These letters were sent between June 60 B.C. and September 59 B.C.
The translation is by E.O. Winstedt (1919). Click on the L symbols to go to the Latin text of each section. Click on ** to go to the translator's footnotes.
CONTENTS: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
← Book 1
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
On the 1st of June I met your boy as I was on my way to Antium and glad to get away from M. Metellus's gladiatorial exhibition. He delivered your letter, and a memorial of my consulship written in Greek. I felt very glad that I gave L. Cossinius the book I had written in Greek on the same subject to take to you some time ago. For, if I had read yours first you would say that I had plagiarised from you. Though yours (which I read with pleasure) seemed to me a trifle rough and unadorned, yet its very lack of ornament is an ornament in itself, just as women were thought to have the best scent who used no scent. My book, on the other hand, has exhausted all the scent box of Isocrates, and all the rouge-pots of his pupils, and some of Aristotle's colours too.
You scanned it through, as you tell me in another letter, at Corcyra, before you had received it from Cossinius, I suppose. I should never have dared to send it to you, if I had not revised it with leisure and care.
2 I sent the memoir to Posidonius too, asking him to write something more elaborate on the same subject; but he tells me that, far from being inspired to write by the perusal of it, he was decidedly put off. In fact, I have flabbergasted the whole Greek nation : so I have ceased to be plagued by the people who were always hanging about asking me to give them something of mine to polish up. If you like the book, you will see to it that Athens and other Greek towns have it in stock ; for I think it may add some lustre to my achievements. 3 I will send you the bits of speeches you ask for and some more too, as you find some interest in things which I write to satisfy young admirers. Your fellow-citizen, Demosthenes, gained a reputation by the speeches called the Philippics, in which he departed from the quibbling style of pleading we use in the law-courts, and appeared in the role of a serious politician. So I took a fancy to leave behind me also some speeches which may be called consular. One was delivered in the House on the 1st of January, another to the people on the agrarian law, the third on Otho, the fourth for Rabirius, the fifth for the sons of the proscribed, the sixth when I declined a province in a public assembly, the seventh when I drove Catiline out, the eighth before the people the day after Catiline fled, the ninth in an assembly on the day when the Allobroges gave their information, the tenth in the House on the 5th of December. There are two more short ones, mere scraps of the agrarian law. I will see that you have the whole corpus ; and, since both my writing and my achievements interest you, you will see from them what I have done, and what I have written. Or else you should not have asked for them : I was not the one to push them on you.
4 You inquire why I ask you to come back, and hint that you are hindered by business. Still you don't refuse to come, if there is any need, or even if I wish it. There is no real necessity; but it does seem to me that you could arrange your times for going away more conveniently. You are away too long, especially when you are quite near, and so I have no chance of enjoying your society and you lack mine. Just at present things are peaceful : but if that little beauty ** should be strong enough to indulge in any wilder freaks I should certainly be summoning you out of your retreat. However, Metellus is holding him in nobly and will continue to do so. Most assuredly he is a thoroughly patriotic consul, and, as I always thought, an excellent fellow.
5 Clodius does not beat about the bush, he is quite plainly aiming at the tribunate. When the point was discussed in the Senate, I sat on him, accusing him of inconsistency, for seeking the tribunate now in Rome, when in Sicily he did nothing but repeat that what he wanted was an inheritance. However, I added, we need not put ourselves about on that point, as he would not be allowed to ruin the country if he becomes a plebeian any more than patricians of his sort were allowed to in my consulship. Then, when he said he had come from the straits in a week, so that no one could go to meet him, and had entered the city at night, and boasted of the fact in a public speech, I said there was nothing new in that. "Seven days from Sicily to Rome : the other time three hours from Rome to Interamna. ** He came in at night: so he did before. No one met him now: nor did anyone meet him last time, when they certainly ought to have done so." In fact, I am taking the cheek out of him, not only by serious set speeches, but by quips of this kind too. So nowadays I bandy jests and banter with him quite familiarly. For instance, when we were escorting a candidate, he asked me whether I used to give the Sicilians seats at the gladiatorial shows. ** I said, No. "Well," said he, "now I am their new patron, I intend to begin the practice : though my sister, ** who, as the consul's wife, has such a lot of room, will not give me more than standing room." "Oh, don't grumble about standing room with your sister," I answered. "You can always lie with her." You will say it was not the remark for a consular to make. I confess it was not ; but I hate the woman, so unworthy of a consul. For she's a shrew and wrangles with her mate, and not only with Metellus, but with Fabius too, because she is annoyed at their interference in this affair.
6 You ask about the agrarian law. Interest in it seems to have cooled down. You give me a gentle slap for my familiarity with Pompey. Please don't imagine I have allied myself to him solely to save my skin: the position of affairs is such that, if we had had any disagreement, there would of necessity have been great discord in the State. Against that I have taken precautions and made provision without wavering from my own excellent policy, while making him more loyal and less the people's weathercock. He speaks, I may tell you, far more glowingly about my achievements than about his own, though many have tried to set him against me, saying that he did his duty to the country, but I saved it. What good his statements will do me, I fail to see: but they will certainly do the country good. Well ! If I can make Caesar, who is now sailing gaily before the breeze, a better patriot too, shall I be doing so poor a service to the country? 7 And, even if none were to envy me and all supported me, as they ought, still a remedy which cures the diseased parts of the State should be preferable to one which amputates them.
But as it is, when the knights, whom I once stationed on the Capitoline hill with you as their standard-bearer and leader, have deserted the Senate, and our great men think themselves in the seventh heaven, if they have bearded mullet in their fish-ponds that will feed from their hand, and don't care about anything else, surely you must allow that I have done my best, if I manage to take the will to do harm from those who have the power to do it. 8 For our friend Cato is not more to you than to me : but still with the best of intentions and unimpeachable honesty at times he does harm to the country : for the opinions he delivers would be more in place in Plato's Republic than among the dregs of humanity collected by Romulus. ** That a man who accepts a bribe for the verdict he returns at a trial should be put on trial himself is as fair a principle as one could wish. Cato voted for it and won the senate's assent. Result, a war of the knights with the Senate, but not with me. I was against it. That the tax-collectors should repudiate their bargain was a most shameless proceeding. But we ought to have put up with the loss in order to keep their good-will. Cato resisted and carried the day. Result, though we've had a consul in prison, ** and frequent riots, not a breath of encouragement from one of those, who in my own consulship and that of my successors used to rally round us to defend the country. "Must we then bribe them for their support?" you will ask. What help is there, if we cannot get it otherwise ? Are we to be slaves of freedmen and slaves? But, as you say, enough of the grand serieux.
9 Favonius carried my tribe with even more credit than his own, but lost that of Lucceius. His accusation of Nasica was nothing to be proud of; however he conducted it very moderately. He spoke so badly that one would think he devoted more time at Rhodes to grinding in the mills than at Molo's lectures. I got into his bad books for undertaking the defence ; however he is standing again now, on public grounds. How Lucceius is getting on I will write and tell you, when I have seen Caesar, who will be here in a couple of days' time. 10 The wrong the Sicyonians have done you, you attribute to Cato and his imitator Servilius. But does not the blow affect many good citizens ? However, if this is what they want, let us acquiesce, and be utterly deserted at the next question put to the vote.
11 My Amalthea is waiting and longing for you. I am delighted with my places at Tusculum and Pompeii, except that, champion of creditors as I am, they have overwhelmed me not so much with Corinthian bronze as with debts in the common copper coin of the realm. We hope things have settled down in Gaul. Expect my 'Prognostics' ** and my bits of speeches very shortly : but for all that, write and tell me your plans about coming. Pomponia has sent a message that you will be in Rome in July : but that disagrees with the letter you sent to me about placing your name on the census list.
12 Paetus, as I have already mentioned, has given me the books left him by his brother : but this gift depends on your kind services. As you love me, see that they are preserved and brought to me. You could do me no greater favour : and I should like the Latin books kept as well as the Greek. I shall count them as a present from yourself. I have written to Octavius, but not spoken to him about it: for I did not know that your business extended to the provinces, nor did I count you among the usurers. But I have written as punctiliously as duty bade.
[2] L { mid- or late December 60 }
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
Look well after my little namesake. I am ill with him by sympathy. 2 I have in hand my treatise on the constitution of Pellene, and you should see the huge heap of Dicaearchus that I have piled at my feet. What a great man ! You could learn a lot more from him than from Procilius. I believe I have got his works on the constitutions of Corinth and Athens at Rome : and you may take my word for it that, if you read them, you will exclaim "The man is a wonder." If Herodes had any sense in him, he would spend his time reading him and never write a single letter of the alphabet. He has attacked me by post, and you, as I see, in person. I would far rather have joined in the conspiracy than opposed it, if I had thought I should have to pay for it by listening to him. 3 As regards the darnel, ** you must be losing your senses : but about the wine I quite agree with you.
But, I say, have you noticed the Kalends are coming, and there is no Antonius ? Though the jury is being empanelled, - at least they tell me so, and that Nigidius is threatening in a public meeting to serve a summons on any juror who does not attend. If you should happen to get any news of Antonius' coming, please let me know : and, as you won't come here, dine with me anyhow on the 29th at my town house. Be sure you do ; and take care of yourself.
[3] L { shortly after previous letter }
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
First a trifle please for good news. Valerius has been acquitted, with Hortensius as his advocate. The verdict is generally thought to be a concession to Aulus' son; and I expect (?) Iphicrates **has been up to some tricks, as you suggest. I didn't like the look of his military boots and puttees. We shall know what it was about, when you arrive.
2 In finding fault with the narrowness of my windows, let me tell you, you are finding fault with the Education of Cyrus: ** for, when I made the same remark to Cyrus, he said that the view of gardens was not so pleasant, if the windows were broad. For, let A be the point of vision, and B, C the object, and D, E the rays, - you see what follows. If our sight resulted from the impact of images, the images would be horribly squeezed in the narrow space : but, as it is, the emission of rays goes on merrily. ** If you have any other faults to find, you will find me ready with an answer, unless they are such as can be put to rights without expense.
3 Now I come to January and my political attitude ; and I shall follow the fashion of the Socratic schools in giving both sides of the question, ending, however, as they do, with the one which I prefer. It really is a point that requires much consideration. For either I have got to resist the agrarian measure ** strongly, which would mean something of a fight, though I should gain prestige by it; or I must hold my peace, which is equivalent to retiring to Solonium or Antium ; or else I must assist the measure, and that is what they say Caesar expects me to do beyond a doubt. For Cornelius paid me a visit - I mean Balbus, Caesar's great friend. He assured me that Caesar will take my own and Pompey's opinion on everything, and that he will make an effort to reconcile Pompey and Crassus. 4 On this side of the sheet may be placed an intimate connection with Pompey and, if I like, with Caesar too, reconciliation with my enemies, peace with the populace, and ease in my old age. But my blood is still stirred by the finale I laid down for myself in the 3rd book of my poem : **
"Meantime the course you chose in youth's first spring
And held to. heart and soul, 'mid civic strife
Keep still, with growing fame and good report."
Since Calliope herself dictated those verses to me in a book full of lordly sentiments, I ought not to have the least hesitation in holding "no omen better than to right one's country's wrongs." **
But this point must be reserved for our strolls at the Compitalia. Please remember the day before the festival. I will order the bath to be heated, and Terentia is going to invite Pomponia. We will make your mother one of the party. Bring me from my brother Quintus' library Theophrastus' "Hints for office-seekers."
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
I am much obliged to you for sending me Serapio's book, though between you and me I hardly understand a thousandth part of it. I have given orders for you to be paid ready money for it, so that you don't have to record it as a present. Since I am mentioning money matters, please settle up with Titinius as best you can. If he won't stand by his agreement, the best plan, so far as I can see, will be to return the goods for which he made a bad bargain, if Pomponia will consent to that course: if even that won't work, then give him his money back rather than have a fuss. I should be very glad if you would finish the business before you leave, with your usual kindness and carefulness.
2 So Clodius is going to Tigranes you say! I wish it were on the same terms as that Scepsian. ** But I don't envy him. It will be a much more convenient time for me to get a free travelling pass, when my brother Quintus has settled down in peace, as I hope he will, and when I know the intentions of that priest of Bona Dea. ** Meantime I shall settle down to the enjoyment of the Muses with resignation, indeed with hearty good-will and delight, for it will never enter my head to envy Crassus, or to repent of not having turned traitor to myself.
3 For the geography I will endeavour to satisfy you, but I won't make any definite promise. It is a big piece of work: still I will do as I am told, and see to it that this little tour is not entirely unproductive for you. 4 Let me have any political news you may worm out, especially who you think are likely to be consuls. However, I am not very anxious. I have made up my mind to forget politics for now. 5 I have had a good look at Terentia's woodlands, and can only say, that, if there was a Dodonaean oak there, I should feel as though I possessed the whole of Epirus. 6 About the first of the month I shall be either in my place at Formiae, or at Pompeii. If I am not at Formiae, as you love me, come to Pompeii. I shall be delighted to see you, and it won't be far out of your way. 7 With regard to the wall, I have given orders to Philotimus to let you do anything you like: but I think you ought to call in Vettius. In these days, when every honest man's life hangs in the balance, I set high store by the enjoyment of my Palatine palaestra for a summer, but not to the extent of wishing Pomponia and her boy to live in terror of a tottering ruin.
[5] L { shortly after previous letter }
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
I am eager, and have long been eager to pay a visit to Alexandria and the rest of Egypt, ** and also to get away from here, where people are sick of seeing me, and return when they miss me a little: but considering the circumstances, and the people who are sending me,
"I fear the men and long-gowned dames of Troy." **
What will our optimate friends say, if there are any of them left? That I have been bribed out of my opinions?
"The first to chide will be Polydamas," **
- that friend of ours, Cato, who alone outweighs a hundred thousand in my eyes. What will history be saying of me six hundred years hence? And that is a thing I fear much more than the petty gossip of those who are alive to-day. But I suppose I can only lie low and see what turns up. If an offer is made to me, the decision will to some extent rest in my own hands, and then I will consider the question. Upon my word there is some little glory even in refusing: so, if Theophanes should happen to consult you, don't decline point blank. 2 This is what I am hoping to hear from you in your letter: - what Arrius has to say for himself, and how he takes Caesar's desertion of him, whether popular report is right in speaking of Pompey and Crassus as the favourites for the consulship, or a correspondent of mine who mentions Gabinius and Servius Sulpicius, whether there are any new laws or any news at all, and to whom the augurship will be offered, ** now that Nepos is going away. That is the only bait with which they could catch me. You see how cheap I am going. But this is a forbidden subject. I mean to forget it, and devote myself heart and soul to philosophy. That, I assure you, is my intention; and I only wish I had always practised it. Now that I have sampled the vanity of what I once thought glory, I am thinking of confining my attention exclusively to the Muses.
3 For all that you must keep me posted with news of Curtius and who will succeed to his position, and what is happening about P. Clodius. Take your time, and write fully about things in general, as you promise. Please let me know on what day you are leaving Rome, so that I can tell you where I shall be: and let me have a letter at once on the points I have mentioned, for I look forward to your letters very eagerly.
[6] L { shortly after previous letter }
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
I am not so certain now about fulfilling the promises I made in former letters to produce some work in this tour: for I have fallen so in love with idleness, that I can't tear myself from it. So I either enjoy myself with my books, of which I have a good lot at Antium, or else count the waves: the rough weather won't allow me to catch (?) mackerel. At the thought of writing my soul rebels utterly. The geographical work I had planned is a big undertaking. Eratosthenes, whom I had taken as my authority, is severely criticised by Serapion and Hipparchus; and, if I take Tyrannio's views too, there is no telling what the result would be. Besides the subject is confoundedly hard to explain and monotonous, nor does it give one as many opportunities for flowers of fancy as I imagined: besides - and this is the chief point - I find any excuse for idleness good enough. I am even debating settling down at Antium, and spending the rest of my life here: and I really wish I had been a magistrate here rather than in Rome.
2 You have been wiser, and have made a home for yourself at Buthrotum: but you may take my word for it that this township of Antium runs your borough very close. To think of there being a place so near Rome, where there are lots of people who have never seen Vatinius, where there is not a single soul save myself who cares whether any of our new commissioners ** are alive or dead, where no one intrudes upon me, though every one is fond of me. This, this is the very place for me to play the politician: for there in Rome, besides being shut out of politics, I am sick of them. So I will compose a private memoir, which I will read only to you, in the style of Theopompus, or even a still bitterer vein. My only policy now is hatred of the radicals: and that without rancour, indeed with some pleasure in expressing it. But to return to business, I have written to the city quaestors about my brother Quintus' affairs. See what they have to say, and whether there is any hope of our getting denarii, or whether we must put up with Pompey's cistophori. ** Also decide what is to be done with the wall. Is there anything else I meant to say? Yes. Let me know when you think of going away.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
[7] L { shortly after previous letter }
I will give the geography further consideration. As to the two speeches you ask for, one I did not want to write down, because I had broken off in the middle, the other, because I had no desire to praise a man whom I did not like. But that too I will see about. Something shall appear anyhow, to convince you that I have not idled all my time away. 2 I am highly delighted with the news about Publius, please investigate all the details thoroughly, and bring a full account with you when you come. Meantime, if you pick up any hints, or draw any inferences, write to me, especially as to what he is going to do about the embassy. For my part, before I read your letter, I wished the man would go, not, I assure you, through any desire to postpone his impeachment - for I am extraordinarily anxious to conduct the case - but because I thought that he would lose any popularity he had gained by turning plebeian. "Why did you transfer yourself to the plebs? Was it to pay a visit to Tigranes? Pray tell me: don't the kings of Armenia return the visit of a patrician? As you see, I had sharpened my wits up to rally him on the subject of his embassy. But if he rejects it with scorn, and, as you say, thereby rouses the indignation of the proposers and augurs of the bill of adoption, it will be a grand sight.
3 To speak the honest truth, you know, our friend Publius is being treated with very scant courtesy. In the first place, though he was once the only man in Caesar's house, now he has not a footing even among twenty; and in the second place, one embassy is talked of, and another is given to him. That fat post for levying money ** is reserved for Drusus of Pisaurum, I suppose, or for the gourmand {epulo} Vatinius, while this barren messenger's job is given to him, and his tribunate too has to wait their convenience. Fire the fellow's resentment please, as much as you can. My one hope of safety lies in a disagreement arising between them: and from Curio I gather that there is a hint of such a thing. Arrius is beginning to rage at being robbed of his consulship: Megabocchus and the rest of that bloodthirsty band of youths are at daggers drawn with them. And if only there may come a dispute about this augurship on top of it. I hope I shall have occasion to send you some of my very best letters and plenty of them on these topics.
4 But I am anxious to know the meaning of that dark hint of yours, that even some of the board of five commissioners are speaking their minds. What on earth can it be? If there really is anything in it, things are in a better way than I thought. Please don't imagine that I ask the question with a view to action, because my soul is yearning to take part in politics. I have long been sick of holding the helm, even when I was allowed to do so: and now, when I have been marooned and the helm torn from my grasp without waiting for me to surrender it, my only desire is to watch their shipwreck from the dry land. I could wish, as your friend Sophocles says,
"In peaceful slumber sunk
To hear the pattering raindrops on the roof."
5 About the wall you will see what is necessary. I will set the mistake about Castricius right; and yet Quintus wrote 15,000 sesterces to me, though now to your sister he makes it 35,000. Terentia sends her love; and my little boy commissions you to give Aristodemus the same answer for him as you gave for his cousin, your sister's son. I won't forget your reminder about your Amalthea. Take care of yourself.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
When I was looking forward eagerly to a letter of yours towards evening, as usual, lo and behold a message that some slaves had come from Rome. I called them, and inquired if they had any letters. "No," they said. "What's that," said I, "nothing from Pomponius?" Frightened to death by my voice and look they confessed they had been given one, but it had been lost on the way. As you may suppose, I was wild with annoyance. For every letter you have sent me these last few days has contained something of importance or entertainment. So, if there was anything worth saying in the letter of the 15th of April, write at once and let me know it: if there was nothing but nonsense, you owe me a repetition of it. Let me tell you that young Curio has come and paid his respects to me: and what he said about Publius agreed very closely with your letter. It is astonishing too how he "holds proud kings in hate," ** and he tells me that the younger generation in general holds equally strong views, and cannot put up with the present state of affairs. We are all right. If we can put our trust in them, we need not trouble ourselves, so far as I can see. I am devoting myself to history. But, though you think me as energetic as Saufeius, I am the laziest mortal alive.
2 But get clear about my journeys, so that you may settle where you will see me. I am intending to get to my place at Formiae on the feast of Pales; and then, since you think I ought not to stop at the mixing-bowl of luxuries ** on this occasion, I shall leave Formiae on the 1st of May, so as to reach Antium on the 3rd. There are games at Antium from the 4th to the 6th of May, and Tullia wants to see them. Then I am thinking of going to Tusculum, and from there to Arpinum, reaching Rome on the 1st of June. Be sure you pay me a visit either at Formiae or at Antium, or at my place at Tusculum. Reproduce your former letter for me, and add something new to it.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
Caecilius the quaestor having suddenly told me that he was sending a man to Rome, I write this note in haste to extract from you all your wonderful dialogues with Publius, those you mention in your note, and the one you keep dark, saying that your answers were too long to write; and besides the one which has not yet taken place, but which that Juno ** is going to report to you, when she returns from Solonium. Please believe me when I say there is nothing that would please me more. If the compact about me is not kept, I am in the seventh heaven with delight at thinking how that Jerusalemite plebeian-monger ** will learn what a pretty return he has made for all my choicest panegyrics: and you may expect a recantation of surpassing splendour; for, so far as I can see, if that good-for-nothing is in favour with our rulers, he will have to give up crowing over the "ex-consul with a cynic's tongue" ** and those "Tritons of the fish-ponds" together: for there will be nothing to envy me for, when I have been robbed of my power and my influence in the Senate. If on the other hand he quarrels with them, then any attack on me would be absurd. However let him attack, if he likes. Upon my word the wheel of State has turned round merrily and with less noise than I had expected: more quickly to be sure than it might have done. That is Cato's fault, but it is still more through the villainy of those who have disregarded auspices and the Aelian law, the Junian and Licinian law and the Caecilian and Didian law, who have thrown out of the window all the cures for the State, who have given kingdoms to tetrarchs as though they were farms and immense sums of money to a few people.
2 I can see already which way jealousy is tending and where it will come home to roost. Count me too big a dunce to have learned anything by experience or from Theophrastus, if you do not see very shortly men mourning for the days of my government. For if the power of the Senate was unpopular, you can imagine what things will be like now, when the power has been transferred not to the people, but to three unbridled men. So let them make anyone they like consuls and tribunes, let them cloak Vatinius' scrofulous body with the double-dyed purple gown of the augur, you will see very soon not only those who have made no slip, but even Cato himself for all his mistakes exalted, to the skies. 3 As for me, I am thinking of playing the sophist, if your comrade Publius will allow me: I shall defend myself only if he compels me. Using the ordinary trick of the trade, I shall put up a notice that I am ready to
"Give blow for blow, if any rouse me first." **
If only the country will be on my side. Certainly it has had from me more than it ever asked for, if not more than I owe to it. I would rather have a bad passage with another at the helm than steer safely myself for such ungrateful passengers. But of this we can talk better when we meet. 4 Now listen to my answer to your question. I am thinking of going to Antium from Formiae on May the 3rd: and I hope to start from Antium for Tusculum on May the 7th. But, as soon as I have returned from Formiae - and I intend to stay there till the end of April - I will send you definite news. Terentia sends her love, and little Cicero his greeting to Titus the Athenian.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
I hope you will admire my consistency. I have decided not to see the games at Antium. For it would be rather noticeably inconsistent at a time when I am trying to avoid the suspicion of taking a pleasure trip, suddenly to appear in the character of one travelling not only for pleasure, but for very foolish pleasure too. So I shall wait for you till the 7th of May at Formiae. Now let me know what day I shall see you.
From Appi Forum at 10 o'clock. I sent another letter a little earlier from the Three Taverns.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
I assure you I feel an absolute exile since I have been at Formiae. There never was a day when I was at Antium that I was not better up in the news of Rome than those who were living there. The fact is your letters used to set before me not only the city news, but all the political news, and not only what was happening, but what was going to happen too. Now I can't get to know anything, unless I pick up chance news from a passing traveller. So, although I am expecting you here very soon, give this man of mine, who is under orders to return at once, a bulky missive, full of news of all that has happened and what you think about it: and don't forget to say what day you are leaving Rome. 2 I intend to stay at Formiae till the 6th of May. If you can't get here before that date, perhaps I shall see you at Rome, for I can hardly invite you to Arpinum,
"My rugged native land, good nurse for men;
None other would mine eyes so gladly see." **
That is all then. Take care of yourself.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
So they deny that Publius has been made a plebeian, do they? This is certainly sheer tyranny and not to be borne. Let Publius send some one to witness my affidavit. I will take my oath that my friend Gnaeus, Balbus' colleague, told me at Antium that he had himself assisted at taking the auspices. Fancy two such delightful letters of yours being delivered at one and the same time! I don't know how to pay you back for your good news, though I candidly confess my debt. Here's a coincidence. 2 I had just taken the turn off the road to Antium on to the Appian Way at the Three Taverns on the very day of the Cerealia, when my friend Curio met me, fresh from Rome: and at the very same moment your man with a letter. Curio inquired whether I hadn't heard the news. "No," said I. "Publius is standing for the tribuneship," says he. "You don't say so!" "And he is at deadly enmity with Caesar," he replies, "and wants to annul all those laws of his." "And what is Caesar doing?" I inquired. "He is denying that he ever proposed Clodius' adoption." Then he expressed his disgust, and that of Memmius and Metellus Nepos. I embraced the youth and said good-bye, being in a hurry to get to your letters. What a lot of nonsense is talked about "viva vox"! Why, I learned a dozen times as much about what is happening from your letter as from his talk - the daily chit-chat, the designs of Publius, Juno's war-cries, how Athenio ** is raising the standard, his letter to Gnaeus, the conversation with Theophanes and Memmius: and you have made me wild with inquisitiveness about that "fast" dinner. My curiosity is insatiable: but I have no grievance at your omitting to write an account of the dinner. I would much rather hear it by word of mouth.
3 As for your exhortations to write something, my material certainly is increasing, as you say; but everything is still in a state of ferment, like must in autumn. When things have settled down, my writing will be more clarified. Though you may not get anything from me at once, you shall be the first to have it however, and no one else for a long time. 4 You are right in admiring Dicaearchus. He is a splendid fellow and a far better patriot than any of these great men of ours to whom his name would certainly not apply. ** I write this on the day of the Cerealia at four o'clock, as soon as I read yours: but I am thinking of giving it to the first person I meet to-morrow. Terentia is delighted with your letters. She sends you her warmest greetings, and Cicero in his new r&ôle of philosopher salutes Titus the politician.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
What a shame! The letter I wrote on the spur of the moment at the Three Taverns in answer to your delightful notes never reached you! The reason was that the packet in which I had put it was taken to my town house the same day, and brought back to me at Formiae. So I have had the letter sent back to show you how pleased I was with yours. 2 Your news that the uproar has died down in Rome does not surprise me: but I can assure you it has not died down in the country, and the very country cannot endure that despotism you endure. If you come to this "Laestrygonia of the far gates," ** - Formiae I mean - you will find the people raging with indignation, and our Great friend - a name which is now growing as obsolete as Crassus' surname Dives - held in the deepest abhorrence. You may not believe me, but I have not met anyone here who takes the matter as coolly as myself. So follow my advice and let us stick to philosophy. I can take my oath there is nothing like it. If you have a letter to send to the Sicyonians, hasten to Formiae. I am thinking of leaving on the 6th of May.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
You have aroused the liveliest curiosity in me as to your talk with Bibulus and your conversation with Juno, and about that "fast" dinner too. So remember my ears are thirsting for news, and come quickly. However, the thing I am most afraid of at the present moment is that our friend Sampsiceramus ** may run amok as soon as he realises that everyone is railing at him and laying into him, and that these new measures are quite easy to upset. For myself, however, I have grown so slack that I should prefer to waste my life in my present ease under a despotism than to take part in the struggle however bright the prospect of success.
2 As for the writing, for which you so incessantly clamour, it is impossible. My house is so crowded with the townsfolk that it is a public hall rather than a private house: and too small at that for the Aemilian tribe. But - to omit the common herd, for others don't bother me after ten o'clock - C. Arrius is my next door neighbour, or rather he lives with me, declaring that he has forborne to go to Rome, expressly for the purpose of spending his whole day philosophising with me here. Then on the other side there is Sebosus, Catulus' intimate friend. Which way can I turn? Upon my word I would go to Arpinum straight away, if I did not see that Formiae is the most convenient place to wait for your visit: but only up to the 6th of May, for you see what bores my ears are condemned to endure. Now's the time to put in a bid for my Formian estate, while these people are pestering me. And in spite of this am I to make good my promise "Let me attempt something great, requiring much thought and leisure"? Still I will satisfy you and not spare my labour.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
I fully realise that, as you say, your letter only reflects the general uncertainty of public affairs: but still that very variety of talk and opinion has its charm: for I feel as though I was at Rome, when I read your letter, and was hearing first one thing and then another, as one does on questions of importance. But what I can't make out is how Caesar can possibly find any solution of the land question which will not meet with opposition. 2 As to Bibulus' firmness in impeding the comitia, it amounts to nothing but an expression of his opinion and does not improve the position of affairs at all. Upon my word our only hope rests in Publius. Let him by all means become tribune; if for no other reason, to make you return all the sooner from Epirus. For I don't see how you can possibly keep away from him, especially if he should choose to quarrel with me. But of course I have no doubt that you would fly to my side, if anything of the kind were to happen. But, even if this does not happen, I am looking forward to a sight worth seeing, whether he runs amok or saves the state, if I can watch it with you sitting by my side.
3 Just as I was writing these words, in comes Sebosus: and I had hardly fetched a sigh, when there was Arrius saying "Good day." This is going out of town! Is it escaping from society to run into people like this? I shall certainly be off to "My native hills, the cradle of my youth." To put it shortly, if I can't be alone, I would rather be with countryfolk than with these ultra-city men. However, as you send no definite date, I will wait for you 4 at Formiae till the 5th of May. Terentia is much gratified by the attention and care you have bestowed on her dispute with Mulvius. She has not the least idea that you are supporting the common cause of all the owners of public land. However you do pay something to the tax-collectors; while she refuses to pay a penny. Accordingly she and my boy, a most aristocratic lad, send their respects.
[16] L { 29 April or 1 May 59 }
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
As I was taking a nap after dinner on the last of April, your letter about the Campanian land arrived. Well, at first it startled me so that it banished all desire to sleep, though it was thought rather than uneasiness that kept me awake. The result of my cogitations was something of this sort. First, when you said in your last letter you had heard from a great friend of Caesar's that some proposal was going to be made to which no one could object, I had feared some sweeping measure; but this I don't consider anything of the kind. Secondly - and that is some consolation to me - all hope of agrarian distribution seems to have been diverted to the Campanian land. Supposing that the allotments are 10 iugera apiece, that land will not hold more than 5,000 people; so they have to offend all the rest of the masses. Besides, if anything is calculated to arouse a fiercer pitch of indignation in the minds of the good men, who are obviously getting roused already, this is the very thing that will; all the more so because there won't be any internal tax left except the 5 per cent, ** now that the customs duties have been abolished, if the Campanian land is distributed: and that, I fancy, it would take only one petty harangue assisted by the cheers of our lackeys to abolish.
2 What on earth our friend Gnaeus is thinking of in letting himself be carried so far, I cannot tell:
"He blows no more on slender pipe of reed,
But fierce unmodulated trumpet-blasts." **
For up to now he has chopped logic about the matter, saying that he approved of Caesar's laws, but it was for Caesar to see to their passing: that the agrarian law was sound enough to his mind, but whether it could be vetoed by a tribune or not did not matter to him: he thought it was high time the question was settled with the king of Alexandria: whether Bibulus had been watching for omens or not at that particular moment was no business of his: as for the tax-gatherers, they were a class that he wished to oblige: what was going to happen, if Bibulus came down to the forum on that occasion, he could not have prophesied. But now what has Sampsiceramus got to say for himself? That he imposed a tax on Antilibanus and took it off the Campanian land? Well, I don't see how he will make it good. "I will keep you in check with Caesar's army," he says. No, not me at least; that army will not restrain me so much as the ungrateful minds of the so-called good men, who have not repaid my services even by thanks, much less by more substantial rewards.
3 But, if I were really to rouse myself to energy against that party, I would certainly find some means of resisting them. As it is, since there is such an endless controversy between your intimate Dicaearchus and my friend Theophrastus, Dicaearchus giving the preference to a practical life, Theophrastus to a contemplative, I have set my mind on making it clear that I have humoured them both. I take it I have fully satisfied Dicaearchus: now I am turning my eye to the other school, which not only gives me permission to take my ease now, but blames me for ever having done anything else. So, my dear Titus, let me throw myself heart and soul into those excellent studies, and at length seek the home that I ought never to have left.
4 As for your complaints about my brother Quintus' letter, to me, too, it seemed "a lion before, behind" ** - heaven knows what. For the groans in the first lines about his long absence would touch anybody's heart: then afterwards he calms down sufficiently to ask me to touch up and edit his journal. Please pay some attention to the point you mention about the dues on goods transferred from port to port. He says he referred it to the Senate by the advice of his assessors. Evidently he had not read my letter, in which I told him after careful consideration and research that no tax was legally due. If any Greeks have come from Asia to Rome about it, please see them, and, it you think fit, tell them my opinion. If I can recant, I will do as the tax collectors wish, rather than see the good cause worsted in the senate: but, if not, I candidly confess I prefer the interests of the whole of Asia and the merchants, for I feel it is really a matter of great importance to them. I think, however, it is a case of necessity for us. But you will see to it. Are the quaestors, then, still debating about the cistophori? If there is no escape from it in spite of all our efforts, I shouldn't turn up my nose at the Asiatic coins as the last resource. I shall see you at Arpinum, and give you a country welcome, since you have despised this at the seaside.
[17] L { shortly after previous letter }
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
I agree entirely with what you say in your letter. Sampsiceramus is running amok. We may anticipate anything: he is quite clearly setting up a tyranny. What else is the meaning of this sudden marriage-contract, ** of the proposals about the Campanian land, of this reckless expenditure of money? If that were the end of it, it would be disastrous enough: but the nature of the case makes it impossible that this should be the end. These things in themselves cannot possibly give them any pleasure: and they would never have taken this step except as the first to other pernicious acts. But, as you say, we will discuss these questions rationally at Arpinum about the 10th of May, and not prove all the labour and the midnight oil we have spent on our studies wasted by weeping over them.
2 Heaven help us! I derive consolation not so much from hope, as I did formerly, as from a spirit of indifference, which I call to my service especially in civic and political matters. What's more, the little strain of vanity and thirst for fame that there is in me - it is a good thing to recognise one's own faults - even experiences a pleasurable sensation. For the thought that Sampsiceramus' services to the country might in the dim future be reckoned higher than mine, used to prick me to the heart: but now I rest quite easy on that score. He has fallen so low that the (?) fallen Curius in comparison seems to stand erect. But of this when we meet. It seems now as though you will be at Rome when I arrive: for which I shall not be at all sorry, if it is convenient to you. 3 But if you come to see me, as you promise in your note, I wish you would fish out of Theophanes how the Sheikh ** is disposed to me. You will of course use your usual care in inquiring, and will deliver to me a kind of Whole Duty by which to regulate my conduct. From his conversation we shall be able to get an inkling of the entire situation.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
I have received several letters of yours, and from them I see with what tense anxiety you are looking forward to news. We are hemmed in on every side; yet we do not rebel at servitude, fearing death and exile as though they were greater evils, whereas they are really far lesser evils. Yes, that is the position, and though every one groans about it, not a voice is raised to relieve it. The object, I presume, of those who hold the reins is to leave nothing for anyone else to give away. One man only opens his mouth and opposes them publicly, and that is young Curio. The good men cheer him loudly, greet him in the forum with the highest respect, and show their good-will to him in many other ways, while Fufius is pursued with shouts and jeers and hisses. But this raises not one's hope so much as one's disgust at seeing the people's will so free and their courage so enslaved.
2 And, not to enter into details with you, affairs have come to such a pass that there is no hope of ever again having free magistrates, let alone a free people. But in the midst of this tyranny speech is freer than ever, at any rate in clubs and over our cups. Disgust is beginning to conquer fear, though it still leaves the blankest despair everywhere. The Campanian law goes so far as to impose upon candidates a formula of curse upon themselves if they propose any different occupation of the land to that laid down by the Julian laws, to be used by them in their speech as candidates. The others showed no compunction in taking the oath: but Laterensis is thought a hero because he threw up his candidature for the tribunate rather than take it.
3 I have no heart to write more about politics. I am disgusted with myself and it is agony to me to write. I stand my ground without losing self-respect considering the universal servility, but with less courage than I could wish considering my past record. Caesar most liberally invites me to take a place on his personal staff: and I even have an offer of a free commission ** nominally to fulfil a vow. But it is hardly safe to trust to Beauty's decency to that extent. Besides it would mean that I should not be here for my brother's return. The other post is much safer, and does not prevent me from being here when I wish. The commission I have, but I don't think I shall use it. No one knows of it however. I don't want to run away; I long to fight. I have plenty of ardent admirers. But I won't take my oath on anything, and please don't mention what I've said.
4 I am much distressed about the manumission of Statius and some other things, but I've become thick-skinned by now. I wish you were here, I long for it. I should no longer feel the lack of advice or consolation. However, hold yourself ready to come quickly, if I call for you.
[19] L { between 7 and 14 July 59 }
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
I have many causes for anxiety, both from the troubled state of the constitution and from the innumerable personal dangers which threaten me. But nothing annoys me more than Statius' manumission:
"That my authority - nay, I let that be -
That my displeasure should be counted nought!" **
But what I am to do, I don't know; and the matter is more talk than anything. I can never be angry with those I really love: I can only feel sorrow, and very deep sorrow too. My other cares are for important matters. Clodius' threats and the struggle I have to face do not affect me much: for I think I can face the music with dignity or avoid the danger without unpleasantness. Perhaps you will say: "Hang dignity. It's prehistoric. ** For mercy's sake look after your safety," Alas! Why aren't you here? You would notice everything: while I perhaps am blinded by my passion for high ideals. 2 Nothing was ever so scandalous, so disgraceful, and so objectionable to every rank and class of men young or old as this present state of affairs, far more so than I expected, indeed upon my soul it is more so than I could wish. The populares have taught even the moderate men to hiss. Bibulus is exalted to the sky, though I don't know why. However he is as much praised as though
"His wise delay alone did save the state." **
To my infinite sorrow, my beloved Pompey has shattered his own reputation. They have no hold on anyone by affection: and I am afraid they may find it necessary to try the effect of fear. I do not quarrel with them on account of my friendship for him, though I refrain from showing approval not to stultify all my previous actions. I keep to the high-road. 3 The popular feeling can be seen best in the theatre and at public exhibitions. For at the gladiatorial show both the leader and his associates were overwhelmed with hisses: at the games in honour of Apollo the actor Diphilus made an impertinent attack on Pompey, "By our misfortunes thou art Great," which was encored again and again. "A time will come when you will rue that might" he declaimed amid the cheers of the whole audience, and so on with the rest. For indeed the verses do look as though they had been written for the occasion by an enemy of Pompey: "If neither law nor custom can constrain," etc. was received with a tremendous uproar and outcry. At Caesar's entry the applause dwindled away; but young Curio who followed was applauded as Pompey used to be when the constitution was still sound. Caesar was much annoyed: and it is said a letter flew post haste to Pompey at Capua.
They are annoyed with the knights who stood up and clapped Curio, and their hand is against every man's. They are threatening the Roscian law and even the corn law. Things are in a most disturbed condition. I used to think it would be best silently to ignore their doings, but I am afraid that will be impossible. The public cannot put up with things, and yet it looks as though they would have to put up with them. The whole people speak now with one voice, but the unanimity has no foundation but common hate.
4 Anyhow our friend Publius is threatening me and making hostile advances: there is trouble ahead, and you must fly to the rescue. I think I have at my back the same firm bodyguard of all the sound men and even the moderately sound, as I had in my consulship. The affection Pompey shows me is more than ordinary. He declares Clodius will not say a word against me: but there he is deceiving himself not me. I have been asked to fill Cosconius' place ** now he is dead. That would be stepping into a dead man's shoes, with a vengeance! I should disgrace myself utterly in the world's eyes: and nothing could be more opposed to the state of safety you keep talking of. For that board is unpopular with the good men, and so I should keep my unpopularity with the unscrupulous men and take up another's burden too. Caesar wants me to go as his legate.
5 That would be a more honourable way of getting out of danger. But I don't want to shirk it, for the very good reason that I prefer fighting. However nothing is settled, I repeat, I wish you were here. However, if it is necessary. I will send for you. Anything else? One thing, I think: I am sure the country is lost. It is no use mincing words any longer. However I have written this in a hurry, and, I may say, in a fright too. Some time I will give you a clear account, if I find a very trusty messenger; or, if I veil my meaning, you will manage to understand it. In these letters I will call myself Laelius and you Furius: and convey the rest in riddles. Here I am cultivating Caecilius and paying him elaborate attention. I hear Bibulus' edicts have been sent to you. Pompey is blazing with wrath and indignation at them.
[20] L { mid-July 59 } I have done all I could for Anicatus, knowing you wanted me to do so, and have willingly adopted Numestius as a friend on the strength of the earnest recommendation in your letter. To Caecilius I take care to pay every suitable attention. Varro is as good as I can expect; and Pompey shows me friendship and affection. Can I believe him, you ask. I do believe him; he quite convinces me. But since men of the world are always advising one in their histories and precepts and even in their verses to beware and forbidding one to believe, I do the one and beware, but to the other - not to believe - I cannot persuade myself.
2 Clodius is still threatening me with danger, while Pompey asserts that there is no danger. He swears it, adding even that he will not see me injured if it costs him his life. The point is under negotiation: as soon as any certain conclusion is reached, I will write to you. If I have to fight, I will summon you to share my labour: but if I am left in peace, I will not summon you out of your Amalthea.
3 Political matters I shall only touch on briefly: for I am beginning to be afraid that the very paper may betray me. So in future, if I have to write in fuller detail to you, I shall hide my meaning under covert language. Now the State is dying of a new disease. The measures that have been passed cause universal discontent and grumbling and indignation: there is no disagreement on the point and people are now venting their opinion and their disapproval openly and loudly, yet no remedy is applied. Resistance seems impossible without bloodshed: nor can we see any other end to concession except destruction. 4 Bibulus is exalted to the skies amid universal admiration and popularity. His edicts and speeches are copied out and read. He has attained the height of glory in quite a novel way. Nothing is so popular now as hatred of the populares.
5 I have my fears about the issue of all this. But I will write more clearly, if I get any definite views. Do you, if your affection for me is as real as I know it to be, hold yourself ready to run to my call, when it comes. But I am doing my best, and will continue to do it, to prevent any necessity. I said I would call you Furius in my letters, but there is no need to alter your name. I will call myself Laelius and you Atticus, and I won't use my own handwriting or seal, at any rate if the letters are such that I should not like them to fall into a stranger's hands.
6 Diodotus is dead: he left me about 100,000 sesterces. Bibulus has written a scathing edict putting off the elections till the 18th of October. I have received the books from Vibius: he is a wretched poet, ** and indeed has nothing in him; still he is of some use to me. I am going to copy the work out and send it back.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
To enter into details about politics would be superfluous. The whole country has gone to rack and ruin: and affairs are in one respect worse than when you left. Then it looked as though we were oppressed with a tyranny which was popular with the lower classes, and, though annoying to the upper, still comparatively harmless: but now it has become suddenly so universally detested that I tremble for the issue. For we have had an experience of the wrath and recklessness of these men, and in their indignation with Cato, they have ruined the state. The poisons they used seemed to be so slow that I thought we could die painlessly. But now I am afraid they have been roused to energy by the hisses of the crowd, the talk of the honourable men, and the murmurs of Italy.
2 I had hopes, as I used often to say to you, that the wheel of state had turned so smoothly that we could scarcely catch the sound of its motion, and scarcely see the track of its path: and that is what would have happened, if people could only have waited for the storm to pass. But for a while they stifled their sighs; then they began to groan aloud; and finally all set about airing their grievances at the top of their voices. 3 And so our friend, ** being unused to unpopularity, and having always lived in an atmosphere of flattery and glory, disfigured in person and broken in spirit, does not know what to do with himself: he sees that to advance is dangerous, to retreat a confession of weakness: the respectable parties are his enemies, the very riff-raff not his friends.
Yet see how soft-hearted I am. I could not restrain my tears, when I saw him on the 25th of July delivering a speech on the subject of the edicts of Bibulus. He used to carry himself with such a lofty bearing, enjoying unbounded popularity and universal respect: and now, how humble he was, how cast down, and what discontent he aroused in himself as well as in his hearers! 4 What a sight! Crassus may have enjoyed it, but no one else. For seeing that he had fallen from the stars, one could not but attribute his swift descent to accident rather than to voluntary motion. And, just as Apelles or Protogenes, if they had seen their Venus or Ialysus smeared with mud, would, I imagine, have been cut to the heart, so I myself could not but feel poignant grief at seeing the idol on whose adornment I had lavished all the colours of my art suddenly disfigured. For though no one looked on it as my duty to retain my friendship with him after the Clodian affair, my affection for him was such that no slight could extinguish it. The result, is that now Bibulus' scathing ** edicts against him are so popular, that one can't pass the place where they are posted up for the crowd of people reading them. Pompey finds them so distressing that he is wasting away with grief; and I myself am much annoyed with them, partly because they cause so much pain to a man whom I have always loved, and partly for fear that being so impulsive and ready to draw the sword, as well as so unused to abuse, he may give full reins to his indignation and wrath.
5 I don't know what will be the end of Bibulus. As things stand at present his reputation is extraordinarily high. When he put off the elections till October, which generally annoys the populace, Caesar thought he could induce the people by a speech to attack Bibulus: but in spite of all his seditious talk, he could not wring a word out of anybody. In short they feel that they have lost the good-will of all parties: and so violent action on their part is all the more to be feared. 6 Clodius is hostile to me. Pompey assures me he will do nothing against me: but I am afraid to trust him and am getting ready for resistance. I hope I shall have very strong support from all classes. For your presence I have a longing myself and circumstances call for it to meet the crisis. If I see you in time, I shall feel it a great accession to my policy, my courage and my safety. Varro is very obliging; and Pompey talks like an angel. I hope that in the end I shall either be certain of a glorious victory, or even escape unmolested. Let me know what you are doing, how you are enjoying yourself, and what has happened as regards the Sicyonians.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
How I wish you were in town! You would certainly have stayed, if we had thought this was going to happen. For then we could have easily kept that little Beauty in order or at any rate should have known what he was going to do. As it is he flits about in a frenzy and doesn't know what he is doing; he threatens lots of people, but will probably do whatever turns up. When he sees the general abhorrence of the present state of affairs he seems to meditate an attack on the authors of it; but when he remembers the armed force behind them, he turns his wrath against the good men. As for me, he threatens me now with brute force, and now with a prosecution. 2 Pompey spoke to him about it, and according to his own account - for he is the only witness I have - he remonstrated strongly with him, saying that he would become a byword for treachery and underhandedness, if my life were threatened by one whose weapons he himself had forged by acquiescing in his transference to the plebs: that both he and Appius had pledged their word for me: and that, unless Clodius respected their promise, he would be so annoyed that he would make it plain to the world that he prized my friendship beyond everything. He declared that after he had said this and much more to the same effect, Clodius at first persisted in arguing the point at length, but finally gave way and promised he would not do anything to offend him. Since then, however, he has not ceased to speak very unpleasantly about me: but, even if he did not, I should not believe him and should continue the preparations which I am making.
3 At the present time I am managing things so that my popularity and the strength of my position increases daily. Politics I am not touching at all, but am busily engaged in the law courts and in my other forensic work: and thereby I find I win extraordinary favour not only with those who enjoy my services, but with the people in general too. My house is thronged with folk; processions meet me; the days of my consulship are recalled; friendships are not disguised: and my hopes are so raised that I often think there is no reason for me to shrink from the struggle which threatens.
4 What I want now is your advice and your affection and loyalty: so fly to me. It will simplify everything, if I have you with me. Varro can render me many services, but they would be far surer if you were here to support them: a great deal of information can be extracted from Publius himself, and a great deal found out, which could not possibly be kept from your ears: besides a great deal more - but it is absurd to specify details, when I want you for everything. 5 The one point I want you to grasp is that the mere sight of you would simplify everything for me; but it all depends on your coming before he enters on his office. I think that, though Crassus is egging on Pompey, if you were here and could find out from the enemy through Juno how far the great men are to be trusted, I should either escape molestation altogether or at any rate I should no longer be in a fog. There is no need of prayers and exhortations between you and me: you know what I wish and what the gravity of the occasion demands. 6 I have no political news except that the present masters of the world have the world's hatred: and yet there is no hope of a change. But, as you can easily imagine, Pompey is disgusted and heartily sick of it all. I can't see what the end of it will be, but I am pretty sure there will be an explosion of some sort.
7 I have sent back the works of Alexander, who is a careless writer and not much of a poet: still there is some use in him. Numerius Numestius I have admitted to my friendship with pleasure and find he has plenty of sober good sense and is quite worthy of your recommendation.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
I don't think you ever before read a letter of mine which I had not written myself. That will show you how I am plagued to death by business. As I haven't a moment to spare, and must take some exercise to refresh my poor voice, I am dictating this as I walk.
2 Well, the first thing I have to tell you, is that our friend Sampsiceramus is heartily sick of his position and wants to be restored to the place from which he fell. He confides his sorrows to me, and at times openly looks for a remedy; but for the life of me I cannot find any. Secondly, the whole of that party, both the principals and their followers, are losing their strength, though no one opposes them; and there never was a greater unanimity of sentiment or of the popular expression of it than there is now.
3 As for me - for I am sure you want to hear about myself - I take no part in public deliberations and devote myself entirely to my law-court practice, which arouses, as you can easily conceive, many a memory of my past achievements and much regret for them. But our dear Juno's brother is venting most alarming threats and, though he denies them to Sampsiceramus, he openly parades them to others. So, if your affection is as real as I know it is, wake up, if you are sleeping, start moving, if you are standing still, run, if you are moving, and fly, if you are running. I set greater store than you can possibly believe by your advice and your wisdom, and, what is still more, by your love and your loyalty. The importance of the theme would perhaps demand a long disquisition; but our hearts are so united that a word is enough. It is of the highest importance to me that you should be in Rome after the elections, if you can't get here before them. Take care of yourself.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
In the letter I gave to Numestius I made a most urgent and pressing appeal to you to come. To the speed that I then implored add something, if you possibly can. And don't be alarmed (for I know you and don't forget that to love "It is to be all made of sighs and tears"): the matter I hope is one that will not be so troublesome at the end as at the beginning.
2 That fellow Vettius, my famous informer, promised Caesar, so far as we can see, that he would get some criminal suspicion thrown on young Curio. So he wormed his way into intimacy with the young man and after meeting him often, as events prove, he went so far as to declare that he was determined to make an attack on Pompey with the assistance of his slaves, and to slay him. Curio told his father of this, and he told Pompey. The affair was reported to the Senate. Vettius was summoned before them and at first denied that he had ever had an appointment with Curio. However he did not stick to that tale for long; but at once asked to give state evidence. Amid cries of "no," he began to explain that there had been a confederacy of the younger men under the leadership of Curio, to which Paulus at first belonged and Q. Caepio, Brutus I mean, and Lentulus, the flamen's son, with his father's consent; and then that C. Septimius, Bibulus' secretary, had brought him a dagger from Bibulus. The idea of Vettius not having a dagger, unless the consul gave him one, and the rest of it, was too much for anybody's belief: and the charge was scorned the more because Bibulus had warned Pompey on the 13th of May to be on his guard against plots; and Pompey had thanked him for the advice.
3 Young Curio was brought in and repelled Vettius' assertions: and the point for which Vettius was especially blamed was saying that the young men's intention was to attack Pompey in the forum at the gladiatorial show which Gabinius gave, and that Paulus was to be the leader, when it was well known that he was in Macedonia at the time. The senate decreed that Vettius should be committed on his own confession of having carried a weapon; and that it should be high treason to release him. The view most generally held is that it was a put up job: Vettius was to be discovered in the forum with a dagger and his slaves round him with weapons, and then he was to turn king's evidence: and it would have come off, if the Curios had not reported the matter to Pompey. Then the senatorial decree was read aloud to an assembly. On the next day, however, Caesar, the man who as praetor some years ago had bidden Q. Catulus speak from the floor, brought Vettius out on the rostra, and set him in a place which was beyond Bibulus' aspiration, though a consul. Here he said anything he liked about public affairs; and, as he had come ready primed and tutored, he omitted all mention of Caepio, though he had named him most emphatically in the senate: so it was obvious that a night and a nocturnal appeal had intervened. Then he mentioned people on whom he had not cast the slightest suspicion in the senate, - L. Lucullus, who, he said, generally used to send to him C. Fannius, the man who once supported a prosecution of P. Clodius, and L. Domitius, whose house was to be the basis of operations. My name he did not mention, but he said that an eloquent ex-consul, a neighbour of the consul, had remarked to him that we stood in need of a Servilius Ahala or a Brutus. He added at the end, when he had been called back by Vatinius after the assembly was dismissed, that he had heard from Curio that Piso, my son-in-law, was in the plot, and M. Laterensis too.
4 Now Vettius is on trial for violence before Crassus Dives, and, when he is condemned, he will claim to give state evidence. If he is successful there may very well be some prosecutions. Of that - though to be sure I never despise anything - I'm not much afraid. Everybody is showing me the greatest kindness; but I am sick of life; the whole world is so thoroughly out of joint. Just lately we were afraid of a massacre, but it was averted by a speech of that gallant old man Q. Considius: ** and now the disaster of which we had been in daily fear has suddenly happened. In fact, nothing could be more deplorable than my situation, nothing more enviable than that of Catulus, considering his glorious life and his timely end. However, I keep up my heart in spite of my misfortunes, and I'm not at all disconcerted, and, with an exercise of caution, I maintain my position and authority with honour.
5 Pompey tells me to have no fear of Clodius, and shows me the greatest good-will whenever he speaks. I am longing to have you to advise my actions, to be the partner of my anxieties, to share my every thought. So I have commissioned Numestius to plead with you, and now add, if possible, even more urgent prayers of my own, that you really fly to me. I shall breathe again when I see you.
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
When I write to you praising any of your friends, I wish you would let them know I have done so. For example, I mentioned in a letter lately Varro's kindness to me, and you answered that you were delighted to hear it. But I had much rather you had written to him saying he was doing all I wished - not that he was, but to make him do it. For, as you know, he is an odd creature, "all tortuous thoughts and no - ". ** But I hold to the maxim, "A great man's follies." ** However, your other friend, Hortalus, most certainly lauded me to the skies in the most liberal, open-hearted and elaborate manner, when he was delivering a speech on Flaccus' praetorship and that incident of the Allobroges. ** You may take my word for it that he could not have expressed himself in more affectionate and laudatory terms, nor more fully. I should much like you to write and tell him that I sent you word of it. 2 But I hope you won't have to write, and are now on your way and quite close after the appeals in my former letter. I am eagerly looking out for you, and in sore need of you: and circumstances and the times call for you as much as I do.
On these affairs I have nothing new to say: the country is in the most desperate position possible, and nothing could exceed the unpopularity of those who are responsible for it. I myself, as I think, hope and imagine, am safeguarded by the staunchest support. So hasten your coming: you will either relieve all my cares or share them with me. If I am rather brief, it is because I hope that I may soon be able to discuss anything I wish with you face to face. Take care of yourself.
Book 3 →
1. P. Clodius Pulcher.
2. A reference to Clodius' alibi in the Bona Dea trial, which was refuted by Cicero.
3. Cicero, as a former quaestor in Sicily and prosecutor of Verres, was a patron of the island.
4. Clodia, later called 'Ox-Eyes' (Juno), who was married to the consul Metellus Celer. Clodius was supposed to have incestuous relations with her.
5. Possibly "among the dregs of [the city] of Romulus"; but Plutarch's translation of the phrase (Phoc.3), is against that rendering.
6. Metellus Celer had bee taken to prison by the tribune Flavius for obstructing his agrarian bill.
7. A translation of Aratus' Diosēmeia.
8. Probably as medicine for young Quintus.
9. Obviously a nickname for Pompey, and, in view of the next sentence, the name of Iphicrates, who invented a military boot, seems more likely than Epicrates, which would mean "our influential friend."
10. A play on the title of Xenophon's book the Cyropaedeia and the name of Cicero's architect.
11. Democritus and the Epicureans held that sight resulted from the incidence of images cast by external things upon the eyes. The view supported by Cicero, that it resulted
12. Caesar's first agrarian bill, which he put to the senate early in his consulship, mainly to find land for Pompey's veterans.
13. On his consulship.
14. Homer, Iliad 12.243
15. Metrodorus of Scepsus was sent by Mithridates to urge Tigranes to wage war with Rome, but privately spoke against it. He was therefore put to death by Mithridates.
16. Clodius, on account of his intrusion into the mysteries of Bona Dea.
17. Cicero was expecting to be offered an appointment as special envoy to Ptolemy XII of Egypt.
18. Homer, Iliad 6.442
19. Homer, Iliad 22.100
20. A vacancy in the college of augurs had been created by the death of Metellus Celer.
21. The commission set up by Caesar to supervise land distribution.
22. The cistophorus was an Asiatic coin, of which Pompey had deposited a large quantity in the treasury. Apparently there was some idea of using them for paying Quintus
23. Ptolemy XII owed vast sums to Roman creditors, and the envoy would unofficially have the lucrative job of collecting it.
24. A quotation from Lucilius.
25. The bay of Naples, where Cicero's Pompeian villa was.
26. Clodia.
27. Pompey, who captured Jerusalem in 63 B.C. As augur he had assisted in Clodius' adoption.
28. Cicero himself.
29. Homer, Iliad 24.369
30. Homer, Od. 9.27
31. Juno = Clodia, while it is probably Sex. Clodius who is referred to as Athenio. Athenio was one of the leaders in the insurrection of slaves in Sicily 103-101 B.C.
32. Cicero puns on the name Dicaearchus (= "just ruler").
33. Homer, Od. 10.81
34. Ruler of a principality in Syria, hence a nickname for Pompey.
35. A tax on manumitted slaves.
36. A quotation from Sophocles.
37. Homer, Iliad vi, 181
38. The marriage of Pompey with Caesar's daughter.
39. Pompey.
40. The libera legatio was a pseudo-embassy at state expense, granted to senators who wished to pay a vow, receive an inheritance, or exact a debt.
41. Terence, Phormio 232
42. Lit. "enough of the oak," a proverb alluding to a supposed acorn diet in the days before the use of corn was discovered.
43. A quotation from Ennius, speaking of Q. Fabius Maximus.
44. As one of the twenty commissioners for the distribution of public land.
45. Not Vibius himself, but Alexander of Ephesus, author of a Cosmographia; see the end of letter 2.22.
46. Pompey.
47. Lit. 'Archilochian'. Archilochus was a Greek poet of Paros, who wrote scathing iambic verses.
48. Considius told Caesar that he did not stay away like the other senators, who were afraid for their lives, "because old age makes me fearless."
49. Euripides, Andr. 448.
50. Euripides, Phoen. 393.
51. As praetor in 63, Flaccus and a colleague had arrested some Allobrogian envoys who were in communication with the Catilinarians, on Cicero's instructions.
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