The Letters of Cicero Part 9

That part of your letter was entirely superfluous, in which you mention what opportunities of doing good business in the provinces or the city you let pa.s.s at other times as well as in the year of my consuls.h.i.+p: for I am thoroughly persuaded of your unselfishness and magnanimity, nor did I ever think that there was any difference between you and me except in our choice of a career. Ambition led me to seek official advancement, while another and perfectly laudable resolution led you to seek an honourable privacy. In the true glory, which is founded on honesty, industry, and piety, I place neither myself nor anyone else above you.

In affection towards myself, next to my brother and immediate family, I put you first. For indeed, indeed I have seen and thoroughly appreciated how your anxiety and joy have corresponded with the variations of my fortunes. Often has your congratulation added a charm to praise, and your consolation a welcome antidote to alarm. Nay, at this moment of your absence, it is not only your advice--in which you excel--but the interchange of speech--in which no one gives me so much delight as you do--that I miss most, shall I say in politics, in which circ.u.mspection is always inc.u.mbent on me, or in my forensic labour, which I formerly sustained with a view to official promotion, and nowadays to maintain my position by securing popularity, or in the mere business of my family?

In all these I missed you and our conversations before my brother left Rome, and still more do I miss them since. Finally, neither my work nor rest, neither my business nor leisure, neither my affairs in the forum or at home, public or private, can any longer do without your most consolatory and affectionate counsel and conversation. The modest reserve which characterizes both of us has often prevented my mentioning these facts; but on this occasion it was rendered necessary by that part of your letter in which you expressed a wish to have yourself and your character "put straight" and "cleared" in my eyes. Yet, in the midst of all this unfortunate alienation and anger, there is one fortunate circ.u.mstance--that your determination of not going to a province was known to me and your other friends, and had been at various times before distinctly expressed by yourself; so that your not being his guest may be attributed to your personal tastes and judgments, not to the quarrel and rupture between you. And so those ties which have been broken will be restored, and ours which have been so religiously preserved will retain all their old inviolability.

At Rome I find politics in a shaky condition; everything is unsatisfactory and foreboding change. For I have no doubt you have been told that our friends, the equites, are all but alienated from the senate. Their first grievance was the promulgation of a bill on the authority of the senate for the trial of such as had taken bribes for giving a verdict. I happened not to be in the house when that decree was pa.s.sed, but when I found that the equestrian order was indignant at it, and yet refrained from openly saying so, I remonstrated with the senate, as I thought, in very impressive language, and was very weighty and eloquent considering the unsatisfactory nature of my cause. But here is another piece of almost intolerable coolness on the part of the equites, which I have not only submitted to, but have even put in as good a light as possible! The companies which had contracted with the censors for Asia complained that in the heat of the compet.i.tion they had taken the contract at an excessive price; they demanded that the contract should be annulled. I led in their support, or rather, I was second, for it was Cra.s.sus who induced them to venture on this demand.

The case is scandalous, the demand a disgraceful one, and a confession of rash speculation. Yet there was a very great risk that, if they got no concession, they would be completely alienated from the senate. Here again I came to the rescue more than anyone else, and secured them a full and very friendly house, in which I, on the 1st and 2nd of December, delivered long speeches on the dignity and harmony of the two orders. The business is not yet settled, but the favourable feeling of the senate has been made manifest: for no one had spoken against it except the consul-designate, Metellus; while our hero Cato had still to speak, the shortness of the day having prevented his turn being reached.

Thus I, in the maintenance of my steady policy, preserve to the best of my ability that harmony of the orders which was originally my joiner's work; but since it all now seems in such a crazy condition, I am constructing what I may call a road towards the maintenance of our power, a safe one I hope, which I cannot fully describe to you in a letter, but of which I will nevertheless give you a hint. _I cultivate close intimacy with Pompey_. I foresee what you will say. I will use all necessary precautions, and I will write another time at greater length about my schemes for managing the Republic. You must know that Lucceius has it in his mind to stand for the consuls.h.i.+p at once; for there are said to be only two candidates in prospect. Caesar is thinking of coming to terms with him by the agency of Arrius, and Bibulus also thinks he may effect a coalition with him by means of C. Piso.[114] You smile?

This is no laughing matter, believe me. What else shall I write to you?

What? I have plenty to say, but must put it off to another time. If you mean to wait till you hear, let me know. For the moment I am satisfied with a modest request, though it is what I desire above everything--that you should come to Rome as soon as possible.

5 December.

[Footnote 112: Cicero is evidently very anxious as to the misunderstanding between Quintus and his brother-in-law Atticus, caused, as he hints, or at any rate not allayed, by Pomponia. The letter is very carefully written, without the familiar tone and mixture of jest and earnest common to most of the letters to Atticus.]

[Footnote 113: At the end of the _via Egnatia_, which started from Dyrrachium.]

[Footnote 114: The election in question is that to be held in B.C. 60 for the consuls.h.i.+p of B.C. 59. Caesar and Bibulus were elected, and apparently were the only two candidates declared as yet. They were, of course, extremists, and Lucceius seems to reckon on getting in by forming a coalition with either one or the other, and so getting the support of one of the extreme parties, with the moderates, for himself.

The bargain eventually made was between Lucceius and Caesar, the former finding the money. But the Optimates found more, and carried Bibulus.

Arrius is Q. Arrius the orator (see Index). C. Piso is the consul of B.C. 67.]

XXIII (A I, 18)

[Sidenote: B.C. 60. Coss., Q. Caecilius Metellus Celer, L. Afranius.]

This was the year in which Caesar, returning from his propraetors.h.i.+p in Spain, found Pompey in difficulties with the senate (1) as to the confirmation _en bloc_ of his _acta_ in the East, (2) as to the a.s.signation of lands to his veterans; and being met with opposition himself as to the triumph that he claimed, and his candidatures.h.i.+p for the consuls.h.i.+p, he formed with Pompey and Cra.s.sus the agreement known as the first triumvirate. Cicero saw his favourite political object, the _concordia ordinum_, threatened by any opposition to the triumvirate, which he yet distrusted as dangerous to the const.i.tution. We shall find him, therefore, vacillating between giving his support to its policy or standing by the extreme Optimates. P. Clodius is taking measures to be adopted into a plebeian gens, in order to stand for the tribunes.h.i.+p. Quintus is still in Asia. Pompey's triumph had taken place in the previous September.

TO ATTICUS (IN EPIRUS)

ROME, 20 JANUARY

[Sidenote: B.C. 60, aeT. 46]

Believe me there is nothing at this moment of which I stand so much in need as a man with whom to share all that causes me anxiety: a man to love me; a man of sense to whom I can speak without affectation, reserve, or concealment. For my brother is away--that most open-hearted and affectionate of men. Metellus is not a human being, but

"Mere sound and air, a howling wilderness."

While you, who have so often lightened my anxiety and my anguish of soul by your conversation and advice, who are ever my ally in public affairs, my confidant in all private business, the sharer in all my conversations and projects--where are you? So entirely am I abandoned by all, that the only moments of repose left me are those which are spent with my wife, pet daughter, and sweet little Cicero. For as to those friends.h.i.+ps with the great, and their artificial attractions, they have indeed a certain glitter in the outside world, but they bring no private satisfaction.

And so, after a crowded morning _levee_, as I go down to the forum surrounded by troops of friends, I can find no one out of all that crowd with whom to jest freely, or into whose ear I can breathe a familiar sigh. Therefore I wait for you, I long for you, I even urge on you to come; for I have many anxieties, many pressing cares, of which I think, if I once had your ears to listen to me, I could unburden myself in the conversation of a single walk. And of my private anxieties, indeed, I shall conceal all the stings and vexations, and not trust them to this letter and an unknown letter-carrier. These, however--for I don't want you to be made too anxious--are not very painful: yet they are persistent and worrying, and are not put to rest by the advice or conversation of any friend. But in regard to the Republic I have still the same courage and purpose, though it has again and again of its own act eluded treatment.[115] For should I put briefly what has occurred since you left, you would certainly exclaim that the Roman empire cannot be maintained much longer. Well, after your departure our first scene, I think, was the appearance of the Clodian scandal, in which having, as I thought, got an opportunity of pruning licentiousness and keeping our young men within bounds, I exerted myself to the utmost, and lavished all the resources of my intellect and genius, not from dislike to an individual, but from the hope of not merely correcting, but of completely curing the state. The Republic received a crus.h.i.+ng blow when this jury was won over by money and the opportunity of debauchery. See what has followed! We have had a consul inflicted upon us, whom none except us philosophers can look at without a sigh. What a blow that is!

Though a decree of the senate has been pa.s.sed about bribery and the corruption of juries, no law has been carried; the senate has been hara.s.sed to death, the Roman knights alienated. So that one year has undermined two b.u.t.tresses of the Republic, which owed their existence to me, and me alone; for it has at once destroyed the prestige of the senate and broken up the harmony of the orders. And now enter this precious year! It was inaugurated by the suspension of the annual rites of Iuventas;[116] for Memmius initiated M. Lucullus's wife in some rites of his own! Our Menelaus, being annoyed at that, divorced his wife. Yet the old Idaean shepherd had only injured Menelaus; our Roman Paris thought Agamemnon as proper an object of injury as Menelaus.[117] Next there is a certain tribune named C. Herennius, whom you, perhaps, do not even know--and yet you may know him, for he is of your tribe, and his father s.e.xtus used to distribute money to your tribesmen--this person is trying to transfer P. Clodius to the plebs, and is actually proposing a law to authorize the whole people to vote in Clodius's affair in the _campus_.[118] I have given him a characteristic reception in the senate, but he is the thickest-skinned fellow in the world. Metellus is an excellent consul, and much attached to me, but he has lowered his influence by promulgating (though only for form's sake) an identical bill about Clodius. But the son of Aulus,[119] G.o.d in heaven! What a cowardly and spiritless fellow for a soldier! How well he deserves to be exposed, as he is, day after day to the abuse of Palica.n.u.s![120]

Farther, an agrarian law has been promulgated by Flavius, a poor production enough, almost identical with that of Plotius. But meanwhile a genuine statesman is not to be found, even "in a dream." The man who could be one, my friend Pompey--for such he is, as I would have you know--defends his twopenny embroidered toga[121] by saying nothing.

Cra.s.sus never risks his popularity by a word. The others you know without my telling you. They are such fools that they seem to expect that, though the Republic is lost, their fish-ponds will be safe. There is one man who does take some trouble, but rather, as it seems to me, with consistency and honesty, than with either prudence or ability--Cato. He has been for the last three months worrying those unhappy _publicani_, who were formerly devoted to him, and refuses to allow of an answer being given them by the senate. And so we are forced to suspend all decrees on other subjects until the _publicani_ have got their answer. For the same reason I suppose even the business of the foreign emba.s.sies will be postponed. You now understand in what stormy water we are: and as from what I have written to you in such strong terms you have a view also of what I have not written, come back to me, for it is time you did. And though the state of affairs to which I invite you is one to be avoided, yet let your value for me so far prevail, as to induce you to come there even in these vexatious circ.u.mstances. For the rest I will take care that due warning is given, and a notice put up in all places, to prevent you being entered on the census as absent; and to get put on the census just before the l.u.s.tration is the mark of your true man of business.[122] So let me see you at the earliest possible moment. Farewell.

20 January in the Consuls.h.i.+p of Q. Metellus and L. Afranius.

[Footnote 115: Reading (mainly with Schutz) _animus praesens et voluntas, tamen etiam atque etiam ipsa medicinam refugit_. The verb _refugit_ is very doubtful, but it gives nearly the sense required. Cicero is ready to be as brave and active as before, but the state will not do its part.

It has, for instance, blundered in the matter of the law against judicial corruption. The senate offended the equites by proposing it, and yet did not carry the law. I think _animus_ and _voluntas_ must refer to Cicero, not the state, to which in his present humour he would not attribute them.]

[Footnote 116: The temple of Iuventas was vowed by M. Livius after the battle of the Metaurus (B.C. 207), and dedicated in B.C. 191 by C.

Licinius Lucullus, games being established on the anniversary of its dedication (Livy, xxi. 62; x.x.xvi. 36). It is suggested, therefore, that some of the Luculli usually presided at these games, but on this occasion refused, because of the injury done by C. Memmius, who was curule aedile.]

[Footnote 117: By Agamemnon and Menelaus Cicero means Lucius and Marcus Lucullus; the former Memmius had, as tribune in B.C. 66-65, opposed in his demand for a triumph, the latter he has now injured in the person of his wife.]

[Footnote 118: A man who was _sui iuris_ was properly adopted before the _commitia curiata_, now represented by thirty lictors. What Herennius proposed was that it should take place by a regular _lex_, pa.s.sed by the _comitia tributa_. The object apparently was to avoid the necessity of the presence of a pontifex and augur, which was required at the _comitia curiata_. The concurrent law by the consul would come before the _comitia centuriata_. The adopter was P. Fonteius, a very young man.]

[Footnote 119: L. Afranius, the other consul.]

[Footnote 120: M. Lollius Palica.n.u.s, "a mere mob orator" (_Brutus_, --223).]

[Footnote 121: The _toga picta_ of a triumphator, which Pompey, by special law, was authorized to wear at the games. Cicero uses the contemptuous diminutive, _togula_.]

[Footnote 122: To be absent from the census without excuse rendered a man liable to penalties. Cicero will therefore put up notices in Atticus's various places of business or residence of his intention to appear in due course. To appear just at the end of the period was, it seems, in the case of a man of business, advisable, that he might be rated at the actual amount of his property, no more or less.]

XXIV (A I, 19)

TO ATTICUS (IN EPIRUS)

ROME, 15 MARCH

[Sidenote: B.C. 60, aeT. 46]

It is not only if I had as much leisure as you, but also if I chose to send letters as short as yours usually are, should I easily beat you and be much the more regular in writing. But, in fact, it is only one more item in an immense and inconceivable amount of business, that I allow no letter to reach you from me without its containing some definite sketch of events and the reflexions arising from it. And in writing to you, as a lover of your country, my first subject will naturally be the state of the Republic; next, as I am the nearest object of your affection, I will also write about myself, and tell you what I think you will not be indisposed to know. Well then, in public affairs for the moment the chief subject of interest is the disturbance in Gaul. For the aedui--"our brethren"[123]--have recently fought a losing battle, and the Helvetii are undoubtedly in arms and making raids upon our province.[124] The senate has decreed that the two consuls should draw lots for the Gauls, that a levy should be held, all exemptions from service be suspended, and legates with full powers be sent to visit the states in Gaul, and see that they do not join the Helvetii. The legates are Quintus Metellus Creticus,[125] L. Flaccus,[126] and lastly--a case of "rich unguent on lentils"--Lentulus, son of Clodia.n.u.s.[127] And while on this subject I cannot omit mentioning that when among the consulars my name was the first to come up in the ballot, a full meeting of the senate declared with one voice that I must be kept in the city. The same occurred to Pompey after me; so that we two appeared to be kept at home as pledges of the safety of the Republic. Why should I look for the "bravos" of others when I get these compliments at home? Well, the state of affairs in the city is as follows. The agrarian law is being vehemently pushed by the tribune Flavius, with the support of Pompey, but it has nothing popular about it except its supporter. From this law I, with the full a.s.sent of a public meeting, proposed to omit all clauses which adversely affected private rights. I proposed to except from its operation such public land as had been so in the consuls.h.i.+p of P. Mucius and L.

Calpurnius.[128] I proposed to confirm the t.i.tles of holders of those to whom Sulla had actually a.s.signed lands. I proposed to retain the men of Volaterrae and Arretium--whose lands Sulla had declared forfeited but had not allotted--in their holdings. There was only one section in the bill that I did not propose to omit, namely, that land should be purchased with this money from abroad, the proceeds of the new revenues for the next five years.[129] But to this whole agrarian scheme the senate was opposed, suspecting that some novel power for Pompey was aimed at. Pompey, indeed, had set his heart on getting the law pa.s.sed.

I, however, with the full approval of the applicants for land, maintained the holdings of all private owners--for, as you know, the landed gentry form the bulk of our party's forces--while I nevertheless satisfied the people and Pompey (for I wanted to do that also) by the purchase clause; for, if that was put on a sound footing, I thought that two advantages would accrue--the dregs might be drawn from the city, and the deserted portions of Italy be repeopled. But this whole business was interrupted by the war, and has cooled off. Metellus is an exceedingly good consul, and much attached to me. That other one is such a ninny that he clearly doesn't know what to do with his purchase.[130] This is all my public news, unless you regard as touching on public affairs the fact that a certain Herennius, a tribune, and a fellow tribesman of yours--a fellow as unprincipled as he is needy--has now begun making frequent proposals for transferring P. Clodius to the plebs; he is vetoed by many of his colleagues. That is really, I think, all the public news.

For my part, ever since I won what I may call the splendid and immortal glory of the famous fifth of December[131] (though it was accompanied by the jealousy and hostility of many), I have never ceased to play my part in the Republic in the same lofty spirit, and to maintain the position I then inaugurated and took upon myself. But when, first, by the acquittal of Clodius I clearly perceived the insecurity and rotten state of the law courts; and, secondly, when I saw that it took so little to alienate my friends the _publicani_ from the senate--though with me personally they had no quarrel; and, thirdly, that the rich (I mean your friends the fish-breeders) did not disguise their jealousy of me, I thought I must look out for some greater security and stronger support. So, to begin with, I have brought the man who had been too long silent on my achievements, Pompey himself, to such a frame of mind as not once only in the senate, but many times and in many words, to ascribe to me the preservation of this empire and of the world. And this was not so important to me--for those transactions are neither so obscure as to need testimony, nor so dubious as to need commendation--as to the Republic; for there were certain persons base enough to think that some misunderstanding would arise between me and Pompey from a difference of opinion on these measures. With him I have united myself in such close intimacy that both of us can by this union be better fortified in his own views, and more secure in his political position. However, the dislike of the licentious dandies, which had been roused against me, has been so far softened by a conciliatory manner on my part, that they all combine to show me marked attention. In fine, while avoiding churlishness to anyone, I do not curry favour with the populace or relax any principle; but my whole course of conduct is so carefully regulated, that, while exhibiting an example of firmness to the Republic, in my own private concerns--in view of the instability of the loyalists, the hostility of the disaffected, and the hatred of the disloyal towards me--I employ a certain caution and circ.u.mspection, and do not allow myself, after all, to be involved in these new friends.h.i.+ps so far but that the famous refrain of the cunning Sicilian frequently sounds in my ears:[132]

"Keep sober and distrust: these wisdom's sinews!"

Of my course and way of life, therefore, you see, I think, what may be called a sketch or outline. Of your own business, however, you frequently write to me, but I cannot at the moment supply the remedy you require. For that decree of the senate was pa.s.sed with the greatest unanimity on the part of the rank and file,[133] though without the support of any of us consulars. For as to your seeing my name at the foot of the decree, you can ascertain from the decree itself that the subject put to the vote at the time was a different one, and that this clause about "free peoples" was added without good reason. It was done by P. Servilius the younger,[134] who delivered his vote among the last, but it cannot be altered after such an interval of time. Accordingly, the meetings, which at first were crowded, have long ceased to be held.

If you have been able, notwithstanding, by your insinuating address to get a trifle of money out of the Sicyonians, I wish you would let me know.[135] I have sent you an account of my consuls.h.i.+p written in Greek.

If there is anything in it which to a genuine Attic like yourself seems to be un-Greek or unscholarly, I shall not say as Lucullus said to you (at Panhormus, was it not?) about his own history, that he had interspersed certain barbarisms and solecisms for the express purpose of proving that it was the work of a Roman. No, if there is anything of that sort in my book, it will be without my knowledge and against my will. When I have finished the Latin version I will send it to you; and thirdly, you may expect a poem on the subject, for I would not have any method of celebrating my praise omitted by myself. In this regard pray do not quote "Who will praise his sire?"[136] For if there is anything in the world to be preferred to this, let it receive its due meed of praise, and I mine of blame for not selecting another theme for my praise. However, what I write is not panegyric but history. My brother Quintus clears himself to me in a letter, and a.s.serts that he has never said a disparaging word of you to anyone. But this we must discuss face to face with the greatest care and earnestness: only _do_ come to see me again at last! This Cossinius, to whom I intrust my letter, seems to me a very good fellow, steady, devoted to you, and exactly the sort of man which your letter to me had described.

15 March.

[Footnote 123: A special t.i.tle given to the aedui on their application for alliance. Caesar, _B. G._ i. 33.]

[Footnote 124: The migration of the Helvetii did not actually begin till B.C. 58. Caesar tells us in the first book of his _Commentaries_ how he stopped it.]

[Footnote 125: Consul B.C. 69, superseded in Crete by Pompey B.C. 65.

Triumphed B.C. 62.]