RETIREMENT OF POMPEY AND THE COALITION OF THE PRETENDERS
When Pompey again turned his eyes homeward, for the second time he found the diadem at his feet. The Roman commonwealth had long been tending towards such a catastrophe. It was obvious to every unbiased observer, and had been remarked a thousand times, that monarchy was inevitable if the rule of the aristocracy should come to an end. The Senate had now been overthrown by the civil democratic opposition and the military power. The only remaining questions were the persons, names, and forms for the new order, and these were already clearly enough indicated in the partly democratic and partly military elements of the revolution.
The events of the preceding five years had set the final seal on this impending transformation of the commonwealth. In the newly erected Asiatic provinces, which gave regal honors to their organizer as the successor of Alexander the Great, and received his favorite freedmen like princes, Pompey had laid the foundations of his rule, and found the treasures, the army, and the halo of glory which the future prince of the Roman state required. Moreover, the anarchist conspiracy in the capital and the civil war connected with it had made it glaringly clear to every one who studied political or even purely economic affairs that a government without authority or military power, such as that of the Senate, exposed the state to the equally ludicrous and formidable tyranny of political sharpers, and that a constitutional change to connect the military power more closely with the government was indispensable if social order was to be maintained. So the ruler had arisen in the East as the throne had been erected in Italy. To all appearances the year 62 B.C. was destined to be the last of the republic and the first of the monarchy.
True, this goal was not to be reached without a struggle. The 500-year-old constitution under which the insignificant town on the Tiber had risen to unprecedented greatness and glory had sunk its roots into the soil to a depth beyond human ken, and no one could calculate what convulsions might attend the attempt to overthrow it. Several rivals had been outrun by Pompey in the race towards the great goal, but they were not entirely out of the running. It was not inconceivable that all these elements might combine to overthrow the new holder of power, and that Pompey might find Quintus Catulus and Marcus Cato united in opposition to him with Marcus Crassus, Gaius Caesar, and Titus Labienus.
But the inevitable struggle could not have been undertaken under circumstances more favorable for Pompey. It was highly probable that, with the memory of the Catilinarian revolt still fresh, any rule which promised order and security at the cost of freedom would win over the whole middle party—including not only the merchants who concerned themselves only with their material interests, but also a great part of the disorganized and politically hopeless aristocracy, which had to content itself with hoping for riches, rank, and influence through a timely compromise with the prince. Perhaps even a portion of the democrats, so sorely smitten by recent blows, might submit in the hope of realizing part of their demands from the military chief they had raised to power.
In any case, of what importance were the parties in Italy in the presence of Pompey and his victorious army? Twenty years earlier Sulla, after concluding an armistice with Mithradates, had with five legions been able to effect a restoration against the course of history and in the face of the whole liberal party, from moderate aristocrats through liberal merchants down to anarchists, which had been arming for years. Pompey’s task was far less difficult. He returned after having fully carried out his various missions by land and sea. He might expect no serious opposition save that of the extreme parties, each of which by itself could do nothing, and which even if leagued together were no more than a coalition of fundamentally hostile factions. Completely unarmed, they were leaderless, without organization in Italy, without support in the provinces, and, above all, without a military force or a general. Their ranks included hardly a soldier of note (to say nothing of an officer) who could have ventured to call out the citizens to oppose Pompey.
It was also noteworthy that the volcano of revolution, which had now been blazing for seventy years and feeding on its own flame, was visibly burning itself out. It was very doubtful whether an attempt to arm the Italians for a political struggle would succeed as it had in the days of Cinna and Carbo. If Pompey exerted himself, how could he fail to effect the revolution which seemed the inevitable next step in the development of the Roman commonwealth?
Pompey, who had seized the right moment when he undertook his mission to the East, seemed willing to go forward. In the autumn of 63 B.C. Quintus Metellus Nepos arrived from Pompey’s camp and came forward as a candidate for the tribuneship. His express purpose was to use that position to procure for Pompey (by special decree of the people) the immediate command of the war against Catiline, and subsequently the consulship for 61 B.C. The excitement in Rome was great, for it was assumed that Nepos was acting under Pompey’s direct or indirect orders. The desire of Pompey to appear in Italy at the head of his Asiatic legions, and to administer simultaneously the supreme military and civil power, was regarded as a further step on the way to the throne, and the mission of Nepos a semiofficial proclamation of the monarchy.
Everything turned on the attitude of the two great political parties towards these overtures, on which their future position and the future of the nation depended. However, the reception which Nepos met was in its turn determined by the existing relations of the parties to Pompey, which were of a very peculiar kind. Pompey had gone to the East as general of the popular party. He had reason enough to be displeased with Caesar and his adherents, but no open rupture had taken place. It is probable that Pompey, who was far away and preoccupied with other things, and who was also quite destitute of political insight, by no means understood at that time the extent and mutual connection of the democratic intrigues aimed at him. Perhaps he even took a haughty and shortsighted pride in ignoring these underground cabals.
There was moreover the fact, which had much weight with a character of the type of Pompey, that the democrats never lost sight of outward respect for the great man. In 63 B.C. they had granted him, by special decree of the people, unprecedented honors and decorations which were quite unsolicited (as he preferred it). But even if all this had not been the case, Pompey’s own well-understood interest was to continue at least outwardly his adherence to the popular party. Democracy and monarchy are so closely related that Pompey, in aspiring to the crown, could scarely do other than continue to call himself the popular champion.
While personal and political reasons thus combined to keep Pompey close to the democratic leaders, despite all that had taken place, nothing was done to bridge the gulf which had separated him from his Sullan partisans since he deserted to the democratic camp. His personal quarrel with Metellus and Lucullus transferred itself to their extensive and influential followings. The paltry opposition of the Senate—all the more exasperating to a character of so paltry a mold—had dogged his whole career as a general. He felt keenly that the Senate had not taken the smallest step to honor the extraordinary man according to his deserts, that is, by extraordinary means. Lastly, it should not be forgotten that the aristocracy was then intoxicated by its recent victory and the democrats deeply humbled, and that the aristocracy was led by the pedantically stiff and half-witless Cato against that supple democratic master of intrigue, Caesar.
Such were the parties amid which the emissary of Pompey appeared. The aristocracy not only regarded the proposals announced on behalf of Pompey as a declaration of war against the constitution, but treated them openly as such, and took not the slightest pains to conceal their alarm and indignation. With the express design of combating these proposals, Cato had himself elected as tribune of the people along with Nepos, and abruptly repelled the repeated attempts of Pompey to approach him personally. Thus Nepos naturally felt no obligation to spare the aristocracy, but attached himself the more readily to the democrats. These, pliant as ever, submitted to the inevitable and chose freely to concede the command in Italy as well as the consulship rather than let the concession be wrung from them by force.
A cordial understanding soon blossomed. In December of 63 B.C. Nepos publicly accepted the democratic view of the executions recently decreed by the Senate as unconstitutional judicial murders. That his lord and master saw them in the same light is implied by his significant silence regarding the voluminous vindication which Cicero had sent to him. On the other hand, Caesar’s first act as praetor was to call Quintus Catulus to account for alleged embezzlement in the rebuilding of the Capitoline temple, and to transfer the completion of the temple to Pompey.
This was a masterstroke. Catulus had already been building at the temple for fifteen years, and seemed quite disposed to continue until he died. An attack on this abuse of a public commission—an abuse covered only by the reputation of the noble commissioner—was entirely justified and highly popular. But to show Pompey the prospect of replacing the name of Catulus with his own, on this proudest spot of the first city of the globe, was to offer him the thing which delighted him most and did no harm to the democrats—abundant but empty honor. At the same time the aristocracy, which could not possibly allow its best man to fall, was brought into the most disagreeable collision with Pompey.
Meanwhile Nepos had brought his proposals concerning Pompey before the citizenry. On the day of the voting Cato and his friend and colleague, Quintus Minucius, interposed their veto. When Nepos disregarded this and continued the reading, Cato and Minucius threw themselves on their colleague and forced him to stop. An armed band liberated him and drove the aristocratic section from the Forum, but Cato and Minucius returned with armed bands of their own and ultimately maintained the field of battle for the government.
Encouraged by this victory of their bands over those of their antagonist, the Senate suspended the tribune Nepos as well as the praetor Caesar, who had vigorously supported him in proposing the law. Their deposition from office by the Senate was prevented by Cato, undoubtedly more because it was unconstitutional than because it was injudicious. Caesar disregarded the decree, and continued his official functions till the Senate used violence against him. At this news the multitude appeared before his house and placed itself at his disposal. He alone was to decide whether the struggle in the streets should begin, or whether at least the proposals of Nepos should be taken up and the military command in Italy procured for Pompey. As this was not in Caesar’s interest he induced the crowds to disperse, whereupon the Senate rescinded his suspension. Nepos himself had set out for Asia immediately after his suspension to report the results of his mission to Pompey.
Pompey had every reason to be content with the way things were going. The road to the throne now involved civil war, and he owed it to Cato’s incorrigible perversity that he could begin this war with good reason. After the illegal condemnation of the adherents of Catiline, after the unparalleled acts of violence against the tribune Nepos, Pompey might wage war both as champion of the party of order against the Catilinarians, and as defender of the two palladia of Roman public freedom—the right of appeal and the inviolability of the tribunate of the people.
It seemed almost impossible that Pompey should neglect this second opportunity, and with open eyes put himself again into the painful position which resulted from the dismissal of his army in 70 B.C., and from which only the Gabinian law had released him. But the closer came the crown, as much as his whole soul longed after it, when action had to be taken his heart and his hand once more failed him. This man, ordinary in every respect except his pretensions, would doubtless gladly have placed himself beyond the law if he could only have done so legally. His very lingering in Asia betrayed his misgivings. He could easily have arrived in January of 62 B.C. with his fleet and army at the port of Brundisium, and received Nepos there. His tarrying the whole winter in Asia had the immediate injurious result that the aristocracy, which of course pressed the campaign against Catiline as best it could, had meanwhile got rid of his bands, and thus removed the most feasible pretext for bringing the Asiatic legions into Italy.
For a man like Pompey, who for lack of faith in himself and in his star timidly clung in public life to formal right, and for whom the pretext was nearly as important as the motive, this circumstance was of serious weight. He probably said to himself that his army was not wholly lost even if he dismissed it, and that if necessary he could still raise a force sooner than any other party chief. He noted that the democrats were waiting submissively for his instructions, and that he could deal with the refractory Senate even without soldiers. Other such considerations doubtless suggested themselves, in which there was just enough truth to make them seem plausible to one who wished to deceive himself.
Once more the peculiar temperament of Pompey turned the scale. He was one of those men who might be capable of a crime, but not of insubordination; in both a good and a bad sense, he was every inch a soldier. Outstanding men respect the law as a moral necessity, ordinary men as a traditional everyday rule. For this very reason military discipline, where law most often dons the guise of habit, fetters all but the most self-reliant men with a magic spell. It has often been observed that the soldier, even where determined to refuse obedience, involuntarily resumes his place in the ranks when obedience is demanded. It was this feeling that made Lafayette and Dumouriez hesitate at the last moment before the breach of faith and break down. To this Pompey also succumbed.
In the autumn of 62 B.C. Pompey embarked for Italy. While everyone in the capital was preparing to receive the new monarch, news came that he had broken up his legions upon landing and was en route to the capital with a small escort. Fortune never did more for mortal man than it did for Pompey, if it is a piece of good fortune to be presented with a crown without trouble. But on those who lack courage the gods lavish every favor and every gift in vain.
The parties breathed freely. For the second time Pompey had abdicated, and his already vanquished competitors might again start the race—in which the strangest entry was Pompey himself. In January of 61 B.C. he came to Rome. His position was awkward, and vacillated so much between the parties that people gave him the nickname of Gnaeus Cicero. He had in fact lost favor with all. The anarchists saw in him an adversary, the democrats an inconvenient friend, Marcus Crassus a rival, the wealthy class an untrustworthy protector, the aristocracy a declared foe. He was still the most powerful man in the state, with his military adherents scattered throughout Italy, his influence in the provinces, particularly in the East, his military fame, and his enormous riches. But instead of the enthusiastic reception on which he had counted, he was more than coolly met, and still cooler was the treatment given to the demands which he presented.
He requested for himself, as already announced by Nepos, a second consulship, and he of course demanded also a confirmation of his arrangements made in the East and a fulfillment of his promise to furnish his soldiers with land. These demands raised a systematic opposition in the Senate, sparked by the personal exasperation of Lucullus and Metellus Creticus, the old resentment of Crassus, and the conscientious folly of Cato. The second consulship was immediately and bluntly refused. The very first request which the returning general addressed to the Senate, that the election of the consuls for 61 B.C. be put off till after his entry into the capital, had been rejected, and there was still less likelihood of obtaining the necessary senatorial dispensation from Sulla’s law forbidding re-election. As to his arrangements in the eastern provinces, Pompey naturally asked their confirmation as a whole. Lucullus carried a proposal that every ordinance should be separately discussed and voted upon, which opened the door for endless annoyances and a multitude of defeats in detail. The promise of land for the soldiers of the Asiatic army was ratified in general by the Senate, but also extended to the Cretan legions of Metellus; and still worse, it was not executed because the treasury was empty, and the Senate was not disposed to meddle with the public domains for this purpose.
Pompey, in despair of mastering the persistent and spiteful opposition of the Senate, turned to the citizens. But he understood still less how to conduct his movements on this field. The democratic leaders, though they did not openly oppose him, had no reason to make his interests their own, and so kept aloof. Pompey’s own instruments—such as Marcus Pupius Piso and Lucius Afranius, who were elected consuls respectively in 61 and 60 B.C. by his influence and partly by his money—showed themselves unskillful and useless. When at length the assignment of land for the Asiatic veterans was submitted to the citizens by the tribune Lucius Flavius as a general agrarian law, the proposal, not supported by the democrats and openly opposed by the aristocracy, was defeated.
The exalted general now sued almost humbly for the favor of the masses, for it was at his instigation that the Italian tolls were abolished in 60 B.C. under a law proposed by the praetor Metellus Nepos. But he played the demagogue without skill or success, his reputation suffering while he did not attain his objectives. He had completely run himself into a noose. One of his opponents summed up his political position by saying that he had endeavored “to conserve by silence his embroidered triumphal mantle.” In fact there was nothing left for him to do but to fret.
Then a new combination offered itself. The leader of the democratic party had actively employed the political calm which had followed Pompey’s retirement. When Pompey returned from Asia, Caesar had been little more than another Catiline—a personal bankrupt and chief of a political party that had dwindled almost into a club of conspirators. But since then he had, after administering the praetorship (62 B.C.), been made governor of Further Spain, and thereby had been able partly to rid himself of debt, and partly to lay the foundation for his military repute. His old friend and ally Crassus had been induced, in the hope of finding support against Pompey, to relieve him even before he left of his most oppressive obligations.
He had made full use of his brief sojourn in Spain. Returning in 60 B.C. as Imperator with filled chests and well-founded claims to a triumph, he came forward as a candidate for the consulship; and when the Senate refused him permission to announce himself as a candidate in absentia, he abandoned without hesitation the honor of the triumph. For years the democrats had striven to raise one of their partisans to the supreme magistracy, through which they might attain a military power of their own. It had long been clear that the political struggle could only be settled by military force. But the history of the coalition between the democrats and the military chiefs, which ended the rule of the Senate, showed with inexorable clarity that such an alliance ultimately subordinated the civil to the military elements, and that if the popular party would really rule, it must make generals of its own leaders instead of allying itself with generals alien or even hostile to it. The attempts to carry the election of Catiline as consul, and to create a military base in Spain or Egypt, had failed. Now a possibility arose of procuring for their most important leader the consulship and the consular province in the usual constitutional way, and of rendering themselves independent of their dubious and dangerous ally Pompey by the establishment of a power base, so to speak, in their own democratic household.
But the more the popular party sought to travel this path, which offered not merely the most favorable but also the only prospect of real success, the more surely it might count on resolute political resistance. Everything depended on who were its opponents in this matter. By itself, the aristocracy was not formidable; but it had just been shown in the Catilinarian affair that it could still exert influence where it was supported by the commercial interests and by the adherents of Pompey. Several times it had frustrated Catiline’s candidacy for the consulship, and it would certainly attempt the same against Caesar. And even if Caesar were chosen in spite of it, his election alone did not suffice. He needed several undisturbed years outside of Italy to create a firm military base, and the nobility would leave no stone unturned to thwart his plans during this period of preparation.
Thus the idea naturally occurred whether the aristocracy might not again be isolated as in 71-70 B.C., and an alliance based on mutual advantage established between the democrats with their ally Crassus on the one side and Pompey and the great capitalists on the other. For Pompey such a coalition was certainly political suicide. His weight in the state rested on the fact that he was the only party leader who also commanded legions, which even if dissolved were still in a sense at his disposal. The democratic plan was precisely intended to deprive him of this preponderance, and to place their own chief by his side as a military rival. Never could he consent to this, and least of all personally help to a post of supreme command a man like Caesar, who had already given him enough trouble as a mere political agitator, and who had also just furnished brilliant proofs of his military capacity in Spain.
But on the other hand, the caviling opposition of the Senate and the indifference of the multitude to his wishes had made Pompey’s position, especially with reference to his old soldiers, so painful and so humiliating that his well-known character might welcome such a coalition, if it could release him from that disagreeable situation. As for the commercial party, it was to be found on whatever side the power lay. As a matter of course it would not hang back if it saw Pompey and the popular party combining anew in earnest. It happened, moreover, that just at that time Cato’s severity—otherwise very laudable—toward the tax farmers had put the great capitalists once more at swords’ points with the Senate.
So the second coalition was formed in the summer of 60 B.C. Caesar was assured of the consulship for the following year and, in due course, a governorship. Pompey was promised the ratification of his Asiatic arrangements and an assignment of lands for his soldiers. Caesar likewise promised the equites to procure for them, by means of the citizens, what the Senate had refused. Crassus was at least allowed to join the league, although without obtaining definite promises for an agreement which he could not refuse.
Exactly the same elements—indeed, the same persons—concluded the league with one another in the summer of 60 B.C. as in the autumn of 71 B.C., but how completely changed was the position of the parties! Before, the democrats were nothing but a political party, while their allies were victorious generals at the head of armies. Now, the democratic chief was himself an Imperator crowned with victory and full of magnificent military schemes, while his allies were retired generals without forces. Then the democrats won victories of principle, and in return for those victories conceded the highest state offices to their two confederates. Now they hard-head-edly grasped the supreme civil and military power for themselves, making concessions to their allies only on subordinate points. (Significantly, not even Pompey’s demand for a second consulship was granted.) Then the democrats sacrificed themselves to their allies; now the latter were forced to trust in them.
Most completely changed of all, however, was the character of the democratic party itself. No doubt it had always contained at its very core a monarchic element. But the constitutional ideal which floated in more or less clear outline before its best intellects was always that of a civil commonwealth, a Periclean state, in which the power of the prince rested on the fact that he represented the citizens in the noblest and most accomplished manner, and the best and noblest of the citizenry recognized him as the man whom they thoroughly trusted. Caesar too began with some such views, but simply as ideals which might influence realities rather than be directly realized. Neither the simple civil power, as Gaius Gracchus possessed it, nor the arming of the democratic party, as Cinna had inadequately attempted, was able to maintain a permanent superiority in the Roman commonwealth. The military machine fighting not for a party but for a general, the rude force of the condottieri, after having first appeared on the stage in the service of the restoration, soon showed its absolute superiority to all political parties.
Caesar could not but become convinced of this through his practical party experience. Accordingly, he matured the momentous resolution of making the military machine itself serve his ideals, and of erecting the commonwealth he envisaged by the power of the rootless soldiers. With this design he concluded in 71 B.C. the league with the generals of the opposite party, which, despite their acceptance of the democratic program, yet brought the party and Caesar himself to the brink of destruction. With the same design he himself came forward eleven years afterwards as a military dictator.
It was done in both cases with a certain naïveté, with faith in his ability to found a free commonwealth, if not by the swords of others, at any rate by his own. We perceive without difficulty that this faith was fallacious, and that no one calls up an evil spirit without becoming himself enslaved to it. But the greatest men are not those who err the least. If after so many centuries we still bow before what Caesar willed and did, it is not because he desired and gained a crown (which is fundamentally as unimportant as the crown itself), but rather because his mighty ideal of a free commonwealth under one ruler never forsook him, and preserved him even as monarch from sinking into vulgar royalty.
The election of Caesar as consul for 59 B.C. was carried without difficulty by the united parties. The aristocracy had to rest content with giving him a colleague by means of a slush fund to which the whole order of lords contributed, and which excited surprise even in that most corrupt period. The colleague in question was Marcus Bibulus, whose narrow-minded obstinacy was regarded as energy in conservative circles, and whose good intentions at least were not at fault if the genteel lords did not get a fit return for their patriotic expenditure.
As consul, Caesar first proposed the measures of his confederates, among which the question of land for the Asiatic veterans was by far the most important. The agrarian law projected for this purpose by Caesar generally followed the outlines of the proposal introduced the year before at the suggestion of Pompey but not carried. Only the Italian domain land was earmarked for distribution—that is, substantially the territory of Capua; and if this should not suffice, other Italian estates were to be purchased at their legal, taxable value, using the revenue of the new eastern provinces. All existing property rights thus remained unaffected.
The individual allotments were small, with the recipients of land to be poor citizens, fathers of at least three children. Thus the dangerous principle that rendering military service gave a claim to landed estate was not laid down, but, in line with reasonable past practice, the land distributors were urged to give special consideration to old soldiers as well as to temporary lessees ejected from their holdings. The execution of the measure was entrusted to a commission of twenty, from whose number Caesar specifically asked to be excluded.
It was hard for the opposition to resist this proposal. Undeniably, after the creation of the provinces of Pontus and Syria the state should be in a position to forego the rents from the Campanian leases. It was unwarranted to withhold one of the finest districts of Italy, and one peculiarly fitted for small holdings, from private enterprise. And finally, it was as unjust as it was ridiculous to withhold municipal rights from the township of Capua, after extending the franchise to all Italy. The whole proposal bore the stamp of moderation, honesty, and solidity, dexterously combined with democratic objectives. In substance, the new law amounted to the re-establishment of the Capuan colony founded in the time of Marius and done away with by Sulla.
Caesar also gave all possible consideration to legal forms. He put the new agrarian law, as well as the proposal to ratify collectively the ordinances issued by Pompey in the East, and the petition of the tax farmers for remission of a third of the sums payable by them, before the Senate for approval, and declared himself ready to entertain and discuss amendments.
That body now had a chance to convince itself how foolishly it had acted in driving Pompey and the equites into the enemy’s arms by refusing these requests. Perhaps it was the secret realization of this that drove the highborn lords to the most vehement opposition, in sour contrast to the calm demeanor of Caesar. They rejected the agrarian law nakedly and without discussion. The decree as to Pompey’s arrangements in Asia found quite as little favor in their eyes. Cato attempted, in accordance with the disreputable custom of Roman parliamentary debate, to kill the proposal regarding the tax farmers by prolonging his speech up to the legal hour for closing the sitting. When Caesar threatened to have the stubborn man arrested, this proposal too was at length rejected.
Of course all the proposals were now brought before the citizens. Without deviating far from the truth, Caesar could tell the multitude that the Senate had scornfully rejected most rational and necessary proposals submitted respectfully to it, simply because they came from the democratic consul. When he added that the aristocrats were plotting to procure rejection of the proposals, and summoned the citizens, especially Pompey himself and his old soldiers, to stand by him against fraud and force, this too was by no means a mere invention. The aristocracy, headed by the weak and obstinate Bibulus and the dogmatic fool Cato, actually intended to push the matter to open violence. Pompey, pressed by Caesar to proclaim his position, on this one occasion declared bluntly that if any one should venture to draw the sword he too would grasp his, and in that case would not leave the shield at home. Crassus expressed himself to the same effect. The old soldiers of Pompey were directed to appear on the day of the vote (which in fact primarily concerned them) with arms under their dress.
The nobility left nothing undone to frustrate the proposals of Caesar. Each day when Caesar appeared before the people, his colleague Bibulus interrupted with the well-known political observations about the weather, which were supposed to suspend all public business. Caesar did not trouble himself about the skies, but continued to prosecute his terrestrial occupation. The tribunician veto was interposed, but Caesar contented himself with disregarding it. Bibulus and Cato then sprang to the rostra, harangued the multitude, and instigated the usual riot. Caesar ordered that they should be led away by lictors from the Forum, and took care that no harm should befall them, for it was to his interest that this political comedy should continue.
Notwithstanding all the chicanery and blustering by the nobility, the agrarian law, the confirmation of the Asiatic arrangements, and the remission to the tax farmers were adopted by the citizens, and the commission of twenty, with Pompey and Crassus at its head, was elected and installed in office. All their exertions had gained the aristocracy nothing, save that their blind and spiteful antagonism had strengthened the bonds of the coalition, and their energy, which they were soon to need for more important matters, was exhausted on these trivial affairs. They congratulated each other on their patriotic courage as evidenced by the declaration of Bibulus that he would rather die than yield, and the peroration which Cato still continued to deliver when in the hands of the lictors. Otherwise, they resigned themselves to their fate.
The consul Bibulus shut himself up for the rest of the year in his house, at the same time intimating that his pious intention was to watch the skies on all the days appropriate for public assemblies during that year. His colleagues once more admired the great man who, as Ennius had said of the old Fabius, “saved the state by wise delay,” and followed his example. Most of them, Cato included, no longer appeared in the Senate, but within their four walls helped their consul to fret over the fact that the history of the world went on in spite of political astrology. To the public this passive attitude of the consul and the aristocracy appeared, as well it might, a political abdication. As for the coalition, it was naturally very well content that it was left to take its further steps almost undisturbed.
The most important of these steps was deciding the future position of Caesar. Constitutionally it devolved on the Senate to fix the functions of the second consular year of office before the election of the consuls took place. Accordingly it had, anticipating the election of Caesar, selected for him for 58 B.C. two provinces in which the governor would be limited to building roads and other public works. Since this was of course out of the question, it was agreed among the confederates that Caesar should obtain by decree of the people an extraordinary command modeled on the Gabinio-Manilian laws. Since Caesar had publicly declared that he would introduce no proposal on his own behalf, the tribune Publius Vatinius submitted the proposal to the citizens, who naturally gave their unconditional assent.
By this means Caesar obtained the governorship of Cisalpine Gaul and the command of the three legions stationed there, which were already experienced in border warfare under Lucius Afranius, as well as the same rank of propraetor for his adjutants as those of Pompey had enjoyed. This post was granted to him for five years, a longer period than ever before assigned to a general whose appointment had any definite limits. The country of the Transpadanes, which for years had supported the democratic party and Caesar in particular in the hope of securing the franchise, formed the main portion of his province. His jurisdiction extended south as far as the Arno and the Rubicon, and included Luca and Ravenna. Subsequently Caesar’s official district was enlarged by the province of Narbo with its one legion, a resolution adopted by the Senate on the proposal of Pompey to prevent this command also from passing to Caesar by extraordinary popular decree.
Caesar’s goal was thus attained. As no troops could constitutionally be stationed in Italy proper, the commander of the legions of northern Italy and Gaul dominated both Italy and Rome for the next five years, and he who was master for five years was master for life. The consulship of Caesar had attained its object. As a matter of course, the new holders of power did not neglect to keep the multitude in good humor by games and amusements of all sorts, and they embraced every opportunity of filling the exchequer. In the case of the king of Egypt, for instance, the decree of the people which recognized him as legitimate ruler was sold to him by the coalition at a high price, and other dynasts and communities acquired charters and privileges in like manner.
The arrangements also seemed sufficiently secure. The consulship was, at least for the next year, in safe hands. The public believed at first that it was destined for Pompey and Crassus. However, the holders of power preferred to elect two subordinate but trustworthy associates, Aulus Gabinius, the best among Pompey’s adjutants, and Lucius Piso, who was less important but was Caesar’s father-in-law. Pompey personally was to watch over Italy, where as head of the commission of twenty he administered the agrarian law and furnished nearly 20,000 citizens, mainly veterans from his army, with land in the territory of Capua. Caesar’s northern Italian legions served to back him against opposition in the capital.
There existed no immediate prospect of a rupture among the holders of power. The laws issued by Caesar as consul, which Pompey was at least as interested in maintaining as Caesar, constituted a guarantee of a continuing breach between Pompey and the aristocracy (whose heads, especially Cato, continued to treat these laws as void) and thereby a guarantee of the existence of the coalition. Moreover, its chiefs were drawn closer by personal bonds. Caesar had honestly and faithfully kept his word to his confederates without trimming or cheating, and in particular had fought as dexterously and energetically for the agrarian law proposed in Pompey’s interest as if it had been his own. Pompey was not insensible to upright dealing and good faith, and was kindly disposed towards the man who had helped rescue him from the sorry part of a suppliant which he had been playing for three years.
Frequent and familiar intercourse with a man as irresistibly amiable as Caesar did what more was needed to convert the alliance of interests into an alliance of friendship. The result and the pledge of this friendship—and at the same time, a public announcement of the newly established joint rule which could hardly be misunderstood—was the marriage of Pompey with Caesar’s only daughter, three-and-twenty years of age. Julia, who had inherited the charm of her father, lived in the happiest domestic relations with her husband, who was nearly twice her age. The citizens, longing for rest and order after so many troubles and crises, saw in this marital alliance the guarantee of a peaceful and prosperous future.
The more firmly and closely the alliance was thus cemented between Pompey and Caesar, the more hopeless grew the cause of the aristocracy. They felt the sword suspended over their heads, and they knew Caesar sufficiently to have no doubt that he would, if necessary, use it without hesitation. “On all sides,” wrote one of them, “we are checkmated. We have already through fear of death or banishment despaired of ‘freedom’; every one sighs, no one ventures to speak.” More the confederates could not desire. But though the majority of the aristocracy was in this desirable frame of mind, there was, of course, no lack of aristocratic Hotspurs. Hardly had Caesar completed his consulship when two of the most violent aristocrats, Lucius Domitius and Gaius Memmius, proposed in a full Senate the annulling of the Julian laws.
This indeed was simply a piece of folly which redounded only to the benefit of the coalition. When Caesar himself now insisted that the Senate investigate the validity of the laws assailed, the latter could not but formally recognize their legality. As may readily be conceived, however, the holders of power used this as a new opportunity to make an example of some of the most notable and noisiest of their opponents, thereby assuring that the remainder would adhere to the policy of sighing in silence. At first the coalition had hoped that the clause of the agrarian law, which as usual required all the senators to swear to uphold the new law on pain of forfeiting their political rights, would induce its most vehement opponents to banish themselves by refusing the oath. But these did not show themselves so compliant. Even the rigid Cato submitted to the oath, and his Sancho Panzas followed.
A second and far from honorable attempt to threaten the leading aristocrats with criminal impeachments and drive them into exile, on account of an alleged plot to murder Pompey, was frustrated by the incapacity of the instruments. The informer, one Vettius, exaggerated and contradicted himself so grossly, and the tribune Vatinius (who directed the foul scheme) showed his complicity with Vettius so clearly, that it was found advisable to strangle the latter in prison and let the matter drop. This occasion, however, produced sufficient evidence of the total disorganization of the aristocracy and the boundless alarm of the genteel lords: even a man like Lucius Lucullus threw himself in person at Caesar’s feet and publicly declared that he found himself compelled by reason of his great age to withdraw from public life.
Ultimately, therefore, the democrats were content with a few isolated victims. It was of primary importance to remove Cato, who made no secret of his conviction as to the nullity of all the Julian laws, and who was a man to act as he thought. Such a man Cicero certainly was not, and they did not bother to fear him. But the victorious democratic party, which played the leading part in the coalition, could not possibly leave unpunished the judicial murder of December 5, 63 B.C., which it had so loudly and justly censured. Had it wished to bring to account the real authors of the fatal decree, it ought to have seized not the pusillanimous consul, but that section of the diehard aristocracy which had egged on the timorous man to the execution. But legally it was not the consul’s advisers but the consul himself who was responsible, and it was the gentler course to charge the consul alone and leave his senatorial colleagues out of it. For this reason the charge directed against Cicero describes the decree of the Senate, by virtue of which he ordered the execution, as supposititious.
Even against Cicero the holders of power would gladly have avoided steps that attracted attention. However, he could not prevail on himself either to give to those in power the guarantees which they required, or banish himself from Rome under one of several feasible pretexts, or even keep silent. With sincere alarm and the utmost desire to avoid any offense, he still did not have enough self-control to be prudent. He could not keep quiet when a petulant witticism stung him, or when the praise of so many noble lords evoked in his brainless conceit the sonorous eloquence of the plebeian advocate.
The execution of the measures against Cato and Cicero was committed to the loose and dissolute but clever and audacious Publius Clodius, a bitter enemy of Cicero for years. In order to satisfy that enmity and play the part of a demagogue, Clodius had hastily converted himself from a patrician into a plebeian during the consulship of Caesar, and was then chosen as tribune of the people for the year 58 B.C. To support Clodius, the proconsul Caesar remained in the vicinity of the capital till the blow was struck against the two victims. In line with the instructions which he had received, Clodius proposed that the citizens entrust Cato with the regulation of the complicated municipal affairs of the Byzantines and with the annexation of the kingdom of Cyprus. The latter had like Egypt fallen to the Romans by the testament of Alexander II; but unlike Egypt, it had not bought off the Roman annexation, and its king had also once given personal offense to Clodius. As for Cicero, Clodius proposed a law which characterized the execution of a citizen without trial and sentence as a crime punishable by banishment.
Cato was thus removed on an honorable mission, while Cicero was given the gentlest possible punishment and, moreover, was not designated by name in the proposal. But the holders of power did not refuse themselves the pleasure, on the one hand, of punishing a notoriously timid and shifty politician for the conservative energy which he had displayed, while on the other they invested the bitter opponent of all governmental interferences by the citizens, and of all extraordinary commands, with just such a command conferred by decree of the citizens themselves. With similar humor the proposal regarding Cato was based on the ground of his abnormal virtue, which made him appear pre-eminently qualified to execute so delicate a commission as confiscating the considerable royal treasure of Cyprus without embezzlement.
Both proposals bear the same stamp of respectful deference and cool irony which generally marked Caesar’s bearing with reference to the Senate. They met with no resistance. It was naturally unavailing that the majority of the Senate, seeking to protest in some way against the mockery and censure of their decree regarding Catiline, put on public mourning, and that Cicero himself, now that it was too late, besought mercy on his knees from Pompey. He had to banish himself even before the passing of the law which barred him from his native land. Cato likewise did not venture to provoke sharper measures by declining the commission which he had received, but accepted it and embarked for the East. What was most immediately necessary was done, and Caesar too might leave Italy to devote himself to more serious tasks.
The situation which Caesar found upon his arrival in Gaul in the spring of 58 B.C. was a difficult one. The Celtic culture of Gaul, prevented by the Romans from expanding further south-westward, was showing signs of disintegration under the blows of the Germans advancing from the east. This pressure had already dislodged the Helvetian tribe of Celts from their accustomed territory and sent them in search of new land in the interior of Gaul. Caesar chastised the Helvetii and sent them back to their former terrain. Then he crushed a major German invasion—and thereby for the first time established the Rhine as the Roman boundary against the Germans.
Thus began the eight years of complicated warfare (58 through 51 B.C.) which accomplished the conquest of all Gaul and saw the beginnings of the Roman dominion over Britain. The detailed story of the numerous campaigns of those years—full of Roman victories, though frequently accompanied by perils and sometimes by disaster—has often been told, most notably by Caesar himself in his Gallic Wars. The consequences were tremendous. “Centuries elapsed before men understood that Caesar had not merely conquered a new province for the Romans, but had laid the foundations for the Romanizing of the west,” comments Mommsen. “That there is a bridge connecting the past glory of Greece and Rome with the prouder fabric of modern history; that Western Europe is Romanic, and Germanic Europe classic; that the names of Themistocles and Scipio have a very different sound for us than those of Asoka and Salmanazar; that Homer and Sophocles are not merely attractive to the literary botanist, but bloom for us in our own garden—all this is the work of Caesar.”
But the still vaster work of Caesar—pulling down the structure of the Roman republic, and thereby laying the foundation of the Roman empire—was yet to come.