Cicero’s Letters to his Friends, Book 2

Translated by Evelyn Shuckburgh

CLXV (F II, I)

TO C. SCRIBONIUS CURIO (IN ASIA)

ROME (JANUARY OR FEBRUARY)

Though¹ I am sorry that you have suspected me of neglect, yet it was not so annoying to me to have my lack of attention [p. 344] found fault with, as delightful to have it missed by you; especially as in the particular point on which you accuse me I happen to be innocent, while in shewing that you miss a letter from me, you avow an affection for me, of which, indeed, I was fully aware, but which, nevertheless, is very soothing and gratifying to my feelings. The fact is that I have never let anyone go, so long, that is, as I thought him likely to reach you, without giving him a letter. Why, was there ever such an untiring correspondent as I? From you, however, I have received two, or at the most three letters--and those extremely brief. Wherefore, if you are a harsh judge of me, I shall find you guilty on precisely the same charge. But if you don't want me to do that, you will have to be considerate to me. However, enough about writing; for I am not afraid of failing to satiate you with my correspondence, especially if you shew a just appreciation of my zeal in that department. I have been grieved on the one hand at your long absence from us, because I have lost the advantage of a most delightful intimacy; and yet on the other hand I rejoice at it, because while on this foreign service you have gained all your objects with infinite credit to yourself, and because in all you have undertaken fortune has answered to my wishes. There is one injunction, a very short one, which my unspeakable affection for you compels me to give you. Such lofty expectations are entertained of your spirit, shall I say? or of your ability, that I cannot refrain from imploring and beseeching you to return to us with a character so finished, as to be able to support and maintain the expectations which you have excited. And since no loss of memory will ever obliterate my recollection of your services to me, I beg you not to forget that, whatever increase of fortune or position may befall you, you would not have been able to attain it, had you not as a boy obeyed my most faithful and affectionate counsels. ² Wherefore it will be your duty to shew me such affection, that my age--now on the decline--may find repose in your devotion and youth. [p. 345]

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¹ The younger Curio was now quaestor to C. Clodius, brother of Publius and Appius, in Asia. He was tribune in B.C. 50, when he suddenly changed sides and joined Caesar, who purchased his adhesion by paying his immense debts.

² Curio had supported Cicero against Clodius, and had worked for his recall. He seems to have attended at Cicero's house for the study of rhetoric or legal practice, as was the fashion for young men to do. He presently married Fulvia, the widow of Clodius, who after his death in Africa (B.C. 48) married Antony.

CLXVII (F II, 2)

TO C. SCRIBONIUS CURIO (IN ASIA)

ROME (?FEBRUARY)

I have been deprived of a strong witness to my extreme affection for you in the person of your most illustrious father: who would have been fortunate above the common lot, both in his own memorable achievements and in the possession of such a son as yourself, had it been granted him to see you before his departure from life. But I hope our friendship stands in no need of witnesses. Heaven bless your inheritance to you! You will at least have in me one to whom you are as dear and as precious as you have been to your father. [p. 347]

CLXVIII (F II, 3)

TO C. SCRIBONIUS CURIO (IN ASIA)

ROME (?FEBRUARY)

Rupa ¹ was not backward in his wish to promise an exhibition of gladiators in your name, but neither I nor any of your friends approved of anything being done in your absence which would tie your hands when you returned. For my part, I will either write you my opinion at greater length later on, or, to give you no opportunity of preparing an answer to it, I will take you unprepared and state my view by word of mouth against yours. I shall thus either bring you over to my opinion, or at least leave in your mind a record of my view, so that, if at any time (which heaven forbid!) you may see cause to repent of your decision, you may be able to recall mine. Briefly, be assured that your return will find the state of things to be such, that you may gain the highest possible honours in the state more easily by the advantages with which you are endowed by nature, study, and fortune, than by gladiatorial exhibitions. The power of giving such things stirs no feeling of admiration in anyone; for it is wholly a question of means, and not of character--and there is nobody who is not by this time sick and tired of them. But I am not acting as I said I would do, for I am embarking on a statement of the reasons for my opinion. So I will put off this entire discussion to your arrival. Believe me, you are expected with the greatest interest, and hopes are entertained of you such as can only be entertained of the highest virtue and ability. If you are as prepared for this as you ought to be--and I feel certain you are--you will be bestowing on us, your friends, on the whole body of your fellow citizens, and on the entire state, the most numerous [p. 348] and most excellent of exhibitions. You will certainly become aware that no one can be dearer or more precious than you are to me.

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¹ A freedman and agent of Curio's. The question is of funeral games and an exhibition of gladiators in honour of Curio's father. Curio gave them, and involved himself in huge debt in consequence.

CLXXIV (F II, 4)

TO C. SCRIBONIUS CURIO (IN ASIA)

ROME (?MAY)

You are aware that letters are of many kinds; but there is one kind which is undeniable, for the sake of which, indeed, the thing was invented, namely, to inform the absent of anything that is to the interest of the writer or recipient that they should know. You, however, certainly don't expect a letter of that kind from me. For of your domestic concerns you have members of your family both to write and to act as messengers. Besides, in my personal affairs there is really nothing new. There are two other kinds of letters which give me great pleasure: the familiar and sportive, and the grave and serious. Which of these two I ought least to employ I do not understand. Am I to jest with you by letter? Upon my word, I don't think the man a good citizen who could laugh in times like these. Shall I write in a more serious style? What could be written of seriously by Cicero to Curio except public affairs? And yet, under this head, my position is such that I neither dare write what I think, nor choose to write what I don't think. Wherefore, since I have no subject left to write about, I will employ my customary [p. 355] phrase, and exhort you to the pursuit of the noblest glory. For you have a dangerous rival already in the field, and fully prepared, in the extraordinary expectation formed of you and this rival you will vanquish with the greatest ease, only on one condition--that you make up your mind to put out your full strength in the cultivation of those qualities, by which the noble actions are accomplished, upon the glory of which you have set your heart. In support of this sentiment I would have written at greater length had not I felt certain that you were sufficiently alive to it of your own accord; and I have touched upon it even thus far, not in order to fire your ambition, but to testify my affection.

CLXXV (F II, 5)

TO C. SCRIBONIUS CURIO (ON HIS WAY FROM ASIA)

ROME (?JUNE)

The state of business here I dare not tell even in a letter. And though, wherever you are, as I have told you before, you are in the same boat, yet I congratulate you on your absence, as well because you don't see what we see, as because your reputation is placed on a lofty and conspicuous pinnacle in the sight of multitudes both of citizens and allies; and it is conveyed to us by neither obscure nor uncertain talk, but by the loud and unanimous voice of all. There is one thing of which I cannot feel certain--whether to congratulate you, or to be alarmed for you on account of the surprising expectation entertained of your return; not because I am at all afraid of your not satisfying the world's opinion, but, by heaven, lest, when you do come, there may be nothing for you to preserve: so universal is the decline and almost extinction of all our institutions. But even thus much I am afraid I have been rash to trust to a letter wherefore you shall learn the rest from others. ¹ However, whether you have still some [p. 356] hope of the Republic, or have given it up in despair, see that you have ready, rehearsed and thought out in your mind, all that the citizen and the man should have at his command who is destined to restore to its ancient dignity and freedom a state crushed and overwhelmed by evil times and profligate morals.

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¹ In these vague though ominous sentences Cicero is referring to the constant and violent hindrances to the election of magistrates, that is, to the orderly working of the constitution, which were occurring. No consuls were elected till September.

CLXXVI (F II, 6)

TO C. SCRIBONIUS CURIO (ARRIVED IN ITALY)

ROME (?JULY)

News had not yet reached me of your arrival in Italy when I sent Sext. Villius, an intimate of my friend Milo, with this letter to you. But nevertheless, since your arrival was thought to be approaching, and it was ascertained that you had already started from Asia Rome-wards, the importance of my subject made me dismiss any fear of being premature in sending you this letter, for I was exceedingly anxious that it should reach you as soon as possible. If the obligations, Curio, had only been on your side, and as great as they are usually proclaimed by you rather than as valued by me, I should have been more shy of coming to you for any request of importance which I might have to make. For it is very disagreeable to a modest man to ask a great favour from one whom he thinks under an obligation to himself, lest he should seem rather to demand than to ask what he is seeking, and to regard it more in the light of a debt than of a favour. But since your kindnesses to me were known to the whole world, or rather I should say were made especially prominent and valuable by the very novelty of my circumstances; and since it is the mark of a generous heart to be willing, when much is owed, to reckon the debt at its highest; [p. 357] I did not hesitate to prefer to you by letter a petition for what was of the highest importance and most vital consequence to me of anything in the world. For I was not afraid of being unable to support your kindnesses to me, even though they were beyond calculation: especially as I felt confident that there was no amount of favour for which my heart was incapable of finding room when receiving it, or for which in repayment it could not make a full and brilliant return. I have concentrated and embarked all my zeal, all my efforts, all the care and industry of which I am capable, my every thought, in fact, my whole heart and soul, on securing Milo's consulship; and I have made up my mind that in this matter I ought to look not merely for the profit arising from an act of kindness, but also for the credit of disinterested affection. Nor do I think that anyone was ever so anxious about his own personal safety and his own fortunes as I am for his election, on which I have made up my mind that all my interests depend. To him I see clearly that, if you choose, you can render such substantial help that we need ask for nothing else. We have on our side all these advantages: the favour of the loyalists won since his tribunate on account of his supporting me (as I hope you understand); that of the common multitude on account of the splendour of his gladiatorial exhibitions and the liberality of his disposition; the favour of the young men and of those influential in securing votes, won by his own eminent powers of captivation, shall I call it? or his diligence in that department; lastly, my own electoral support, which, if it is not very powerful, is at any rate regarded as only right, due and proper, and on that account is perhaps influential also. What we want is a leader, and what I may call a controller, or, so to speak, a pilot of those winds which I have described: and if we had to select one such out of the whole world, we should have no one to compare with you. Wherefore, if (as I am sure you can) you can regard me as a grateful, as an honest man, from the mere fact that I am thus eagerly exerting myself for Milo, if, in fine, you think me worthy of your kindness, I do ask you this favour--that you come to the rescue of this anxiety of mine and this crisis in my reputation, or, to put it with greater truth, that you will devote your zeal to what is all but a question of life and death to me. As to Titus [p. 358] Annius ¹ himself, I promise you this much--that if you resolve to embrace his cause, you will never have anyone of greater spirit, solidity, firmness, or affection to yourself. While to me you will have given so much additional honour and prestige, that I shall have no difficulty in acknowledging you to have been as effective in supporting my reputation as you were in securing my safety.

Did I not know that you must be fully aware, while writing this letter to you, under what a weight of obligation I am labouring, how strongly I am bound to work in this election for Milo, not only with every kind of exertion, but even with downright fighting, I should have written at greater length. As it is, I hand over and commit the business, the cause, and myself wholly and entirely into your hands. Of one thing be sure: if I obtain this help from you, I shall owe you almost more than I owe Milo himself; for my personal safety, in which I have been conspicuously aided by him, has not been as dear to me as the sacred duty of returning the favour will be delightful. That object I feel confident that your aid, and yours alone, will enable me to secure.

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¹ Milo. His full name is T. Annius Milo Papianus; originally of the gens Papia, be had been adopted by his maternal grandfather, T. Annius.

CCXXVI (F II, 7)

TO C. SCRIBONIUS CURIO (IN ROME)

CILICIA, 10 DECEMBER

It is not usual to find fault with a tardy congratulation, especially if it has been omitted by no negligence: for I am far off, and news reaches me slowly. However, I both congratulate you and heartily wish that your tribunate may redound to your lasting reputation; and I exhort you to direct and control everything by your own good sense, and not allow yourself to be carried away by suggestions of others. There is no one who can give you wiser advice than you can give yourself: you will never make a slip, if you listen to your own heart. I don't write this inconsiderately: I am fully conscious to whom I am writing: I know your courage, I know your good sense. I am not afraid of your acting timidly or foolishly, if you maintain what you feel in your own heart to be right. To what a political situation you have, I don't say fallen, but come--for it is by your own deliberate choice and not by chance that you have brought [p. 85] your tribuneship into the very midst of a crisis--you, of course, perceive. I do not doubt that you are considering how decisive in politics is the choice of seasons, how rapidly events shift, how uncertain are results, how pliable are men's wills, what treachery, what falseness, there is in life. But I beseech you, Curio, give your whole heart and mind, not to any new principle, but to that which I mentioned at the beginning of my letter: commune with your own thoughts, take your own self into council, listen to yourself, obey your-self. It is not easy to find anyone capable of giving better advice to another than you are: to yourself, at any rate, no one will give better. Good heavens! why am I not there to be, if you will, the spectator of your glory, or the sharer, or partner, or assistant in your counsels? Although of this you do not in the least stand in need, yet, after all, the greatness and intensity of my affection would have secured my being of some use to you by my advice. I will write at greater length to you at another time: for within the next few days I intend to send some letter-carriers from my own establishment, that, since I have performed a public service with good results and to my own satisfaction, I may in one despatch give an account to the senate of the events of the whole summer. As to your election to the priesthood, you will learn from the letter which I delivered to your freedman Thraso how much trouble I have taken, and how difficult a matter it has been to deal with and maintain. For yourself, Curio, in the name of your uncommon affection for me, and my own unparalleled one for you, I beg you not to allow any extension of time to be made in my case to this burden of a province. I urged this on you when I was with you, and when I had no idea that you were going to be tribune this year, and I have often made the same request by letter; but then it was made to you as a member of the senate, ¹ who was yet a young man of the highest rank and the greatest popularity, now it is to I tribune, and that tribune a Curio: not to get any novel [p. 86] decree--which is usually somewhat more difficult--but to prevent any novelty: to support both a decree of the senate and laws, and to allow the terms under which I left Rome to remain as they are. This I earnestly beg of you again and again.

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¹ Reading senatore with the MSS. It seems to me evidently right. Cicero says that when he first appealed to Curio, he was only a private member of the senate, with only such influence as his rank and popularity gave him--now he is a tribune who could veto any such measure, and therefore had as great power in the matter as any man could have. I doo not think that Cicero would have called Curio his sectator, especially When wishing to secure his services.

CC (F II, 8)

TO M. CAELIUS RUFUS (AT ROME)

ATHENS, 6 JULY

What! Do you suppose that I meant you to send me an account of gladiatorial matches, of postponements of trials, of robberies by Chrestus, and such things as, when I am at Rome, nobody ventures to retail to me? See what a high opinion I have of you--and not, indeed, undeservedly, for I have never yet known anyone with keener political instincts--I don't care for your writing to me even the daily occurrences in the most important affairs of the state, unless there is something specially affecting myself. Other people will write about them ; many will convey news of them: common report itself will bring many of them to my ears. Therefore it is not things past or present that I expect from you, but things to come--for you are a man who sees far in front of you--so that, having got a view of the ground plan of the Republic from your pen, I may satisfy myself as to what the future building is to be. As yet, however, I have no fault to find with you ; for it is impossible for you to see farther than any one of us, and especially myself, who have spent several days with Pompey in conversation exclusively political, which neither can nor ought to be committed to writing. Only take this as certain, that Pompey is an admirable citizen, and prepared in courage and wisdom alike to meet every contingency that needs to be provided against in the political situation. Wherefore devote yourself to him: he will receive you, believe me, with open arms. For he takes the same view, as we ever do, as to who are good and bad citizens. After spending exactly ten days in Athens, and having seen a great deal of our friend Caninius Gallus, ¹ [p. 34] I am starting on my journey today, the 6th of July, the day on which I send you this letter. All interests of mine I desire to have the benefit of your greatest attention, but nothing more so than that the time of my provincial government should not be extended. That is all in all to me. When, how, and by whose means this is to be worked, you will settle best for yourself.

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¹ L. Caninius Gallus, a strong supporter of Pompey tribune B.C. 56. What he was doing at Athens is uncertain ; it is suggested that he was propraetor of Achaia, but it is doubtful whether such an officer existed at this period.

CCXXIII (F II, 9)

TO M. CAELIUS RUFUS (AT ROME)

CILICIA (NOVEMBER)

M. CICERO, proconsul, greets M. Caelius, curule aedile elect. First of all, as in duty bound, I congratulate you and express my delight at the rank which you have already attained, and your hopes of advancement in the future. It is somewhat late in the day: that, however, does not arise from my negligence, but from my ignorance of everything that is going on. For I am in a district where, partly from its distance, and partly from brigandage, all news is as late as possible in arriving. Besides congratulating you, I can scarcely find words to thank you for having had an election calculated, as you said in your letter, to give us an endless fund of laughter. And so, as soon as I heard the news, I imagined myself in that man's skin--you know whom I mean--and personified to myself all that "rising generation" about which he is always talking so big. "'Tis hard to say "--looking at you in my mind's eye the while, though far away, and as though I were talking to you face to face--

By heaven, how great, How grand the feat!

[p. 80] But since it had surpassed my expectation, I began the quotation:

A glad surprise Before my eyes.

¹ In fact, I all on a sudden stepped out "gay as gay can be," and when I was rebuked for being all but silly from excess of joy, I quoted in my defence, "Beyond all measure to express delight," etc.' In short, while laughing at him, I almost became another like him. But I will write more about this, and much else besides about you and to you, as soon as I have got a minute to spare. Meanwhile however, my dear Rufus, I am deeply attached to you--you whom fortune gave me to be the promoter of my dignity, and such a scourge, not of my enemies only, but of my jealous rivals also, that they had reason to be sorry in some cases for their evil deeds, and in others even for their stupidities.

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¹ Ego voluptatem animi nimiam summum esse errorem arbitror--"I think the height of exultation the height of error" (Traben ap Tusc. 4.35). This is only a "defence" ironically.

CCXXIV (F II, 10)

TO M. CAELIUS RUFUS (AT ROME)

PINDENISSUS, 26 NOVEMBER

M. CICERO, imperator, ¹ greets M. Caelius, curule aedile elect. Just see how letters fail to reach me! For I cannot be induced to believe that you have not sent me any letter since your election to the aedileship, considering the importance of the fact and the congratulation for which it called: on your account, because it was what I was hoping for, on that of Hillus ² (you see I lisp) because it was what I had not [p. 81] expected. However, be assured that I have received no letter from you since that glorious election, which transported me with delight. This makes me fear that the same may happen to my letter. For my part, I have never sent a single packet home without an enclosure for you, and nothing can be more delightful and beloved than you are to me. But let us return (not "weturn," for I have lost my lisp) to business.

It is as you desired. For you could have wished me, you say, to have no more trouble than just enough for the laurel. ³ You are afraid of the Parthians, because you have no confidence in the forces at my disposal. Well, the course of affairs has been as follows. On the announcement of a Parthian invasion, relying on certain difficulties in the country and on the natural features of the mountains, I led my army to Amanus, supported by a fairly good contingent of auxiliary forces, and by a certain prestige attaching to my reputation among populations who had no personal knowledge of me. For one often hears in these parts, "Is that the man by whom the city--,whom the senate--?" You can imagine the rest. By the time I had arrived at Amanus, which is a mountain common to me and Bibulus, the dividing line being the watershed, our friend Cassius, to my great joy, had repulsed the enemy from Antioch: Bibulus had taken over his province. Meanwhile, with my full forces I harassed the population of Amanus, our immemorial foes. Many were killed and taken prisoners, the rest were scattered: the fortified Strongholds were taken by surprise and burnt. Accordingly, after a complete victory, having been acclaimed imperator at Issus--in which place, as I have often been told by you, Clitarchus related to you that Darius was conquered by Alexander--I drew off my army to the most disturbed part of Cilicia. There for the past twenty-five days I have been assailing a very strongly fortified town called Pindenissus with earthworks, pent-houses, towers, and with such great resources and energy, that the only thing now wanting to the attainment of the most glorious renown is the credit of taking the town; and if, as I hope, I do take it, I will then at Once send an official despatch. For the present I content myself with writing this to you, to give you hope of attaining [p. 82] your wish. But to return to the Parthians, the present summer has had the fairly fortunate result I have mentioned: for the next, there is much cause for alarm. Wherefore, my dear Rufus, be vigilant: in the first place, that I may have a successor: but if that shall turn out to be, as you write, too much of a business, then, what is easy enough, that no additional period be imposed. About politics I expect in your letters, as I have said before, current events and, even more, conjectures of the future. Wherefore I beg you earnestly to write me an account of everything in the greatest detail.

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¹ Cicero calls himself imperator, as having been greeted by that title by his soldiers in the field. This was a special usage of the title, to be distinguished from the same word applied to a magistrate with imperium. This title by acclamation could only be given once in the same war. It always comes after the name. The chief authority ou this subject is Dio, 43, 44; cp. 70, 21.

² Hillus for Hirrus. It doesn't seem much of a jest.

³ For a triumph.

CCLIV (F II, II)

TO M. CAELIUS RUFUS (CURULE AEDILE)

LAODICEA, 4 APRIL

WOULD you have supposed that words could possibly fail me, and not only oratorical words, such as you advocates use, but even this common vernacular which I employ? Still, fail me they do, and for this reason--I am surprisingly anxious as to what decree may pass about the provinces. An astonishing yearning for the city possesses me, an incredible longing for my friends and for you among the first, and at the same time a weariness of a province, either because I seem to have gained so much reputation, that an accession to it is now not so much to be sought, as some change of fortune to be feared; or because the whole business is one unworthy of my powers, able and accustomed as I am to sustain more important burdens in the public service; or, again, because an alarm of a serious war is hanging over us, which I seem likely to avoid by quitting my province on the day appointed. The panthers are being energetically attended to by the ordinary hunters in accordance with my orders: but there is a great scarcity of them, and such as there are, I am told, complain loudly that they are the only things for which traps are set in all my province, and they are said in consequence to have resolved to quit our province for Caria. However, the business is being pushed on zealously, and especially by Patiscus. All that turn up shall be at your service, but how many that is I don't in the least know. I assure you I am much interested in your aedileship: the day itself reminds me of it; for I am writing on the very day of the Megalensia. ¹ Please write the fullest particulars as to the state of politics in general: for I shall look on information from you as the most trustworthy I get. [p. 149]

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¹ The festival of Cybele, the Great Mother, began on the 4th of April. It and the ludi Romani were under the charge of the aediles.

CCLXII (F II, 12)

TO M. CAELIUS RUFUS (CURULE AEDILE)

CILICIA, JUNE

I am much worried by events in the city. Such stormy meetings are reported to me, such a disturbed Quinquatrian holiday: ¹ for what has happened since I have not yet heard. But after all nothing worries me so much as the being debarred in the midst of these troubles from having a laugh with you at the comic points in them. These are, in fact, numerous, but I dare not trust them to paper. What annoys me is that I have not as yet received a line from you on these subjects. Wherefore, though by the time you read this letter I shall have finished my year of office, pray, nevertheless, send a letter to meet and enlighten me on all public affairs, that I may not arrive home an utter stranger. No one can do this better than you. Your friend Diogenes, a steady good man, has left me in company with Philo for Pessinus. They are on their way to visit Adiatorix, ² where they are fully prepared to find neither kindness nor a full exchequer.

The City, the City, my dear Rufus--stick to that and live in its full light! Residence elsewhere--as I made up my mind in early life--is mere eclipse and obscurity to those whose energy is capable of shining at Rome. Knowing this thoroughly, would that I had been true to my convictions! Before heaven, I do not compare all the advantages of a province put together with one stroll and one conversation with you. I hope I have gained a reputation for integrity. I had that, however, quite as much from rejecting ³ as from administering a province. "But what about the hope of a triumph?" say you. I had already had a sufficiently glorious triumph: I never ought to have been so long separated from [p. 167] all that I love best. But I shall, I hope, soon see you. Mind you send some letters to meet me worthy of yourself.

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¹ The quinquatrus Minervae, March 19-23, was a general holiday.

² Son of a tetrarch of Galatia.

³ As he did at the end of his consulship.

CCLVI (F II, 13)

TO M. CAELIUS RUFUS (CURULE AEDILE)

LAODICEA, MAY

THOUGH{ your letters are rare (perhaps they don't all reach me), yet I always receive them with delight. For instance, the last received-- how sensible it is! How kind and instructive! Though in all points I had made up my mind that I must act as you advise, yet my plans are confirmed when I see that farseeing and faithful advisers agree with me. I am very fond of Appius, as I have often remarked to you in the course of conversation, and I perceived that the moment our quarrel was at an end he began to like me. For when consul he shewed me great respect, and as a friend he has made himself agreeable, and has taker great interest in my pursuits. That good services on my side were in truth not wanting you are witness, and are supported now, I think, by Phania coming in pat, like a [p. 155] character in a farce; ¹ and, by heaven! I valued him still more from perceiving that he was attached to you. You know that I am now wholly Pompey's: you understand that Brutus is the object of my warm affection. What is there to prevent my wishing to embrace a man who has all the advantages of youth, wealth, honours, genius, children, relations, marriage connexions, and friends: especially as he is my colleague, ² and in regard even to the reputation and learning of the college shews great value for me? I write at the greater length on this subject, because your letter hints a kind of doubt as to my feelings towards him. I suppose you have been told something: it is false, believe me, if you have. My official principles and policy present certain points of contrast with his method of administering the province. From that circumstance, perhaps, people have suspected that this contrast arises from estrangement of feeling, not mere difference of opinion. I have, however, never done or said anything with the object of lessening his reputation. Moreover, since this trouble that has come upon him from the rash act of our Dolabella, ³ I am putting myself forward as his apologist and defender.

Your letter mentioned "a lethargy on the state." I am very glad to hear it, and rejoice that our friend ⁴ has been frozen by the public tranquillity. Your last page, in your own handwriting, was like a dagger in my heart. What! Curio now standing up for Caesar? Who had ever expected it? No one but myself! For, as I live, I thought that would happen. ⁵ Immortal gods! How I yearn for the laugh we should have over it together! My intention is, since I have finished hearing my cases, have enriched the [p. 156] states, have secured for the publicani even the arrears of the last quinquennium without a murmur from the allies, and have made myself agreeable to private persons from the highest to the lowest, to start for Cilicia on the 15th of May, and, as soon as I have reached the summer quarters and have got the troops established in them, to quit the province in accordance with the senatorial decree. I desire to see you while still aedile; ⁶ and the city, as well as all my friends, and you among the first, inspire me with extraordinary longing.

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¹ Kômikos martus. Phania is a freedman of Appius Claudius, whom Cicero trusts to speak well of his feelings towards Appius. Cicero is fond of illustrating such convenient or sudden events by the incidents of a play. Cp. 2 Phil. 65, Exultabat gaudio persona de mimo "modo egens repente dives."

² In the college of augurs.

³ His prosecution of Appius for maiestas. See Letter CCXLI.

⁴ Curio. See same letter.

⁵ Soon after Curio entered on his tribuneship (10th December, B.C. 51) it became evident that he had changed sides. Caesar had bought him by relieving him of his debts, incurred by his extravagant funeral games and other ways.

⁶ By the time Cicero reached Italy, Caelius too had become a Caesarian.

CCXLIV (F II, 14)

TO M. CAELIUS RUFUS (AT ROME)

LAODICEA (FEBRUARY)

I am very intimate with M. Fadius, a most excellent man an& most accomplished scholar, and I am wonderfully [p. 120] attached to him, as well for his great talents and consummate learning, as for the singular modesty of his behaviour. Pray take up his business as though it were my own. I know you distinguished advocates: one must commit a murder if one wishes the benefit of your services: but in the case of this man I will accept no excuse. You will throw up every other engagement, if you love me, when Fadius desires your services. I am eagerly looking out and longing for news from Rome, and before all I desire to know how you are: for, owing to the severity of the winter, it is now a long time since any news found its way to us.

CCLXXII (F II, 15)

TO M. CAELIUS RUFUS (AT ROME)

(ASIA) AUGUST

NOTHING could have been more correct or wise than your dealings with Curio as to my supplicatio: and, by Hercules, the business was settled exactly as I wished, both from its speed and because the person whom it irritated--the rival, I [p. 186] mean, of us both ¹ --voted with the man who complimented my achievements in terms of extraordinary praise. Wherefore let me tell you I have hopes of the next step : ² so be prepared for it. I am glad in the first place to hear your compliments to Dolabella, and in the second place to find that you like him. For what you say of the possibility of his being reformed by Tullia's good sense, I know to what letter of your own it is an answer. ³ What if you were to read the letter which I wrote to Appius at the time after reading yours? But what would you have? It is the way of the world. What is done is done, and heaven prosper it! I hope I shall find him an agreeable son-in-law, and in that respect your kindness will be of much assistance.

Politics make me very anxious. I am fond of Curio: I wish Caesar to shew himself an honest man: I could die for Pompey: but after all nothing is dearer in my sight than the Republic itself. In this you are not making yourself very Conspicuous, for you seem to me to have your hands tied--by being at once a good citizen and a good friend. On quitting my province, I have put my quaestor Caelius in command. "A mere boy," say you. Yes, but a quaestor, a young man of high rank, and in accordance with nearly universal precedent: for there was no one who had held higher office for me to put in that position. Pomptinus had departed long ago: my brother Quintus could not be induced: moreover, if I had left him, enemies would have said that I had not really left the province at the end of a year, in accordance with the decree of the senate, since I left a second self behind me. Perhaps they might even have added, that the senate had ordered that those should govern provinces who had not done so before; whereas my brother had governed Asia for three years. In fine, I have now no anxieties: if I had left my brother behind, I should have been afraid of everything. Lastly, not so much of my own initiative, as following the precedent set by the two most [p. 187] powerful men of the day, who have secured the allegiance of all the Cassii and Antonii, ⁴ I have not so much been desirous to attract a young man to myself, as unwilling to repel him You must needs praise this policy of mine: for it cannot now be changed. You did not write clearly enough to me about Ocella, and it was not mentioned in the gazette. Your doings are so well known, that even on the other side of Mount Taurus the story of Matrinius was heard. Unless the Etesian winds delay me, I shall, I hope, see you before long.

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¹ Hirrus, who stood for the augurship against Cicero in B.C. 53, and for the aedileship against Curio in B.C. 51.

² A triumph.

³ He means that by the complimentary remarks as to Dolabella, Caelius had tried to do away with the impression likely to have been made by what he had said about Dolabella before (Letter CCXLI).

⁴ Pompey had chosen Cassius, Caesar Antonius, as their quaestors. Cicero argues that he has done less--for he has only employed the quaestor assigned him by lot (vol. i., p. 73; 2 Phil. 50).

CCCXCIII (F II, 16)

TO M. CAELIUS RUFUS (IN GAUL)

CUMAE (MAY)

Your letter ¹ would have given me great pain, had it not been that by this time reason itself has dispelled all feelings of annoyance, and had not my mind, from long despair of public safety, become callous to any new sorrow. Nevertheless, I do not know how it happened that you conceived from my former letter the suspicion which you mention in yours. For what did it contain beyond a lamentation over the state of the times, which do not cause me greater anxiety than they do you? For I know the keenness of your intellect too well to suppose that you do not see what I see myself. What surprises me is that, knowing me as thoroughly as you ought to do, you could be induced to think, that I was either so shortsighted as to abandon a fortune in the ascendant for one on the wane and all but entirely sunk; or so inconsistent as to throw away the favour already gained of a man at the height of prosperity, and so be untrue to myself, and-- a thing which I have from the beginning and ever since avoided--take part in a civil war. What, then, do you mean by my "lamentable" design? Is it that of retiring, perhaps, to some secluded spot? For you know how it not [p. 386] only turns my stomach--as it used at one time to turn yours also--but sickens my very eyes to see the insolent conduct of mere upstarts. I have the additional gêne of the procession of lictors, and the title of imperator, by which I am addressed. If I had been without that burden, I should have been content with any retreat, however humble, in Italy. But these laurelled fasces of mine not only attract the eyes, but now also provoke the remarks of the malevolent. And though that is so, I yet never thought of leaving the country without the approbation of your party. But you know my small estates: I am obliged to stay on them, not to be troublesome to my friends. Now the fact of my finding it pleasantest to reside in my marine villa causes some to suspect me of an intention to embark on a voyage: and, after all, perhaps I should not have been unwilling to do so, had I been able to reach peace: for how could I consistently sail to war: especially against a man who, I hope, has forgiven me, on the side of a man who by this time cannot possibly forgive me?

In the next place, you might without any difficulty have understood my feeling at the time of your visit to me in my Cuman villa. For I did not conceal from you what Titus Ampius had said: ² you saw how I shrank from leaving the city after hearing it. Did I not assure you that I would endure anything rather than quit Italy to take part in a civil war? What, then, has occurred to make me change my resolve? Has not everything been rather in favour of my abiding by my opinion? Pray believe me in this--and I am sure you do think so-that among these miseries I seek for nothing but that people should at length understand that I have preferred peace to everything: that, when that was given up in despair, my first object was to avoid actual civil war. Of this consistent conduct I think I shall never have cause to repent. I remember, for instance, that our friend Q. Hortensius used to plume himself on this particular thing, that he had never taken any part in a civil war. In this matter my credit will be more brilliant, because it was attributed to want of spirit in his case: in mine I do not think that this idea can possibly be entertained. Nor am I terrified by the considerations [p. 387] which you put before me, with the most complete fidelity and affection, with the view of alarming me. For there is no sort of violence that does not seem to be hanging over the heads of all in this world-wide convulsion; and this, indeed, I would with the greatest pleasure have averted from the Republic at the cost of my private and domestic losses, even those against which you bid me be on my guard. To my son, whom I rejoice to see enjoying your affection, I shall leave, if the Republic survives in any shape, a sufficiently noble inheritance in the memory of my name: but if it entirely disappears, nothing will happen to him apart from the rest of the citizens. You ask me to have some regard to my son-in-law-a most excellent young man, and very dear to me: can you doubt, when you know how much I regard both him, and of course my dear Tullia, that this subject gives me the keenest anxiety? The more so, that in the universal disaster I yet used to flatter myself with this little grain of hope, that my, or rather our, Dolabella would be freed from those embarrassments which he had brought upon himself by his own liberality. Pray ask him how he got through the settling days, while he was in the city. How disagreeable they were to him, and how derogatory to myself as his father-in-law! Accordingly, I am neither waiting for the result of the Spanish campaign, as to which I am fully convinced that the truth is as you say, nor am I meditating any astute policy. If there is ever to be a state, there will be doubtless a place for me: but if there is not, you will yourself, as I think, make for the same lonely retreats in which you will hear that I have taken up my abode. But perhaps I am talking wildly, and all these troubles will end better. For I remember the expressions of despair among those who were old men when I was a youth: perhaps I am now imitating them, and indulging in the usual weakness of my time of life. I wish it may be so. But nevertheless!-I suppose you have heard that a purple-bordered toga is being woven for Oppius. ³ For our friend Curtius thinks of a double-dyed one: but the hand that should dye it keeps him waiting. ⁴ I put in this seasoning of joke to shew you that, in [p. 388] spite of my indignation, I am still in the habit of laughing. ⁵ As to what you say in your letter about Dolabella, I advise you to look to it as closely as if your own interests were at stake. My last remark shall be this: I shall do nothing wild or inconsiderate. However, I beg you, in whatever country I may be, to protect me and my children, as our friendship and your honour demand.

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¹ See Letter CCCLXXXII, p. 367. This letter to Caelius is far more discreditable to Cicero than the most pitiful of his letters from exile. There is hardly a word in it which is not false, or a suggestio falsi. It was meant to be shewn to Caesar, and is a sad piece of trimming. It is astonishing that he should have sent Atticus a copy of it, when he remembered what he had written continually to him. The idea of Malta, if really entertained, was only a passing one. His real hesitation was as to going to Pompey.

² Who advocated uncompromising resistance to Caesar.

³ That is, Oppius, a partisan of Caesar's, and generally spoken of in connexion with Balbus, is to have some curule office by Caesar's favour.

⁴ M. Curtius Postumus, who had also joined Caesar, was to have an augurship (see p. 396). The augurs wore a toga dyed in some special way with two colours, which in Letter XXXV he calls dibaphon (vol. i., p. 98). By infector, "dyer," Cicero seems to mean Caesar, who was to give him the promotion.

⁵ The jest consists in the jocose description of Oppius and Curtius-- Oppius as ordering a new toga, and Curtius as sending his toga to be dyed, and being kept waiting by the dyer (i.e., Caesar). He seasons the bitter herbs of his letter with a dressing of jest. He uses a word (adspersi) specially applied to "dressing" salads or vegetables with oil or vinegar or the like. Cp. pro Cluent. 7 I, Conditor totius negotii Guttam aspergit huic Bulbo.

CCLXXI (F II, 17)

TO GNAEUS SALLUSTIUS (PROQUAESTOR IN SYRIA)

TARSUS, 18 JULY

Your orderly delivered me your letter at Tarsus on the 17th of July, and I will now proceed to answer it, as I perceive is your wish, in detail. About my successor I have heard nothing, and I don't think there will be one. There is no reason for my not leaving the province to the day, especially as all fear from the Parthians is removed. I am strongly inclined to stop nowhere. I think I shall go to Rhodes for the sake of the boys, but of even that I am not certain. I wish to arrive outside the city as soon as possible, yet the course of politics and events in Rome will guide the course of my journey. Your successor cannot in any case make such haste as to enable you to meet me in Asia. As to delivering the copies of accounts, your non-delivery of them, for which you say Bibulus gave you licence, is no inconvenience to me: but I scarcely think you are justified in so doing by the Julian law, which Bibulus disregards on a certain settled principle, ¹ but which I think you ought certainly to observe. You say that the garrison ought not to have been withdrawn from Apamea; I see that others think the same, and I am much annoyed that rather unpleasant remarks have been made by my ill-wishers. As to whether the Parthians have crossed or not I perceive that you are the only man who has any doubt. Accordingly, all the garrisons, which I had raised to a state of great effectiveness I have been induced by the positive assertions I hear made to dismiss. As to my quaestor's accounts, it was neither reasonable that I should send them to you, nor were [p. 184] they then made up. I think of depositing them at Apamea. Of the booty taken by me no one, except the quaestors of the city--that is, the Roman people--has touched or will touch a farthing. At Laodicea I think I shall accept sureties for all public money, so that both I and the people may be insured against loss in transit. As to what you say about the 100,000 drachmae, in a matter of that kind no concession to anyone is possible on my part. For every sum of money is either treated as booty, in which case it is administered by the praefecti or it is paid over to me, in which case it is administered by the quaestor. You ask me what my opinion is as to the legions which the senate has ordered for Syria. ² I had my doubts before about their coming; now I feel no doubt, if news is received in time of there being peace in Syria, that they will not come. I see that Marius, the successor to the province, will be slow in coming precisely because the Senate has decreed that he should accompany the legions.

There's the answer to one letter. Now for the second. You ask me to recommend you as earnestly as possible to Bibulus. In this matter inclination on my part is not wanting, but it seems to me to be a proper opportunity for expostulating with you: for you are the only man of all Bibulus's staff who never informed me of his complete and causeless alienation from me. For a number of people reported to me that, when there was a great alarm at Antioch, and great hopes were entertained of me and my army, he was accustomed to say that they would prefer to endure any-thing rather than be thought to have wanted my help. I am not at all annoyed that, from the loyalty due from a quaestor to his praetor, you say nothing of this: although I was informed of the treatment you are receiving. He, for his part, when writing to Thermus about the Parthian war, never sent me a line, though he knew that the danger from that war specially affected me. The only subject on which he wrote to me was the augurship of his son: ³ in regard to which I was [p. 185] induced by compassion, and by the friendly feelings I had always entertained to Bibulus, to be at the pains of writing to him with the greatest cordiality. If he is universally ill-natured--which I never thought--I am the less offended by his conduct to me: but if he is on special bad terms with me, a letter from me will do you no good. For instance, in his despatch to the senate, Bibulus took the whole credit for matters in which we both had a share. He says in it that he had secured that the rate of exchange should be to the public advantage. Again--and this is wholly my doing--the declining to employ Transpadane auxiliaries he mentions as a concession of his own, also to the profit of the people. On the other hand, when a thing is entirely his own doing, he brings me into it: "When WE demanded more corn for the auxiliary cavalry" he writes. Surely, again, it is the mark of a small mind, and one which from sheer ill-nature is poor and mean, that because the senate conferred the title of king on Ariobarzanes through me, and commended him to me, he in his despatch does not call him king, but the "son of king Ariobarzanes." Men of this temper are all the worse if favours are asked of them. Nevertheless, I have yielded to your wish, and have written him a letter, with which you can do what you like when you have received it.

________________________________________

¹ Because he would not acknowledge the Julian laws of B.C. 59, which he considered to have been rendered null and void by his obnuntiato.

² These are the two legions, of which one was to be supplied by Pompey, and one by Caesar, but which eventually both came to Italy from Caesar's army, and were not sent to Syria.

³ Apparently for the vacancy which was filled up at the beginning of this year by M. Antonius or Q. Cassius Longinus. The surviving son of Bibulus (L. Calpurnius Bibulus)--by his wife Porcia, afterwards wife of M. Brutus--lived till about B.C. 31, and wrote a memoir of his stepfather Brutus.

CCLVII (F II, 18)

TO Q. MINUCIUS THERMUS (PROPRAETOR OF ASIA)

LAODICEA (MAY)

I am exceedingly glad that such services as I have rendered to Rhodon, and any other kindnesses I have done you and yours, have pleased you, the most grateful of men; and let me assure you that I feel greater interest every day in promoting your position, though, indeed, you have yourself so enhanced it by the purity and lenity of your administration, that it seems scarcely to admit of any increase. But as I think over your plans, I am more and more convinced every day of the soundness of the advice which I originally gave our friend Ariston, when he came to see me, that you would be incurring dangerous enmity, if a young man ¹ of powerful connexions and high birth received a slight from you. And, by heaven! it certainly will be a slight: for you have [p. 157] no one with you of higher official rank. The man himself, too, to say nothing of his high birth, has claims superior to those of the excellent and unimpeachable officers, your legates, in this special particular, that he is a quaestor and your quaestor. That no individual can, however provoked, do you any harm I quite see; yet I would not like you to have three brothers, of the highest birth, energetic, and not without eloquence, angry with you at once, especially on any good ground: men too whom I see will be successively tribunes during the next three years. ² Who knows, again, what sort of times await the Republic? In my opinion, they will be stormy. Why should I wish you to incur the alarms which tribunes can cause, especially when, without exciting remark from anyone, you can give the preference to a quaestor over legates of only quaestorian rank? And if he shews himself worthy of his ancestors, as I hope and trust he may do, the credit will to a certain extent be yours: if, on the other hand, he comes to grief in any way, the discredit will be all his, not yours at all. ³ I thought, as I am on the point of starting for Cilicia, that I ought to write and tell you what occurred to me as being for your interests. Whatever you decide upon doing I pray heaven to prosper. But if you will listen to me, you will avoid enmities, and take measures for your tranquillity in the future. [p. 158]

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¹ Gaius Antonius (brother of Marcus), now quaestor in Asia, and the question is whether Thermus should leave him in charge of the province. He was praetor in B.C. 44, and being assigned the province of Macedonia for B.C. 43, was taken prisoner by M. Brutus, and after a time put to death, in revenge, it was said, for the murder of Cicero.

² M. Antonius was tribune in B.C. 50-49, L. Antonius in B.C. 44, but Gaius does not appear to have been tribune. The three brother were all in office together in B.C. 44, as consul, tribune, and praetor.

³ Because Thermus would only have followed the regular course in appointing his quaestor to take charge of his province in the interval between his departure and the arrival of his successor. It is an irony of destiny, somewhat pathetic, that Cicero should be writing in Antony's favour, and should speak of the brothers as non indisertos, considering the charges of ignorance and every vice which he afterwards flung at Marcus Antonius, to whom also he was to owe his own death.

CCLXI (F II, 19)

TO C. CAELIUS CALDUS (APPOINTED QUAESTOR FOR CILICIA)

(CILICIA, JUNE)

M. Tullius Cicero, imperator, son of Marcus, grandson of Marcus, greets C. Caelius Caldus, son of Lucius, grandson of Gaius, quaestor. When I first received the most welcome intelligence that the lot had assigned you to me as quaestor, [p. 165] I hoped that this chance would be a source of greater pleasure the longer you were with me in the province. For it appeared to me of great importance that the connexion between us, thus formed by fortune, should be supplemented by personal intercourse. When subsequently I failed to hear anything from yourself, or to receive a letter from anyone else as to your arrival, I began to fear, what I still fear may be the case, that I should have left the province before you arrived in it. However, when I was in camp in Cilicia, I received a letter from you on the 21st of June, expressed in the most cordial terms, and sufficiently manifesting your kindness and abilities. But it contained no indication of day or place of writing, nor of the time at which I might expect you; nor was the person who delivered it to me the one to whom you had given it: for then I might have ascertained from him where and when it was despatched. In spite of this uncertainty, I yet thought that I must contrive to send some of my orderlies and lictors to you with a letter. If you receive it in anything like time, you will be doing me a very great favour if you will join me in Cilicia as soon as you can. For though, of course, what your cousin Curius, who is, as you know, a very great ally of mine, and also what your relative and my most intimate friend C. Vergilius, have written to me about you with the greatest earnestness has, of course, very great importance in my eyes--as a serious recommendation of such very warm friends is bound to have--yet your own letter, and especially what you say about your own position and our connexion, has, to my mind, the greatest weight of all. No quaestor could have been assigned to me that would have been more welcome. Wherefore whatever marks of distinction I can shew you, shall be shewn, demonstrating to all the world that I fully recognize your own and your ancestors' high position. I shall be better able to do this, if you join me in Cilicia, which I think is very much to my interest and that of the state, and above all to your own. [p. 166]