The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1

Again, they make no concealment of their dissatisfaction on the ground that in the speeches which I make in the senate in praise of Cæsar I am departing from my old policy. But while giving explanations on the points which I put before you a short time ago, I will not keep till the last the following, which I have already touched upon. You will not find, my dear Lentulus, the sentiments of the loyalists the same as you left them—strengthened by my consulship, suffering relapse at intervals afterwards, crushed down before your consulship, revived by you: they have now been abandoned by those whose duty it was to have maintained them: and this fact they, who in the old state of things as it existed in our day used to be called Optimates, not only declare by look and expression of countenance, by which a false pretence is easiest supported, but have proved again and again by their actual sympathies and votes. Accordingly, the entire view and aim of wise citizens, such as I wish both to be and to be reckoned, must needs have undergone a change. For that is the maxim of that same great Plato, whom I emphatically regard as my master: "Maintain a political controversy only so far as you can convince your fellow citizens of its justice: never offer violence to parent or fatherland."664 He, it is true, alleges this as his motive for having abstained from politics, because, having found the Athenian people all but in its dotage, and seeing that it could not be ruled by persuasion, or by anything short of compulsion, while he doubted the possibility of persuasion, he looked upon compulsion as criminal. My position was different in this: as the people was not in its dotage, nor the question of engaging in politics still an open one for me, I was bound hand and foot. Yet I rejoiced that I was permitted in one and the same cause to support a policy at once advantageous to myself and acceptable to every loyalist. An additional motive was Cæsar's memorable and almost superhuman kindness to myself and my brother, who thus would have deserved my support whatever he undertook; while as it is, considering his great success and his brilliant victories, he would seem, even if he had not behaved to me as he has, to claim a panegyric from me. For I would have you believe that, putting you aside, who were the authors of my recall, there is no one by whose good offices I would not only confess, but would even rejoice, to have been so much bound.

Having explained this matter to you, the questions you ask about Vatinius and Crassus are easy to answer. For, since you remark about Appius, as about Cæsar, "that you have no fault to find," I can only say that I am glad you approve my policy. But as to Vatinius, in the first place there had been in the interval a reconciliation effected through Pompey, immediately after his election to the prætorship, though I had, it is true, impugned his canditature in some very strong speeches in the senate, and yet not so much for the sake of attacking him as of defending and complimenting Cato. Again, later on, there followed a very pressing request from Cæsar that I should undertake his defence. But my reason for testifying to his character I beg you will not ask, either in the case of this defendant or of others, lest I retaliate by asking you the same question when you come home: though I can do so even before you return: for remember for whom you sent a certificate of character from the ends of the earth. However, don't be afraid, for those same persons are praised by myself, and will continue to be so. Yet, after all, there was also the motive spurring me on to undertake his defence, of which, during the trial, when I appeared for him, I remarked that I was doing just what the parasite in the Eunuchus advised the captain to do:

"As oft as she names Phædria, you retortWith Pamphila. If ever she suggest,'Do let us have in Phædria to our revel:'Quoth you, 'And let us call on PamphilaTo sing a song.' If she shall praise his looks,Do you praise hers to match them: and, in fine,Give tit for tat, that you may sting her soul."

So I asked the jurors, since certain men of high rank, who had also done me very great favours, were much enamoured of my enemy, and often under my very eyes in the senate now took him aside in grave consultation, now embraced him familiarly and cheerfully—since these men had their Publius, to grant me another Publius, in whose person I might repay a slight attack by a moderate retort.665 And, indeed, I am often as good as my word, with the applause of gods and men. So much for Vatinius. Now about Crassus. I thought I had done much to secure his gratitude in having, for the sake of the general harmony, wiped out by a kind of voluntary act of oblivion all his very serious injuries, when he suddenly undertook the defence of Gabinius, whom only a few days before he had attacked with the greatest bitterness. Nevertheless, I should have borne that, if he had done so without casting any offensive reflexions on me. But on his attacking me, though I was only arguing and not inveighing against him, I fired up not only, I think, with the passion of the moment—for that perhaps would not have been so hot—but the smothered wrath at his many wrongs to me, of which I thought I had wholly got rid, having, unconsciously to myself, lingered in my soul, it suddenly shewed itself in full force. And it was at this precise time that certain persons (the same whom I frequently indicate by a sign or hint), while declaring that they had much enjoyed my outspoken style, and had never before fully realized that I was restored to the Republic in all my old character, and when my conduct of that controversy had gained me much credit outside the house also, began saying that they were glad both that he was now my enemy, and that those who were involved with him would never be my friends. So when their ill-natured remarks were reported to me by men of most respectable character, and when Pompey pressed me as he had never done before to be reconciled to Crassus, and Cæsar wrote to say that he was exceedingly grieved at that quarrel, I took into consideration not only my circumstances, but my natural inclination: and Crassus, that our reconciliation might, as it were, be attested to the Roman people, started for his province, it might almost be said, from my hearth. For he himself named a day and dined with me in the suburban villa of my son-in-law Crassipes. On this account, as you say that you have been told, I supported his cause in the senate, which I had undertaken on Pompey's strong recommendation, as I was bound in honour to do.

I have now told you with what motives I have supported each measure and cause, and what my position is in politics as far as I take any part in them: and I would wish you to make sure of this—that I should have entertained the same sentiments, if I had been still perfectly uncommitted and free to choose. For I should not have thought it right to fight against such overwhelming power, nor to destroy the supremacy of the most distinguished citizens, even if it had been possible; nor, again, should I have thought myself bound to abide by the same view, when circumstances were changed and the feelings of the loyalists altered, but rather to bow to circumstances. For the persistence in the same view has never been regarded as a merit in men eminent for their guidance of the helm of state; but as in steering a ship one secret of the art is to run before the storm, even if you cannot make the harbour; yet, when you can do so by tacking about, it is folly to keep to the course you have begun rather than by changing it to arrive all the same at the destination you desire: so while we all ought in the administration of the state to keep always in view the object I have very frequently mentioned, peace combined with dignity, we are not bound always to use the same language, but to fix our eyes on the same object. Wherefore, as I laid down a little while ago, if I had had as free a hand as possible in everything, I should yet have been no other than I now am in politics. When, moreover, I am at once induced to adopt these sentiments by the kindness of certain persons, and driven to do so by the injuries of others, I am quite content to think and speak about public affairs as I conceive best conduces to the interests both of myself and of the Republic. Moreover, I make this declaration the more openly and frequently, both because my brother Quintus is Cæsar's legate, and because no word of mine, however trivial, to say nothing of any act, in support of Cæsar has ever transpired, which he has not received with such marked gratitude, as to make me look upon myself as closely bound to him. Accordingly, I have the advantage of his popularity, which you know to be very great, and his material resources, which you know to be immense, as though they were my own. Nor do I think that I could in any other way have frustrated the plots of unprincipled persons against me, unless I had now combined with those protections, which I have always possessed, the goodwill also of the men in power. I should, to the best of my belief, have followed this same line of policy even if I had had you here. For I well know the reasonableness and soberness of your judgment: I know your mind, while warmly attached to me, to be without a tinge of malevolence to others, but on the contrary as open and candid as it is great and lofty. I have seen certain persons conduct themselves towards you as you might have seen the same persons conduct themselves towards me. The same things that have annoyed me would certainly have annoyed you. But whenever I shall have the enjoyment of your presence, you will be the wise critic of all my plans: you who took thought for my safety will also do so for my dignity. Me, indeed, you will have as the partner and associate in all your actions, sentiments, wishes—in fact, in everything; nor shall I ever in all my life have any purpose so steadfastly before me, as that you should rejoice more and more warmly every day that you did me such eminent service.

As to your request that I would send you any books I have written since your departure, there are some speeches, which I will give Menocritus, not so very many, so don't be afraid! I have also written—for I am now rather withdrawing from oratory and returning to the gentler Muses, which now give me greater delight than any others, as they have done since my earliest youth—well, then, I have written in the Aristotelian style, at least that was my aim, three books in the form of a discussion in dialogue "On the Orator," which, I think, will be of some service to your Lentulus. For they differ a good deal from the current maxims, and embrace a discussion on the whole oratorical theory of the ancients, both that of Aristotle and Isocrates. I have also written in verse three books "On my own Times," which I should have sent you some time ago, if I had thought they ought to be published—for they are witnesses, and will be eternal witnesses, of your services to me and of my affection—but I refrained because I was afraid, not of those who might think themselves attacked, for I have been very sparing and gentle in that respect, but of my benefactors, of whom it were an endless task to mention the whole list. Nevertheless, the books, such as they are, if I find anyone to whom I can safely commit them, I will take care to have conveyed to you: and as far as that part of my life and conduct is concerned, I submit it entirely to your judgment. All that I shall succeed in accomplishing in literature or in learning—my old favourite relaxations—I shall with the utmost cheerfulness place before the bar of your criticism, for you have always had a fondness for such things. As to what you say in your letter about your domestic affairs, and all you charge me to do, I am so attentive to them that I don't like being reminded, can scarcely bear, indeed, to be asked without a very painful feeling. As to your saying, in regard to Quintus's business, that you could not do anything last summer, because you were prevented by illness from crossing to Cilicia, but that you will now do everything in your power to settle it, I may tell you that the fact of the matter is that, if he can annex this property, my brother thinks that he will owe to you the consolidation of this ancestral estate. I should like you to write about all your affairs, and about the studies and training of your son Lentulus (whom I regard as mine also) as confidentially and as frequently as possible, and to believe that there never has been anyone either dearer or more congenial to another than you are to me, and that I will not only make you feel that to be the case, but will make all the world and posterity itself to the latest generation aware of it.

Appius used some time back to repeat in conversation, and afterwards said openly, even in the senate, that if he were allowed to carry a law in the comitia curiata, he would draw lots with his colleague for their provinces; but if no curiatian law were passed, he would make an arrangement with his colleague and succeed you: that a curiatian law was a proper thing for a consul, but was not a necessity: that since he was in possession of a province by a decree of the senate, he should have imperium in virtue of the Cornelian law until such time as he entered the city. I don't know what your several connexions write to you on the subject: I understand that opinion varies. There are some who think that you can legally refuse to quit your province, because your successor is named without a curiatian law: some also hold that, even if you do quit it, you may leave some one behind you to conduct its government. For myself, I do not feel so certain about the point of law—although there is not much doubt even about that—as I do of this, that it is for your greatest honour, dignity, and independence, which I know you always value above everything, to hand over your province to a successor without any delay, especially as you cannot thwart his greediness without rousing suspicion of your own. I regard my duty as twofold—to let you know what I think, and to defend what you have done.

P.S.—I had written the above when I received your letter about the publicani, to whom I could not but admire the justice of your conduct. I could have wished that you had been able by some lucky chance to avoid running counter to the interests and wishes of that order, whose honour you have always promoted. For my part, I shall not cease to defend your decrees: but you know the ways of that class of men; you are aware how bitterly hostile they were to the famous Q. Scævola himself. However, I advise you to reconcile that order to yourself, or at least soften its feelings, if you can by any means do so. Though difficult, I think it is, nevertheless, not beyond the reach of your sagacity.

CLIII (a iv, 18)

TO ATTICUS (IN ASIA)

Rome, October

b.c. 54, æt. 52

As it is,666 to tell you my opinion of affairs, we must put up with it. You ask me how I have behaved. With firmness and dignity. "What about Pompey," you will say, "how did he take it?" With great consideration, and with the conviction that he must have some regard for my position, until a satisfactory atonement had been made to me. "How, then," you will say, "was the acquittal secured?" It was a case of mere dummies,667 and incredible incompetence on the part of the accusers—that is to say, of L. Lentulus, son of Lucius, who, according to the universal murmur, acted collusively. In the next place, Pompey was extraordinarily urgent; and the jurors were a mean set of fellows. Yet, in spite of everything, there were thirty-two votes for conviction, thirty-eight for acquittal. There are the other prosecutions hanging over his head: he is by no means entirely free yet. You will say, "Well, then, how do you bear it?" With the best air possible, by heaven! and I really do plume myself on my behaviour. We have lost, my dear Pomponius, not only all the healthy sap and blood of our old constitution, but even its colour and outward show. There is no Republic to give a moment's pleasure or a feeling of security. "And is that, then," you will say, "a satisfaction to you?" Precisely that. For I recall what a fair course the state had for a short time, while I was at the helm, and what a return has been made me! It does not give me a pang that one man absorbs all power. The men to burst with envy are those who were indignant at my having had some power. There are many things which console me, without my departing an inch from my regular position; and I am returning to the life best suited to my natural disposition—to letters and the studies that I love. My labour in pleading I console by my delight in oratory. I find delight in my town house and my country residences. I do not recall the height from which I have fallen, but the humble position from which I have risen. As long as I have my brother and you with me, let those fellows be hanged, drawn, and quartered for all I care: I can play the philosopher with you. That part of my soul, in which in old times irritability had its home, has grown completely callous. I find no pleasure in anything that is not private and domestic. You will find me in a state of magnificent repose, to which nothing contributes more than the prospect of your return. For there is no one in the wide world whose feelings are so much in sympathy with my own. But now let me tell you the rest. Matters are drifting on to an interregnum; and there is a dictatorship in the air, in fact a good deal of talk about it, which did Gabinius also some service with timid jurors. All the candidates for the consulship are charged with bribery. You may add to them Gabinius, on whom L. Sulla had served notice, feeling certain that he was in a hopeless position—Torquatus having, without success, demanded to have the prosecution. But they will all be acquitted, and henceforth no one will be condemned for anything except homicide. This last charge is warmly pressed, and accordingly informers are busy. M. Fulvius Nobilior has been convicted. Many others have had the wit to abstain from even putting in an appearance. Is there any more news? Yes! After Gabinius's acquittal another panel of jurors, in a fit of irritation, an hour later condemned Antiochus Gabinius, some fellow from the studio of Sopolis, a freedman and orderly officer of Gabinius, under the lex Papia. Consequently he at once remarked, "So the Republic will not acquit me under the law of treason as it did you!"668

Pomptinus wants to celebrate a triumph on the 2nd of November. He is openly opposed by the prætors Cato and Servilius and the tribune Q. Mucius. For they say that no law for his imperium was ever carried:669 and this one too was carried, by heaven, in a stupid way. But Pomptinus will have the consul Appius on his side.670 Cato, however, declares that he shall never triumph so long as he is alive. I think this affair, like many of the same sort, will come to nothing. Appius thinks of going to Cilicia without a law, and at his own expense.671 I received a letter on the 24th of October from my brother and from Cæsar, dated from the nearest coasts of Britain on the 26th of September. Britain done with … hostages taken … no booty … a tribute, however, imposed; they were on the point of bringing back the army. Q. Pilius has just set out to join Cæsar. If you have any love for me or your family, or any truth in you, or even if you have any taste left, and any idea of enjoying all your blessings, it is really time for you to be on your way home, and, in fact, almost here. I vow I cannot get on without you. And what wonder that I can't get on without you, when I miss Dionysius so much? The latter, in fact, as soon as the day comes, both I and my young Cicero will demand of you. The last letter I had from you was dated Ephesus, 9th of August.

CLIV (q fr iii, 5-6)

TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS (IN GAUL)

Tusculum (October)

b.c. 54, æt. 52

You ask me what I have done about the books which I begun to write when in my Cuman villa: I have not been idle and am not being idle now; but I have frequently changed the whole plan and arrangement of the work. I had already completed two books, in which I represented a conversation taking place on the Novendialia held in the consulship of Tuditanus and Aquilius,672 between Africanus, shortly before his death, and Lælius, Philus, Manilius, P. Rutilius, Q. Tubero, and Lælius's sons-in-law, Fannius and Scævola; a conversation which was extended to nine days and the same number of books "On the best Constitution of the State" and "On the best Citizen." The work was excellently composed, and the rank of the speakers added considerable weight to the style. But when these books were read to me in the presence of Sallustius at Tusculum, it was suggested to me by him that a discourse on such subjects would come with much greater force if I were myself the speaker on the Republic, especially as I was a no mere Heraclides Ponticus,673 but an ex-consul, and one who had been engaged in the most important affairs in the state: that when I put them in the mouth of men of such ancient date they would have an air of unreality: that I had shewn good taste in my books about the science of rhetoric in keeping the dialogue of the orators apart from myself, and yet had attributed it to men whom I had personally seen: and, finally, that Aristotle delivers in the first person his essays "On the Republic" and "On the Eminent Man." I was influenced the more by this from the fact that I was unable to touch on the most important commotions in our state, because they were subsequent to the age of the speakers. Moreover, my express object then was not to offend anyone by launching into the events of my own time: as it is, I shall avoid that and at the same time be the speaker with you. Nevertheless, when I come to Rome I will send you the dialogues as they originally stood. For I fancy that those books will convince you that they have not been abandoned by me without some chagrin.

I am extremely gratified by Cæsar's affection of which you write to me. The offers which he holds out I do not much reckon on, nor have I any thirst for honours or longing for glory; and I look forward more to the continuation of his kindness than to the fulfilment of his promises. Still, I live a life so prominent and laborious that I might seem to be expecting the very thing that I deprecate. As to your request that I should compose some verses, you could hardly believe, my dear brother, how short of time I am: nor do I feel much moved in spirit to write poetry on the subject you mention. Do you really come to me for disquisitions on things that I can scarcely conceive even in imagination—you who have distanced everybody in that style of vivid and descriptive writing? Yet I would have done it if I could, but, as you will assuredly not fail to notice, for writing poetry there is need of a certain freshness of mind of which my occupations entirely deprive me. I withdraw myself, it is true, from all political anxiety and devote myself to literature; still, I will hint to you what, by heaven, I specially wished to have concealed from you. It cuts me to the heart, my dearest brother, to the heart, to think that there is no Republic, no law courts, and that my present time of life, which ought to have been in the full bloom of senatorial dignity, is distracted with the labours of the forum or eked out by private studies, and that the object on which from boyhood I had set my heart,

"Far to excel, and tower above the crowd,"674

is entirely gone: that my opponents have in some cases been left unattacked by me, in others even defended: that not only my sympathies, but my very dislikes, are not free: and that Cæsar is the one man in the world who has been found to love me to my heart's content, or even, as others think, the only one who was inclined to do so. However, there is none of all these vexations of such a kind as to be beyond the reach of many daily consolations; but the greatest of consolations will be our being together. As it is, to those other sources of vexation there is added my very deep regret for your absence. If I had defended Gabinius, which Pansa thought I ought to have done, I should have been quite ruined: those who hate him—and that is entire orders—would have begun to hate me for the sake of their hatred for him. I confined myself, as I think with great dignity, to doing only that which all the world saw me do. And to sum up the whole case, I am, as you advise, devoting all my efforts to tranquillity and peace. As to the books: Tyrannio is a slow-coach: I will speak to Chrysippus, but it is a laborious business and requires a man of the utmost industry. I find it in my own case, for, though I am as diligent as possible, I get nothing done. As to the Latin books, I don't know which way to turn—they are copied and exposed for sale with such a quantity of errors! However, whatever can possibly be done I will not neglect to do. Gaius Rebilus, as I wrote to you before, is at Rome. He solemnly affirms his great obligations to you, and reports well of your health.675 I think the question of the treasury was settled in my absence. When you speak of having finished four tragedies in sixteen days, I presume you are borrowing from some one else? And do you deign to be indebted to others after writing the Electra, and the Troades? Don't be idle; and don't think the proverbial γνῶθι σεαυτόν was only meant to discourage vanity: it means also that we should be aware of our own qualities. But pray send me these tragedies as well as the Erigona. I have now answered your last two letters.