_CICERO AS QUÆSTOR._
Cicero was elected Quæstor in his thirtieth year, B.C. 76. He was then
nearly thirty-one. His predecessors and rivals at the bar, Cotta and
Hortensius, were elected Consul and Prætor, respectively, in the same
year. To become Quæstor at the earliest age allowed by the law (at
thirty-one, namely) was the ambition of the Roman advocate who purposed
to make his fortune by serving the State. To act as Quæstor in his
thirty-second year, Ædile in his thirty-seventh, Prætor in his
forty-first, and Consul in his forty-fourth year, was to achieve, in the
earliest succession allowed by law, all the great offices of trust,
power, and future emolument. The great reward of proconsular rapine did
not generally come till after the last step, though there were notable
instances in which a Proprætor with proconsular authority could make a
large fortune, as we shall learn when we come to deal with Verres, and
though Ædiles, and even Quæstors, could find pickings. It was therefore
a great thing for a man to begin as early as the law would permit, and
to lose as few years as possible in reaching the summit. Cicero lost
none. As he himself tells us in the passage to which I have referred in
the last chapter, and which is to be found in the Appendix, he gained
the good-will of men--that is, of free Romans who had the suffrage, and
who could therefore vote either for him or against him--by the assiduity
of his attention to the cases which he undertook, and by a certain
brilliancy of speech which was new to them.[85] Putting his hand
strenuously to the plough, allowing himself to be diverted by none of
those luxuries to which Romans of his day were so wont to give way, he
earned his purpose by a resolution to do his very best. He was "Novus
Homo"--a man, that is, belonging to a family of which no member had as
yet filled high office in the State. Against such there was a strong
prejudice with the aristocracy, who did not like to see the good things
of the Republic dispersed among an increased number of hands. The power
of voting was common to all Roman male citizens; but the power of
influencing the electors had passed very much into the hands of the
rich. The admiration which Cicero had determined to elicit would not go
very far, unless it could be produced in a very high degree. A Verres
could get himself made Prætor; a Lepidus some years since could receive
the Consulship; or now an Antony, or almost a Catiline. The candidate
would borrow money on the security of his own audacity, and would thus
succeed--perhaps with some minor gifts of eloquence, if he could achieve
them. With all this, the borrowing and the spending of money, that is,
with direct bribery, Cicero would have nothing to do; but of the art of
canvassing--that art by which he could at the moment make himself
beloved by the citizens who had a vote to give--he was a profound
master.
There is a short treatise, De Petitione Consulatus, on canvassing for
the Consulship, of which mention may be made here, because all the
tricks of the trade were as essential to him, when looking to be
Quæstor, as when he afterward desired to be Consul, and because the
political doings of his life will hurry us on too quickly in the days of
his Consulship to admit of our referring to these lessons. This little
piece, of which we have only a fragment, is supposed to have been
addressed to Cicero by his brother Quintus, giving fraternal advice as
to the then coming great occasion. The critics say that it was retouched
by the orator himself. The reader who has studied Cicero's style will
think that the retouching went to a great extent, or that the two
brothers were very like each other in their power of expression.
The first piece of advice was no doubt always in Cicero's mind, not only
when he looked for office, but whenever he addressed a meeting of his
fellow-citizens. "Bethink yourself what is this Republic; what it is you
seek to be in it, and who you are that seek it. As you go down daily to
the Forum, turn the answer to this in your mind: 'Novus sum; consulatum
peto; Roma est'--'I am a man of an untried family. It is the Consulship
that I seek. It is Rome in which I seek it.'" Though the condition of
Rome was bad, still to him the Republic was the greatest thing in the
world, and to be Consul in that Republic the highest honor which the
world could give.
There is nobility in that, but there is very much that is ignoble in the
means of canvassing which are advocated. I cannot say that they are as
yet too ignoble for our modern use here in England, but they are too
ignoble to be acknowledged by our candidates themselves, or by their
brothers on their behalf. Cicero, not having progressed far enough in
modern civilization to have studied the beauty of truth, is held to be
false and hypocritical. We who know so much more than he did, and have
the doctrine of truth at our fingers' ends, are wise enough to declare
nothing of our own shortcomings, but to attribute such malpractices only
to others. "It is a good thing to be thought worthy of the rank we seek
by those who are in possession of it." Make yourself out to be an
aristocrat, he means. "Canvass them, and cotton to them. Make them
believe that in matters of politics you have always been with the
aristocracy, never with the mob;" that if "you have at all spoken a word
in public to tickle the people, you have done so for the sake of gaining
Pompey." As to this, it is necessary to understand Pompey's peculiar
popularity at the moment, both with the Liberals and with the
Conservatives. "Above all, see that you have with you the 'jeunesse
dorée.' They carry so much! There are many with you already. Take care
that they shall know how much you think of them."
He is especially desired to make known to the public the iniquities of
Catiline, his opponent, as to whom Quintus says that, though he has
lately been acquitted in regard to his speculations in Africa, he has
had to bribe the judges so highly that he is now as poor as they were
before they got their plunder. At every word we read we are tempted to
agree with Mommsen that on the Roman oligarchy of the period no judgment
can be passed save one, "of inexorable condemnation."[86]
"Remember," says Quintus, "that your candidature is very strong in that
kind of friendship which has been created by your pleadings. Take care
that each of those friends shall know what special business is allotted
to him on the occasion; and as you have not troubled any of them yet,
make them understand that you have reserved for the present moment the
payment of their debts." This is all very well; but the next direction
mingles so much of business with its truth, that no one but Machiavelli
or Quintus Cicero could have expressed it in words. "Men," says Quintus,
"are induced to struggle for us in these canvassings by three
motives--by memory of kindness done, by the hope of kindness to come,
and by community of political conviction. You must see how you are to
catch each of these. Small favors will induce a man to canvass for you;
and they who owe their safety to your pleadings, for there are many
such, are aware that if they do not stand by you now they will be
regarded by all the world as sorry fellows. Nevertheless, they should be
made to feel that, as they are indebted to you, you will be glad to have
an opportunity of becoming indebted to them. But as to those on whom you
have a hold only by hope--a class of men very much more numerous, and
likely to be very much more active--they are the men whom you should
make to understand that your assistance will be always at their
command."
How severe, how difficult was the work of canvassing in Rome, we learn
from these lessons. It was the very essence of a great Roman's life that
he should live in public; and to such an extent was this carried that we
wonder how such a man as Cicero found time for the real work of his
life. The Roman patron was expected to have a levee every morning early
in his own house, and was wont, when he went down into the Forum, to be
attended by a crowd of parasites. This had become so much a matter of
course that a public man would have felt himself deserted had he been
left alone either at home or abroad. Rome was full of idlers--of men who
got their bread by the favors of the great, who lounged through their
lives--political quidnuncs, who made canvassing a trade--men without a
conviction, but who believed in the ascendency of this or the other
leader, and were ready to fawn or to fight in the streets, as there
might be need. These were the Quirites of the day--men who were in truth
fattened on the leavings of the plunder which was extracted from the
allies; for it was the case now that a Roman was content to live on the
industry of those whom his father had conquered. They would still fight
in the legions; but the work of Rome was done by slaves, and the wealth
of Rome was robbed from the Provinces. Hence it came about that there
was a numerous class, to whom the name "assectatores" was given, who of
course became specially prominent at elections. Quintus divides all such
followers into three kinds, and gives instructions as to the special
treatment to be applied to each. "There are those who come to pay their
respects to you at your own house"--"Salutatores" they were called;
"then those who go down with you into the Forum"--"Deductores;" "and
after these the third, the class of constant followers"--"Assectatores,"
as they were specially named. "As to the first, who are the least in
consequence, and who, according to our present ways of living, come in
great numbers, you should take care to let them know that their doing
even so much as this is much esteemed by you. Let them perceive that you
note it when they come, and say as much to their friends, who will
repeat your words. Tell themselves often if it be possible. In this way
men, when there are many candidates, will observe that there is one who
has his eyes open to these courtesies, and they will give themselves
heart and soul to him, neglecting all others. And mind you, when you
find that a man does but pretend, do not let him perceive that you have
perceived it. Should any one wish to excuse himself, thinking that he is
suspected of indifference, swear that you have never doubted him, nor
had occasion to doubt.
"As to the work of the 'Deductores,' who go out with you--as it is much
more severe than that of those who merely come to pay their compliments,
let them understand that you feel it to be so, and, as far as possible,
be ready to go into town with them at fixed hours." Quintus here means
that the "Deductores" are not to be kept waiting for the patron longer
than can be helped. "The attendance of a daily crowd in taking you down
to the Forum gives a great show of character and dignity.
"Then come the band of followers which accompanies you diligently
wherever you go. As to those who do this without special obligation,
take care that they should know how much you think of them. From those
who owe it to you as a duty, exact it rigorously. See that they who can
come themselves do come themselves, and that they who cannot, send
others in their places." What an idea does this give as to the labor of
a candidate in Rome! I can imagine it to be worse even than the
canvassing of an English borough, which to a man of spirit and honor is
the most degrading of all existing employments not held to be absolutely
disgraceful.
Quintus then goes on from the special management of friends to the
general work of canvassing. "It requires the remembering of men's
names"--"nomenclationem," a happy word we do not possess--"flattery,
diligence, sweetness of temper, good report, and a high standing in the
Republic. Let it be seen that you have been at the trouble to remember
people, and practise yourself to it so that the power may increase with
you. There is nothing so alluring to the citizen as that. If there be a
softness which you have not by nature, so affect it that it shall seem
to be your own naturally. You have indeed a way with you which is not
unbecoming to a good-natured man; but you must caress men--which is in
truth vile and sordid at other times, but is absolutely necessary at
elections. It is no doubt a mean thing to flatter some low fellow, but
when it is necessary to make a friend it can be pardoned. A candidate
must do it, whose face and look and tongue should be made to suit those
he has to meet. What perseverance means I need not tell you. The word
itself explains itself. As a matter of course, you shall not leave the
city; but it is not enough for you to stick to your work in Rome and in
the Forum. You must seek out the voters and canvass them separately; and
take care that no one shall ask from another what it is that you want
from him. Let it have been solicited by yourself, and often solicited."
Quintus seems to have understood the business well, and the elder
brother no doubt profited by the younger brother's care.
It was so they did it at Rome. That men should have gone through all
this in search of plunder and wealth does not strike us as being
marvellous, or even out of place. A vile object justifies vile means.
But there were some at Rome who had it in their hearts really to serve
their country, and with whom it was at the same time a matter of
conscience that, in serving their country, they would not dishonestly or
dishonorably enrich themselves. There was still a grain of salt left.
But even this could not make itself available for useful purpose without
having recourse to tricks such as these!
[Sidenote: B.C. 75, ætat. 32.]
In his proper year Cicero became Quæstor, and had assigned to him by lot
the duty of looking after the Western Division of Sicily. For Sicily,
though but one province as regarded general condition, being under one
governor with proconsular authority, retained separate modes of
government, or, rather, varied forms of subjection to Rome, especially
in matters of taxation, according as it had or had not been conquered
from the Carthaginians.[87] Cicero was quartered at Lilybæum, on the
west, whereas the other Quæstor was placed at Syracuse, in the east.
There were at that time twenty Quæstors elected annually, some of whom
remained in Rome; but most of the number were stationed about the
Empire, there being always one as assistant to each Proconsul. When a
Consul took the field with an army, he always had a Quæstor with him.
This had become the case so generally that the Quæstor became, as it
were, something between a private secretary and a senior lieutenant to a
governor. The arrangement came to have a certain sanctity attached to
it, as though there was something in the connection warmer and closer
than that of mere official life; so that a Quæstor has been called a
Proconsul's son for the time, and was supposed to feel that reverence
and attachment that a son entertains for his father.
But to Cicero, and to young Quæstors in general, the great attraction of
the office consisted in the fact that the aspirant having once become a
Quæstor was a Senator for the rest of his life, unless he should be
degraded by misconduct. Gradually it had come to pass that the Senate
was replenished by the votes of the people, not directly, but by the
admission into the Senate of the popularly elected magistrates. There
were in the time of Cicero between 500 and 600 members of this body. The
numbers down to the time of Sulla had been increased or made up by
direct selection by the old Kings, or by the Censors, or by some
Dictator, such as was Sulla; and the same thing was done afterward by
Julius Cæsar. The years between Sulla's Dictatorship and that of Cæsar
were but thirty--from 79 to 49 B.C. These, however, were the years in
which Cicero dreamed that the Republic could be re-established by means
of an honest Senate, which Senate was then to be kept alive by the
constant infusion of new blood, accruing to it from the entrance of
magistrates who had been chosen by the people. Tacitus tells us that it
was with this object that Sulla had increased the number of
Quæstors.[88] Cicero's hopes--his futile hopes of what an honest Senate
might be made to do--still ran high, although at the very time in which
he was elected Quæstor he was aware that the judges, then elected from
the Senate, were so corrupt that their judgment could not be trusted. Of
this popular mode of filling the Senate he speaks afterward in his
treatise De Legibus. "From those who have acted as magistrates the
Senate is composed--a measure altogether in the popular interest, as no
one can now reach the highest rank"--namely, the Senate--"except by the
votes of the people, all power of selecting having been taken away from
the Censors."[89] In his pleadings for P. Sextus he makes the same boast
as to old times, not with absolute accuracy, as far as we can understand
the old constitution, but with the same passionate ardor as to the body.
"Romans, when they could no longer endure the rule of kings, created
annual magistrates, but after such fashion that the Council of the
Senate was set over the Republic for its guidance. Senators were chosen
for that work by the entire people, and the entrance to that order was
opened to the virtue and to the industry of the citizens at large."[90]
When defending Cluentius, he expatiates on the glorious privileges of
the Roman Senate. "Its high place, its authority, its splendor at home,
its name and fame abroad, the purple robe, the ivory chair, the appanage
of office, the fasces, the army with its command, the government of the
provinces!"[91] On that splendor "apud exteras gentes," he expatiates in
one of his attacks upon Verres.[92] From all this will be seen Cicero's
idea of the chamber into which he had made his way as soon as he had
been chosen Quæstor.
In this matter, which was the pivot on which his whole life turned--the
character, namely, of the Roman Senate--it cannot but be observed that
he was wont to blow both hot and cold. It was his nature to do so, not
from any aptitude for deceit, but because he was sanguine and
vacillating--because he now aspired and now despaired. He blew hot and
cold in regard to the Senate, because at times he would feel it to be
what it was--composed, for the most part, of men who were time-serving
and corrupt, willing to sell themselves for a price to any buyer; and
then, again, at times he would think of the Senate as endowed with all
those privileges which he names, and would dream that under his
influence it would become what it should be--such a Senate as he
believed it to have been in its old palmy days. His praise of the
Senate, his description of what it should be and might be, I have given.
To the other side of the picture we shall come soon, when I shall have
to show how, at the trial of Verres, he declared before the judges
themselves how terrible had been the corruption of the judgment-seat in
Rome since, by Sulla's enactment, it had been occupied only by the
Senators. One passage I will give now, in order that the reader may see
by the juxtaposition of the words that he could denounce the Senate as
loudly as he would vaunt its privileges. In the column on the left hand
in the note I quote the words with which, in the first pleading against
Verres, he declared "that every base and iniquitous thing done on the
judgment-seat during the ten years since the power of judging had been
transferred to the Senate should be not only denounced by him, but also
proved;" and in that on the right I will repeat the noble phrases which
he afterward used in the speech for Cluentius when he chose to speak
well of the order.[93]
It was on the Senate that they who wished well for Rome must depend--on
the Senate, chosen, refreshed, and replenished from among the people; on
a body which should be at the same time august and popular--as far
removed on the one side from the tyranny of individuals as on the other
from the violence of the mob; but on a Senate freed from its corruption
and dirt, on a body of noble Romans, fitted by their individual
character and high rank to rule and to control their fellow-citizens.
This was Cicero's idea, and this the state of things which he endeavored
to achieve. No doubt he dreamed that his own eloquence and his own
example might do more in producing this than is given to men to achieve
by such means. No doubt there was conceit in this--conceit and perhaps,
vanity. It has to be admitted that Cicero always exaggerated his own
powers. But the ambition was great, the purpose noble, and the course of
his whole life was such as to bring no disgrace on his aspirations. He
did not thunder against the judges for taking bribes, and then plunder a
province himself. He did not speak grandly of the duty of a patron to
his clients, and then open his hands to illicit payments. He did not
call upon the Senate for high duty, and then devote himself to luxury
and pleasure. He had a _beau ideal_ of the manner in which a Roman
Senator should live and work, and he endeavored to work and live up to
that ideal. There was no period after his Consulship in which he was not
aware of his own failure. Nevertheless, with constant labor, but with
intermittent struggles, he went on, till, at the end, in the last fiery
year of his existence, he taught himself again to think that even yet
there was a chance. How he struggled, and in struggling perished, we
shall see by-and-by.
What Cicero did as Quæstor in Sicily we have no means of knowing. His
correspondence does not go back so far. That he was very active, and
active for good, we have two testimonies, one of which is serious,
convincing, and most important as an episode in his life. The other
consists simply of a good story, told by himself of himself; not
intended at all for his own glorification, but still carrying with it a
certain weight. As to the first: Cicero was Quæstor in Lilybæum in the
thirty-second year of his life. In the thirty-seventh year he was
elected Ædile, and was then called upon by the Sicilians to attack
Verres on their behalf. Verres was said to have carried off from Sicily
plunder to the amount of nearly £400,000,[94] after a misrule of three
years' duration. All Sicily was ruined. Beyond its pecuniary losses, its
sufferings had been excruciating; but not till the end had come of a
Governor's proconsular authority could the almost hopeless chance of a
criminal accusation against the tyrant be attempted. The tyrant would
certainly have many friends in Rome. The injured provincials would
probably have none of great mark. A man because he had been Quæstor was
not, necessarily, one having influence, unless he belonged to some great
family. This was not the case with Cicero. But he had made for himself
such a character during his year of office that the Sicilians declared
that, if they could trust themselves to any man at Rome, it would be to
their former Quæstor. It had been a part of his duty to see that the
proper supply of corn was collected in the island and sent to Rome. A
great portion of the bread eaten in Rome was grown in Sicily, and much
of it was supplied in the shape of a tax. It was the hateful practice of
Rome to extract the means of living from her colonies, so as to spare
her own laborers. To this, hard as it was, the Sicilians were well used.
They knew the amount required of them by law, and were glad enough when
they could be quit in payment of the dues which the law required; but
they were seldom blessed by such moderation on the part of their rulers.
To what extent this special tax could be stretched we shall see when we
come to the details of the trial of Verres. It is no doubt only from
Cicero's own words that we learn that, though he sent to Rome plenteous
supplies, he was just to the dealer, liberal to the pawns, and
forbearing to the allies generally; and that when he took his departure
they paid him honors hitherto unheard of.[95] But I think we may take it
for granted that this statement is true; firstly, because it has never
been contradicted; and then from the fact that the Sicilians all came to
him in the day of their distress.
As to the little story to which I have alluded, it has been told so
often since Cicero told it himself, that I am almost ashamed to repeat
it. It is, however, too emblematic of the man, gives us too close an
insight both into his determination to do his duty and to his
pride--conceit, if you will--at having done it, to be omitted. In his
speech for Plancius[96] he tells us that by chance, coming direct from
Sicily after his Quæstorship, he found himself at Puteoli just at the
season when the fashion from Rome betook itself to that delightful
resort. He was full of what he had done--how he had supplied Rome with
corn, but had done so without injury to the Sicilians, how honestly he
had dealt with the merchants, and had in truth won golden opinions on
all sides--so much so that he thought that when he reached the city the
citizens in a mob would be ready to receive him. Then at Puteoli he met
two acquaintances. "Ah," says one to him, "when did you leave Rome? What
news have you brought?" Cicero, drawing his head up, as we can see him,
replied that he had just returned from his province. "Of course, just
back from Africa," said the other. "Not so," said Cicero, bridling in
anger--"stomachans fastidiose," as he describes it himself--"but from
Sicily." Then the other lounger, a fellow who pretended to know
everything, put in his word. "Do you not know that our Cicero has been
Quæstor at Syracuse?" The reader will remember that he had been Quæstor
in the other division of the island, at Lilybæum. "There was no use in
thinking any more about it," says Cicero. "I gave up being angry and
determined to be like any one else, just one at the waters." Yes, he had
been very conceited, and well understood his own fault of character in
that respect; but he would not have shown his conceit in that matter had
he not resolved to do his duty in a manner uncommon then among Quæstors,
and been conscious that he had done it.
Perhaps there is no more certain way of judging a man than from his own
words, if his real words be in our possession. In doing so, we are bound
to remember how strong will be the bias of every man's mind in his own
favor, and for that reason a judicious reader will discount a man's
praise of himself. But the reader, to get at the truth, if he be indeed
judicious, will discount them after a fashion conformable with the
nature of the man whose character he is investigating. A reader will not
be judicious who imagines that what a man says of his own praises must
be false, or that all which can be drawn from his own words in his own
dispraise must be true. If a man praise himself for honor, probity,
industry, and patriotism, he will at any rate show that these virtues
are dear to him, unless the course of his life has proved him to be
altogether a hypocrite in such utterances. It has not been presumed that
Cicero was a hypocrite in these utterances. He was honest and
industrious; he did appreciate honor and love his country. So much is
acknowledged; and yet it is supposed that what good he has told us of
himself is false. If a man doubt of himself constantly; if in his most
private intercourse and closest familiar utterances he admit
occasionally his own human weakness; if he find himself to have failed
at certain moments, and says so, the very feelings that have produced
such confessions are proof that the highest points which have not been
attained have been seen and valued. A man will not sorrowfully regret
that he has won only a second place, or a third, unless he be alive to
the glory of the first. But Cicero's acknowledgments have all been taken
as proof against himself. All manner of evil is argued against him from
his own words, when an ill meaning can be attached to them; but when he
speaks of his great aspirations, he is ridiculed for bombast and vanity.
On the strength of some perhaps unconsidered expression, in a letter to
Atticus, he is condemned for treachery, whereas the sentences in which
he has thoughtfully declared the purposes of his very soul are counted
as clap-traps.
No one has been so frequently condemned out of his mouth as Cicero, and
naturally. In these modern days we have contemporary records as to
prominent persons. Of the characters of those who lived in long-past
ages we generally fail to have any clear idea, because we lack those
close chronicles which are necessary for the purpose. What insight have
we into the personality of Alexander the Great, or what insight had
Plutarch, who wrote about him? As to Samuel Johnson, we seem to know
every turn of his mind, having had a Boswell. Alexander had no Boswell.
But here is a man belonging to those past ages of which I speak who was
his own Boswell, and after such a fashion that, since letters were
invented, no records have ever been written in language more clear or
more attractive. It is natural that we should judge out of his own mouth
one who left so many more words behind him than did any one else,
particularly one who left words so pleasant to read. And all that he
wrote was after some fashion about himself. His letters, like all
letters, are personal to himself. His speeches are words coming out of
his own mouth about affairs in which he was personally engaged and
interested. His rhetoric consists of lessons given by himself about his
own art, founded on his own experience, and on his own observation of
others. His so-called philosophy gives us the workings of his own mind.
No one has ever told the world so much about another person as Cicero
has told the world about Cicero. Boswell pales before him as a
chronicler of minutiæ. It may be a matter of small interest now to the
bulk of readers to be intimately acquainted with a Roman who was never
one of the world's conquerors. It may be well for those who desire to
know simply the facts of the world's history, to dismiss as unnecessary
the aspirations of one who lived so long ago. But if it be worth while
to discuss the man's character, it must be worth while to learn the
truth about it.
"Oh that mine adversary had written a book!" Who does not understand the
truth of these words! It is always out of a man's mouth that you may
most surely condemn him. Cicero wrote many books, and all about himself.
He has been honored very highly. Middleton, in the preface to his own
biography, which, with all its charms, has become a bye-word for eulogy,
quotes the opinion of Erasmus, who tells us that he loves the writings
of the man "not only for the divine felicity of his style, but for the
sanctity of his heart and morals." This was the effect left on the mind
of an accurate thinker and most just man. But then also has Cicero been
spoken of with the bitterest scorn. From Dio Cassius, who wrote two
hundred and twenty years after Christ, down to Mr. Froude, whose Cæsar
has just been published, he has had such hard things said of him by men
who have judged him out of his own mouth, that the reader does not know
how to reconcile what he now reads with the opinion of men of letters
who lived and wrote in the century next after his death--with the
testimony of such a man as Erasmus, and with the hearty praises of his
biographer, Middleton. The sanctity of his heart and morals! It was thus
that Erasmus was struck in reading his works. It is a feeling of that
kind, I profess, that has induced me to take this work in hand--a
feeling produced altogether by the study of his own words. It has seemed
to be that he has loved men so well, has been so anxious for the true,
has been so capable of honesty when dishonesty was common among all
around him, has been so jealous in the cause of good government, has
been so hopeful when there has been but little ground for hope, as to
have deserved a reputation for sanctity of heart and morals.
Of the speeches made by Cicero as advocate after his Quæstorship, and
before those made in the accusation of Verres, we have the fragment only
of the second of two spoken in defence of Marcus Tullius Decula, whom we
may suppose to have been distantly connected with his family. He does
not avow any relationship. "What," he says, in opening his argument,
"does it become me, a Tullius, to do for this other Tullius, a man not
only my friend, but my namesake?" It was a matter of no great
importance, as it was addressed to judges not so called, but to
"recuperatores," judges chosen by the Prætor, and who acted in lighter
cases.