It is probable that Cicero is the greatest of all letter-writers. The importance of his matter, the range of his public and private interests, the variety of his moods, his facility in expressing every shade of sense and feeling, the aptness of his quotations, above all his spontaneity, have never in combination been excelled or equalled.
J. A. K. THOMSON (1956)
From the pen or (more often) dictation of Cicero more than 800 letters, dealing with an enormous variety of subjects, have come down to us. Since ninetenths of these letters were not intended for publication, they give an astonishingly frank and authentic picture of their writer’s character: he was not only an indefatigable correspondent, but uniquely articulate about himself. ‘I saw a complete picture of you in your letter,’ says his brother Quintus, and Cicero’s own comment is: ‘a letter does not blush’. His talent for self-revelation means that we know more about him than about any other ancient personage, and almost more than about any other historical or literary figure of any date whatsoever. Furthermore, these letters are our principal – very often our only – source of knowledge for the events of this decisive period in the history of civilization.1
In the form in which we possess them, there are sixteen hooks (each containing numerous letters) addressed to Cicero’s friend Atticus, sixteen containing letters to other correspondents (Ad Familiares, ‘To his Friends’), three to his brother Quintus, two to Brutus; some thirty-five other books of his letters seem to have been known in antiquity but have not survived. Cicero often sent people copies of letters which he had received from others, and this fortunate habit has preserved go letters from his various correspondents; a few of them will be included here. But his prolonged exchange with Atticus, this ‘conversation between the two of us’, has come down in one-sided shape: ‘I talk to you as I do to myself he is assured by Cicero, who ’so as not to miss a day’ would compose him a note even when there was nothing to tell, and sometimes wrote him three letters within twelve hours. Atticus, on the other hand -who survived him and by no means shared his desire for self-revelation – ensured that his own replies (other than a few tantalizing extracts and echoes) should not appear in the collection. However, he and the orator’s secretary Tiro (p. 75) preserved Cicero’s own letters for posterity, and at least half were published while the secretary and Atticus were still alive.
The remarkable abundance and variety of the letters that such men sent to one another bear witness to a society which, now extending unbroken over an enormous area, depended largely upon written communication. There was not yet a regular postal service, but leading Romans entrusted their letters to travellers or employed their own couriers, who could cover fifty miles a day (two letters written by Caesar in Britain to Cicero took twenty-six and twenty-eight days to arrive). Letters were normally written with reed pen and ink on papyrus; the pages were pasted together to form a roll, which was then tied with thread and sealed. But there were also many briefly scribbled notes, and these were scratched with a metal stilus on wax-covered folding tablets which the recipient could erase in order to reply on the same wax.
The earliest of our surviving letters of Cicero dates from 68 B.C., the thirty-eighth year of his life, two years after his successful prosecution of the corrupt governor of Sicily, Gaius Verres (Chapter 1). Then, in 63 B.C., he attained the climax of the Republican hierarchy, the consulship. That was an outstanding achievement, at this time, for a man from a small-town family which had never even produced any Senators, much less a consul; nobody without Senators among his ancestry had been consul for the past thirty years. Yet Cicero became consul, and while holding that office, by intense political activity, inspired amateur espionage, and brilliant speech-making, he achieved what he was always to regard as the greatest of his services to Rome1 the unmasking and suppression of the conspiracy which the savage, impoverished, aristocratic anarchist Catiline was about to launch against the Republican regime. The first of his Catilinarian Orations compelled the chief conspirator to flee from Rome; soon afterwards he was cornered near Pistoria, and died fighting. But before that Cicero had arrested five of Catiline’s principal supporters – after they had been implicated in the plot by information received from Gaulish visitors to Rome and had caused them to be executed without trial. Now, before this was done, the Senate had agreed to the executions; they were chiefly prompted to do so by the austere, crafty, hard-drinking Stoic Cato, whose rigorous Republican principles caused the historian Sallust to regard him, with Caesar (who opposed him on this occasion), as the greatest man of his age1 Yet in spite of the Senate’s sanction a problem which was to cloud Cicero’s future was whether his action had been legally justifiable. There had, it is true, been a declaration of emergency; but did its vague terms, or any actual or threatened collapse of public order, warrant so extreme a measure as executions without trial?
It can still be argued either way. Certainly Cicero, in spite of his hesitant nature, acted with resolution in dealing, as consul, with a crisis: at least, he saved the state from fairly grave embarrassment. But as we can now see with the unfair advantage, denied to Cicero at the time, of knowing what was going to happen next – an old-fashioned demagogic wild man like Catiline was by no means such a serious threat to the Republic and the Senate as were the great military commanders who, glorified by military victories, gathered round themselves armies and gangs of civilian dependants inspired by stronger allegiance to their leaders than to the government. At the time of Cicero’s success against Catiline, one of the greatest of these commanders, Pompey, was shortly to return to Italy and to the political scene.
Arrogant, shifty, and aloof, but with no autocratic intentions, Pompey was about to come back from the East, after winning unprecedented victories. These had brought Rome vast accessions of territory in Asia Minor, Syria, and Crete, as well as a host of new dependent allies, a huge influx of treasure and revenue, and a state of peace with which the Mediterranean area was wholly unfamiliar.
Cicero, however, chose in this and other letters to dwell rather on his own services in rescuing the country from Catiline: in the words of his notorious verse:
How fortunate a natal day was thine
In that late consulate, O Rome, of mine!
And he requested a contemporary historian, Lucceius, to gild the lily and employ the laudatory methods of the traditional encomium in describing his achievements.2 This emphasis was prompted not only by vanity but by the need to secure influential recognition so that his execution of Catiline’s asso dates should not be treated as illegal. Pompey had already indicated in practical fashion that this distribution of the applause failed to satisfy him, for he had recently dispatched to Rome a representative, Quintus Metellus Nepos member of the dominant family of the Caedlii – who vetoed Cicero’s farewell speech as consul and introduced a critical Bill in the Assembly before being compelled to withdraw from the capital.
‘As a rule,’ remarked a cynical young commentator Marcus Caelius Rufus (p. 74), ‘Pompey thinks one thing and says another, and yet is not quite clever enough to conceal his wishes.’ But now he was returning in ominous silence. It is interesting to contrast Cicero’s present disappointment with his later assurance that Pompey had warmly applauded his handling of the Catilinarian crisis (p. 108).
TO POMPEY, IN ASIA MINOR
Rome, summer 62 B.C.
Like everybody else I was delighted with your official dispatch. It held out the confident expectation of peace which I have always forecast to everyone because I rely on you so completely. I have to tell you that your new friends,1 who used to be your enemies, were really shattered by what you wrote, and prostrated with disappointment at the collapse of their high hopes.
I can only assure you that your private letter to me was also welcome – although it only contained a slender indication of your regard for myself. However, what pleases me most in the world is feeling that I have done the right thing by other people, and if on any occasion I do not receive the same return I am perfectly satisfied that the balance of services rendered should be on my side. Besides, even if my unremitting efforts on your behalf have not altogether succeeded in attaching you to me, I am convinced that our country’s needs will bring us together and make us close associates.
All the same, I do want you to know what I missed in your letter. I shall explain to you openly what I have in mind – my character and our friendship being what they are, I cannot do otherwise. I have achieved things for which I had hoped, in view of our relationship and the national interest, to find some word of congratulation in your letter. I expect you left it out in case you should cause someone2 offence. But I must tell you that the reaction to what I did to save our country has been universally favourable. When you come home you will, I know, realize that what I did was brave, as well as wise; and so I am confident that you will be happy to let me join you as a political ally as well as a friend – you being so much greater than Scipio Aemilianus, and myself not much inferior to Laelius! (Fam. V, 7)1
*
The years 60 and 59 B.C. constitute a decisive stage in the break-up of the Republic and the removal of the great families, and the Senate, from the control of events. For the three strongest men of the day, Pompey, Caesar, and Crassus, now came to an unofficial understanding, known to us as the First Triumvirate, by which they took it upon themselves to make every important decision working together and employing their power to reduce the Republican institutions to subservience. Pompey was impelled to take this step by a series of unwise rebuffs from the senatorial leaders. Caesar, established now (in his early 40s) in Roman politics but with his military genius scarcely tested by a recent post in Spain, was prepared to do almost anything in return for two offices, which through Pompey’s influence he now obtained: a consulship (50, B.C.) and the subsequent command which resulted in the conquest of Gaul and his Commentaries on the Gallic War. He gave his daughter Julia in marriage to Pompey (and it proved an excellent match, for Pompey, like Caesar, was capable of attracting the love of women). Crassus, for whom Cicero always felt a strong distaste, was brought into the Triumvirate because of his enormous wealth: ‘nobody should be called rich,’ he once remarked, ‘who cannot keep an army on his income.2
Cicero was told by Pompey that he, Pompey, disliked the Triumvirate -but by Caesar that he, Cicero, ought to join it: the Triumvirs could find uses for his persuasive oratory and the weight which his opinion carried in the townships of Italy. In the end, however, Cicero refused, unable to acquiesce in an arrangement which made such a mockery of his ambition to combine Senate and knights in a dominant ‘Harmony between the Orders’ as effective co-rulers of the empire.
TO ATTICUS,
ON HIS WAY TO EPIRUS
Rome, June or July 59 B.C.
I have received several letters from you, and they gave me an idea of the anxious suspense with which you are waiting for news. Every single outlet is blocked to us. And yet far from refusing to be slaves we fear death or exile as greater evils than slavery, when they are really much smaller ones. That is how things are; everyone groans about the situation, and not a voice is raised to suggest remedies for it.
What those in charge have in mind, I suspect, is to make sure that there is nothing left which anyone else besides themselves might be able to offer as a bribe! Only one man opens his mouth and speaks against them publicly and that is young Curio.1 Rightminded people give him tremendous applause and a highly respectful reception in the Forum as well as a great many other signs of goodwill. Fufius,2; on the other hand, they pursue with shouts and insults and hisses. But this inspires distress rather than confidence, when you see that the people are free enough in their feelings, while their capacity for courageous action, on the other hand, is muzzled. Do not ask me to go into details, but in general things have come to this: there can be no hope of either private individuals or even state officials being free for much longer.
Yet amid all this oppression there is more free speech than ever, at any rate at social gatherings and parties. Indeed, people’s indignation is beginning to outweigh their fright; though on all sides there is nothing but utter despair. The Campanian Law3 ordains that candidates for official posts put themselves under a curse if their election speeches make any mention of land being occupied on different terms from those laid down by Caesar’s legislation. Everyone else took this oath without hesitation, but Juventius Laterensis4 abandoned his candidature for the tribuneship rather than swear it – and he is regarded as having done a very fine thing.
I cannot bear to write any more about politics. I am disgusted with myself and find writing about it extremely painful. Considering how crushed everyone is, I manage to carry on without actual humiliation, yet without the courage I should have hoped for from myself in the light of my past achievements. Caesar very generously proposes that I should join his staff. He also offers to send me on a mission at state expense,1 nominally to fulfil a vow. But the decent instincts of sweet Clodius2 hardly suggest that this would be secure, and it would mean I was away from Rome when my brother3 comes back. The other job, on Caesar’s staff, is safe, and would not prevent me from being here whenever I want to -1 am keeping the offer in reserve, but do not think I shall use it. I do not know what to do. I hate the idea of running away. I long to fight and have a lot of enthusiastic supporters. But I make no promises, and please say nothing about it.
I am distressed about the freeing of Statius and a number of other things, but I have become thoroughly thick-skinned by now. I wish you were here -1 long for you to be. Then I should not feel so short of advice and consolation. Hold yourself ready to fly to me if I call for you.
(Att. II, 18)
*
After Cicero had declined to associate himself with the New Order, the Triumvirs in their turn – including, to his great disappointment, Pompey -proved unwilling or unable to save him from his enemies and from the consequences of his elimination of Catiline’s supporters (p. 60). The young political gangster, Publius Clodius, of a great family with a traditional tastes’ encanailler, revenged a personal grudge against Cicero4 by securing the passage of a law punishing by exile or execution anyone who should condemn, or had condemned, a Roman citizen to death without trial. Cicero fled from the capital, and was shortly afterwards sentenced to exile, his residence to be not less than 500 miles from the city. He left for Greece; his property at Rome was confiscated, and his house destroyed.
In the years to come Cicero’s relations with his wife Terentia gradually became colder – he found her too independent financially (accusing her of ruining him for her own profit), and she may also have wished him to show greater tolerance of Caesar; he therefore divorced her in 46 B.C. Though he appreciated a literary lady-friend, Caerellia (from whom he borrowed money), he was not very interested in sex. ‘The fact is, that sort of thing never had much attraction for me when I was a young man, much less now that I am old’ When, after the failure of a further marriage (p. 86), the general and writer Aulus Hirtius offered him his sister, Cicero declined on the grounds that it was difficult to deal with a wife and philosophy at the same time.
TO HIS WIFE TERENTIA,
HIS DAUGHTER TULLIA,
AND HIS SON MARCUS
Thessalonica, November 58 B.C.
Many people write to me and everybody tells me about how unbelievably brave and strong you are being, Terentia, and about how you are refusing to allow your troubles either of mind or of body to exhaust you. How unhappy it makes me that you with your courage, loyalty, honesty, and kindness should have suffered all these miseries because of me! And that our darling daughter Tullia has been plunged into such wretchedness because of her father who used to give her so many pleasures! And what can I say about our son, Marcus, who from the very moment when he began to be aware of things has known the bitterest griefs and sorrows?1
If I could only believe that fate alone is responsible for all that has happened, as you say in your letter, I would bear it a little more easily. But it is all my own fault! I thought people loved me when they were really jealous of me, and as for those who did want me, I refused to join them. If only I had acted upon my own judgement, and been less influenced by the advice of friends who were misguided and advisers who were unscrupulous, my life would now be a happy one.
As it is, since my friends tell me there is reason to hope, I will see that my health does not let your efforts down. I understand what a problem it is; also how much easier it was for you to stay at home than to go back. All the same, if we can rely on all the tribunes, and on Lentulus1 being as friendly as he seems to be, and above all on Pompey and Caesar, there is no need to despair.
About our slaves, I shall do as you say in your letter that our friends have advised. As regards this place, the epidemic has now finished, and while it lasted I did not catch it. Plancius2 is most helpful; he wants me to be with him and is still keeping me. I should have preferred to be somewhere less frequented – in Epirus, out of the reach of Lucius Piso3 and his soldiers – but Plancius insists on my staying; he hopes we may be able to leave for Italy together. If I ever see that day, and come into your arms, and get you all back as well as myself, then indeed I shall really feel that our loyalty to one another has been rewarded!
Gaius Piso4 is as kind and good and affectionate to all of us as any man possibly could be. I only hope he will derive some pleasure from it! That he will feel proud of what he has done I know. On the subject of my brother Quintus: I am not criticizing you, but I do hope you will all be as close as possible to each other, especially as there are so few of you
I have written to thank the people you wanted me to, and I let them know that it was you who told me. My Terentia, you write that you are going to sell your block of flats5 But oh dear, in that case, I ask you, what is going to happen? And if our disasters continue, what on earth will become of our unfortunate boy? I cannot write about the rest of it – my tears would get the better of me, and I do not want to reduce you to the same condition. I only say this: if our friends remain true to us, there will be no lack of money. If they do not, you will in any case not be able, with your own money, to achieve what we are after. Do, in the name of our unhappy fortunes, make sure that we do not ruin our already ruined boy still further. If he has enough to keep him from actual want, he only needs a fair share of good qualities and a fair share of luck, and he will be able to get the rest for himself.
Keep well, and send me messengers so that I know how things are going and how you are all getting on. In any case I do not have long to wait now. Give my love to darling Tullia and Marcus. Goodbye.
(Fam. XIV, 1)
Dyrrhachium, 25 November
I have come to Dyrrhachium because it is a free state and very friendly to me, as well as being the nearest point to Italy. But if I find it undesirably crowded I shall go elsewhere; I will let you know.
*
Since Pompey very quickly found Clodius intolerable, he abandoned his acquiescence in the exile of Cicero, who was consequently recalled in August 57 B.C. Hoping, on his return, to play a major part in politics again, and relying on dissensions between the Triumvirs, he delivered speeches against their associates and planned to attack the legislation of Caesar’s consulship. He therefore received a most unpleasant shock when Pompey, Caesar, and Crassus met in April 56 B.C. at Luca (Lucca) and patched up their differences, with mutual promises of military commands (the governorship of Spainin absentia/orPompey, a renewal of Caesar’s tenure in Gaul, and an eastern expedition against Rome’s Parthian enemies for Crassus). It was then intimated to Cicero that, whereas they were prepared to sugar the pill, he had better swallow it and collaborate. His next letter shows the disillusioned feelings with which he realized that the conservative Republican oligarchy (described here as the ‘leaders’) would not back him against the Triumvirs. Accordingly, he agreed to their requests. This ‘recantation’ probably took the form of a letter to Pompey>perhaps to Caesar also – and it was soon followed by a complimentary speech. But Cicero, to console himself for the restricted opportunities of political expression, now praised repose as a senior statesman’s objective – and soon began work on his constitutional treatises On the State and On Laws.
This letter, as often, refers to Cicero’s houses, which Atticus was frequently asked to look after in one way or another. In the course of his life Cicero acquired an astonishing variety of house property (see map, p. 264). He could ill afford these mansions and estates, but he loved the works of art and other luxuries that went with them and he felt that this, like other costly activities, was part of the price which the political ‘new man’ had to pay in order to compete with the dominant clans.
Other tasks of Atticus, it is clear, were to help Cicero fit out his extensive libraries, and to criticize his writings – a matter of equal professional interest to both of them, since Atticus was not only an excellent critic but also his publisher. A pioneer at Rome in this field, he kept a team of trained copyists who could rapidly produce an edition of a work before anyone else had seen it; and his services to Cicero were presumably to some extent reimbursed by the circulation of the latter’s books.
TO ATTICUS
Antium, May 56 B.C.
What, do you really believe that I prefer someone other than yourself to read and approve what I have been writing? If not, then why -you ask – did I send it to somebody else first? Because the man I sent it to had been pressing me, and I had no second copy. Was that all? Well: I have nibbled enough at the bitter pill, and must now swallow it – but I felt that my recantation was just a trifle discreditable! However, to every course of action that is fair, straightforward, or honest, we must say goodbye. One simply cannot credit the treacherous behaviour of those ‘leaders’ – as they claim to be, and would be if there was any loyalty in them. I had a feeling, in fact I was in no doubt, that they had only led me on in order to desert me and throw me aside. Yet, in spite of that, I had decided to work with them politically. But they have turned out exactly the same as ever.
So now finally I have come to my senses – guided by you. You will answer that your advice did not go further than suggesting that I should refrain from speaking – you did not advise that I should write instead! But the fact is that I wanted to commit myself thoroughly to this new alignment, so that I should deprive myself of any chance of slipping back to those other people – who even now, when they ought to be feeling sorry for me, persist in their jealous attitude.
All the same, I have been moderate in my ‘deification’.1 Yes, you will say, but I have committed it to writing. Certainly, and I shall be free with my compliments if he takes it well, and if it causes wry faces among the men who complain that I have a house which once belonged to the great Catulus2 (ignoring the fact that I bought it from Vettius) – and who say I ought not to have built a house, but should have sold the land. But what is the importance of that, compared to the fact that they have been revelling because the very utterances that I was making in sympathy with their views were alienating Pompey from me? It has got to stop. Since the powerless do not want to be my friends, I must make sure that the powerful are! You will say: ‘I wish you had done so long ago.’ I know that you wanted me to, and that I have been an utter fool. But now it is high time for me to be friends with myself and my own interests, since I cannot possibly be with the other lot.
Many thanks for going to see my house so often. Crassipes3 is making away with all the money I could have had for travelling. As for you, turn off the main road and come straight to my gardens. You would find it more convenient for me to come to you? The next day then. It is all the same to you, isn’t it? However, we can see. Your men have made my library as fine as a picture with their bindings and their title-strips; please congratulate them on my behalf.
(Att. IV, 5)
*
While Pompey, governor of Spain (and commander of its troops) in absentia, was uneasily resting upon his laurels in expectation of a quasi-dictatorial consulship without a colleague (52), while Caesar was completing his sensational conquest of Gaul, while Crassus was going to his death against the Parthians (53), Cicero discusses a literary matter with his friend Curio. A brilliant young man with a good knowledge of the arts but a bad reputation (later offensively dwelt upon by Cicero, p. 122), Curio spent vast sums on the public spectacles needed as a bait to secure his election to office, and was thereby impelled into dependence on Caesar, who, from the abundant harvest of Gaulish spoils, paid his extensive debts.
Cicero discusses the art, or several different arts, of writing letters, even such as his which were mostly not intended for publication. The stylistic variety of his correspondence, ranging through every nuance from occasional formality to more frequent colloquialism – an exceptionally valuable testimony to the day-to-day speech of educated Romans – unfortunately cannot be brought out in a translation; though certain translators have made it a point of honour to render his numerous Greek quotations by phrases in French or other foreign languages.
TO GAIUS SCRIBONIUS
CURIO
Rome, about the middle of 53 B.C.
As you know very well, there are many sorts of letter. But there is one unmistakable sort, which actually caused letter-writing to be invented in the first place, namely the sort intended to give people in other places any information which for our or their sakes they ought to know. But you certainly do not expect that sort of letter from me; since for your personal affairs you have your own private correspondents and messengers, while my own affairs can produce absolutely nothing new to report.
There are two other sorts of letter which I like very much, one intimate and humorous, the other serious and profound. I am not sure which of these genres would be more inappropriate than the other for me to employ in writing to you. Am I to send you letters full of jokes? I really do not think there is a single Roman who could make jokes in these times. And in serious vein what could Cicero possibly write about to Curio except politics? But on this subject my situation is that I dare not write what I feel and have no desire to write what I do not feel.
Since, then, there is no theme left for me to write about, I shall fall back upon my customary peroration and urge you to aim at the highest honours. True, you are faced by a formidable rival here; by which I mean the quite outstandingly optimistic expectations that people have of you. And there is only one way in which you can overcome this rival, and that is by deliberately developing, with continuous effort, the qualities needed for the great deeds which will achieve your purpose. I would enlarge on this theme if I were not already certain that this is precisely what you intend to do! So it is not from any idea of spurring you on that I have mentioned the matter, but only to show how affectionately I feel towards you.
(Fam. II, 4)
*
During these years, several important figures disappeared from the political scene. In 52 B.C. Clodius was murdered in a gang-fight-Cicero tried and failed to defend his killer Titus Annius Milo – but, before that, a tendency towards estrangement between Pompey and Caesar had become accentuated by the deaths of Crassus and of Pompey’s beloved wife Julia, who was Caesar’s daughter. Pompey was driven closer and closer to the conservative Republican upper class, and Cicero (as seen from the next letter) cleared the decks for an honourable move in the same direction by settling, through Atticus, a debt he owed Caesar’s henchman Oppius: with his expensive tastes Cicero, in spite of inheriting enormous legacies (p. 120), was always in debt. But he now found another infuriating departure from Rome ahead of him. In 31 the Senate decreed that all qualified ex-officials who had not yet governed a province should do so. Cicero, unexpectedly called upon to cast lots for a major province, drew Cilicia, which comprised at this time a huge, mountainous area of central and southern Asia Minor.
He now describes how, on his way out of Italy, he spent an uncomfortable evening with his brother Quintus and sister-in-law Pomponia, the sister of Atticus. Quintus had seen distinguished service on Caesar’s staff, but, though himself uncontrolled in temperament (and with a tendency to exaggeration), was unable to stand up to his thrifty but difficult wife. When Quintus later divorced her, he declined to marry again, observing – as Cicero reported to Atticus – that he had learnt to appreciate the blessing of going to sleep in bachelor tranquillity; and his poetry (in Gaul he once wrote four tragedies in sixteen days) includes an epigram beginning: ‘entrust your ship to the winds, but not your soul to a woman’.
TO ATTICUS
Minturnae, 5 or 6 May 51 B.C.
Yes, I saw your feelings when we parted, and I know what mine were. That is an additional reason why you must make sure that no new decrees are passed which would extend this unhappy separation beyond the statutory year. You have taken the right steps about Annius Saturninus.1 As to the guarantee,2 could you please give it yourself while you are still at Rome. Certain securities in guarantee of ownership already exist, for example for the estate of Mennius or perhaps I should say Atilius. As regards Oppius you have done just what I wanted, especially in promising to credit him with 800,000 sesterces. I would rather borrow to pay this debt than keep him waiting until the last arrears due to me have come in.
Now I come to the note you wrote across the end of your letter advising me about my sister Pomponia. The situation is as follows. When I came to my house at Arpinum the first thing we did after my brother had arrived was to have a talk, largely about yourself. After that I went on to discuss the subject of the conversation you and I had about your sister at my place at Tusculum. My brother’s attitude to your sister then seemed perfectly kind and conciliatory; if there had been any quarrel about expenditure there were no signs of it.
So much for that day. The next day we left Arpinum. Quintus stayed at Arcanum because of a festival, and I stopped at Aquinum, but we had lunch together at Arcanum. You know his farm there. When we got to it, Quintus said very pleasantly, ‘Pomponia, you take the women, and I will have the boys.’3 As far as I could see nothing could have been more polite, and his feelings and expression matched the words. But her reply (which we heard) was this: ’so I am evidently a stranger in my own house!’ – I imagine merely because Statius4 had gone on ahead to see to our meal. Quintus’s comment to me was: ‘You see? That is what I have to put up with every day!’
Surely that does not amount to very much, you will say. But it does. Indeed, she upset me too, she spoke and looked with such un called-for sharpness. However, I did not show my feelings, and we all took our places except her – Quintus sent her something from the table, but she refused to touch it. To sum up, my brother seemed to me thoroughly good-tempered and your sister thoroughly acrimonious ; and I have refrained from mentioning a lot of things which at the time irritated me more than Quintus. Then I went on to Aquinum. Quintus stayed at Arcanum, but came to me the next morning and told me that she had refused to sleep with him and when she was leaving had been as cross as I had seen her the day before.
So, to answer your point, you could tell her yourself that in my opinion her behaviour on that day was not pleasant. I have written to you about this at perhaps rather greater length than was necessary, so that you should see that it is up to you as well to do some instructing and advising.
Now, it only remains for you to do the things I asked you to before you leave, to write to me about them all, to propel Pomptinus1 on his way, to make sure you tell me when you have started, – and to appreciate that the affection and regard that I feel for you are quite unlimited 1
At Minturnae I said a most friendly goodbye to the excellent Aulus Torquatus.2 Please mention to him that I wrote you something about him.
(Att. V, 1)
*
Cicero did his best to be a good governor. He worked strenuously, fought to maintain public security, and even, unlike so many others, was in a position to claim that he had extracted no improper gains from his province his only profit, one regarded as legitimate, being the proceeds (at famine prices) from the large amount of com which a governor was allowed to requisition, ostensibly for his table (when the Civil War started, Pompey hid hands on this sum). In accordance with this unusual care for the interests of the provincials, Cicero was unwilling as the next letter tactfully reveals to gratify Caelius, the fashionable Angry Young Man and brilliant public speaker who was his political informant in the capital, with free panthers for his electioneering show. Elsewhere, he rebukes Caelius for suggesting that the province should support his candidature with a financial contribution. Caelius was later to meet an unhappy end, at the age of thirty-four (47 B.C.), stirring up revolt at Thurium in South Italy. After praising his oratory the leading educationalist Quintilian described him as ‘a man who deserved to behave better and live longer’.
Cicero grudged every minute spent away from Roman politics. He embarked on his return journey from Side in southern Asia Minor on 3 August 50 B.C., and put into Brundisium on 24 November of the same year.
TO MARCUS CAELIUS RUFUS
Laodicea, 4 April 50 B.C.
Would you ever have believed it possible that words would fail me, and not only those words you public speakers use but even my humble sort of language! But they do fail me, and this is why: because I am extraordinarily nervous about what is going to be decreed concerning the provincial governorships. My longing for Rome is quite unbounded! you could not believe how I long for my friends and most of all for yourself.
My province, on the other hand, bores me completely. This may be because the degree of distinction which I feel I have already attained in my career makes me not so much ambitious to add to it as fearful of impairing it. Or perhaps it is because the whole business is unworthy of my capacities, in comparison with the heavier burdens which I can bear and often do bear in the service of my country. Or it may be because we are menaced by the horror of a major war1 in these parts, which I seem likely to avoid if I leave the province on the appointed day.
The matter of the panthers is being carefully attended to by my orders through the agency of the men who make a practice of hunting them. But there are surprisingly few of the animals; and those that there are, I am told, complain that in my province they are the only living creatures for whom traps are laid! So rumour has it that they have decided to evacuate the province and live in Caria. Nevertheless, strenuous attempts are being made, and by nobody more than Patiscus. Anything that is caught will be yours, but what it will be I have no idea. I am deeply interested in your candidature for the aedileship, I assure you; this very day reminds me of it, because I am writing this on the actual day of the Megalensian Games.1
Please write me the most careful accounts of the entire political situation. For whatever information I receive from you I shall regard as more reliable than anything else.
(Fam. II, 11)
*
The next letter contains affectionate messages, dispatched by Cicero from the Ionian Islands on his way home, to his steward and future biographer, Tiro. This man was also his secretary: in addition to arranging dinnerparties and dealing with debtors and creditors, he took dictation from Cicero, keeping pace by a kind of shorthand which he himself had invented. He was good at correcting inaccuracies, and better than other copyists at deciphering his employer’s handwriting. (One of his assistants, Spintharus, had to be dictated to syllable by syllable, but proved useful when language had to be carefully weighed.)
Cicero sent Tiro a nurse and cook to speed his convalescence. He must have made a good recovery since he is said to have lived to a hundred. Six years after the present letter, his master was to write to Atticus:’ There is no collection of my letters, but Tiro has about seventy, besides a few still to come from you.’ By that date Cicero had begun to envisage publishing his letters, but only a carefully chosen and edited selection from them. But after his death Atticus and Tiro ensured that nearly twelve times the seventy letters mentioned by Cicero should survive, and in due course they were published: the Letters to Friends by Tiro, and those To Atticus perhaps (though this is disputed) not for nearly a century after Cicero’s death.2
FROM CICERO AND HIS
BROTHER QUINTUS AND THEIR
SONS TO TIRO
Leucas, 7 November 50 B.C.
Your letter caused me mixed feelings. I was very upset by the first page, but a little reassured by the second. As a result I am perfectly certain that until you are completely well you should not trust yourself to travel at all, whether on sea or on land. I shall see you soon enough if, when I do, you have completely recovered. As to your doctor, you write that he is well thought of and I hear the same. But I am by no means satisfied with the treatment he has been giving you. He ought not to have let you have soup when your stomach was bad. However, I have written to him in detail, and to Lyso1 as well.
I have also written at length to that most agreeable, obliging, and kindly man, Curius. Among other things I have asked him to have you in his house – if that is what you would like. For I am afraid our friend Lyso is a little casual, first because all Greeks are, and secondly because after he had received a letter from me he did not send me any answer. But you are complimentary about him, so you will be the best judge of what ought to be done. Please, Tiro, spare no expense whatever to make yourself well. I have written to Curius telling him to give you whatever sum you ask, for I feel the doctor ought to be given something for himself, to make him more interested.
The services you have done me are beyond all number – in my home, in court, in Rome, and in the provinces; in my private and public affairs alike, as well as in my literary researches and publications. But you will have performed a greater service than any of them, if, as I hope, I am going to see you in good health. If everything goes well I think you will have a delightful sea journey home with the quaestor Mescinius.2 He is quite a civilized person and I have reason to believe that he is very fond of you. So when you have done everything possible for your health, then, my dear Tiro, think about the voyage. But I do not want you to hurry in the slightest respect. My one anxiety is that you should be safe and sound.
Rest assured that every friend of mine is a friend of yours too and that your well-being is of the utmost importance not only to you and myself but is a matter of concern to many others also. So far, out of your desire not to fail me in any circumstances, you have never been able to get strong. Now there is nothing to stop you. Drop everything else, and look after your own physical health. I shall measure your regard for me by the amount of care you devote to your recovery. Goodbye, my dear Tiro, goodbye and get well. Lepta1 and all of us send you every good wish. Goodbye. (Fam. XVI, 4)
*
In September 50 B.C., Cicero first heard from Caelius his belief that Pompey and Caesar were now irreconcilable, and that civil war could not be avoided. The war began early in the following year, on the night between 10 and 11 January, when Caesar, coming from the scene of his northern triumphs, crossed the stream of the Rubicon, then the border of Italy. The rights and wrongs of the two leaders’ constitutional claims and counterclaims – bearing upon the durations of commands and the dates of Caesar’s eligibility for further office – were, and indeed still are, disputed (p. 113). But the plain facts were, that the epublican achinery of government had completely broken down; that, since no one could enforce (or even suggest) a practicable alternative, autocracy was inevitable; and that the state had no room for two autocrats.
Pompey proved unable to hold Rome, but evaded pursuit and withdrew to the south-east coast of Italy. On the way, he wrote this short letter to Cicero. Flattering though the title ‘general’ (imperator) was to its recipient-who had been hailed by this title by his troops while governor of Cilida - Pompey would have created a better impression upon him, crisis or no crisis, if he had attempted something a little more distinguished, both in style and substance.
FROM POMPEY,
PROCONSUL,
TO CICERO, GENERAL
Canusium (Canosa), 20 February
49 B.C.
I was glad to read your letter. For I recognized your courage of old in the national interest. The consuls1 have joined my army in Apulia. I urge you strongly, in the name of your exceptional and unceasing patriotism, to come to us so that we can plan together how to help and rescue our sorely afflicted country. I propose that you should travel by the Appian Way and proceed quickly to Brundisium.
(Att. VIII, 11c)
*
Cicero could not fail to prefer Pompey to Caesar, who was the less likely of the two to restore the Republic – though such was his despondency and disillusionment that he regarded Pompey also as by now inevitably committed to tyranny. Cicero was appalled both by the war itself and by Pompey s failure to hold Italy, which he skilfully evacuated on 17 March, sailing from Brundisium for Greece. Cicero was particularly distressed by the Sacle of the blue-blooded but pig-headed Republican commander Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus, who, ignoring Pompey’s orders to fall back, shut himself up in Corfinium. Domitius and his force were quickly obliged to surrender to Caesar, who then created a profound impression by releasing his distinguished prisoners.
Cicero rightly criticizes Pompey for having overestimated his ability to mobilize support in Italy, but it seems hardly fair to blame him for abandoning Domitius – or for deciding to prosecute the war from Greece, which was within reach of the wealthy eastern regions where Pompey commanded much support.
TO ATTICUS
Formiae, 24 February 49 B.C.
What a disgrace! – and, consequently, what misery. For my own feeling is that disgrace is the ultimate misery, or even the only one.
Pompey cherished Caesar, suddenly became afraid of him, refused all peace terms, failed to prepare for war, evacuated Rome, culpably lost Picenum, got himself tied up in Apulia, and then went off to Greece without getting in touch with us or letting us know anything about his unprecedented plan upon which so much depended. And now suddenly Domitius’s letter to him, and his to the consuls.
I had almost come to believe that the Right Thing to Do had flashed before his eyes, and that Pompey – the man Pompey ought to be – had cried: ‘Let them devise their uttermost to meet this occasion; let them exert their every wile against me: yet Right is on my side.’1 But Pompey bids Right a long farewell, and is off to Brundisium. They say it was on hearing this news that Domitius and those with him surrendered. What a melancholy business! I am too deeply distressed to write you any more. I hope to hear from you.(VIII, 8)
*
Cicero now explains his dilemma in terms of principle. Of the questions that he poses here (he writes them in Greek, the language of philosophy), the last ‘is a cri du coeur of Cicero’s own; but the others are all familiar stations on the Via Dolorosa of modem Europe’.2 The answers of Atticus, however, were predictable: this cautious Epicurean, ‘friend to all men and ally to none’ – he was to become a friend even of Cicero’s killers Antony and Octavian -favoured abstention from the struggle as the best way to maintain sanity and the cultured life in an insane world, and to preserve his vast and varied banking and business interests. Though far from a Resistance type, he was a Republican by conviction and intended, by passive acquiescence, to avoid collaboration with unsavoury conquerors.
Almost exactly five years later, Cicero’s problems concerning tyranny and tyrants were solved, to his immediate if not lasting satisfaction, by Brutus and Cassius. But for his own use Cicero much preferred, if possible, the weapon at which he excelled, his power of oratorical persuasion. How he wrestled with the demands of successive emergencies will be seen from the letters during the months and years to come.
TO ATTICUS
Formiae, 12 March 49 B.C.
Though I do not relax nowadays except while I am writing to you or reading your letters, still I feel the lack of subject-matter for a letter and I believe you feel the same. The easy, intimate exchanges we are accustomed to are out of the question in these critical times; and every topic relating to the crisis we have already exhausted. However, so as not to succumb completely to morbid reflections, I have put down certain questions of principle – relating to political behaviour – which apply to the present crisis. As well as distracting me from my miserable thoughts, this has given me practice in judging the problems at issue. Here is the sort of thing:
Should one stay in one’s country even if it is under totalitarian rule?
Is it justifiable to use any means to get rid of such rule, even if they endanger the whole fabric of the state? Secondly, do precautions have to be taken to prevent the liberator from becoming an autocrat himself?
If one’s country is being tyrannized, what are the arguments in favour of helping it by verbal means and when occasion arises, rather than by war?
Is it statesmanlike, when one’s country is under a tyranny, to retire to some other place and remain inactive there, or ought one to brave any danger in order to liberate it?
If one’s country is under a tyranny, is it right to proceed to its invasion and blockade?
Ought one, even if not approving of war as a means of abolishing tyranny, to join up with the right-minded party in the struggle against it?
Ought one in matters of patriotic concern to share the dangers of one’s benefactors and friends, even if their general policy seems to be unwise?
If one has done great services to one’s country, and because of them has received shameful and jealous treatment, should one nevertheless voluntarily endanger oneself for one’s country’s sake, or is it legitimate, eventually, to take some thought for oneself and one’s family, and to refrain from fighting against the people in power?
Occupying myself with such questions, and marshalling the argument on either side in Greek and Latin, I take my mind off my troubles for a little; though the problems I am here posing are far from irrelevant to them. But I am afraid I am being a trouble to you: for if the man carrying this letter makes good speed he will bring it to you on the day when you are due for your fever.1
(IX, 4)
*
Through an intermediary Furnius (p. 98), Caesar sent Cicero a conciliatory letter. But by now, as at certain other critical moments of his life, Cicero’s juristic weighings up of every side of the situation had hardened his customary hesitancy into a more obstinate attitude; and, distressed though he was at what he regarded as Pompey’s cowardly flight, he felt increasingly remorseful at not having accompanied him. In the next letter, therefore, he declined to join Caesar in Rome: instead, lie sent him an earnest though surely hopeless appeal to seek an understanding with his enemy. Then, on 26 March, Cicero met Caesar at Formiae – and persevered in his refusal to go to the capital. ‘He asked me to think it over; I could not say no to that. So we parted. I am convinced he does not like me or approve of me. But I approve of myself, which I have not done for a long time.’
This was one among a relatively small number of Cicero’s letters for which he himself arranged publication. In the present case he defended his decision to Atticus.’ I am not afraid of looking as though I am flattering him. To save my country I should gladly have thrown myself at his feet’ (a not infrequent occurrence in the emotional turmoil of Roman public life).
FROM CICERO, GENERAL,
TO CAESAR, GENERAL
Formiae, 19 March 49 B.C.
When I read your letter – passed to me by our friend Furnius – in which you requested me to come near Rome, it did not surprise me that you wanted to utilize my ‘advice and position’. But I asked myself what you meant by also referring to my ‘influence’ and ’support’. However, my hopes – and I based them on your outstanding and admirable statesmanship – made me conclude that what you aimed at was peace, and agreement and harmony among Romans: and for that purpose I felt that both my character and my background suited me well.
If I am right in my interpretation, and if you are at all disposed to protect our friend Pompey and reconcile him to yourself and the state, you will certainly find no one better adapted to that aim than myself. In speaking both to him and to the Senate I have always advocated peace ever since I first had the opportunity of doing so; and I have taken no part in the hostilities from their outset. My considered opinion was that the war involved an infringement1 of your rights in view of the opposition by unfriendly and envious persons to a distinction the Roman people had conferred on you. But in just the same way as at that time I upheld your rightful position myself and also urged everyone else to help you, so now I am deeply concerned for the rightful position of Pompey.
A good many years have passed since I first chose you and him as the men whom, above all others, I proposed to support and have as my friends – as I do. So I ask you, indeed I pray and entreat you with all urgency, to spare some time – among your many grave cares – to consider this problem: how, by virtue of your kindness, can I best be enabled to behave decently, gratefully, and dutifully to Pompey, so as not to be oblivious of his great kindness towards myself? If this was a matter relating to myself alone, I should still hope that you would grant my request. However, I suggest that your honour and the national interest are also at stake; and what they demand is that I, who am a friend of peace and of you both, should receive every protection from you in my efforts to achieve a reconciliation between yourself and Pompey, and peace for the people of Rome.
I thanked you on another occasion for saving Lentulus,2 as he had saved me; and now, when I read the truly thankful letter in which he told me of your generosity and kindness, I feel that in rescuing him you rescued me at the same time. If you appreciate the reasons why I am under a grateful obligation to him, I beg you to give me the opportunity of fulfilling my obligation to Pompey as well. (IX, 11a)
*
Caesar, who had in this year assumed the dictatorship for the first time (for eleven days), now left on a lightning expedition which destroyed Pompey’s supporters in Spain at the battle of Ilerda. Writing on the way to Spain, perhaps from Ventimiglia, he made this further attempt, with a hint of threats, to prevent Cicero from joining Pompey in Greece – as he evidently suspected was about to happen. Antony, whom Caesar had left in charge of Italy, reinforced the request with a reminder that he could allow no one to leave the country.
Caesar was not a new correspondent of Cicero’s; no less than thirty-four of his letters to the orator are known in copies, digests, or allusions. He writes in a purer style than Antony, and his letter is a very much more distinguished affair than Pompey’s productions (p. 78); for Caesar, in addition to his unequalled military talent, was one of the most brilliant men of letters of his age – as the consummately skilful plainness of his Commentaries reveals and could even have rivalled Cicero in oratory if he had given the time to it. Although totally at variance in political matters, the two men greatly respected each other’s talents – ‘it is better,’ said Caesar (as the elder Pliny tells us) of Cicero, ‘to have extended the boundaries of the Roman spirit than of the Roman empire.’ However, Caesar’s present letter produced no result. For with himself out of the way on a hazardous campaign, Cicero at last made up his mind: on 7 June, accompanied by his brother, son, and nephew, he sailed from Formiae for Greece.
FROM CAESAR, GENERAL,
TO CICERO, GENERAL
On the march, 16 April 49 B.C.
Although I was convinced that you would take no rash or ill-judged action, nevertheless my anxiety about what people are saying has impelled me to write to you and urge, in the name of our friendship, that you should not make any move, now that things have gone my way, which you did not see fit to make while matters were undecided. For, everything having manifestly turned out to our advantage and the disadvantage of the other side, you will have seriously damaged the good relations between our two selves – as well as acting against your own interests – if you display resistance to the trend of events. It would then be evident that your action resulted not from support of a cause, since the cause is the same as it was when you decided to hold aloof, but from your objection to something that I have done. And that would be the severest blow you could inflict on me.
Our friendship entitles me to ask you not to do it. Besides, what could be more appropriate for a man of peace and integrity, and a good citizen, than to keep out of civil disturbance? There were many who felt mat to be so, but were prevented from acting as they wished because of the dangers that would have been involved. Weigh up the evidence provided by my career and by your own assessment of our friendly relations, and you will find abstention from the quarrel the safest and most honourable course. (X, 8b)
*
The Civil War continued upon its swift and shattering course. Unable to deploy his eastern resources – or his superiority at sea – Pompey was overwhelmed at Pharsalus in Thessaly on 9 August 48 B.C., and fled to Egypt, where he was murdered on landing. Thereupon Caesar passed to a further series of victories against the remnants of the Pompeian cause in Egypt, Asia Minor, North Africa, and Spain – the landmarks of these campaigns being, respectively, Cleopatra and the battles of Zela (47), Thapsus (46), and Munda (45).
Once he reached the Balkans in 48, Cicero remained in camp on the day of Pharsalus, whether unwell (as Plutarch explains) or just unwarlike. He had disgusted everybody by grumbling incessantly, and they had disgusted him by their greedy and bloodthirsty attitude. After Pharsalus – and a quarrel with his brother and Pompey’s elder son – he returned to Italy to spend eleven dismal months at Brundisium, in bad health and nerves, amid the collapse of his marriage.
Before his departure for Greece (he had delayed it until after the event), his beloved daughter Tullia had given birth to a seven months’ child on 19 May. Her first child had died very young: this one, though delicate, survived. Tullia’s life was tragic. Her first two marriages, resulting respectively in widowhood (at the age of about twenty-one, after eight years of marriage) and divorce, had been prompted by the endeavours of the bourgeois Cicero to raise himself to the level of the noble, plutocratic world in which a politician had to move. Next – on this occasion by her mother’s choice, and perhaps her own also – she married the patrician Publius Cornelius Dolabella, who proved an outrageously bad husband: in the year following the next letter, while pregnant, she left his house for her father’s and not long afterwards she died. It is painful to note that, even after that, Cicero sometimes continued to contrive, for financial, snobbish, and political reasons, to appear his friend (p. 94). But at other times he was repelled by the man, and although he could not blame himself for her disastrous third marriage his distress here includes remorse for his failure to make life happier for his daughter. He wrote of Tullia to his brother, ‘I find again in her my features, my words, my soul.’
Brundisium, 12 or 13 June 47 B.C.
I am giving this letter to someone else’s messengers, since they are leaving urgently; that is why it is so short – also because I am about to send messengers of my own.
My Tullia came to see me on 12 June and told me all about your attentiveness and kindness to her; and she handed me three letters. But her goodness and sweet character and affection did not give me the pleasure which I ought to feel for such a wonderful daughter, because I was terribly distressed that such a person should be in so miserable a situation – which she has done nothing to deserve, since it is entirely my own lamentable fault. So I expect neither consolation from you – though I see you would like to give it me – nor advice, since there is none that can be taken. I realize you have made every possible attempt in many earlier letters as well as in these last ones.
(XI, 17)
*
While Cicero was at Brundisium, Caesar, on one of his visits to Italy, sent him a ‘fairly generous letter’: they met, and Cicero became ostensibly reconciled to the dictatorship. He subsequently delivered two diplomatically worded speeches requesting the dictator to pardon former enemies. But in the absence of real political activity what kept him reasonably contented was his literary work. During 46 B.C. he published two important books on oratory and the prevalent educational system which depended upon it – the Brutus and the Orator.
This letter is written to the greatest scholar of the day, Varro, an ex-Pompeian polymath whom Cicero treated with cautious respect but found tortuous, difficult, and over-critical.
TO MARCUS TERENTIUS VARRO
Rome, early 46 B.C.
From your letter to Atticus, which he read to me, I learnt of what you are doing and where you are. But I could not gather from it any hint of when we are likely to see you again. However, I am beginning to hope that you will be coming to us before long. I look forward to deriving comfort from your presence. Our problems are so vast and various that no one in his right mind should expect any relief from them. All the same, there are ways in which you can help me, and perhaps ways in which I can help you.
For let me tell you that since my arrival in Rome I have re-established friendly relations with some old friends – my books. I had ceased associating with them, not because I found them annoying but because they made me slightly ashamed. For having plunged into the middle of the most turbulent happenings in highly untrustworthy company, I felt I had not sufficiently followed the advice the books had given me. But they forgive me, and revive their old relationship with me – and say that you were wiser than I was because you never gave yours up!
Consequently, since they are reconciled with me, I feel entitled to hope that if I can see you I shall not find it hard to endure both my present troubles and those to come. So whichever of my houses you choose for our meeting – Tusculum, or Cumae, or Rome (the last would be me least satisfactory in my opinion) – provided only that we are together I will make it my business to see that wherever we meet it will be very agreeable for us both. (Fam. IX, 1)
*
The death of his daughter Tullia (p. 84) at Tusculum, in February 45 B.C., inflicted on Cicero the most grievous personal sorrow he ever had to endure. At the time he had recently embarked on a second marriage, to his rich ward Publilia, so young (at seventeen) that he joked: ’she’ll be a woman tomorrow!’ But when Tullia died, Publilia, who had been jealous of her, showed too little sympathy, and Cicero – who had meanwhile inherited an important legacy from another source – sent her back to her parents for good.
Sadly wandering on the sea-shore at Astura, he composed a Consolation on his daughter’s death.1 Writing was now not only a partial remedy for political frustration, and a missionary endeavour to give Romans the best of Greek thought, but ‘the only way I can get away from my misery’. His literary output during 45 and 44 B.C. was startling in quantity as well as in brilliance of execution; in lasting effect, it marks the climax of his life. Three of his greatest works of this period are translated in the present volume (Chapters 3, 4, and 5).
Astura, 15 May 45 B.C.
I think I shall conquer my feelings and go from Lanuvium to my house at Tusculum. For either I must give up my property there for ever – since my grief will remain the same, though I shall become able to conceal it better – or if not it does not matter in the least whether I go there now or in ten years’ time. The place will not remind me of her any more than the thoughts which consume me all the time, day and night. You will be asking me if there is no comfort to be derived from books. I am afraid that in this situation they have the contrary effect. Without them I might have been tougher; an educated man is not insensitive or impervious enough.
So do come as you wrote you would, but not if it is inconvenient. A couple of letters1 will be enough. I will come and meet you, if necessary. Whatever you can manage, so be it (Att. XII, 46)
*
With Caesar installed as absolute ruler, Atticus’s friend the high-principled though hard-hearted2Stoic intellectual Brutus was evidently able as late as August 45 B.C., as this next letter shows, to speak in favour of the dictator – whom certain people believed to be his father. But a month later Caesar returned to the capital for a Triumph over those whom he had crushed; so many of whom, as was painfully remarked, were distinguished Romans. The beginnings of the plot against his life cannot now have been long delayed. The matter was urgent, since in the following spring he would be off to the east to rival Alexander’s conquests, retaining the title of ‘perpetual dictator’ (which he assumed in February 44 B.C.) and leaving a henchman to deputize for him as tyrant at Rome. Perhaps the more violent Cassius worked on the philosophical Brutus. To the classic Athenian tradition of tyrannicide, Brutus added the inspiration of semi-mythical ancestors, Lucius Brutus the first consul and Ahala, who were hymned as the ejector of Tarquin and the slayer of a would-be autocrat Maelius in early Rome: later, Cicero was to use their names against Antony (p. 114).
Cicero’s nephew Quintus, son of his brother of the same name, incurs criticism in this letter. ‘Oh dear, oh dear !’ says Cicero, ‘it is the biggest sorrow of my life. Corrupted no doubt by our indulgent methods he has gone very far, to a point indeed which I do not venture to describe’ – to the point, it was suggested, of (unsuccessfully) denouncing his own father to the dictator. In December, however, his uncle agreed to meet him: the young Quintus complained about his debts, but at this point, writes Cicero to Atticus, ‘I borrowed from your style of eloquence – I held my tongue.’
TO ATTICUS
Tusculum, 7 or 8 August, 45 B.C.
So Brutus reports that Caesar is converted to the good party? Splendid news. But where is he going to find them? Unless he hangs himself. But how foolish of Brutus to say such a thing!1 What has happened to that masterpiece of yours which I saw in Brutus’s gallery his family-tree with Ahala and Brutus the first consul? But what can he do?
I was very glad to read that even the man who started the whole criminal business has nothing good to say for my nephew, young Quintus. I was beginning to be afraid that Quintus was liked even by Brutus, who in his letter to me remarked: ‘But I wish you could have had a taste of his stories.’ However, when we meet, as you say. What do you advise, though? Do I fly to Rome, or stay here? Personally I am both glued to my books and unwilling to receive Quintus here. I am told his father has gone off to Red Rocks2 to meet him – in a very bad temper indeed, so exceedingly cross that I actually remonstrated! However, I have been thoroughly inconsistent too. So much for that later.
See what you think about my coming and the whole business and let me hear first thing tomorrow morning, if you can see your way to any conclusion in the matter. (XIII, 40)
*
In commenting on Caesar’s dictatorship to Atticus, Cicero expresses a view which Atticus himself had often put forward: ‘Let us give up flattery and be at least half free, and we can manage that by keeping quiet and out of sight. In the previous year Cicero had prasied Caesar’s arch-Republican enemy Cato (who had committed suicide after the defeat at Thapsus), and in 45 he drafted an open letter to the dictator about future methods of government. But the criticisms of his friends decided him against sending this, and in May his frustration had even moved him, in a letter to Atticus, to a bitter joke hinting at the desirability of Caesar’s death. The dictator was under no illusions: ‘Can I be foolish enough to suppose,’ he is quoted as saying, ‘that this man, good-natured though he be, is friendly to me when he has to sit and wait so long for my convenience?’1
Yet the next letter shows how Cicero acquiesced sufficiently in the state of affairs to have Caesar stop for dinner at one of his villas. Other prominent men of the time are also mentioned in this letter. Gaius Marcius Philippus (stepfather of the future Augustus) must have had a large house to hold two thousand men. Mamurra was a nouveau riche senior officer of Caesar in Gaul, attacked as a vulgarian in two savage epigrams by Catullus. We do not know what news about Mamurra was broken to Caesar on this afternoon – perhaps his death. Lucius Cornelius Balbus, with whom the dictator had a private discussion during the morning, was an enormously wealthy Spaniard, perhaps of Levantine origin; he and Oppius (p. 71), though holding no official posts, acted as Caesar’s chief ministers. Though Balbus had a passion for philosophy – he used to have Cicero’s works copied before they were published – Cicero’s friendly relations with him had suffered since the former’s divorced wife Terentia had assigned her dowry (which Cicero now had to repay her) to Balbus in settlement of a debt; and Balbus was in a position to exert pressure. Caesar’s gesture to Dolabella, mentioned at the end of this letter, recalls the dictator’s observation that, even if he employed crooks and gangsters, he had to reward them.
TO ATTICUS
Puteoli, 19 December 45 B.C.
A formidable guest, yet no regrets! For everything went very pleasantly indeed. However, when he reached Philippus on the evening of the 18th, the house was so full of soldiers that there was hardly a room free for Caesar himself to have dinner. Two thousand men! I was distinctly alarmed about what would happen the next day, but. Cassius Barba1 came to my rescue with a loan of some guards. A camp was pitched on my land and the house was put under guard. On the 19th he stayed with Philippus until one o’clock and let no one in – I believe he was doing accounts with Balbus. Then he went for a walk on the shore. After two he had a bath. Then he was told about Mamurra; but there was no change in his expression. He had an oil-massage and then sat down to dinner.
He was following a course of emetics, so he ate and drank without arrière-pensiée and at his ease. It was a sumptuous dinner and well-served, and more than that, well-cooked and seasoned, with good talk and in a word agreeable.2 His entourage were very lavishly provided for in three other rooms. Even the lower-ranking ex-slaves and the slaves lacked for nothing; the more important ex-slaves I entertained in style.
In other words, we were human beings together. Still, he was not the sort of guest to whom you would say ‘do please come again on your way back’. Once is enough! We talked no serious politics, but a good deal about literary matters. In short, he liked it and enjoyed himself. He said he was going to spend one day at Puteoli and the next in the neighbourhood of Baiae. There you have the story of how I entertained him – or had him billeted on me; I found it a bother, as I have said, but not disagreeable. Now I am going to stay on here for a little and then go to my place at Tusculum.
As Caesar passed Dolabella’s house on horseback his whole guard paraded under arms to the right and left of him, which they did nowhere else, so I heard from Nicia. (XIII, 52)
*
In the next letter, written to Atticus three and a half weeks after Caesar had been murdered, Cicero expresses unqualified admiration of the deed. Yet as a friend of the dictator (Gaius Matius) now remarked, ‘if Caesar with all his genius could not find a solution, who is to find one now?’ Cicero, too, is already painfully aware that the removal of Caesar had not automatically brought the Republic into existence again. In spite of the gradual decay of its government during the past twenty years, this came as a surprise to him, as it did to the assassins themselves. Now their lives were only safe if they stayed outside Rome. Cicero believed that he too was threatened, and moved rapidly from one to another of his country-houses, thus sacrificing, as he no doubt regretted later, his opportunity to exercise valuable influence at Rome.
In expecting no good to come from Sextus, the surviving son of Pompey, he was right, for that unstable young man, though an able naval commander, was interested in little but large-scale piracy, which he successfully maintained for eight years. He held out in Sicily until 36 B.C.and was then put to death in Asia Minor.
TO ATTICUS
Lanuvium, 9 or 10 April 44 B.C.
What news do you suppose I get at Lanuvium? But I suspect that in town you hear something new every day. Things are boiling up; for when Matius says so, can you not imagine what the others feel like? What distresses me is something which never happened in any other state, that the recovery of freedom did not mean the revival of free government. It is dreadful what talk and threats are going around; and I am afraid of a war in Gaul and of where Sextus will end up.
Yet come one, come all, the Ides of March are a consolation. Our heroes most splendidly and gloriously achieved everything that lay in their power. The rest requires money and men, and we have neither. That is all from me to you at the moment. But if you hear any news -for I am awaiting some every day – tell me it quickly, and if you hear nothing, all the same keep to our custom and do not let our exchange of notes be interrupted. I shall not. (XIV, 4)
*
I do lack some part
Of that quick spirit that is in Antony.
So Shakespeare’s Brutus admits; and Cicero too, incessantly brooding on the Ides of March and its failure due to the usurpation of Antony, feels that Brutus has been ineffective. In particular, Brutus’s speech to the people on 17 March – when he attacked Caesar but promised not to interfere with grants made to ex-soldiers – had been far too academic, in Cicero’s opinion, to enlist on the right side the inflammable potentialities of the Roman crowd: in which the high proportion of down-and-outs ready for hire and trouble had become, next to the army, the major factor in contemporary power politics. Cicero’s comment is professional as well as general, since Brutus was one of the leading practitioners of the austere ‘Attic’ style of oratory, whereas Cicero had achieved his outstanding success by a more vigorous and copious mixture of the Attic with the flamboyant Asianic style.
‘If I had pleaded that cause…’ says Cicero; but he had not been there. Besides, the conspirators – though soon after the murder he had visited them on the Capitol – had not trusted him with their secret:
O name him not:
For he will never follow anything
That other men begin.
In spite of all these worries, by 11 May Cicero, in the prolonged climax of his literary production, had completed and dedicated to Atticus his essay On Old Age(Chapter 5).
TO ATTICUS
Sinuessa, 18 May 44 B.C.
Yesterday I sent you off a letter as I was leaving my house at Puteoli; I stopped at Cumae. There I saw Pilia, who is well; indeed I saw her again before leaving Cumae. She had come for a funeral, which I attended too – our friend Gnaeus Lucullus was burying his mother. So I stayed that day at my place at Sinuessa, and am writing this letter early on the following day as I start for Arpinum.
However, I have got no news to send you or ask you for, unless you may consider that this has some significance: our friend Brutus has passed me the speech he made at the meeting on the Capitol,1 and has requested me to correct it perfectly candidly before he publishes it. Now the sentiments of the speech are expressed with the utmost elegance, and the language could not possibly be bettered. Yet if I had pleaded that cause I should have written more fierily. You can see the potentialities of the theme – and of the speaker. So I did not feel able to suggest any corrections
For if one bears in mind the stylistic aims of our friend Brutus and his conception of the public speaker’s ideal, he has in this speech achieved a degree of elegance that really could not be improved upon. Personally, however, I have tried to do something quite different, rightly or wrongly. But I should like you to read his speech, if you have not done so already, and let me know what you think of it yourself: though I am afraid that your name will lead you astray and that you will be hyper-Attic in your appreciation! But if you remember the thunderbolts of Demosthenes you will realize that it is possible to speak with great force and in purest Attic at the same time. But we will talk of this when we meet. At the moment what I wanted was that Metrodorus should not come to you without any letter or with a letter that had nothing in it. (XV, 1a)
*
In the next letter, Cicero reports how he attended a conference of the ‘liberators’ to decide on future policy, now that their cause was shattered and their lives endangered by the quasi-dictatorial regime of Antony. The meeting offers a striking testimony to the importance of leading Roman women. Servilia, the mother of Brutus (who had reputedly been Caesar’s mistress), speaks as though she could control events; and perhaps she could, since her connexions were powerful and her wealth substantial. Porcia is Shakespeare’s Portia, Brutus’s wife; Tertia, nicknamed Tertulla, is his half-sister and the wife of Cassius, thus illustrating the marriage links with which the ‘establishment’ cemented their political alliances.1 Roman matrons had long been imposing, weighty and interfering, almost like the princesses of Hellenistic courts (and far freer than respectable women of Periclean Athens). Caesar, fighting in Gaul, had found time to send presents to influential ladies at Rome.
As this discussion indicates, Antony had arranged for Brutus and Cassius to be offered minor posts overseas in order to save their faces but get them out of the way. Decimusfunius Brutus (Shakespeare’sDecius), of whomthe conspirators and their women here complain, was a relative of Brutus and one of their number – though, like others among them, a beneficiary and even an heir of Caesar. Showing great despondency after the Ides, Decimus had left for his allotted province of Cisalpine Gaul (North Italy), where he was now wasting his troops – in the view of Republican leaders – by stirring up local actions against Alpine tribes in the hope of being awarded a Triumph. He was executed in the proscriptions of the following year.
The last paragraph of the letter refers to one of Cicero’s hopeful plans to get away himself. As he says, the traditional expedient of a mission ‘to fulfil a vow’ (p. 64) looked rather feeble; he is still willing to associate himself with Dolabella (p. 84). Attachment to Dolabella’s staff during his forthcoming five-year governorship of Syria would secure Cicero not only an officially sponsored post but a chance to visit Athens and see how his son’s studies were progressing (p. 157). So Cicero embarked on 17 July at Pompeii: a departure which earned him the reproaches of Atticus for abandonment of his country, but which Cicero subsequently explained in retrospect as a temporary absence – approved, he had understood, by Atticus, and due to end before the New Year. His ship was driven back by contrary winds to the Italian coast. There, at Leucopetra near Rhegium, he received news that Brutus and Cassius, themselves about to leave for Macedonia and Syria,1 had urged all senior members of the Senate to attend its meeting (after their departure) on 1 September. So he turned back, never to leave Italy again.
TO ATTICUS
Antium, 8 June 44 B.C.
I came to Antium today (the eighth). Brutus was pleased I had come. Then, before a large audience – Servilia, Tertulla, Porcia – he asked me what I advised. Favonius2 was also there. My advice, which I had been thinking out on the journey, was that he should accept the directorship of the corn-supply from Asia.3 The only thing left for us to do, I said, was to ensure his safety, since that was equivalent to safeguarding the Republic itself. While I was talking, Cassius came in. I repeated what I had been saying. At that point Cassius, with a fierce look in his eye, and practically breathing fire and slaughter, declared that he would not go to Sicily. ‘Am I to take an insult as a favour?’ ‘Then what will you do?’ I inquired. He said he would go to Achaia. ‘What about you, Brutus?’ I asked. ‘I will go to Rome,’ he said, ‘if you think that is the right thing to do.’ ‘On the contrary,’ I replied; ‘you would not be safe there,’ ‘But if I could be safe there, would you think I should go?’, ‘I am against your going to a province either now or after your praetorship, I do not advise you torisk going to Rome. I gave the reason which no doubt occur to you – why he would not be safe there.
Then they went on talking for a long time and lamenting their lost chances, Cassius in particular, and they bitterly attacked Decimus Brutus. I offered the opinion that they ought to stop harping on the past, but I expressed agreement with what they said. When I went on to suggest what ought to have been done, saying nothing new but what everyone says every day, and not touching on the question whether anyone besides Caesar ought to have been dealt with, but observing that the Senate should have been summoned and that more should have been done to rouse the excited populace, your friend Servilia exclaimed: ‘Well, I never heard anyone…!’ I stopped short. However, I think Cassius will go; for Servilia has promised she will see that the appointment to the corn-supply is erased from the senatorial decree. And our friend soon dropped his foolish talk about wanting to be in Rome. So he has decided that the Games1 shall be held in his absence but under his name. Nevertheless, I believe he intends to go to Asia, embarking from Antium.
In short, I got no satisfaction from the trip – except to my conscience. For I could not allow Brutus to leave Italy until we had met. Except for the satisfaction of fulfilling this obligation due to our friendship, I had to ask myself’ What is the point of your journey now, prophet?’2 I found the ship falling in pieces, or rather already in fragments. Not a sign of plan, logic, or system. So although I was certain even before, now I am even more certain that I must fly away from here at the earliest possible opportunity to ‘where I shall not hear of the deeds or fame of the sons of Pelops’.3
And what about this? – in case you have not heard it: on 2 June Dolabella enrolled me on his staff. I was told of it yesterday evening. Even you did not approve of the idea of a mission to fulfil a vow; for it was absurd that a vow which I had made on condition that the Republic was maintained should be fulfilled after it has been overthrown. And I fancy that these missions at state expense have a time-limit assigned to them by one of Caesar’s laws, and it is not easy to get an extension. I want the sort of mission that allows you to come and go as you please, and that additional advantage is what I have now got. And the privilege of retaining the appointment on these terms for five years is very fine. Though why should I think about five years? For I believe things are coming to a head. But absit omen. (XV, II)
*
While the conspirators were gathering round the dictator to murder him, one of their number, Cicero’s friend Gains Trebonius – to whom the next letter is addressed – had taken the hefty Antony aside and detained him in conversation. But though Trebonius was an admirer of Cicero (of whose bons mots he made a collection), the orator now complains to him, with a touch of pique for his own exclusion from the plot, that it would have been better for Antony to have been killed too: ‘then we should have had no leavings’.
On returning to Rome on 31 August 44 B.C., Cicero had taken one of the most decisive steps of his career by launching his Philippics against Antony (Chapter 3). On 28 November the latter, hearing that two legions had deserted him, left rapidly for the north, on the way to Cisalpine Gaul of which he had made himself governor [in place ofDecimus Brutus). The Senate then declared war upon Antony, perhaps on the very day on which Cicero wrote this letter. He dispatched it to Asia, of which Trebonius had been appointed governor. But the letter never reached its recipient, for in January Trebonius had been murdered in Smyrna by Dolabella (soon to the himself, p. 94).
Cicero’s hopes, alluded to here, that the cold young adoptive son of Caesar, Octavian (the future Augustus), was interested in restoring the Republic or in respectfully allowing himself to be patronized, were to prove within the year to have been pathetically misguided. Probably Cicero, who could never resist an epigram, was unwise to have suggested – as Octavian discovered -that the young man should be ‘lauded, applauded, and dropped’.
It is astonishing evidence of Cicero’s energy that the great Second Philippic was ready by October 44 B.C., and the completion of his treatise On Duties (Chapter 4) is announced in a letter of 5 December. The speech of 20 December to which Cicero refers in this letter was the Third Philippic.
TO GAIUS TREBONIUS
Rome, about 2 February 43 B.C.
How I wish you had invited me to that superb banquet on the Ides of March! Then we should have had no leavings. As it is, on the other hand, they are giving us so much bother that the superhuman service you people did for the Republic is liable to some qualification. Indeed the fact that this pestilential character was taken aside by you, excellent man that you are, and consequently owes his survival to your generosity, makes me feel just a little indignant with you (though I am hardly entitled to do so): since you left me with more trouble to be dealt with by my single self than by all the rest of the world beside me. For as soon as meetings of the Senate could be held in free conditions – after Antony’s thoroughly discreditable withdrawal – I reassumed that old spirit of mine which you and your patriotic father were always approving and praising.
For when the tribunes summoned the Senate on 20 December and put another question to the House, I rose and reviewed the entire political situation. Using forceful rather than intellectual methods -for I was speaking with intense urgency -1 brought the drooping and weary Senate back to its old, traditional courage. That day, and my energetic pleading, gave the Roman people its first hopes of becoming free again. And from that time onwards I have given every moment not only to thinking about national affairs but to participating actively in them.
If I were not under the impression that you already receive reports about everything that happens in Rome, I should give you full details myself, in spite of all the important business that is taking up my time. But you will get that from others; so this is only a brief summary. We have a firm Senate – though some of the ex-consuls are timid and others unsound. Servius1 is a grave loss. Lucius Caesar is completely loyal; but being Antony’s uncle he does not express himself very vigorously. The consuls are first-class; Decimus Brutus is admirable; Octavian is an excellent boy, of whom I personally have high hopes for the future. And you can take this as certain, that if Octavian had not quickly mobilized the ex-service men, and if two legions of Antony’s army had not transferred themselves to his command – thus frightening Antony – Antony would have committed every sort of crime and cruelty. Though I expect you have heard all this, all the same I want you to know more about it. I will write at greater length if I get more free time. (Fam. X, 28)
*
Cicero tried to stiffen the resolution of the military commanders in the neighbourhood of Antony. One of them was Plancus, governor of Gallia Comata (northern and central France), later described as ‘pathologically treacherous’1– a watchful and obsequious time-server who, by frequent changes of side, was to outlive this whole period of civil war into a successful old age under Augustus. Cicero’s present sermon must have exerted a temporary effect, since Plancus wrote back placing himself under the orders of the Senate – an elegant letter, since he is the best stylist of Cicero’s correspondents. Nevertheless, he went over to Antony soon afterwards. Plancus’s brother Gains (not the ‘excellent brother’ mentioned here) was less skilful at survival, since during the proscriptions later this year his executioners located his hiding-place by the smell of his favourite scent.
Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, referred to by Cicero here, was another political weathercock – a ‘barren-spiritedfellow’ who, although Brutus’s brother-in-law, owed too much to Antony, and deserted to him three months later. He, like Plancus, survived, but in disgrace (from 36 B.C.): though Chief Priest, he was kept by Augustus in enforced seclusion at Circeiifor nearly a quarter of a century.
Gaius Fumius, who figures here as an intermediary, was a moderate anti-Caesarian – and an honest man. He was said to be the ablest speaker in Rome. Augustus honoured him, but it is recorded that on one occasion Furnius failed to hold the attention of Antony who, catching sight of Cleopatra crossing the square outside, jumped up and ran out.
TO LUCIUS MUNATIUS PLANCUS
Rome, 20 March 43 B.C.
The report by our friend Gaius Fundus about your attitude to the Republic pleased the Senate and satisfied the Assembly very greatly. But your letter which was read out in the Senate seemed by no means to agree with what Furnius had said. For you spoke in favour of peace at a time when your distinguished colleague Decimus Brutus was under siege from a gang of repulsive brigands. It is imperative that they should lay down their arms and beg for peace. Alternatively, if they are determined to fight in order to secure this peace, then victory, not negotiation, is the only way for us to win it.
As to the reception given to your letters or those from Lepidus, you will be able to obtain news from your excellent brother and from Furnius. Nevertheless, in spite of my conviction of your own sound tense and accessibility to the loyal, friendly wisdom of your brother and Furnius, I am eager that some advice from myself also should reach you, carrying with it such influence as the very numerous bonds between us warrant.
Believe me then, Plancus: all the public distinctions that you have received – and you have received the most glorious distinctions that exist – will be universally regarded not as indications of merit but as mere honorific titles, if you do not now identify yourself with the cause of Roman freedom and senatorial authority. I entreat you to dissociate yourself, finally, from the men you have joined1 – joined through the compelling force of circumstances, and not from your own free decision.
Amid our political confusion a good many men have come to be called ex-consuls, but not one of them has been regarded as of truly consular rank unless in national affairs he showed a consul’s spirit. Consequently, your foremost duty is to break away from bad Romans with whom you have nothing in common. Secondly, you should offer the Senate and all right-thinking persons your services as counsellor, chief, and leader. And lastly, you must make up your mind that peace will not be achieved by laying down your arms: abolition of the general terror of arms and of enslavement is what will bring peace. If you act along those lines, and associate yourself with people of that 1. Probably Cicero is referring principally to Lepidus. calibre, then you will not only be a consul and a consular, but a great one. Otherwise, those resplendent official distinctions of yours will bring you no dignity but utter disgrace.
It is only because I am your friend diat I have written you these rather harsh words. Put them to the test in the only way which is worthy of you, and you will find that diey are true. (X, 6)
*
In April 43 B.C., Antony was defeated by the armies of the Republic beneath the walls of Mutina. But their victory was marred by the deaths of both consuls (Hirtius and Pansa). And then disaster followed. Just as seventeen years earlier the first Triumvirs had leagued together to suppress the Republican government, so now the twenty-year-old Octavian, though he had fought on the Republican side at Mutina, felt himself rebuffed by the Senate (as Pompey had on that previous occasion), and joined Antony. With Lepidus as their associate, in November 43 B.C., they announced the formation of the Second Triumvirate – this time on a formal basis, as a committee of joint dictators.
In the following year the Triumvirs overwhelmed the Republican cause at Philippi in Macedonia, and Brutus and Cassius met their deaths. But first the Triumvirate had arranged the ‘proscriptions’: the many leading Romans who opposed them, or might oppose them, were to die. Cicero and his brother and nephew were on the list. They decided to escape across the Adriatic to Brutus and Cassius. But the two Quintuses were betrayed by their servants and killed. Cicero himself, after many changes of mind, put back to shore and went to his villa at Astura. Urged by his slaves to depart he set out again for the coast in a litter on 7 December 43 B.C., but while he was on the way two officers of the Triumvirs came upon him. They cut off his head, and the hands which had written the Philippics.
*
The letters which have been translated here are the following (Fam. = To Friends, Att. =To Atticus): Fam. V, 7 (p. 61);Att. II, 18 (p. 63);Fam. XIV, 1(p. 65); Att. IV, s (p. 68); Fam. II, 4 (p. 70); Att. V, 1 (p. 71); Fam. II, 11 (p. 74), XVI, 4 (p. 76); Att. VIII, lie and 8 (p. 78), IX, 4 (p. 79), HA (p. 81), X, 8B (p. 83), XI, 17 (p. 85); Fam. DC, 1 (p. 85); Att. XII, 46 (p. 87), Xni, 40 (p. 88), 52 (p. 89), XIV, 4 (p. 91), XV, IA (p. 92), II (p. 94); Fam. X, 28 (p. 97), 6 (p. 99).