60, had been a keen opponent of Cæsar, who tried to deprive him of the
honour of dedicating the restored Capitoline temple, and beat him in the
election of Pontifex Maximus.]
[Footnote 278: Servilia, mother of Brutus, was reported to be Cæsar's
mistress. As Cicero is insinuating that the whole affair was got up by
Cæsar to irritate Pompey with the _boni_, this allusion will be
understood.]
[Footnote 279: If Vettius did say this, he at any rate successfully
imitated Cicero's manner. These names are always in his mouth. See 2
_Phil._ §§ 26, 87; _pro Mil._. §§ 8, 82, etc. For a farther discussion
of Vettius, see Appendix B.]
[Footnote 280: Probably a prætor, not the triumvir.]
[Footnote 281: Q. Considius Gallus, who, according to Plutarch (_Cæs._
13), said in the senate that the attendance of senators was small
because they feared a massacre. "What made you come, then?" said Cæsar.
"My age," he replied; "I have little left to lose."]
LI (A II, 25)
TO ATTICUS (IN EPIRUS)
ROME (JULY OR AUGUST)
[Sidenote: B.C. 59, ÆT. 47]
When I have praised any one of your friends to you I should like you
tell him that I have done so. For instance, you know I lately wrote to
you about Varro's kindness to me, and that you wrote me back word that
the circumstance gave you the greatest delight. But I should have
preferred your writing to him and saying that he was doing all I could
expect--not because he was, but in order that he might do so. For he is
a man of astonishing whims, as you know, "tortuous and no
wise----."[282] But I stick to the rule "Follies of those in power,"
etc.[283] But, by Hercules, that other friend of yours, Hortalus--with
what a liberal hand, with what candour, and in what ornate language has
he praised me to the skies, when speaking of the prætorship of Flaccus
and that incident of the Allobroges.[284] I assure you nothing could
have been more affectionate, complimentary, or more lavishly expressed.
I very much wish that you would write and tell him that I sent you word
of it. Yet why write? I think you are on your way and are all but here.
For I have urged you so strongly to come in my previous letters. I am
expecting you with great impatience, longing for you very much; nor do I
call for you more than circumstances themselves and the state of the
times. Nothing can be more desperate than the position of politics,
nothing more unpopular than the authors of it, I--as I think, hope, and
imagine--am safe behind a rampart of goodwill of the strongest kind.
Wherefore fly to me: you will either relieve me from all annoyance or
will share it. My letter is all the shorter because, as I hope, I shall
be able in a very short time to talk over what I want to say face to
face. Take care of your health.
[Footnote 282:
ἑλικτὰ κοὐδὲν ὑγιὲς ἀλλὰ πᾶν πέριξ φρονοῦντες.
Eur. _Androm._ 448.
"With tortuous thoughts, naught honest, winding all."
]
[Footnote 283:
τὰς τῶν κρατούντων ἀμαθίας φέρειν χρεών.
Eur. _Phœn._ 393.
"Follies of those in power we needs must bear."
]
[Footnote 284: L. Valerius Flaccus, as prætor in B.C. 63, had assisted
Cicero in the Catiline conspiracy. He was now being tried for
embezzlement in Asia, and was defended by the famous Q. Hortensius
(Hortalus) and Cicero--the only extant speech of this year.]
LII (Q FR I, 2)
TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS (IN ASIA)
ROME, 26 OCTOBER
[Sidenote: B.C. 59, ÆT. 47]
Statius arrived at my house on the 25th October. His arrival gave me
uneasiness, because you said in your letter that you would be plundered
by your household in his absence. However, I thought it a very happy
circumstance that he anticipated the expectation of his arrival, and the
company that would have assembled to meet him, if he had left the
province with you, and had not appeared before. For people have
exhausted their remarks, and many observations have been made and done
with of the "Nay, but I looked for a mighty man"[285] kind, which I am
glad to have all over before you come. But as for the motive for your
sending him--that he might clear himself with me--that was not at all
necessary. For, to begin with, I had never suspected him, nor in what I
wrote to you about him was I expressing my own judgment; but since the
interest and safety of all of us who take part in public business
depends, not on truth alone, but on report also, I wrote you word of
what people were saying, not what I thought myself. How prevalent and
how formidable that talk was Statius ascertained himself on his arrival.
For he was present when certain persons at my house gave vent to some
complaints on that very subject, and had the opportunity of perceiving
that the observations of the malevolent were being directed at himself
especially. But it used to annoy me most when I was told that he had
greater influence with you, than your sober time of life and the wisdom
of a governor required. How many people, do you suppose, have solicited
me to give them a letter of introduction to Statius? How often, do you
suppose, has he himself, while talking without reserve to me, made such
observations as, "I never approved of that," "I told him so," "I tried
to persuade him," "I warned him not to"? And even if these things shew
the highest fidelity, as I believe they do, since that is your judgment,
yet the mere appearance of a freedman or slave enjoying such influence
cannot but lower your dignity: and the long and short of it is--for I am
in duty bound not to say anything without good grounds, nor to keep back
anything from motives of policy--that Statius has supplied all the
material for the gossip of those who wished to decry you; that formerly
all that could be made out was that certain persons were angry at your
strictness; but that after his manumission the angry had something to
talk about.
Now I will answer the letters delivered to me by L. Cæsius, whom, as I
see you wish it, I will serve in every way I can. One of them is about
Zeuxis of Blaundus, whom you say was warmly recommended to you by me
though a most notorious matricide. In this matter, and on this subject
generally, please listen to a short statement, lest you should by chance
be surprised at my having become so conciliatory towards Greeks. Seeing,
as I did, that the complaints of Greeks, because they have a genius for
deceit, were allowed an excessive weight, whenever I was told of any of
them making complaint of you, I appeased them by every means in my
power. First, I pacified the Dionysopolitans, who were very bitter:
whose chief man, Hermippus, I secured not only by my conversation, but
by treating him as a friend. I did the same to Hephæstus of Apameia; the
same to that most untrustworthy fellow, Megaristus of Antandrus; the
same to Nicias of Smyrna; I also embraced with all the courtesy I
possessed the most trumpery of men, even Nymphôn of Colophôn. And all
this I did from no liking for these particular people, or the nation as
a whole: I was heartily sick of their fickleness and obsequiousness, of
feelings that are not affected by our kindness, but by our position.
But to return to Zeuxis. When he was telling me the same story as you
mention in your letter about what M. Cascellius had said to him in
conversation, I stopped him from farther talk, and admitted him to my
society. I cannot, however, understand your virulence when you say that,
having sewn up in the parricide's-sack two Mysians at Smyrna, you
desired to display a similar example of your severity in the upper part
of your province, and that, therefore, you had wished to inveigle Zeuxis
into your hands by every possible means. For if he had been brought into
court, he ought perhaps not to have been allowed to escape: but there
was no necessity for his being hunted out and inveigled by soft words to
stand a trial, as you say in your letter--especially as he is one whom I
learn daily, both from his fellow citizens and from many others, to be a
man of higher character than you would expect from such an obscure town
as his.[286] But, you will say, it is only Greeks to whom I am
indulgent. What! did not I do everything to appease L. Cæcilius? What a
man! how irritable! how violent! In fact, who is there except
Tuscenius,[287] whose case admitted of no cure, have I not softened? See
again, I have now on my hands a shifty, mean fellow, though of
equestrian rank, called Catienus: even he is going to be smoothed down.
I don't blame you for having been somewhat harsh to his father, for I am
quite sure you have acted with good reason: but what need was there of a
letter of the sort which you sent to the man himself? "That the man was
rearing the cross for himself from which you had already pulled him off
once; that you would take care to have him smoked to death, and would be
applauded by the whole province for it." Again, to a man named C.
Fabius--for that letter also T. Catienus is handing round--"that you
were told that the kidnapper Licinius, with his young kite of a son, was
collecting taxes." And then you go on to ask Fabius to burn both father
and son alive if he can; if not, to send them to you, that they may be
burnt to death by legal sentence. That letter sent by you in jest to C.
Fabius, if it really is from you, exhibits to ordinary readers a
violence of language very injurious to you. Now, if you will refer to
the exhortations in all my letters, you will perceive that I have never
found fault with you for anything except harshness and sharpness of
temper, and occasionally, though rarely, for want of caution in the
letters you write. In which particulars, indeed, if my influence had had
greater weight with you than a somewhat excessive quickness of
disposition, or a certain enjoyment in indulging temper, or a faculty
for epigram and a sense of humour, we should certainly have had no cause
for dissatisfaction. And don't you suppose that I feel no common
vexation when I am told how Vergilius is esteemed, and your neighbour
C. Octavius?[288] For if you only excel your neighbours farther up
country, in Cilicia and Syria, that is a pretty thing to boast of! And
that is just the sting of the matter, that though the men I have named
are not more blameless than yourself, they yet outdo you in the art of
winning favour, though they know nothing of Xenophon's Cyrus or
Agesilaus; from which kings, in the exercise of their great office, no
one ever heard an irritable word. But in giving you this advice, as I
have from the first, I am well aware how much good I have done.[289]
Now, however, as you are about to quit your province, pray do leave
behind you--as I think you are now doing--as pleasant a memory as
possible. You have a successor of very mild manners; in other respects,
on his arrival, you will be much missed. In sending letters of
requisition, as I have often told you, you have allowed yourself to be
too easily persuaded. Destroy, if you can, all such as are inequitable,
or contrary to usage, or contradictory to others. Statius told me that
they were usually put before you ready written, read by himself, and
that, if they were inequitable, he informed you of the fact: but that
before he entered your service there had been no sifting of letters;
that the result was that there were volumes containing a selection of
letters, which were usually adversely criticised.[290] On this subject I
am not going to give you any advice at this time of day, for it is too
late; and you cannot but be aware that I have often warned you in
various ways and with precision. But I have, on a hint from Theopompus,
intrusted him with this message to you: do see by means of persons
attached to you, which you will find no difficulty in doing, that the
following classes of letters are destroyed--first, those that are
inequitable; next, those that are contradictory; then those expressed in
an eccentric or unusual manner; and lastly, those that contain
reflexions on anyone. I don't believe all I hear about these matters,
and if, in the multiplicity of your engagements, you have let certain
things escape you, now is the time to look into them and weed them out.
I have read a letter said to have been written by your nomenclator Sulla
himself, which I cannot approve: I have read some written in an angry
spirit. But the subject of letters comes in pat: for while this sheet of
paper was actually in my hands, L. Flavius, prætor-designate and a very
intimate friend, came to see me. He told me that you had sent a letter
to his agents, which seemed to me most inequitable, prohibiting them
from taking anything from the estate of the late L. Octavius Naso, whose
heir L. Flavius is, until they had paid a sum of money to C. Fundanius;
and that you had sent a similar letter to the Apollonidenses, not to
allow any payment on account of the estate of the late Octavius till the
debt to Fundanius had been discharged. It seems to me hardly likely that
you have done this; for it is quite unlike your usual good sense. The
heir not to take anything? What if he disowns the debt? What if he
doesn't owe it at all? Moreover, is the prætor wont to decide whether a
debt is due?[291] Don't I, again, wish well to Fundanius? Am I not his
friend? Am I not touched with compassion? No one more so: but in certain
matters the course of law is so clear as to leave no place for personal
feeling. And Flavius told me that expressions were used in the letter,
which he said was yours, to the effect that you would "either thank them
as friends, or make yourself disagreeable to them as enemies." In short,
he was much annoyed, complained of it to me in strong terms, and begged
me to write to you as seriously as I could. This I am doing, and I do
strongly urge you again and again to withdraw your injunction to
Flavius's agents about taking money from the estate, and not to lay any
farther injunction on the Apollonidenses contrary to the rights of
Flavius. Pray do everything you can for the sake of Flavius and, indeed,
of Pompey also. I would not, upon my honour, have you think me liberal
to him at the expense of any inequitable decision on your part: but I do
entreat you to leave behind you some authority, and some memorandum of a
decree or of a letter under your hand, so framed as to support the
interests and cause of Flavius. For the man, who is at once very
attentive to me, and tenacious of his own rights and dignity, is feeling
extremely hurt that he has not prevailed with you either on the grounds
of personal friendship or of legal right; and, to the best of my belief,
both Pompey and Cæsar have, at one time or another, commended the
interests of Flavius to you, and Flavius has written to you personally,
and certainly I have. Wherefore, if there is anything which you think
you ought to do at my request, let it be this. If you love me, take
every care, take every trouble, and insure Flavius's cordial thanks both
to yourself and myself. I cannot use greater earnestness in making any
request than I use in this.
As to what you say about Hermias, it has been in truth a cause of much
vexation to me. I wrote you a letter in a rather unbrotherly spirit,
which I dashed off in a fit of anger and now wish to recall, having been
irritated by what Lucullus's freedman told me, immediately after hearing
of the bargain. For this letter, which was not expressed in a brotherly
way, you ought to have brotherly feeling enough to make allowance. As to
Censorinus, Antonius, the Cassii, Scævola--I am delighted to hear from
you that you possess their friendship. The other contents of that same
letter of yours were expressed more strongly than I could have wished,
such as your "with my ship at least well trimmed"[292] and your "die
once for all."[293] You will find those expressions to be unnecessarily
strong. My scoldings have always been very full of affection. They
mention certain things for complaint,[294] but these are not important,
or rather, are quite insignificant. For my part, I should never have
thought you deserving of the least blame in any respect, considering the
extreme purity of your conduct, had it not been that our enemies are
numerous. Whatever I have written to you in a tone of remonstrance or
reproach I have written from a vigilant caution, which I maintain, and
shall maintain; and I shall not cease imploring you to do the same.
Attalus of Hypæpa has begged me to intercede with you that you should
not prevent his getting the money paid which has been decreed for a
statue of Q. Publicius. In which matter I both ask as a favour and urge
as a duty, that you should not consent to allow the honour of a man of
his character, and so close a friend of mine, to be lowered or hindered
by your means. Farthermore, Licinius, who is known to you, a slave of my
friend Æsopus, has run away. He has been at Athens, living in the house
of Patron the Epicurean as a free man. Thence he has made his way to
Asia. Afterwards a certain Plato of Sardis, who is often at Athens, and
happened to be at Athens at the time that Licinius arrived there, having
subsequently learnt by a letter from Æsopus that he was an escaped
slave, arrested the fellow, and put him into confinement at Ephesus; but
whether into the public prison, or into a slave mill, we could not
clearly make out from his letter. But since he is at Ephesus, I should
be obliged if you would trace him in any manner open to you, and with
all care either [send him] or bring him home with you. Don't take into
consideration the fellow's value: such a good-for-nothing is worth very
little; but Æsopus is so much vexed at his slave's bad conduct and
audacity, that you can do him no greater favour than by being the means
of his recovering him.
Now for the news that you chiefly desire. We have so completely lost the
constitution that Cato,[295] a young man of no sense, but yet a Roman
citizen and a Cato, scarcely got off with his life because, having
determined to prosecute Gabinius for bribery, when the prætors could not
be approached for several days, and refused to admit anyone to their
presence, he mounted the rostra in public meeting and called Pompey an
"unofficial dictator." No one ever had a narrower escape of being
killed. From this you may see the state of the whole Republic. People,
however, shew no inclination to desert my cause. They make wonderful
professions, offers of service, and promises: and, indeed, I have the
highest hopes and even greater spirit--so that I hope to get the better
in the struggle, and feel confident in my mind that, in the present
state of the Republic, I need not fear even an accident. However, the
matter stands thus: if Clodius gives notice of an action against me, the
whole of Italy will rush to my support, so that I shall come off with
many times greater glory than before; but if he attempts the use of
violence, I hope, by the zeal not only of friends but also of opponents,
to be able to meet force with force. All promise me the aid of
themselves, their friends, clients, freedmen, slaves, and, finally, of
their money. Our old regiment of loyalists is warm in its zeal and
attachment to me. If there were any who had formerly been comparatively
hostile or lukewarm, they are now uniting themselves with the loyalists
from hatred to these despots. Pompey makes every sort of promise, and so
does Cæsar: but my confidence in them is not enough to induce me to drop
any of my preparations. The tribunes-designate are friendly to us. The
consuls-designate make excellent professions. Some of the new prætors
are very friendly and very brave citizens--Domitius, Nigidius, Memmius,
Lentulus[296]--the others are loyalists also, but these are eminently
so. Wherefore keep a good heart and high hopes. However, I will keep you
constantly informed on particular events as they occur from day to day.
[Footnote 285: ἀλλ' αἰεί τινα φῶτα μέγαν καὶ καλὸν ἐδέγμην, "but I ever
expected some big and handsome man" (Hom. _Odyss._ ix. 513). Statius had
been manumitted by Quintus Cicero, and there had been much talk about
it, as we have already heard. See XLIV, p. 109, and XLV, p. 111.]
[Footnote 286: Reading _quam pro civitate sua_ for _prope quam civitatem
suam_. I think _prope_ and _pro_ (_pr_) might easily have been mistaken
for each other, and if the order of _quam_ and _pro_ (mistaken for
_prope_) were once changed, the case of _civitate_ would follow. Prof.
Tyrrell, who writes the town _Blandus_, would read _molliorem_ for
_nobiliorem_, and imagines a pun on the meaning of _Blandus_. But the
name of the town seems certainly _Blaundus_, Βλαῦνδος, or Μλαῦνδος
(Stephanus, Βλαῦδος); see Head, _Hist. Num._ p. 559: and Cicero, though
generally punning on names, would hardly do so here, where he is making
a grave excuse.]
[Footnote 287: Whom he called (Letter XXIX) "a madman and a knave."]
[Footnote 288: C. Vergilius Balbus, proprætor in Sicily (_pro Planc._ §
95; Letter XXIX). C. Octavius (father of Augustus), in Macedonia (see p.
78). L. Marcius Philippus was proprætor of Syria B.C. 61-59. The
governor of Cilicia in the same period is not known; probably some one
left in charge by Pompey.]
[Footnote 289: I have endeavoured to leave the English as ambiguous as
the Latin. Cicero may mean that he has done some good, for at the end of
Letter XXIX he says that Quintus has improved in these points, and had
been better in his second than in his first year. On the other hand, the
context here seems rather to point to the meaning "how _little_ good I
have done!"--impatiently dismissing the subject of temper.]
[Footnote 290: These "requisitionary letters" were granted by a
provincial governor to certain persons requiring supplies, payment of
debts, or legal decisions in their favour in the provinces, or other
privileges, and, if carelessly granted, were open to much abuse. Cicero,
in his own government of Cilicia, boasted that he had signed none such
in six months. The ill-wishers of Quintus had apparently got hold of a
number of these letters signed by him (having been first written out by
the suitors themselves and scarcely glanced at by him), and a selection
of them published to prove his injustice or carelessness.]
[Footnote 291: The governor of a province would stand in such a matter
in the place of the prætor in Rome, _i.e._, he would decide on questions
of law, not of fact, as, whether a debt was due or not. However, Quintus
perhaps only erred in the form of his injunction. He might forbid the
deceased's estate being touched till the question of Fundanius's debt
was decided; but in his letter he assumed (as he had no right to do)
that the claim was good. Substantially it seems to me that Quintus was
right, and certainly in his appeal to him Cicero does not follow his own
injunction to disregard personal feelings.]
[Footnote 292: ὀρθὰν τὰν ναῦν. Quintus had written, it seems, defiantly
about the slanders afloat against him, and had quoted two Greek
proverbial sayings. The first is found in Stobæus, 108 (extract from
Teles): "It was a fine saying of the pilot, 'At least, Poseidon, a ship
well trimmed,'" _i.e._, if you sink my ship, she shall at least go down
with honour. Quintus means, "Whatever my enemies may do afterwards, I
will keep my province in a sound state as long as I am here."]
[Footnote 293: ἅπαξ θανεῖν, perhaps "Better to die once for all than
give in to every unjust demand." The editors quote Æschylus, _Pr. V._
769:
κρεῖσσον γὰρ εἰσάπαξ θανεῖν
ἢ θὰς ἁπάσας ἡμέρας πάσχειν κακῶς.
But I don't feel sure that this is the passage alluded to.]
[Footnote 294: Reading _queruntur_ for _quæ sunt_.]
[Footnote 295: Gaius Cato, tribune B.C. 56.]
[Footnote 296: L. Domitius Ahenobarbus, who as prætor threatened Cæsar
with impeachment, and as consul (B.C. 54) tried to get him recalled. He
was, in 50-49, appointed Cæsar's successor in Gaul, defended Marseilles
against him, and eventually fell in the battle of Pharsalia. P. Nigidius
Figulus supported Cicero during the Catiline conspiracy. Gaius Memmius,
ædile B.C. 60 (see p. 51). Lucretius dedicated his poem to him. L.
Cornelius Lentulus Crus, consul B.C. 49, accused Clodius in B.C. 61,
murdered in Africa after Pompey, B.C. 48.]
LIII (F XIII, 42)
TO L. CULLEOLUS (IN ILLYRICUM)
ROME[297]
[Sidenote: B.C. 59, ÆT. 47]