the 12th of April I will not be wanting either to you or to Pomponius.
5. The poems of Lucretius are just what you describe them ; remarkable for uo great brilliancy of genius, but for a great deal of art. But when you come, I shall think you a man indeed, if you can read the Empedoclea of Sallust; au ordinary man I shall not think you. Farewell.
LETTER XII. Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. I AM glad that my letters are acceptable to you, and yet I should not even now have had any subject for writing upon, if I had not received yours; for, on the lith, when Appius had assembled the senate, which met in very scanty numbers, it was so bitterly cold that he was compelled by the grumbling of the people to dismiss us.
2. About the king of Commagene, Appius, both in his own letters to me, and by the mouth of Pomponius, caresses me wonderfully for having frustrated the whole affair ; for he sees that if I adhere to this kind of speaking on other matters, February will be quite barren; and I touched him off in a tolerably sportive humour, and wrung from him not only that little town which was situated on the Euphrates at Zeugma, but ridiculed his praetexta gown which he had re- ceived in the consulship of Cajsar, with much laughter from everybody.
3. As to his not wishing, said I, to renew the same honours, so as not to have to furbish up his praetexta every year, I do not think we need come to any vote on that point : ^ but you, nobles, who could not bear a man from Bostra wearing the pi-SBtexta, will you endure one from Commagene 1 Yon see the kind, and the topics, of my jokes. I said a great
• Manutius confesses that he is not at all aware what is meant or referred to here.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 67
deal against an ignoble king, and at the end he was com- pletely hissed out. With this sort of speech, Appius, as I said, being delighted, is entirely devoted to me ; for nothing can be more easy than to get rid of all the rest of the business. But I will do nothing to offend him, lest he im- plore the protection of Jupiter Hospitalisj and call together all the Greeks by whose intervention I have been reconciled to him.
4. We will give satisfaction to Theopompus. About Csesar it had escaped me to write to you, for I see what a letter you expected ; but he wrote to Balbus, that that bundle of letters, in which mine and Balbus's were, was brought to him soaked through and through with water, so that he did not even know that there had been any letter at all from me. But of the letter of Balbus, he had been able to make out a few words; to which he replied in these terms: — I see that you have said something about Cicero which I have not been able to make out ; but as far as I could guess, it was something of this kind, that I should think him rather to be wished for than hoped for.
5. I, therefore, subsequently sent Csesar another copy of that letter; do not you overlook his jest about his difficulties. And I wrote him word also in reply, that there was nothing that he would be able to throw into disorder from relying on my strong-box : and in this way I jested with him fami- liarly, and at the same time with a proper dignity. His exceeding good-will towards me is communicated by mes- sengers, from all quarters. Letters, indeed, referring to what 3'ou exjjfecit, will very nearly coincide with your return. The other evellRs of each day I will write to you, that is to say, if yotfwill j|ovide couriers. Although, such terrible cold has prevailed, ttat there was very great danger of Appius's house being burnt down.^ Farewell.
• From his trying to warm it with a stove.
68 CICEEO'S LETTERS
LETTER XIII. Marcus to his brother Quintus, grteting.
1. I LAUGHED at the black snow;^ and I am very glad that you are in a cheerful humour, and so well inclined to jest. About Pompey I agree with you ; or rather you agree with me. For as you know, I have been for a long time talking of nothing but Caesar.^ Believe me, I have taken him to my heart, nor am I to be torn from him.
2. Now you must learn what was done at the Ides. The tenth day was fixed for the impeachment of Coelius; and Domitius^ had not collected judges in sufficient number. I am afraid lest that rude and brutal man, Servius Pola, may come to the accusation; for our friend Coelius is violently attacked by the whole train of Clodius's friends. There is aa yet nothing certain; but we are kept in a state of alarm. On the same day a very full senate assembled to hear the ambassadors of the Tyrians:* on the other side, the Syrian farmers of the revenue mustered in great numbers; Gabinius was violently attacked; however, the farmers were roughly handled by Domitius, for having escorted him on horseback. Our friend Gains Lamia spoke somewhat boldly, when Domi- tius had said, " It is through your fault, Roman knights, that these things have happened, because you are such profligate judges." He replied : " We judge ; you praise." Nothing was done that day, and night put an end to the discussion.
3. On the days appointed for holding the comitia, which come immediately after the Quirinalia, Appius explains hia notion that he is not prevented by the Pupian law from holding a senate, and that on the contrary, it is especially provided by the Gabinian law, that the senate is obliged to
^ This has some reference to a ridiculous doctrine of Anaxagoras, that snow must be black, because water, of which it was composed, was black.
^ Cicero had lately made a very impressive speech in the senate, extolling Caesar's conduct in his pi-ovince in the highest terms.
^ This Domitius was Cnajus D. the praetor. The Domitius men- tioned a few lines lower down, was Domitius Ahenobarbus, the consul.
* The citizens of Tyre had sent an embassy, with complaints of th« extortions of the farmers of the revenue in the province of Syriai Gabinius, as has been already said, had been governor of Syria.
mi
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTCS. 59
assemble to give audience to ambassadors every day from the 1st of February till the 1st of March. In this way they think that the comitia may be put off till the month of March. But on these days of the comitia the tribunes of the people declare that they will bring on the question about Gabinius. I collect all reports, to have some news to send to you ; but, as you see, matter itself fails me.
4. I return, therefore, to Callisthenes^ and Philistus,^ in whose works I see you are occupied. Callisthenes indeed is relating a common and well-known set of transactions, in a style such as that in which several of the Greeks express themselves. But the Sicilian is an admirable writer, impres- sive, acute, concise ; almost a little Thucydides, but which of his books you have, (for there are two volumes of them,) or whether you have them both, I know not. He pleases me most in his account of Dionysius. For Dionysius was a great intriguer, and made himself very familiar with Philistus. But as to what you add in your letter, are you thinking of undertaking a history? In my judgment, you may do so. And since you furnish couriers, you shall have at the Luper- calia an account of what is done to-day. Amuse yourself with my Cicero as well as you can.
LETTER XIV. Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1, I HAVE as yet received but two letters from you: one of them written just after I had left you; the other dated from Ariminum. The additional ones, which you say that you sent, I never received. I have been amusing myself in the neighbourhood of Cumse and Pompeii, pleasantly enough, except that I was without your company; and I intended to stay in those parts till the 1st of June. I was writing those political treatises which I had mentioned to you; a very large and laborious work; but still, if the result is to my satisfaction, labour will have been well em- ployed; if not, I will throw it mto the sea, which I have
' Callisthenes was an Olynthian, and had written a life of Alexander. * Philistus was a Sicilian, and wrote many books, and among theia an accoimt of Dionysius the elder.
60 CICERO's LETTERS
before my eyes while T am writing. I shall attempt some other things, too, since I cannot remain idle.
2. I will attend carefully to your injunctions, both as to conciliating some men, and avoiding to alienate others. But it will be my chief object to see your Cicero, and mine, I mean, every day; but I will examine as often as I can, what he is learning; and, unless he is above it, I will even offer myself as his teacher; an employment in which I hava obtained some practice in my leisure during these few days, by training my own Cicero the younger.
3. You, (as you write me word you will, and as I should be quite certain of your doing most carefully, even if you did not write;) you, I say, will take care to digest my instructions ; follow them up, and fulfil them. When I come to Rome I will never let one single courier of Caesar's go without giving him a letter for you ; but while I have been here (you will excuse my silence), there has been no one to whom I could give one before this Marcus Orfius, a Roman knight, attached to me, both as being exceedingly intimate with me, and as being from the municipality of Atella, which you know is faithful to me. I therefore recommend him to you in an extraordinary degree, as being a man of a high consideration at home, and of great influence away from home. Take cai'e to bind him to yourself by your libe- rality. He is a military tribune in our army. You will find him a man of a very grateful disposition, and eager to be of service to you. I press upon you earnestly to be very civil to Trebatius. Farewell.
LETTER XV. a.
Marcus Cicero to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. Ox the 2d of June, the day on which I arrived at Rome, I received your letter dated from Placentia ; and then, the next day, I received a second dated at Blandeus,^ with a letter from Csesar, full of expressions of respect, zeal to serve me, and courtesy. These are things of great, or rather of the very greatest consequence ; for they contribute very ' There ia some error in the text here
TO HIS BROTHER QUIXTUS, 61
greatly to our reputation and high dignity. But, believe me, whom you know well, that what I value most in all these matters I have already secured; namely, that, in the first place, I see you contributing so much to our common dig- nity; secondly, the extraordinary liking of Julius Csesar for me, a man whom I prefer to all the honours which he wishes me to expect from him. His letter was dated at the same time with your own ; the beginning of it is, how acceptable your arrival was to him, and his recollection of our old friendship ; then assuring me that he would take care that in the midst of my sorrow and regret for your absence, while you are away, I should be pleased, above all, that you wer9 with him. The letter delighted me amazingly.
2. You, therefore, act in a most brotherly spirit when you exhort me, though in truth I am running of my own accord the same way, to devote all my energies to his single service; and perhaps by my eager zeal I shall do what often happens to travellers when they are in haste, that if by chance they have got up later than they intended, they still, by making haste, arrive where they wish earlier than they would have done if they had lain awake a great part of the night ; aud so now I, since I have been asleep a long time as to paying attention to that man, though you in truth have often tried to wake me, shall now by my speed make amends for my slowness, both on horseback, and (since you write me word that my poem is approved by him) in the coach and four of poetry; only give me Britain to paint with your colours and my pencil. But of what am I thinking 1 what spare time presents itself to me, particularly while I remain at Rome, as he begs me to do? However, I will see. For perhaps, as is often the case, my affection for you will over- come every difiiculty. He thanks me with a good deal of humour, and with great civility too, fcr having sent him Trebatius; for he says that in all that number of persons who were with him, there was not one who could draw a bail-bond. I asked him for the tribuneship for Marcus Curtius, (for Domitius would have thought that he was being turned into ridicule if he had been solicited by me, since it IS a daily saying of his, that he cannot make even a tribune of the soldiers ; aud even in the senate he rallied Appius his colleague, saying that he had gone to Csesar, with the view of
62 CICERO 8 LETTERS
getting some tribuneship or other,) but only for the year after next. And that was what Curtius wished too.
3. Know that, as you think it behoves you to be, in regard to public affairs and our private enmities, so I myself both am, and shall be, of a very gentle and moderate demeanour.
4. Affairs at Rome were in this state. There was some expectation of the comitia, but a doubtful one: there was some suspicion of a dictatorship, but not even that was certain. There is a perfect cessation of all business in the courts of law, but more as if the state was growing indolent from age than from real tranquillity. Our own opinion deli- vered in the senate was of such a kind that others agreed with it more than we did ourselves.
Such are the evils of disastrous war.^
LETTER XV. b. Marcus Cicero to his hrother Quintus, greeting.
1. What is to be done shall be done with a pen, and the finest ink, and glazed paper : for you say that you have hardly been able to read my last letters, for which, however, my brother, there were none of the reasons which you fancy; for I was neither busy, nor had I been worried or angry with any one; but I always make it a practice, whatever pen comes iii-st to hand, to use it as if it were a good one.
2. But listen now, my most excellent and kind brother, while I answer the things which you wrote in this same short letter of yours in a very business-like manner. As to what you ask, that I should write to you without concealing any- thing, or dissembling anything, or saying anything merely for the sake of pleasing you, but frankly and as a brother, that is, whether you should hasten, as we said, or, if there should be sufficient reason, delay, for the purpose of setting yourself clear, — if, my dear Quintus, it were any unimportant matter on which you were asking me my wishes, still after having left it to yourself to do what you thought best, I should point out what I wished myself But in the present
* ToiavS" 6 rXrinav ir6\(fios e^epyd^ejai. A line from the Supplicee of Euripides.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 6S
state of affairs, you ask me plainly what sort of year I expect the ensuing one to be ; certainly one of tranquillity for me, or at least one of very great security, as the state of my own house, and my reception in the forum, and the way in which I am greeted at the theatre, indicate every day. And^ » * * no man is unwilling to see * * * that I am in favour with both Csesar and Pompey — these things give me confidence. If any rage from that senseless man^ breaks out, everything is prepared for putting him down.
3. These are my real sentiments and opinions, and I write them to you in all plainness. And I beg of you not to fee a doubt, speaking not like a flatterer, but as a brother; so that, for the sake of your enjoying the pleasant condition in which I find myself, I should wish you to come at the time which you have mentioned. But still I should prefer beyond, that the events which you expect * * * * And I attach great consequence to your abundance, and to the expectations of your obligations being acquitted. Of this you may be assured, that if we succeed, nothing can be more fortunate than we shall be when freed from all annoyance. There is not much which is wanting to make us happy after our own fashion; and that is very easy to be procured, provided I keep my health.
4. An amazing degree of corruption prevails again; never was it so great. In the middle of July, interest was double what it had been, from the coalition into which Memmius entered with Domitius for the sake of beating Scaurus. Messala has a bad chance ; ^ I do not exaggerate, when I say
^ There is something lost here, which makes this sentence unintel- ligible ; and it is probable that there is a little corruption in the former part of the letter, and a few sentences later.
2 Clodius.
^ The candidates for the consulship in the next year, 701 a.u.c, were Memmius, Domitius Calvinus, JEmilius Scaurus, and Valerius Messala. Memmius and Domitius had won over the existing consuls by a promise of procuring them whatever provinces they chose ; but at last Pompey persuaded Memmius to break with Domitius, and join the triumvirs. The senate instituted an inquiry. The year 700 passed without any election of consuls for the ensuing year. Interest rose to 8 per cent, a-month ; and the year 701 opened with an interregnum, and it was not till half the year had elapsed, that Cnseus Domitiua Calvinus, and Messala, were elected '/onsuls for the remainder of the year.
64 ClCERO's LETTERS
that the prerogative century will get above eighty thousand pounds for its vote. The business is extremely unpopular ; the candidates for the tribuneship have come to an agree- ment, that every one of them shall place above four tti Dusaud pounds a-piece in Cato's hands, as a pledge to conduct their canvass as he approves; and those who forfeit their pledge are to forfeit the money. And if the comitia for their election is really unbribed, as is expected, Cato alone will have had more influence than all the laws and all the judges.
LETTER XVI.
Marcus Cicero to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. When you have received a letter from me written in the hand of my secretary, you must consider that I had not even a little leisure ; when it is written in my own hand, that I had a little. For you must understand, that I was never more distracted by causes and trials, and that too at a most unhealthy time of the year, and when the heat is greatest. But this, since that is your advice, must be borne ; nor must I give cause for appearing to have been wanting, either to your hopes or opinion; especially when, although that is somewhat more difficult, I am still likely to gain great influence and great dignity from these exertions; therefore, as you wish, I take great pains to offend no one, and even to be loved by those very men who are sorry to see me so united with Csesar, and also to be earnestly caressed and loved by all impartial persons, and even by those who are inclined to favour the other side.
2. While there was a most violent discussion in the senate for many days on the subject of corruption, because the con- sular candidates had gone such lengths that it could not be endured any longer, I was not present in the senate. I de- termined not to come forward to offer any remedy for the evils of the commonwealth without strong protection.
3. The day that I wrote this, Drusus had been acquitted of prevarication^ by the tribunes of the treasury, by foui
^ Prevarication was the betrayal of his client's cause by an advocat* wao aad undertaken it.
TO HIS BKOTH73B ijUINTUS. 65
votes in all, after the senators and knights had condemned him. The same day, in the afternoon, I appeared in court to defend Vatinius; that was not a difficult task. The comitia are postponed till the month of September. The trial of Scaunis will be brought on immediately, and we shall not be wanting in our exertions on his behalf. I by no means approved of the Messmates of Sophocles, although I see that the piece was very neatly acted by you.
4. Now I come to that, which perhaps ought to have made the first part of my letter. 0 how delightful to me are your letters from Britain. I was afraid of the ocean : I was afraid of the shore of the island. I do not indeed despise the obstacles which may yet remain, but they present more ground for hope than for fear, and I am anxious more because of the eagerness of my expectation than from any alarm. And I see that you have an admirable subject for writing about. What a situation you have to describe, what natural cha- racteristics of circumstances and places, what customs of the people, what nations and battles, and even what a commander ! I will with all my heart help you, as you ask, in whatever you wish ; and will send you the verses for which you ask, like an owl to Athens.
5. But ah ! I see that I am kept in the dark by you ; for how, my dear brother, did Caesar express himself about my verses 1 for he wrote me word before, that he had read my first book, and praised the beginning so much that he says he has not read anything better even in Greek. What came aftei-, he thought, was in some places a little paOvfjim-epa (more careless), this is the very word that he uses. Tell me th(> truth, is it the matter, or the style that does not please him 1 There is no reason why you should fear to tell me the truth, for I shall not be an atom the less satisfied with myseit Write to me on this subject with frankness, and, as jou always do, with brotherly aifection.
66 CICERO S LFTTERS.
BOOK III.
LETTER I. Marcui Cicero to his brother Quinttis, greeting.
1. 1. After the great heat, (for I do not recollect ever having felt greater,) I refreshed myself in the neighbourhood of Arpinum, with the extreme agreeableness of the river, during the days of the games,^ having recommended the men of my tribe to Philotimus. I was at Arcanum on the 10th of September: there I found Messidius and Philoxenus, and the water which they had contracted to bring near the villa flowing pleasantly enough, especially considering the great general drought; and they said that they would collect it in somewhat larger quantities. Everything was going on well with Herus.2 At your Manlian farm I found Diphilus slower than Diphilus ; yet nothing remained for him to do, except the bath-rooms, the colonnade to walk under, and the aviary. The villa pleased me exceedingly, because the paved portico had an appearance of great dignity, which was now for the fii'st time visible to me, since it is completely uncovered, and the columns are polished. Everything now depends on the ceiling being, elegant, which shall be an object of attention to me. The pavements appeared to me to be done correctly; some of the rooms I did not quite like, and ordered them to be altered..
2. Where they say that you have written orders for a small hall to be made in the colonnade, the place pleased me better as it is ; for there did not seem to be room enough even for a little hall, nor is one usually made, except in houses in which there is a larger hall; nor could it have any bed- chambers attached to it, or apartments of that kind. But now, even from the mere beauty of the vaulted roof, it will get the character of an excellent summer retreat.^ However,
> The Roman games took place in September. * The bailiff.
3 Manutius thinks this quite corrupt and unintelligiKe.
TO HTS BROTHER QUINTUS. 67
if you are of a different opinion, write again at the first opportunity. In the bath-rooms I have moved forward the stoves into the other corner of the dressing-room ; because they were before placed in such a manner, that their chimney, from which the heat comes, was situated imder the bed- chambers. But I greatly approved of having a tolerably large bed-chamber and a lofty winter-room, because they were of a good size, and admirably situated on one side of the covered walk, — on that side, I mean, which is next to the bath-rooms. Dipliilus had not put the pillars upright, nor opposite to one another; he will accordingly pull them down again. Some day or other he will learn how to use a perpen- dicular and a line. Altogether, I hope that Diphilus's work will be finished in a few months, for Csesius, who was with me on that occasion, gives most diligent attention to it.
II. 3. From that place we went straight along the Vitu- larian road to your Fufidian farm, which, according to the last communication, I had bought of Fufidius at Arpinum, for a little more than eight thousand pounds. I never saw a place more shady in the summer, with water flowing through the land in many places, and in great abundance. What would you have ? Csesius thought that you would easily be able to irrigate fifty acres of meadow-land. This, at all events, which I understand better, I can affirm positively, that you will have a villa of exceeding pleasantness, with a fish-pond, and springs of water besides, and a palaestra, and a green wood. 1 hear that you wish to retain this farm near Bovillse ; what you may choose to do about it, you will decide yourself Calvus said that though the water was excepted, and the light over that water reserved, and though a service^ lay upon the farm, still we could keep up the piice if we chose to sell it. I had Messidius with me : he said that he had agreed with you at three sestertii"^ a foot ; and observed that he himself 'had measured the distance, by steps, making fourteen hundred paces. To me it appeared more ; but I will under- take to say, that the money could nowhere be more advan- tageously spent. I had sent for Chile from Venafrum ; but
Service, servitus, on a piece of land, when there was a right of way- through it, of carrying water through it, of taking water from it, feeding cattle on it, &c.
' The seatertvua was equal to 1 penny 8} farthings. f2
68 CICERO's LETTERa
that very day a subterraneous passage atVenafrum had crushed four of his fellow-workmen and apprentices.
4. On the 13th of September I was at Laterium. I saw the road, which pleased me so much, that I thought it waa a public work, with the exception of a hundred and fifty paces ; for I measured it from the little bridge, which is close to the temple of Farina on the side of Satricum. At that spot, dust has been thrown in and not gravel ; but that shall be altered ; and that part of the road is very steep ; but I waa told that it could not have been carried in any other direction, especially as you did not wish to have it go through the farm of Locusta, or through that of Varro. Varro had almost com- pleted the roads through his estate before. Locusta had not touched his ; but I shall call upon him at Rome, and, as I expect, shall move him ; and at the same time I will ask Marcus Taurus, who is now at Rome, and who, I hear, gave you a promise on the subject, about carrying the water through his farm.
5. I conceived a good opinion of Nicephorus, your bailifl^ and I asked him, whether you had given him any charge about that little building at Laterium of which you spoke to me. And then he told me, in reply, that he himself had contracted for that work for about a hundred and thirty pounds; but that afterwards you had added a good deal to the work to be done, but nothing to the money to be paid for it ; and that, therefore, he had given up the contract. I am in truth exceedingly well-pleased that you should add those things as you determined ; although the villa which at present exists, seems to be something like philosophy re- proving the insanity visible in other villas : however, that addition will give great pleasure.
I praised, too, your ornamental gardener ; he clothes every- thing so with ivy, not only the foundations of the villa, but the spaces between the pillars of the covered walk. So that those figures in the Greek dresses appear to be cutting the trees into shape, and to be selling the ivy. As for the dressing- room, nothing can be more cool and mossy.
6. You have now heard nearly all that I have to say about country affairs. He and Philotimus and Cincius are press- ing forward the polishing of your town-house ; but I myself also freq^uently go to look at it, as is easy to be done ; and I
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 69
therefore hope you will foel relieved from that cause of •nxiety.
III. 7. As to what you ai-e always asking me about Cicero, I pardon you, indeed ; but I also wish you to pardon me. For I will not allow you to love him more than I do myself; and I wish that he had been with me during those days in the country near Arpinum, as he himself had desired, and I no less. As to Pomponia, if it seems good to you, I wish you would send an order, that when we go anywhere she is to go with us, and take the boy. I shall raise a perfect uproar if I can have him with me without his having any- thing to do ; for at Rome he has no breathing room. You know that I promised you that before gratuitously : what do you think now that so great a bribe is offered me from you?
8. I now come to your letters ; of which I received several while I was in the neighbourhood of Arpinum ; for three were delivered to me on one day, and indeed, as they seemed, all written by you at one time. One was at great length, in which the fii-st statement was, that an earlier day was men- tioned in your letter than in that of Ceasar. Oppius some- times does that from necessity ; because, after he has arranged to send off the couriers, and has received a letter from us, he is hindered by some new business ; and of necessity sends it off Ia*^^er than he had intended to do ; nor do we, when the letter is once dated, care about the date being altered.
9. You mention Caesar's exceeding regard for us : you will "do your best to cherish this ; we too will increase it by all the means in our power. With regard to Pompey, I do with all ■diligence, and will continue to do, what you advise. That my permission for you to remain longer is acceptable to you, though to my own great sorrow and regret, I am yet partly glad. What your object is in sending for horsebreakers and others I have no notion ; there is not one of that sort of people who will not expect a present from you equal to a suburban farm. And as for your mixing up my friend Trebatius with that fellow, for that you have no foundation. I sent him to Csesar, because he had previously satisfied me ; if he does not please him equally, I am not bound to anything, and I acquit and release you also of any charge in respect of him. With regard to your statement, that you are every day more and more esteemed by Csesar, I am rejoiced beyond all expression.
^^■^■i"iir»"^^^^^p^»^«-".^'---l" ..-^
70 CICEROS LETTERS
I am also very much attached to Balbus, who is, as you writer an active assistant in that business ; I am very glad too that my friend Trebonius is beloved by you, and you by him.
10. As to what you write about the tribuneship, I asked it for Curtius by name ; and Csesar wrote me back word that it was secured for Curtius, also mentioning him by name ; and he reproached me for my shamefaced ness in asking. If I ever ask for any one again, (as I told Oppius too, that he might write to him,) I shall easily allow a refusal to be given me, since those who are troublesome to me^ do not easily allow refusals to be given them from me. I love Curtius, (as I told the man himself,) on account not only of your asking, but of your testimony in his favoiu*, — because from your letters I easily perceived his zeal for our safety.
With respect to the affairs of Britain, I learned from your letters that there was no reason either why we should fear, or why we should rejoice. With respect to public affairs, on which you wish Tiro to write to you, I was already writing to you rather carelessly myself ; because I knew that everything, as well of the smallest as of the greatest importance, was sent to Caesar.
IV. 11. I have now completed my answer to your longest letter: hear now as to your little one; in which the first remark is, about Clodius's letter to Csesar, in which affair I approve of Caesar's conduct, in not granting you leave, though you asked it in the most affectionate manner, to write a single word of answer to that Fury. The next observation is about the speech of Marius Calventius. I marvel at your saying that you think I should write a reply to it, especially as no one is likely to read it if I write nothing in reply, while all the children will learn my answer to him by heart as a lesson.
I have begun those books of mine which you are looking for, but am unable to finish them at the present time. I have completed the required speeches for Scaurus and for Plancius. The poem to Csesar, which I had composed, I have destroyed.^ ^Vhat you ask, I will write for you, since the springs them- selves are now thirsty, if I have any room.
^ Noble considers that the text is here incorrect or defective.
2 Incidi. .'imesti interprets this verb by conscindere ; and Schillet agrees with him in giving it the sense of "cutting to pieces," ol ** annulling."
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS 71
12. I now come to the third letter. As to what you say^ that Balbus is soon coming to Rome with a number of com- panions, and that he will be constantly with me till the middle of May; that will be very pleasant and delightful to me. As to the exhortations which you give me, in the same letter, as oftentimes before, to ambition and to diligence, I will observe them; but when am I to enjoy life ?
13. A fourth letter was delivered to me on the 13th of September, which you had dated from Britain on the 10th of August. In it there was no news, except about the Erigona ; which if I receive from Oppius, I will write you word what I think of it; and I have no doubt that it will give me pleasure. And (a matter which I have passed over) with respect to the person who, you say, wrote to Csesar about the applause which Milo received, I readily allow Csesar to imagine that the applause was very great ; and, in fact, so it was ; and yet the applause which is given to him appears in some degree to be given to us.
14. A very old letter from you has also been brought me, but brought rather late, in which you give me instructions about the temple of Tellus, and the portico of Catulus. Both works are going on with all speed ; at the temple of Tellus, in- deed, I have also placed your statue. Also, as to the wishes that you express about the gardens, I never was very desirous of such things ; and ray house now makes up to me for the want of the luxury of a garden.
When I came to Rome, on the 19th of September, T found the roof of your house completed, which, above the chambers, you had decided should not have any great number of gables; but it slopes down in anything but a neat manner to the roof of the colonnade below. While I have been absent, my Cicero has not ceased from his attendance on the rhetorician : you have no reason to be anxious about his attainments, since you know his natural abilities; and his studious disposition I see myself. All his other interests I look to, as if I thought that I were going surety for them.
V. 15. As yet, three parties are prosecuting Gabinius :
Lucius Lentulus, the son of the flamen, who has already lodged
an accusation of treason' against him; Tiberius Nero, with his
well-disposed backers; and Caius Memmius, the tribune of
* MoQestaa. See nolo, p. 74.
72 Cicero's letters
the people, with Lucius Capito. He arrived in the city on the 20th of September ; no entrance was ever more mean or more solitary. But I do not dare to place any confidence in these trials. Because Cato was indisposed, he has not as yet been prosecuted for peculation. Pompey labours very hard to reconcile me to him ; but he has not succeeded as yet, and, if I retain any portion of my liberty, he shall not succeed. I am extremely anxious for a letter from you.
1 6. As to what you write me word that you have heard, namely, that I interfered in the coalition of the candidates for the consulship, it is not true ; for agreements were made iu that coalition of such a character (which Memmius subse- quently exposed) that no respectable person ought to have been concerned in them : and, besides, it was not a proceed- ing for me, to have anything to do with a coalition from which Messala was excluded, — a man with whom I agree perfectly in all points ; and, in my opinion, also with Memmius. I have already done many things for Domitius, which he wished, and which he requested of me ; and I have laid Scaurus under great obligations to me by defending him. As yet it has been uncertain, both when the comitia would take place, and who were to be the new consuls.
17. When I was just folding up this letter, a courier arrived from you on the 21st of September, having made the iourney in twenty days. 0 how anxious I am ! How much I have grieved over that most kind letter from Caesar; but the more kind it was, the greater grief did that misfortune of his cause me.^ But I come to your own letter. In the first place, I approve above all things of your intention of remaining, especially since, as you write me word, you have consulted Caesar on the subject. I wonder that Oppius should have said anything to Publius, for I did not like the man.
18. As to what you write in your enclosure, that I should be appointed one of Pompey 's lieutenants in the middle of September, I have not heard it; and I have written to CsBsar, that Vibullius brought directions from CsBsar about my stay to Pompey, but not to Oppius. With what object 1 Although I detained Oppius, becavise the right of speaking
^ It seems probable that this refers to a storm mentioned in tha fourth book of his account of the Gallic war, in which he lost a great number of ships. His daughter Julia, too, died nearly about this time.
TO mS BROTHER QUINTU8. 73
fii-st to Pompey belonged to Vibullius ; for Ccesar had talked the matter over iu an interview with him ; to Oppius he had written. However, I can have no second thoughts in Caesar's affairs. He is next to you and to our children in my heart ; so near, indeed, that he is almost equal to them. I seem to myself to feel thus from judgment; for indeed I ought; but still I am warmed with love for him.
VI. 19. When I had written these last lines, which are in my own hand, your Cicero came in to us to supper, as Pom- ponia was supping out. He gave me your letter to read, which he had received a short time before; a letter written in the Aristophanic spirit, being in truth both pleasant and sensible ; and I was greatly pleased with it. He also gave me that other letter of yours, in which you enjoin him to attach himself as much to me as to his tutor. How those letters delighted himl how they gratified me! Nothing can be more engaging than that boy, — no one can be more attached to me. These lines I dictated to Tiro while at supper, that you may not be surprised at their being in a different hand.
20. Your letters were very acceptable also to Annalis, as they showed that you were very anxious about him, and, at the same time, assisted him with most serious advice. Publiiis Servilius the father, from the letters which he saya have been sent him from Caesar, intimates that you have done what was very acceptable to him, in having spoken with great courtesy and great earnestness of his attachment to Caesar.
21. When I had returned to Rome from the neighbour- hood of Arpiuum, I was told that a horsebreaker had set out to go to you. I cannot say that I was astonished at his having acted so like a barbarian as to go without any letter from me to you; 1 merely say that it was vexatious to me, — for I had been thinking of it for a long time, — in consequence of what you wrote to me, that if there should be anything which I should wish to be conveyed to you with extra- ordinary care, I was to give it to him ; because, in truth, in these letters which I usually send to you, I generally write nothing which would cause me any annoyance if it fell into other hands. I used to keep myself for Minucius. and Salvius, and Labeo. Labeo will either go at a late period, of
74 Cicero's letters
will remain here. The horsebreaker did not even ask if 1 wished to send anything.
22. Titus Pinarius sends very kindly-expressed letters about you to me ; saying that he is beyond all measure delighted ■with your letters, conversation, and, besides, with your sup- pers. Tliat man has always pleased me, and his brother is a great deal with me. Do you, therefore, as you have begun to do, cherish that young man.
VII. 23. As I have had this letter under my hands several days, owing to the delay of the couriers, many different things have consequently been thrown into it, one thing at one time, and another at another ; as for instance this : Titus Anicius has already often said to me, that he should not hesitate to purchase a suburban villa for you, if he could meet with one. In regard to this remark of his, I cannot but wonder at two things : that though you write to him about buying you a suburban villa, you not only do not write to me about it, but even write to quite the contraiy effect; and also, that when you are writing to him, you recollect nothing about him, nothing about those letters of his which you showed me when you were at Tusculum, and nothing about the precepts of Epicharmus, " Take notice how he treats any one else." You forget, in short, the man's whole countenance, and language, and disposition; and, as I conjecture, just as if — ^ but to these things you must look yourself
24. Take care that I may know what you really wish about this suburban villa, and take care at the same time that he does not cause any trouble. What more have I to say? What? Oh, this : Gabinius, on the 28th of September, entered the city by night; and to-day, at the eighth hour, when, according to the edict of Cains Alfius, he ought to have appeared to the accusation of majesty ,2 he was almost over- whelmed by the concourse and by the detestation of the whole people. Nothing ever was more contemptible than his ap- pearance. Piso, however, comes very near to him; I am therefore thinking of introducing a marvellous episode in the
^ Orellius saya that this is not an aposiopesis, hut that some Greek word or phrase is lost.
^ Majesty was nearly equivalent to treason. It was a general term for any offence committed against the Roman people, or ita Mcority.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTU8. 75
second of my books : Apollo in the council of the gods pre- dicting wliat sort of return that of the two generals will be, of whom one has lost his army, and the other has sold it.
25. Caesar wrote me a letter from Britain on the 1st of September, which I received on the 28th, giving a satis- factory account of the affairs of Britain; in it, that I may not be surprised at receiving no letter from you, he says that he had been without your company, as he had gone to the coast. I have not sent him any answer to that letter, noi even to congratulate him, because of his private mourning. Again and again, my dear brother, I beg you to take care of your health.
LETTER II.
Marcus Cicero to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. On the 10th of October, Salvius went by sea to Ostia, late in the evening, with the things which you wished to have sent to you from home. On the same day, Memmius had given Gabinius a warming before the people with so lucid au accusation, that Oalidius was unable to utter a single word on his behalf. But the day after, which was coming on as I waa writing this before dawn, a great argument was to be held at Cato's between Memmius and Tiberius Nero, and Caius Antonius and Lucius Antonius, the sons of Marcus, as to wha should manage the prosecution against Gabinius. We thought that it would be allotted to Memmius, although there waa an extraordinary struggle on the part of Nero. What would you have] The matter is well pressed forward, did not our friend Pompey, in spite of both gods and men, upset the business.
2, Understand now the boldness of the man, and that some- thing still amuses us in so distressed a condition of public- affairs. After Gabinius, wherever he went, had said that he was demanding a triumph, and after this good general had suddenly entered the city by night, (as if, evidently, it had been the city of an enemy,) he did not venture to present himself before the senate. In the meantime, on the tenth day after his arrival, on which he ought to have given in his report of the numbers of the enemies and of our troops, he sneakei
76 OICBRO'S LRTTEKS
into the senate-house with a very small following. When he •was about to depart, he was detained by the consuls. The formers of the revenues were introduced. The man, being attacked on all sides, and being wounded by me most of all, could bear it no longer, and with a trembling voice called me an exUe. On this, (0 ye gods ! nothing more honourable «ver happened to me,) the whole senate to a man rose in an uproar against him, so that they came close to him ; while the farmers of the revenue started up with a similar noise and rush. What more do you ask? All of them behaved as if you yourself had been there. Nothing can be more complimentary than the language of men out-of-doors. I, however, restrain myself from accusing him, with difficulty indeed, but I do restrain myself, not only because I do not wish to oppose Pompey, (the business which presses me about Milo is quite enough,) but because ^fie have no judges whom we can trust. I dread a failure. I may take also into con- gideration the malevolence of men, and I am afraid that if I were to accuse him, something might happen to him; nor do I despair that the matter may be accomplished without me, though in some degree by my means.
3. All who are candidates for the consulship are impeached on the charge of bribery, Domitius by Memmius, Memmiua by Quiutus Curtius, a good and accomplished young man; Messala by Quintus Pompey, Scaurus by Triarius. It is a great measure in agitation, because the ruin either of tha men, or of the laws, is threatened. Some efforts are made; that no trials may take place. The affair appears to point to an interregnum. The consuls wish to hold the comitia; tha impeached parties are against it, and Memmius above all, •because on the arrival of Caesar he hopes to become consul. But he has an extraordinarily bad chance. Domitius and Messala appeared sure of success ; Scaurus had lost heart. Appius asserts, that if it were not for a lex curiata, he shoull succeed our friend Lentulus, who on that day showed won- derful vigour against Gabiuius, (a thing which I had almost? forgotten to mention;) he accused him of treason; names 2? witnesses were given in ; while Gabinivis did not say a wori. You now know the affairs of the forum. At home things go on well, and the house itself is proceeding with great rapidity onder the hands of the contractors.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTTJS, 77
LETTER III. Marcus Cicero to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1, The hand of my secretary may be a sign to you how busy I am. Be assured that there does not a day pass in "which I do not speak on behalf of some accused person. Thus, whatever I compose or meditate, I generally throw into the time of my walk. In this state is my public business : our domestic afiairs go on as I wish. The boys are well; they learn with great diligence ; they are taught with great pains; they love us, and love one another. The polishing of both our houses is going on; while your rural matters at Arcanum and Laterium are advancing to completion.* Besides, in one of my letters, I omitted nothing to give you a clear account about the water, and the road.
But this subject of anxiety disturbs and annoys me, that for the space of now more than fifty days, not only no letter has come from you, none from Cassar, none from that country, but not even a single report ; and that sea, and that country, keep me now in a state of anxiety. Nor do I cease (as is the case with persons in love) to imagine the things which I least wish. I do not therefore now ask you to write to me about yourself and about affairs in that quarter, (for I know that you never omit to do so when you have an oppor- tunity,) but I wish you to know, that I scarcely ever longed for anything so much, as, when 1 wrote this, I did for a letter from you.
2, Hear now what is going on in the republic. Day after day appointed for the comitia is constantly cancelled by notices of ill omens, to the great joy of the well-affected citizens, in such unpopularity are the consuls on account of the suspicion of their having bargained for bribes from the candidates. There are four candidates for the consulship; all are prosecuted ; the causes are difl&cult ones ; but still we will exert ourselves that Messala may come off" safe ; a result which is even connected with the safety of the rest. Publius Sylla has impeached Gabinius of bribery, his stepson Mem- mius supporting the accusation, as well as his brother Cajcilius,
* A corrupt passage, says Orellins. There are various readings, bui none satisfactory.
78 CICERO 8 LETTERS
and his son Sylla, Lucius Torquatus made objections, but failed in his purpose, to the great joy of all men.
3. Do you ask, what is to become of Gabinius? We shall know in three days about the impeachment for treason ; on which charge he is weighed down by the detestation of all classes; and is especially damaged by the evidence. He has very cool accusers; the bench is of a varied character; the chief judge, Alfius, is a man of high and resolute temper. Pompey is earnest in canvassing the judges; how it will end I know not ; but I see no room for him in the city. I have a moderate wish for his downfal, but the faintest possible as to the result of the whole proceedings.
4. You have now an account of almost everything. I will add this one particular : your Cicero and mine is now apply- ing himself with great diligence to the instructions of Pajonius, a rhetorician, a man, in my opinion, well accomplished, and of excellent character; but you know well enough that my own style of education is a little more learned and philo- sophical. Though, therefore, I do not wish Cicero's progress, and that course of instruction, to be impeded; and the boy himself seems to be greatly charmed and delighted with the exercise in declamation ; (and as I was myself also practised in it, I would allow him to go on in my steps, for I feel sure that he will an-ive at the same end,) but still, if I take him anywhere into the country with me, I shall lead him into ray own method and practice. For a great reward is offered me from you, which certainly I shall not fail to gain through my own fault. In what parts you are going to winter, and with what expectations, I should wish you to write me word with all possible minuteness. FarewelL
LETTER IV.
Marcus Ciosro to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. Gabinius has been acquitted. Altogether, nothing could be more childish than Lentulus, his accuser, and his fellow- prosecutors, nothing more corrupt than the bench ; but still, if the exertion and entreaties of Pompey had not been extra- ordinary, and if the repoil of a coming dictatorship had nol
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTXJS. 79
been full of alarm, he would not have made any reply even to Lentulus; and yet with him for his accuser, and with that bench for his judges, he had thirty-two votes against him, seventy persons voting. Certainly, this trial is of so severe a character, that he seems likely to be convicted on the other accusations, and especially on that of peculation ; but you see that there is really no republic at all, no senate, no judges, no dignity in any one of us.
Why should I say more about the judges 1 Two men of prae- torian rank were on the bench ; Domitius Calvinus; he voted openly for his acquittal, so that all might see it; and Cato;^ he, after the votes had been counted, withdrew himself from the circle, and was the first to announce the result to Pompey.
2. Some say, and Sallust among them, that I ought to have been the accuser. Should I trust myself to such judges? What would have been thought of me if he had escaped while I had pleaded against him 1 But other considerations influenced me. Pompey would have thought that he had a dispute with me, not about the safety of Gabinius, but his own dignity. He would have entered the city. The matter would have come to a regular quarrel ; I should have seemed like Pacideianus when matched with ^seminus the Samnite; perhaps he would have bitten off my ear. He would at least have been reconciled to Clodius. With my own conduct certainly, I am thoroughly satisfied, particularly if you do not disapprove of it. He, after he had been honoured by me with eminent exertions on my part, and though I owed Lim nothing, and he owed everything to me, was still unable t:; bear my differing in opinion with him about the affairs of the commonwealth, (I will not use a harsher expression ;) anti even at the period when he was less powerful, he showed hoi? much he could do against me when I was at the height 0\ my reputation. Now, when I myself am not even anxious t: acquire any great influence, when the republic itself has cer tainly no power at all, and when he has power over everything could I possibly contend with him 1 For so I must hav; done. I do not believe that you think that I ought to hav undertaken such a task.
3. [You should,] Sallust still argues, [have done] cne of
• What Cato, is uncertain ; but it was not, as Paul Manutius observes, the Cato afterwards called Uticensia.
80 CICKKO'S LETTERS
two things ; [if you did not accuse him,] you should hava defended him, and have granted that to the entreaty of Pompey : for indeed he did entreat very earnestly. A plea- Bant friend certainly Sallust is, who thinks that I was bound either to incur a most dangerous enmity or everlasting infamy. But I myself am pleased with this middle course ; and it is gratifying to me, that after I had with great serious- ness given my evidence in accordance with good faith and religion, the defendant said, that if he could possibly have been in the city, he would have satisfied me;^ nor did he put a single question to me.
4. With respect to the verses which you wish me to writs out for you, the task cannot be undertaken by me, a task ■which requires not only time, but also a mind free from all care. But enthusiasm is also wanting, for I am not altogether "without anxiety as to the coming year, though I am without apprehension. And at the same time (I assure you that I speak without the slightest irony) I assign a higher place in that kind of writing to you than to myself
5. As to completing your Greek library, changing some books, and procuring some Latin ones, I wish indeed that those matters may be done, especially as they have reference to my accommodation. But I myself have no person by whose agency I can get such things done for me; for the books which have attractions for me are not for sale, and cannot be completed except by a man who is both skilful and diligent : however, I will give Chrysippus a commission, and I will speak with Tyrannio. I will inquire too, what Scipio has done about the money. Whatever seems proper, I will attend to it. As to Ascanio, you shall do whatever you please ; I will interpose no obstacle on my own accoiint. I commend you for not being in a hurry about your suburban villa, but I advise you to have one.
6. I have written this on the 24th of October, the day on which the games were beginning, as I was going to my Tusculan villa, and taking my Cicero with me for a game ^ of instruction, not of amusement ; on that account
* Would hava thanked me, for not having been his accuser, but having merely given testimony against him. — Paul Manutius.
* In Ivdum discendi, non litsionis. He plays on the word ludut^vrbid he had used just before; ludi committdtantitr.
iMOM
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 81
I did not go further than I wanted, because I desired to be present at the triumph of Pomptinius/ on the 3d of Novem- ber ; for there will be I know not what trifle of business ; since Cato and Servilius, the praetors, threaten that they will prevent it ; and I do not know what they can do, as he will both have Appius the consul with him, and the majority of the praetors, and the tribunes of the people. However, they 80 threaten, and especially Quintus Scaevola, who breathes nothing but war. My kindest and dearest brother, take care of your health.
LETTERS V. VI.
Marcus Cicero to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1, With respect to your question, what I have done about those books which, when I was in the neighbourhood of Cumae, I began to write, I have not been idle, nor am I idle ; but I have several times changed my whole plan and method of treating the subject : for after two books were completed, in which, during that nine days' festival which took place in the consulship of Tuditanus and Aquilius, a conversation is commenced by me between Africanus,^ a little before his death, and Laelius, Philus, Manilius, Quintus Tubero, and Fannius and Scaevola, the sons-in-law of Laelius ; and that conversation is extended over nine days, and through nine books, being on the best form of government, and the charac- ter of the best citizen, (the work in truth was put together with sufficient clearness, and the dignity of the speakers added some weight to the arguments ;) — when these books were read by me at my Tusculan villa in the hearing of Sallust, I was assured by him that opinions might be given on those sub- jects with much greater authority, if I myself were to speak on the republic, especially as I was not a Heraclides of Pon- tus, but a man of considar rank, and one who had myself been eoncemed in the most important affairs of state; but that what I attributed to characters of such antiquity, would appear to be fictitious; that as to the dialogue upon oratory
' Over the Allobroges.
* That is, the younger Africanus. The book alluded to is the treatiflt De Bepublicd., discovered in this century. a
82 CICERO's LETTERS
in th jse treatises of mine, I had doue well ncvt to tatter iu my own character what was said on the art of speaking, but to refer it to those men whom I had seen myself; but that Aristotle himself delivers in his own character what he writes about the commonwealth, and the most excellent kind of citizen.
2. He made an impression upon me, and so much the more because, [by the plan that I had adopted,] I was imable to touch upon the greatest disturbances in our commonwealth, inasmuch as they were posterior to the age of the speakers ; though at first I had made this very thing one of my objects, lest in touching on our own times, I should give ofience to any one. Now I shall both avoid that, and shall myself converse •with you ; but, nevertheless, if I come to Rome, I shall send you what I had originally written ; for I imagine that you "will be of opinion, that those books were not put aside by me without some feeling of disappointment.
3. I am exceedingly gratified by Caesar's great good-will, of ■which he has assured me in his letter : but I do not depend much on the promises which he holds out. I am neither eager for honours nor anxious for glory; and I am more desirous of the duration of his good- will, than the fulfilment of his promises. Nevertheless, I live amidst the same-ambi- tion and labour, as if I were expecting what I never solicit.
4. As to what you ask me about making verses, it is in- credible, my dear brother, how much I want time ; nor indeed am I sufficiently animated in thought to sing of those things which you wish. And do you, who have surpassed all men in that description of language and expression, ask me for suggestions on a subject which I cannot fully grasp even with the utmost exertion of thought 1 Nevertheless, I would do it as well as I could, but, (what by no means escapes your knowledge,) there is need, for composing a poem, of a certain cheerfulness of spirit, which the times altogether take away from me. I indeed free myself, as far as I can, from all anxiety on account of the commonwealth, and devote myself to literature; but still I will tell you what in truth I wished above all things concealed from you : I am made wretched, my dearest brother, I am made wretched by the consideration that there is no commonwealth; no courts of justice; and that this present time of life of mice, which ought to be in full
_J
dMfli
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTU8. 83
possession of the authority of a senator, is either harassed with the labour of pleading'in the forum, or endured witli the aid of private literary pursuits ; and that the idea which I cherished from my childh»Dd,
At all times to excel, and be above
My fellows,
is all come to nothing ; that of my enemies, some are not attacked by me, some are even defended; that not only my inclinations, but my very dislikes are not free ; and that Csesar is the only one of all men who is found to love me aa much as I desire ; or even, as some think, is the only one whp is inclined to love me.
Yet none of these vexations are of such a nature tha*" I cannot every day soothe myself with great consolation ; bul the greatest consolation of all will be if we shall be together again; but, at present, to those other disquietudes of mine, there is added even the most vehement longing to see you.
5. If, as Pansa thinks that I ought to have done, I had defended Gabinius, I should have been utterly ruined ; those who hate him, and they are all ranks of men, would have begun to hate me, on account of him whom they already hate. I bore myself, in my opinion, admirably, so as to do only so much as every one might see. And in the whole of my conduct, as you advise me, I devote myself greatly to the cultivation of ease and tranquillity.
6. In respect of the library, it is Tyrannio who is the idler. I will speak to Chrysippus ; but it is a troublesome task, and one that requires a very diligent man. I find this myself, who, with a great deal of trouble, meet with no suc- cess. But for Latin books, I know not whither to turn my- self; so faultily are they copied, and so dishonestly are they 3old ; however, I will not neglect to do what may be done. Crebrius, as I wrote you word before, is at Rome, and the men who take their oaths to anything, tell me that he is under ^eat obligations to you. I fancy that the money matters have oeen settled in my absence.
7. When you say that you have finished four tragedies in jxteen days, are you borrowing anything from any one else ] And are you aiming at credit/^ by copying out the Electra or the Troades? Do not be an idler; and do not fancy that
' Host texts have XP^°^ '• Oronovius and some others prefer kAAs. a2
84 aCERO S LETTERS.
the saying yvio6i a-eavrov is intended merely to diminiah arrogance, but that it also intimates that we should know our own powers. However, I would wish you to send me both them, and the Erigona. You have in this packet my last two letters.
LETTER VII. Marcm Cicero to his brother Quintiis, greeting.
1. Thebe is a wonderful flood at Rome, and especially along the Appian road, as far as the temple of Mars ; the walks of Crassipes, and his gardens, have been cai-ried away, and many shops. There has been an amazing quantity of water down as far as the public fish-ponds. The passage of Homer ^ is powerfully illustrated : —
As on an autumn day, when Jupiter
Pours violent waters forth, whene'er, enraged.
His anger burns 'gainst men :
For it applies well to the acquittal of Gabinius : —
Men who by force in council will pronounce Judgments unjust, and banish right, the voice Of heav'n not heeding.
But I have made up my mind not to trouble myself about these matters.
2. When I arrive at Rome, I will write you word what I observe, and especially about the dictatorship; and I will give the courier letters, both for Labienus and for Ligurius.
I wrote this before daybreak, by the light of a little wooden candlestick, which was very acceptable to me, because they said that you^ when you were at Samos, had had it made. Farewell, my most affectionate and most excellent brother.
LETTER VIII. Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. There is no need for me to reply to your former letter,
which is full of discontent and complaints; of which kind
too you say that you had given Labienus another the day
before; but he has not arrived yet. For your caore recent
1 U, xvi. 386.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 85
letter has removed from me every feeling of annoyance ; only I both advise and entreat you, to recollect amid all those annoyances and labours and feelings of regret, what our intention was in your journey. For we were not aiming at any trifling or ordinary advantages ; for what advantage could there have been which we should have thought worth pur- chasing at the price of our separation? We were seeking most powerful protection, for the full maintenance of our dignity, from the good-will of a most excellent and most influential man. More is risked on hope than on money; everything else will go ^ to loss. If, therefore, you often turn back your thoughts to the consideration of our old objects and hopes, you will more easily bear those hardships of military sei*vice, and other things which annoy you; and still you will be able to shake them off" when you please. But the full time for that matter has not arrived yet, though it is approaching.
2. Moreover, I recommend you not to trust anything to your letters, from which, if it should be divulged, we should suffer annoyance. There are many things of which I had rather be ignorant than be informed of them at any risk. I will write to you further with a mind at ease, when my Cicero is going on well again, as I hope he will. I would wish you to take care and let me know to whom I must give the letter which I am to send you next ; whether to the couriers of Caesar, that he may at once send them on to you, or to those of Labienus; for where those Nervii^ are, or how far off" they are, I know not.
3. I derived great pleasure from your letter concerning the virtue and gravity of Caesar, which he had displayed when under deep aflSiction. And as to your requesting me to finish the poem which I have begun to him, although I am distracted with labour, and still more in mind, still, since Caesar has learned from the letter which I had sent to you, that I have begun something, I will resume what I had commenced, and complete it in these idle days of supplica- tions; during which I am extremely glad that our friend
* Stntentur is the reading of Orellius and most other editors ; Nobba has strttantur.
' The Nervii in Gaul, among whom Quintus was in winter quarters with hia legion. Cses. B. G. v. — Paul Ma/imtiua,
86 CICERO S LETTERS
Messala and the rest are relieved from annoyance, and when you Bet him down as quite sure to be consul with Domitius, ycu do not in the least dissent from my own opinion. I will under- take for Messala's conduct to Csesar; but Memmius places hopes in the arrival of Caesar, in which I think he is mis- taken ; here at least he is coldly regarded : as for Scaurus, Pompey cast him off some time ago.
4. Matters are postponed ; the comitia are brought to an interregnum. The rumour of a dictator is disagreeable to the well-affected j but what they say is far more disagreeable to me. However, the whole business is regarded with alarm, and goes on slowly. Pompey plainly denies that he has any inclination for it. Before he did not use to deny it to me. Hirrus seems likely to propose it. O ye gods, what a fool of a man ! how does he love himself without a rival ! He frightened off, by my means, Crassus Junianus,^ a man wholly devoted to me. It is very hard to know whether he wishes it, or whether he does not. However, while Hirrus is acting, he will not make people believe that he has any disinclination. People at this time were talking of nothing else with regard to public affairs ; at all events, nothing else is done.
5. The funeral of Serranus Domesticus the son, was a very mournful one : it took place on the 1 9th of November. The father spoke a funeral panegyric over him, of my writing.
6. Now as to Milo: Pompey has given nothing to him, and everything to Gutta; and says that he will take care that Csesar shall use all his endeavours to further his interest. Milo is apprehensive of this, — and not without reason, — and almost despairs, if he becomes dictator. If he with any armed force, or with his protection, should assist any one who inter- posed a veto to his dictatorship, he fears Pompey would be his enemy; and if he does not assist some one, then he is afraid that matters will be carried by violence. He is pre- paring the most magnificent games,^ of such a character that no man has ever exhibited any more costly ones ; a double and a treble piece of folly, as they are not demanded,^ — either because he had already exhibited a very fine show, or because
' The name is probably corrupt.
- In honour of the dead, by whose will he had received a bequetit •^Paul Manutius. » By the people. See Ep. ad Fam. ix. 8.— /dm.
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTCS. 8T
means were wanting, or because he was a director,^ or because he might fairly look upon himself as a director, and not aa an sedile.^ I have now written nearly all that I had to say. My dearest brother, take care of your health.
LETTER IX. Marcus to his brother Quintus, greeting.
1. In the matter of Gabinius, none of those things which were most affectionately imagined by you, were necessary to be done:
Then may the wide-mouthed earth, with ample yawn, Swallow me quick.
I acted with the most consummate dignity, as all men are of opinion, and also with the greatest lenity, in all the steps which I took : I neither pressed him hard, nor relieved him. I was a very strong witness ; in other respects I was quiet. The disgraceful and ruinous result of the trial I took very easily; and my prudence indeed now redounds to my ad- vantage; so that I am not in the least moved by these calamities of the commonwealth, and the licentiousness of audacious citizens, with which I used to be distracted ; for nothing can be more utterly lost than these men and these times.
2. Since, therefore, no pleasure can now be derived from public affairs, I do not know why I should vex myself. Literature, my studies, and leisure, my country-houses, and especially our boys, give me great pleasure. Milo is the only one that gives me annoyance ; but I wish that the