Cicero’s Letters to his Friends, Book 9

Translated by Evelyn Shuckburgh

CDLIV (F IX, I)

TO M. TERENTIUS VARRO

ROME (?)

From a letter of yours,¹ which Atticus read to me, I learnt what you were doing and where you were; but when we were likely to see you, I could gain no idea at all from the letter. However, I am beginning to hope that your arrival is not far off. I wish it could be any consolation to me! But the fact is, I am overwhelmed by so many and such grave anxieties, that no one but the most utter fool [p. 66] ought to expect any alleviation: yet, after all, perhaps you can give me some kind of help, or I you. For allow me to tell you that, since my arrival in the city, I have effected a reconciliation with my old friends, I mean my books: though the truth is that I had not abandoned their society because I had fallen out with them, but because I was half ashamed to look them in the face. For I thought, when I plunged into the maelstrom of civil strife, with allies whom I had the worst possible reason for trusting, that I had not shewn proper respect for their precepts. They pardon me: they recall me to our old intimacy, and you, they say, have been wiser than I for never having left it. Wherefore, since I find them reconciled, I seem bound to hope, if I once see you, that I shall pass through with ease both what is weighing me down now, and what is threatening. Therefore in your company, whether you choose it to be in your Tusculan or Cuman villa, or, which I should like least, at Rome, so long only as we are together, I will certainly contrive that both of us shall think it the most agreeable place possible.

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¹ Varro, the "most learned of the Romans," and author, it is said, of 490 books (two only of which remain even partially), had been one of Pompey's legates in Spain in B.C. 49, where he had to surrender his legions to Caesar. He, however, joined Pompey in Epirus. Whilst Caesar was at Alexandria, Antony seized Varro's villa at Casinum (Phil. 2.103), but on his return Caesar restored him to his property and civil position, and indeed employed his services in the collection of the public library. He was the oldest of the leading men of this period, yet survived them all. He was born B.C. 116, and died B.C. 28.

CDLIX (F IX, 2)

TO M. TERENTIUS VARRO (AT TUSCULUM)

ROME (APRIL, AFTER THE 20TH OF APRIL)

Caninius, our common friend, having called upon me very late in the evening, and having told me that he was starting to join you in the morning, I told him that I would have something for him to take, and begged him to Call for it in the morning. I finished my letter in the night, but he never Came: I supposed that he had forgotten. Nevertheless, I should have sent you the letter itself by my own letter-carriers, had I not heard from the same friend next day that you were starting from your Tusculan villa in the morning. But now look at, this! All on a sudden a few days later, when I wasn't in the least expecting it, Caninius Called on me in the morning, and said that he was starting to join you at once. Though that letter was now stale, especially considering the importance of the news that have since arrived, ¹ yet I was unwilling that my night's work should be thrown away, and gave it as it was to Caninius: but I spoke to him as to a man of learning and one warmly attached to you, and I presume that he has conveyed my words to you.

However, I give you the same counsel that I give myself --to avoid men's eyes, if we find it difficult to avoid their tongues. For those who give themselves airs about the victory regard us in the light of defeated enemies: while those who are vexed at our friends' defeat regret that we remain alive. You will ask perhaps why, this being the state of things in the city, I have not left town like yourself? You, I presume, you, who surpass both me and others in the clearness of your perceptions, divined it all! Nothing of course escaped you! Why, who is so much of a Lynceus [p. 75] as, in such pitchy darkness, never to stumble on anything, never to blunder against anything anywhere? For my part, it long ago occurred to my mind how pleasant a thing it would be to go out of town somewhere, so as to avoid seeing and hearing what is being done and said here. But I had certain misgivings: my idea was that everyone who met me on the road would, as it suited his particular point of view, suspect, or, even if he did not suspect it, would say: "This fellow is either frightened, and therefore is running away, or he is meditating some move and has a ship ready prepared." In fact, even the man whose suspicion was the least malicious, and who perhaps knew me best, would have thought my motive for going was that my eyes could not endure the sight of certain persons. From some such misgivings as these I am as yet staying on at Rome, and after all, long habit has insensibly covered over the wound and deadened my indignation.

That is the explanation of my policy. For yourself, then, what I think you should do is this: remain in retirement where you are until such time as this exultation is past boiling point, and at the same time till we hear particulars of the decisive struggle: for decisive I think it was. But it will make all the difference what the feeling of the conqueror is, and how the campaign has ended. Though I am able to make a shrewd guess, still I wait, after all, for information. Nor, indeed, would I have you starting for Baiae until rumour has shouted itself hoarse. For it will be more to our credit, even when we do quit the city, to be thought to have come to that neighbourhood rather to weep than to swim. But you know all this better than I. Only let us abide by our resolve to live together in pursuit of those studies of ours, from which we formerly sought only pleasure, but now seek also the preservation of our lives. And if anyone wishes for our services-not merely as architects, but also as workmen to build up the constitution-let us not refuse to assist, but rather hasten with enthusiasm to the task. And if, on the other hand, no one will employ us, let us compose and read "Republics." And if we cannot do so in the senate-house and forum, yet at least (after the example of the most learned of the ancients) on paper and in books let us govern the state, and investigate its customs [p. 76] and laws. These are my views. You will very much oblige me if you will write and tell me what you mean to do and what your opinion is.

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¹ The battle of Thapsus was fought on the 6th of April, according to the unrevised calendar. The news reached Rome on the evening of the 20th (Dio, 43, 42).

CDLVIII (F IX, 3)

TO M. TERENTIUS VARRO (AT TUSCULUM)

ROME (ABOUT THE 18TH OF APRIL)

Though I have nothing to say to you, yet I could not let Caninius go to you without taking anything from me. What, then, shall I say for choice? What I think you wish, that I am coming to you very soon. Yet pray consider whether it is quite right for us to be in a place like that ¹ when public affairs are in such a blaze. We shall be giving those persons an excuse for talking, who don't know that, wherever we are, we keep the same style and the same manner of life. But what does it matter? Anyhow, we shall give rise to gossip. We ought, forsooth, to take great pains, at a time when society at large is wallowing in every kind of immorality and abomination, to prevent our abstention from active life, whether indulged in alone or together, from being unfavourably remarked upon! For my part, I shall join you, and snap my fingers at the ignorance of these Philistines. For, however miserable the present state of affairs--and nothing can be more so-yet, after all, our studies seem in a way to produce a richer harvest now than of old, whether it is because we can now find relief in nothing else, or because the severity of the disease makes the need of medicine felt, and its virtue is now manifested, which we used not to feel while we were in good health. 'But why these words of wisdom to you now, who have them at hand home-grown--"an owl to Athens? " ² Only, of course, to get you to write me an answer, and wait for my coming. Pray do so therefore. [p. 74]

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¹ That is, Baiae, a holiday resort full of amusement and gay company. Varro had apparently suggested going there.

² Our "coals to Newcastle." See vol. i., p.290.

CDLXIV (F IX, 4)

TO M. TERENTIUS VARRO (?AT CUMAE)

TUSCULUM (JUNE)

About things "possible," let me tell you my opinion agrees with Diodorus. Wherefore, if you are to come, be assured that your coming is "necessary," but if you are not, then it is "impossible" that you should come. Now see which [p. 83] opinion pleases you the more, that of Chrysippus or the one which our teacher Diodotus could not stomach. But on these points also we will talk when we are at leisure: that too is "possible," according to Chrysippus. ¹ I am much obliged to you about Coctius: for that is just what I had commissioned Atticus to do. Yes, if you don't come to me, I shall take a run to you. If you have a garden in your library, ² everything will be complete.

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¹ Cicero playfully alludes to the necessitudinarian doctrines of Diodorus of Caria (the Megaric philosopher, ob. B.C. 307) and Chrysippus of Soli, the Stoic (born B.C. 280). Diodorus maintained that "only what is or what will be is possible." Chrysippus, on the other hand, defined "the possible" as what is "capable of being true if circumstances do not prevent." Diodotus was a Stoic who lived many years in Cicero's house, and died there B.C. 59. See vol. i., p.115.

² Probably means (though it is a strange way of expressing it) a garden to sit and converse in, like philosophers in the Academy: the library being like Cicero's Tusculan gymnasium, round a court containing shrubs, etc. There is a similar reference to Cicero's villa at Cumae, Vol. i., p.253 (Q. Fr. 2.8).

CDLXI (F IX, 5)

TO M. TERENTIUS VARRO (AT TUSCULUM)

ROME (LATE IN MAY)

Yes, I think the 5th of next month will be in very good time, both in consideration of the state of public affairs and of the season of the year. ¹ Wherefore I approve of that day: and will myself accordingly aim at the same. I should [p. 78] not have thought that we ought to repent of our policy, even if those who did not adopt it were not now repentant. For our guiding star was not advantage, but duty: and what we abandoned was not duty, but a hopeless task. So we shewed greater sensitiveness to honour than those who never stirred from home, and greater reasonableness than those who did not return home when all was lost. But nothing irritates me so much as the severe Criticism of the do-nothings, and I am more inclined to feel scrupulous about those who fell in the war, than to trouble myself about those who are angry with us for being alive. If I find a spare moment for coming to Tusculum before the 5th, I will see you there: if not, I will follow you to your Cuman villa, and give you notice beforehand, that the bath may be got ready.

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¹ For starting to meet Caesar. We must remember that, in spite of an intercalary month inserted after the 23rd of February, the calendar this year was two months in advance, and was not rectified till the autumn. Therefore the 5th of June is really about the 5th of April, and that was full early for Caesar to embark on a voyage from Africa.

CDLXVIII (F IX, 6)

TO M. TERENTIUS VARRO (AT TUSCULUM)

ROME (JUNE)

Our friend Caninius has brought a message from you bidding me write and tell you whatever I thought you ought to know. Well then, Caesar's arrival of course is occupying men's minds, and of that you are yourself not unaware. However, he having written, I presume, to say that he intended to come to his villa at Alsium, ¹ his friends wrote to him not to do so: that many people would annoy him, and he himself annoy many: they thought it would be more convenient for him to land at Ostia. I do not myself understand what difference it makes; but yet Hirtius told me that both he and Balbus and Oppius had written to him to do so-men, as I have reason to know, who are attached to you. I wanted you to learn this, that you might know [p. 87] where to prepare yourself a lodging, or rather that you might do so in both places : ² for what he is going to do is uncertain. At the same time I have shewn you that I am intimate with these men and admitted to their counsels And I don't see any reason for avoiding that. It is one thing to bear what one must bear, another to approve what one ought not to approve. Though for my part I do not know why I should not approve, with the exception of the first steps in the movement: for they were within the control of men's wills. I saw of course (you were abroad) that our friends desired war, whereas Caesar did not so much desire it as not fear it (wherefore the first steps were deliberate, the rest merely consequential), and that it must needs be that either this party or that should win. I know that you always lamented with me, when we saw, first, that frightful alternative--the destruction of one or the other army and leader; and, secondly, that the most dreadful evil of all was victory in a civil war, which indeed I dreaded even if it declared on the side of those whom I had joined. For the veriest do-nothings ³ were uttering bloodthirsty threats, and they were offended both by your feelings and my words. At this moment, indeed, if our men had prevailed, they would have been exceedingly violent; for there were some who were very angry with us, as though forsooth we had adopted any resolution as to our own preservation which we had not decided to be good for them also; or as though it were more for the advantage of the state that they should fly to the protection of the beasts, ⁴ than either die out of hand, or continue to live, if not with the best prospect, yet at least with some. But, it may be said, we are living in a distracted republic. Who denies it? But this is their look-out, who secured no resources for the various phases of life.

Well, it was to arrive at this point that my preface has extended to a greater length than I intended. For as I have ever regarded you as a great man, because in the face of these storms you are nearly the only one safely in port, and are reaping the best fruits of philosophy-namely, to [p. 88] fix your mind upon and handle themes, the study and delight of which are to be preferred to all their employments and pleasures: so I consider these days you are spending at Tusculum to be a specimen of true life, and I would with pleasure resign all the wealth in the world to anybody on condition of being allowed, without the interruption of violence, to live a life like yours. And this, indeed, I imitate to the best of my ability, and with the utmost delight find repose in the studies which we both pursue. For who will grudge us this privilege, that, when our country either cannot or will not employ our services, we should return to that way of life, which many learned men have, perhaps wrongly, but still have thought was to be preferred even to public business? These studies, in the opinion of some eminent men, involve a kind of furlough from public duties: why then, when the state allows it, should we not enjoy them to the full? But I have more than fulfilled Caninius's demand; for he quite legitimately ⁵ asked me for anything I knew which you didn't: but I am telling you what you know better than I myself who tell it. I will accordingly do what I was asked, that is, prevent your being ignorant of anything that is in your way connected with this crisis which I may hear. ⁶

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¹ On the coast of Etruria, about eighteen miles north of the mouth of the Tiber. Caesar had a villa there, but so had many Roman nobles, and I suppose that he would be among enemies.

² At Alsium and Ostia, that he might be ready to meet Caesar in, either.

³ Reading otiosissimi minabantur.

⁴ The elephants of King Juba.

⁵ Iure, the MS. reading. I am not satisfied that it is rightly rejected, as it is by all editors; ut scriberem is easily understood after rogarat. He elsewhere (vol. i., p.354) says that the proper purpose of a letter is to inform the recipient of what he does not but ought to know, and the writer does. So in asking that, Caninius asked iure, in accordance with the law of letter writing.

⁶ The reading is doubtful.

CDLX (F IX, 7)

TO M. TERENTIUS VARRO (AT TUSCULUM)

ROME (MAY)

I was dining with Seius when a letter was delivered to each of us from you. Yes, I really think it is high time. For as to the personal motive in what I said before, I will own the cunning of my heart--I wanted you to be somewhere near in case of anything good turning up: "two heads," ¹ you know. At present, seeing that it is all over and done, we should not hesitate to go over, horse, foot, and artillery! For when I heard about L. Caesar the younger, I said to myself: What will he do for me, his sire? ² Accordingly, I do not cease dining out with the members of the party now in power. What else should I do? One must go with the times. But a truce to jesting, especially as we have nothing to laugh at: With fearsome tumult shakes wild Afric's shore. ³ Accordingly, there is nothing "undesirable" ⁴ which I do not [p. 77] fear. But, in answer to your question as to when, by what road, and whither ⁵ --I as yet know nothing. You suggest Baiae--but some doubt whether he will not come by way of Sardinia. ⁶ For that particular one of his estates he has not inspected as yet. It is the worst of them all, ⁷ nevertheless he does not despise it. For my part, I am on the whole more inclined to think that he will come through Sicily to Velia: but we shall know directly; for Dolabella is on his way home: he, I suppose, will be our instructor: "Scholars are often wiser than their teachers." ⁸ But nevertheless, if I can ascertain what you have settled, I will accommodate my policy to yours before anyone else's. Wherefore I am anxious for a letter from you.

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¹ Iliad, 10.224, also quoted at vol. ii., p.322: "when two go together one hits one thing first and the other another." "Two heads are better than one." Cicero expects the learned Varro, as he did Atticus, to fill up the quotation.

² Terence, Andr. 112. The old father, seeing his son weep at a funeral of a comparative stranger, says, "I liked that: I thought to myself, what will he do for me, his father?" So, Cicero means, "If Caesar pardoned his bitter enemy, young Lucius Caesar, what must he do to me, his old friend?" L. Caesar is the man who brought the messages to and from Pompey (vol. ii., pp.249, 250, 255).

³ A fragment of Ennius.

⁴ apoproêgmenon, a technical word of the Stoics. Nothing is good or bad but virtue and vice; but among other things which are strictly neither good nor bad some are to be preferred (proêgmena), some not (aproêgmena). Cicero uses the word jestingly for what he considers very bad.

⁵ I.e., to meet Caesar.

⁶ Caesar did come by Sardinia, and therefore sailed straight to Ostia, not to Puteoli (Dio, 43, 14).

⁷ Because of its unhealthiness. Vol. i., p.217.

⁸ polloi mathêtai kreissones didaskalôn, a line of which the author is unknown. He refers to his instructing Dolabella in oratory.

DCXXXVIII (F IX, 8)

TO M. TARENTIUS VARRO (With a copy of the Academica)

TUSCULUM (JULY 11?)

To demand a gift, even if a man has promised it, ¹ is more than even a nation will generally do, unless under great [p. 305] provocation: nevertheless I have so much looked forward to your present that I venture to remind you of it, though not to press for it. So I have sent you four reminders who are not afflicted with excessive modesty: for you know how brazen-faced the New Academy is. Accordingly, I am sending ambassadors enlisted from its ranks, who I fear may by chance lodge a demand, though I have only commissioned them to ask a favour. I have been waiting in fact for a long time now, and have been holding back, so as not to address any work to you before I had received something from you, in order that I might repay you as nearly as possible in your own coin. But as you were somewhat slow in doing it--that is, as I construe it, somewhat unusually careful--I could not refrain from making manifest by such literary composition as I was capable of producing the union of our tastes and affections. I have therefore composed a dialogue purposing to be held between us in my villa at Cumae, Pomponius being there also. I have assigned to you the doctrines of Antiochus, which I thought I understood to have your approval; I have taken those of Philo for myself. I imagine that when you read it you will be surprised at our holding a conversation, which we never did hold; but you know the usual method of dialogues. At some future time, my dear Varro, we shall--if such is your pleasure-have many a long conversation of our own also. It may perhaps be some time hence: but let the fortune of the state excuse the past; it is our business to secure this ourselves. And oh that we might pursue these studies together in a time of tranquillity and with the constitution established on some basis, which if not good may be at any rate definitely fixed! Though in that case there would be other calls upon us-honourable responsibilities and political activities. As things are now, however, what is there to induce us to live without these studies? In my eyes indeed, even with them, it is barely worth while: when they are withdrawn, not even so much as that. But of this when we meet, and often hereafter. I hope your change of houses and new purchase may turn out everything you can desire. I think you were quite right to make them. Be careful of your health. [p. 306]

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¹ Varro had promised to dedicate some work to Cicero. See p.289.

CDVII (F IX, 9)

DOLABELLA TO CICERO (IN EPIRUS)

CAESAR'S CAMP IN EPIRUS (MAY OR JUNE)

If you are well, I am glad. I am quite well, and so is our dear Tullia. Terentia has been rather unwell, but I am assured that she has now recovered. In all other respects things are quite as they should be at your house. Though at no time did I deserve to be suspected by you of acting from party motives rather than from a regard to your interests, when I urged you either to join Caesar and myself, or at least to retire from open war, especially since victory has already inclined in our favour, it is now not even possible that I should create any other impression than that of urging upon you what I could not, with due regard to my duty as your son-in-law, suppress. On your part, my dear Cicero, pray regard what follows-whether you accept or reject the advice--as both conceived and written with the best possible intention and the most complete devotion to yourself.

You observe that Pompey is not secured either by the glory of his name and achievements, or by the list of client kings and peoples, which he was frequently wont to parade: and that even what has been possible for the rank and file, is impossible for him,--to effect an honourable retreat: driven as he has been from Italy, the Spanish provinces lost, a veteran army captured, and now finally inclosed by his enemy's lines. ¹ Such disasters I rather think have never [p. 7] happened to a Roman general. Wherefore employ all your Wisdom in considering what either he or you have to hope. For thus you will most easily adopt the policy which will be to your highest advantage. Yet I do beg this of you,--that if Pompey succeeds in avoiding this danger and taking refuge with his fleet, you should consult for your own interests, and at length be your own friend rather than that of anyone else in the world. You have by this time satisfied the claims of duty or friendship, whichever you choose to call it: you have fulfilled all obligations to your party also, and to that constitution to which you are devoted. It remains to range ourselves with the constitution as now existing, rather than, while striving for the old one, to find ourselves with none at all. Wherefore my desire is, dearest Cicero, that, supposing Pompey to be driven from this district also and compelled to seek other quarters, you should betake yourself to Athens or any peaceful city you choose. If you decide to do so, pray write and tell me, that I may, if I possibly can, hurry to your side. Whatever marks of consideration for your rank have to be obtained from the commander-in-chief, such is Caesar's kindness, that it will be the easiest thing in the world for you to obtain them from him yourself: nevertheless, I think that a petition from me also will not be without considerable weight with him. I trust to your honour and kindness also to see that the letter-carrier whom I send to you may be enabled to return to me, and bring me a letter from you.

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¹ This refers to the lines, fifteen miles long, drawn by Caesar round Pompey's position on the bay of Dyrrachium. They were not, however, completed at the southern extremity, and shortly afterwards pierced them at this point, and inflicted a severe defeat upon Caesar.

DXXXVI (F IX, 10)

TO P. CORNELIUS DOLABELLA (IN SPAIN)

ROME (JANUARY)

I DID not venture to allow our friend Salvius to go without a letter to you; yet, by Hercules, I have nothing to say except that I love you dearly : ¹ of which I feel certain that [p. 185] you do not doubt without my writing a word. In any case I ought rather to expect a letter from you, than you one from me. For there is nothing going on at Rome such as you would care to know: unless it would interest you to know that I am acting as arbitrator between our friend Nicias and Vidius! The latter puts forward in two lines, I think, a claim for money advanced to Nicias: the former, like a second Aristarchus, obelizes them. I am to be in the position of a critic of old days, and to judge whether they really are the poet's or are interpolations. I imagine you putting in here: "Have you forgotten, then, those mushrooms which you had at Nicias's dinner, and the big dishes joined to Septima's learned talk?" ² What! do you think my old preciseness so entirely knocked out of me, that there is no trace of my former regard for appearances to be seen even in the forum? However, I will see our delightful boon companion through his little trouble, nor will I, by securing his condemnation, give you the opportunity of re storing him, that Plancus Bursa ³ may have some one to teach him his rudiments.

But what am I doing? Though I have no means of knowing whether you are in a quiet state of mind, or, as generally happens in war, are involved in some more important anxiety or occupation, yet I drift on farther and farther. So when I shall have ascertained for certain that you are in the vein for a laugh, I will write at greater length. However, I want you to know this, that the people have been very anxious about the death of Publius Sulla before they knew it for certain. Since then they have ceased to inquire how he perished: they think in knowing that they know enough. For the rest I bear it with equanimity: the only thing I fear is lest Caesar's auctions should have received a blow. ⁴ [p. 186]

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¹ An astonishing remark to a man whom Cicero's daughter had just divorced for gross misconduct. But the letter is forced and cold.

² The text is corrupt, and we know nothing of Septima, if, indeed, that is the name. We may suppose a reference to a dinner party at a rich freedman's table, with a learned lady who rather bored the guests. For fercularum (MS. cularum) iocatiuncularum, bons mots, has been suggested.

³ For Bursa, see vol. i., p. 365. Cicero seems to be jesting at his illiterate character, but rather clumsily. We may suppose that his recall had been brought about by Dolabella.

⁴ The auctions of confiscated property, at which P. Sulla was a constant bidder or sector, which was always considered discreditable. He had begun the business early in the time of the confiscations of his uncle, the dictator Sulla, see de Off. ii. § 29, where Cicero speaks of his conduct now as even worse than in the previous matter. In his defence of him in B.C. 60 he put a very different complexion on his character; but his conduct as Caesar's legatus seems to have alienated him thoroughly. See pp. 51, 53.

DLXXV (F IX, 11)

TO P. CORNELIUS DOLABELLA (IN SPAIN)

(FICULEA, 20 APRIL)

I HAD rather that even my own death had been the cause of your being without a letter from me than the misfortune which has so grievously afflicted me. I should have borne it at least with greater firmness if I had had you; for your wise conversation, no less than your marked affection for me, would have been a support. But since I am about, as I think, to see you before long, you shall find that though much broken I am yet in a state to receive great assistance from you; not that I am so crushed as to be unable to remember my manhood, or to think it right to give in to fortune. But in spite of that the old cheerfulness and gaiety, in which you took more delight than anybody else, have all been taken from me. Nevertheless, you will find in me the same fortitude and firmness--if I ever had these qualities--as you left.

You say that you have to fight my battles: I don't so much care about my detractors being refuted by you, as I wish it to be known--as is plainly the case--that I retain your affection. I urge you repeatedly to let it be so, and to pardon the brevity of my letter; for in the first place I think I shall see you very shortly, and in the second place I have not yet sufficiently recovered my calmness for writing. [p. 237]

DCLXXVII (F IX, 12)

TO P. CORNELIUS DOLABELLA (AT BAIAE)

PUTEOLI (DECEMBER)

I congratulate our favourite Baiae on its becoming, as you say, a healthy place; unless perchance it is fond of and flatters you and, so long as you are there, has forgotten its usual habits. If that is really so, it doesn't at all surprise me that sky and land are foregoing their usual evil effects.

My poor little speech for Deiotarus, for which you asked, I have with me, though I thought I had not. Accordingly I am sending it to you. Please read it with the understanding that it is a slight and weak case and not much worthy of being committed to writing. But I wished to send an old host and friend a small present--of loose texture and coarse thread--as his own presents usually are ¹ . As for yourself, I [p. 348] would have you shew wisdom and courage, in order that the moderation and dignity of your bearing may throw discredit on the unfair treatment you have met with from others. ²

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¹ Apparently native cloths or textures sent as presents to his friends at Rome.

² Cicero means to refer to Antony, who had opposed Dolabella's consulship, for which Dolabella inveighed against him in the senate on the next Kalends of January. See the passage of the second Philippic quoted in the note to the previous letter.

DXLII (F IX, 13)

TO P. CORNELIUS DOLABELLA (IN SPAIN)

(ROME, FEBRUARY)

C. SUBERNIUS of Cales is both my friend and very closely connected with Lepta, who is a very intimate friend of mine. Having for the express purpose of avoiding the war one to Spain with M. Varro before it began, with a view of being in a province in which none of us had thought that there was likely to be any war after the defeat of Afranius, ¹ he found himself plunged into the precise evils which he had done his very best to avoid. For he was overtaken by a sudden war, which being set in motion by Scapula was afterwards raised to such serious proportions by Pompey, that it became impossible for him to extricate himself from that unhappy affair. ² M. Planius Heres, also of Cales, and also a very close friend of our friend Lepta, is in much the same position. These two men, therefore, I commend to your protection with a care, zeal, and heartfelt anxiety beyond which I cannot go in commending anyone. I wish it for their own sake, and in this matter I am also strongly influenced by motives of humanity no less than by friendship. For since Lepta is so anxious that his fortunes would seem to be at stake, I cannot but be in a state of anxiety next or even equal to his. Therefore, although I have often had proof of how much you loved me, yet I would have you be convinced that I shall have no better opportunity than this of judging that to be so. I therefore ask you, or, if you allow [p. 197] it, I implore you to save from disfranchisement two unhappy men, who owe their loss of citizenship to fortune--which none can avoid-rather than to any fault of their own. Be so good as to allow me by your help to bestow this favour both on the men themselves, who are my friends, and also on the municipium of Cales, with which I have strong ties, and lastly upon Lepta, whom I regard more than all the rest. What I am going to say I think is not much to the point, yet, after all, there is no harm in saying it. The property of one of them is very small, of the other scarcely up to the equestrian standard. Wherefore, seeing that Caesar, with his usual high-mindedness, has granted them their lives, and since there is very little else that can be taken from them, do secure these men their return, if you love me as much as I am sure you do. The only possible difficulty is the long journey; which their motive for not shirking is their desire to be with their families and to die at home. That you do your best and exert yourself, or rather that you carry it through--for as to your ability to do it I have no doubt--I strongly and repeatedly entreat you.

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¹ Afranius and Petreius were conquered by Caesar in B.C. 49. See p. 1.

² Baetica and the legions there were disaffected to Caesar all along. They turned out Caesar's first governor, Cassius, and afterwards Trebonius. After Thapsus (B.C. 46) they invited the surviving Pompeians to come to them, and meanwhile elected Titus Quintus Scapula and Quintus Afranius to command them. When Cn. and Sextus Pompeius and the other survivors of Thapsus arrived, the state of things became so serious that Caesar had to go to Spain himself.

F IX, 14=A XIV, 17a

CDLXXIX (F IX, I5)

TO L. PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

ROME (SEPTEMBER)

I will answer two letters of yours: one which I received four days ago from Zethus, a second which your letter-carrier Phileros brought. From your former letter I gathered that you were much gratified by my anxiety about your health, and I rejoice that you have been convinced of it. ¹ But, believe me, you will never see it in its full reality from a letter. For though I perceive that I am being sought out and liked by a considerable number of people--a thing it is impossible for me to deny--there is not one of them all nearer to my heart than yourself. For that you [p. 106] love me, and have done so for a long while and without interruption, is indeed a great thing, or rather the greatest, but it is shared with you by many: but that you are yourself so lovable, so gracious, and so delightful in every way--that you have all to yourself. Added to that is your wit, not Attic, but more pungent than that of the Attics, good Roman wit of the true old city style. Now I--think what you will of it--am astonishingly attracted by witticisms, above all of the native kind, especially when I see that they were first infected by Latinism, when the foreign element found its way into the city, and now-a-days by the breeched ² and Transalpine tribes also, so that no trace of the old-fashioned style of wit can be seen. Accordingly when I see you, I seem--to confess the truth--to see all the Granii, the Lucilii, as well as the Crassi and Laelii. Upon my life, I have no one left but you in whom I can recognize any likeness of the old racy cheerfulness. And when to these graces of wit there is added your strong affection for me, do you wonder that I have been so severely alarmed at so grave a blow to your health?

In your second letter you say in self-defence that you did not advise me against the purchase at Naples, ³ but recommended caution. You put it politely, and I did not regard it in any other fight. However, I gathered the same idea as I do from this letter, that you did not think it open to me to take the course which I thought I might-namely, to abandon politics here, not indeed entirely, but to a great extent. You quote Catulus and all that period. ⁴ Where is the analogy? I did not myself at that time desire to absent myself for any length of time from the guardianship of the constitution: for I was sitting at the helm and holding the rudder; whereas now I have scarcely a place in the hold. Do you suppose the number of senatorial decrees will be any the less if I am at Naples? While I am at Rome and [p. 107] actually haunting the forum, senatorial decrees are written out in the house of your admirer, my intimate friend. ⁵ And whenever it occurs to him, I am put down as backing a decree, and am informed of its having reached Armenia and Syria, professing to have been made in accordance with my vote, before any mention has been made of the business at all. ⁶ And, indeed, I would not have you think that I am joking about this; for I assure you I have had letters from kings at the other end of the earth, thanking me for having voted for giving them the royal title, as to whom I was not only ignorant of their having been called kings, but of their very existence even. What, then, am I to do? After all, as long as this friend of ours-this guardian of morals ⁷ --is here, I will follow your advice: but directly he goes away I am off to your mushrooms. If I have a house there, I will make the expenses allowed for a day by the sumptuary law last over ten days. But if I don't find anything to suit me, I have made up my mind to reside with you: for I know I could not please you more. I am beginning to despair of Sulla's house, as I told you in my last, but I have not, after all, quite given it up. Pray do what you suggest, inspect it with some builders. If there is no defect in walls or roof, the rest will meet my views very well.

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¹ The text is doubtful. I have taken Mueller's reading, quam tibi perspectam esse gaudeo, omitting animumque erga te meum tibi perspectum.

² Technically Gallia bracata was the Province, i.e., Narbonensis.

³ See pp.94, 107.

⁴ He is referring to the period of his own consulship, and the years immediately preceding it. Q. Lutatius Catulus (consul B.C. 78) had been a consistent supporter of the party of the Optimates, supported Cicero against the Catilinarian conspirators, and hailed him as pater patriae (pro Sest. § 121). He died in B.C. 6o. See vol. i., pp.59, 124.

⁵ Caesar.

⁶ Other references to falsifications of senatus consulta are de Domo, § 50; pro Sulia, § 40. In these cases here mentioned Cicero alleges that his name was placed on the back as having been one of the committee to draw up the decree (esse ad scribendum, or adesse scribendo). See vol. ii., p.194.

⁷ The title of praefectus moribus had been given to Caesar for three years, among other honours, this year after the news of Thapsus (Dio, 43, 14).

CDLXX (F IX, 16)

TO L. PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

TUSCULUM (JULY)

I was charmed with your letter¹ , in which, first of all, what I loved was the tenderness which prompted you to write, in alarm lest Silius should by his news have caused me any anxiety. About this news, not only had you written to me before--in fact twice, one letter being a duplicate of the other-shewing me clearly that you were upset, but I also had answered you in full detail, in order that I might, as far as such a business and such a crisis admitted, free you from your anxiety, or at any rate alleviate it. But since you shew in your last also how anxious you are about that matter-make up your mind to this, my dear Paetus: that whatever could possibly be accomplished by art--for it is not enough nowadays to contend with mere prudence, a sort of system must be elaborated-however, whatever could be done or effected towards winning and securing the goodwill of those men I have done, and not, I think, in vain. For I receive such attentions, such politenesses from all Caesar's favourites as make me believe myself beloved by them. For, though genuine love is not easily distinguished from feigned, unless some crisis occurs of a kind to test faithful affection by its danger, as gold in the fire, there are other indications of a general nature. But I only employ one proof to convince me that I am loved from the heart and in sincerity-namely, that my fortune and theirs is of such a kind as to preclude any motive on their part for pretending. In regard, again, to the man who now possesses all power, I see no reason for my being alarmed: except the fact that, once depart from law, everything is uncertain; and that nothing can be guaranteed as to the future which [p. 91] depends on another man's will, not to say caprice. Be that as it may, personally his feelings have in no respect been wounded by me. For in that particular point I have exhibited the greatest self-control. For, as in old times I used to reckon that to speak without reserve was a privilege of mine, since to my exertions the existence of liberty in the state was owing, so, now that that is lost, I think it is my duty to say nothing calculated to offend either his wishes or those of his favourites. But if I want to avoid the credit of certain keen or witty epigrams, I must entirely abjure a reputation for genius, which I would not refuse to do, if I could. But after all Caesar himself has a very keen critical faculty, and, just as your cousin Servius ² --whom I consider to have been a most accomplished man of letters--had no difficulty in saying: "This verse is not Plautus's, this is--"because he had acquired a sensitive ear by dint of classifying the various styles of poets and habitual reading, so I am told that Caesar, having now completed his volumes of bons mots, ³ if anything is brought to him as mine, which is not so, habitually rejects it. This he now does all the more, because his intimates are in my company almost every day. Now in the course of our discursive talk many remarks are let fall, which perhaps at the time of my making them seem to them wanting neither in literary flavour nor in piquancy. These are conveyed to him along with the other news of the day: ⁴ for so he himself directed. Thus it comes about that if he is told of anything besides ⁵ about me, he considers that he ought not to listen to it. Wherefore I have no need of your Oenomaus, ⁶ though your quotation of [p. 92] Accius's verses was very much on the spot. But what is this jealousy, or what have I now of which anyone can be jealous? But suppose the worst. I find that the philosophers, who alone in my view grasp the true nature of virtue, hold that the wise man does not pledge himself against anything except doing wrong; and of this I consider myself clear in two ways, first in that my views were most absolutely correct; and second because, when I found that we had not sufficient material force to maintain them, I was against a trial of strength with the stronger party. Therefore, so far as the duty of a good citizen is concerned, I am certainly not open to reproach. What remains is that I should not say or do anything foolish or rash against the men in power: that too, I think, is the part of the wise man. As to the rest--what this or that man may say that I said, or the light in which he views it, or the amount of good faith with which those who continually seek me out and pay me attention may be acting--for these things I cannot be responsible. The result is that I console myself with the consciousness of my uprightness in the past and my moderation in the present, and apply that simile of Accius's not to jealousy, but to fortune, which I hold--as being inconstant and frail--ought to be beaten back by a strong and manly soul, as a wave is by a rock. For, considering that Greek history is full of examples of how the wisest men endured tyrannies either at Athens or Syracuse, when, though their countries were enslaved, they themselves in a certain sense remained free--am I to believe that I cannot so maintain my position as not to hurt anyone's feelings and yet not blast my own character?

I now come to your jests, since as an afterpiece to Accius's Oenomaus, you have brought on the stage, not, as was his wont, an Atellan play, ⁷ but, according to the present fashion, a mime. What's all this about a pilot-fish, a denarius, ⁸ and a dish of salt fish and cheese? In my old [p. 93] easy-going days I put up with that sort of thing: but times are changed. Hirtius and Dolabella are my pupils in rhetoric, but my masters in the art of dining. For I think you must have heard, if you really get all news, that their practice is to declaim at my house, and mine to dine at theirs. Now it is no use your making an affidavit of insolvency to me: for when you had some property, petty profits used to keep you a little too close to business; but as things are now, seeing that you are losing money so cheerfully, all you have to do, when entertaining me, is to regard yourself as accepting a "composition"; and even that loss is less annoying when it comes from a friend than from a debtor. ⁹ Yet, after all, I don't require dinners superfluous in quantity: only let what there is be first-rate in quality and recherché. I remember you used to tell me stories of Phamea's dinner. Let yours be earlier, ¹⁰ but in other respects like that. But if you persist in bringing me back to a dinner like your mother's, I should put up with that also. For I should like to see the man who had the face to put on the table for me what you describe, or even a polypus-looking as red as Iupiter Miniatus. ¹¹ Believe me, you won't [p. 94] dare. Before I arrive the fame of my new magnificence will reach you: and you will be awestruck at it. Yet it is no use building any hope on your hors d'oeuvre. I have quite abolished that: for in old times I found my appetite spoilt by your olives and Lucanian sausages. But why all this talk? Let me only get to you. By all means--for I wish to wipe away all fear from your heart--go back to your old cheese-and-sardine dish. The only expense I shall cause you will be that you will have to have the bath heated. All the rest according to my regular habits. What I have just been saying was all a joke.

As to Selicius's villa, ¹² you have managed the business carefully and written most wittily. So I think I won't buy. For there is enough salt and not enough savour. ¹³

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¹ Paetus, to whom twelve letters are addressed, is an unknown man, though evidently very intimate with Cicero, to whom we have heard of his presenting a collection of books (vol. i., pp.60, 66).

² Servius Claudius, whose books Paetus had given to Cicero. He was probably cousin, not brother, of Paetus.

³ His Dicta Collectanea, which Augustus would not allow to be pub- lished (Suet. Iul. 56).

⁴ For the acta diurna, see vol. i., p. 146; vol. ii., pp.187, 404. But besides this Caesar seems to have had a private report made to him each day of what was happening, just as Augustus did, whether of public or domestic occurrences (Suet. Aug. 32 and 78). It was Caesar who first ordered the acta of the senate to be published (Suet. Iul. 20).

⁵ That is, anything unfavourable. "Caesar considers that he knows the worst that I say from his own reporters, and will listen to nothing more."

⁶ A play of Accius, from which Paetus had, it seems, quoted some lines recommending him to avoid exciting envy.

⁷ The fabulae Atellanae got their name from Atella in Campania. They were coarser Oscan plays (vol. i., p. 259), presented after those taken from Greek tragedies, on the analogy of the satyric dramas at Athens. Mimes were solo plays or recitatives by single actors with appropriate gestures. They were becoming fashionable, and we hear of an eques who acted his own mime (Suet. Iul. 39; Aug.45, 99).

⁸ A dinner at a denarius (10d.) a head.

⁹ To understand this rather elaborate chaff we must remember the circumstances of the time. Caesar's law of B.C. 49 to relieve the financial situation in Italy enacted that creditors foreclosing for mortgage debtors were: (1) to deduct certain sums received as interest; (2) to take over the mortgaged properties at their value before the war panic. That value had to be estimated, and to accept an aestimatio meant generally a loss: for a creditor had property on his hands which often would not fetch the amount of the debt. Suetonius reckons the average loss to have been twenty-five per cent. Now Paetus was a Caesarian, and therefore Cicero says, "Of course you are bearing your losses cheerfully (in the good cause), so you needn't make a fuss about entertaining me. It was some good being close-fisted when you had anything to save, now you may look upon any expense I cause you as only one other item in your bankruptcy." He does not seriously mean that Paetus was bankrupt. He chooses to represent the losses under tbe Caesarian law as amounting to that. I have accepted the reading, non est quod non sis, though I do not feel that it is satisfactory.

¹⁰ See vol. ii., pp.311,344.

¹¹ That is, "red-leaded" Iupiter. On certain festivals, especially at triumphal banquets, figures of Iupiter were introduced stained with red-lead or cinnabar (Plin. N. H. 33.112). An earthenware figure of the same god was also in the Capitolium coloured in the same way (Plin. N. H. 35.157). It is remarked that the polypus is not naturally red-some colouring substance must have been used in the cooking.

¹² Q. Selicius, a money-lender, whose villa near Naples Cicero was thinking of buying.

¹³ Schütz supposes that there may have been salinae, "salt-works," on the property, and Cicero puns on the other meaning of salt--"wit." He seems to mean, "I won't buy the property, for, though there is plenty of salt in it (as there was wit in your letter), there is a lack of sound attractions (sanorum)." Tyrrell and Purser read saniorum, and translate, "We have had enough of joking, too little common sense." The MSS. have sannionum, "of jesters," which perhaps might be rendered, "though there is enough salt (material for jest), there are not enough people to take advantage of it."

CDLXXVIII (F IX, 17)

TO L. PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

ROME (AUGUST)

Aren't you a ridiculous fellow for asking me what I think will be done about those municipal towns and lands, when our friend Balbus ¹ has been staying with you? As though I were likely to know what he doesn't, and as though, when I do know anything, it is not from him that I always learn it. Nay rather, if you love me, tell me what is going to be done about us: for you have had in your power one from whom you could have learnt it either sober or at any rate drunk. But for myself, I do not ask you for such information: in the first place, because I put it down as so much gain that I have been left alive for the last four years, if gain it is to be called, and if it is life to survive the Republic; and, in the second place, because I think that I myself know what is going to happen. For whatever the stronger chooses will be done, and the stronger will always be the sword. We ought, accordingly, to be content with any concession made to us, whatever it is; the man who was unable to endure this ought to have died.

They are measuring the territory of Veii and Capena. ² This is not far from my Tusculan property. However, I don't at all alarm myself. I enjoy while I may: I only wish it may last. If that does not turn out to be the case, yet, since I in my courage and philosophy thought that nothing was better than to remain alive, I cannot but love the man by whose kindness I gained that object. But even if he should desire the continuance of a republic, such as perhaps he wishes and we ought all to pray for, he yet does not know how to do it: so completely has he entangled himself with many other people. [p. 105]

But I am going too far. I forgot that I am writing to you. However, let me assure you of this, that not only I, who am not in his confidence, but even the leader himself is unable to say what is going to happen. For, while we are his slaves, he is a slave to circumstances: and so neither can he possibly be sure of what circumstances will demand, nor we of what he is designing. The reason that I did not send you this answer before was not because I am usually idle, especially in the matter of writing, but because, as I had no certainty about anything, I did not choose to cause you either anxiety from the hesitation, or hope from the confidence of my words. However, I will add this, which is the most absolute truth, that during the present crisis I have not heard a word about the danger you mention. ³ In any case you will be bound, like the man of sense that you are, to hope for the best, prepare yourself for the worst, and bear whatever happens.

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¹ Who, as Caesar's friend and agent, would know his intentions.

² That is, for allotments of land to veterans.

³ That is, of confiscations in Campania.

CDLXXI (F IX, 18)

TO L. PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

TUSCULUM (JULY)

Being quite at leisure in my Tusculan villa, because I had sent my pupils ¹ to meet him, ² that they might at the same time present me in as favourable a light as possible to their friend, I received your most delightful letter, from which I learnt that you approved my idea of having begun--now that legal proceedings are abolished and my old supremacy [p. 95] in the forum is lost--to keep a kind of school, just as Dionysius, when expelled from Syracuse, is said to have opened a school at Corinth. ³ In short, I too am delighted with the idea, for I secure many advantages. First and foremost, I am strengthening my position in view of the present crisis, and that is of primary importance at this time. How much that amounts to I don't know: I only see that as at present advised I prefer no one's policy to this, unless, of course, it had been better to have died. In one's own bed, I confess it might have been, but that did not occur: and as to the field of battle, I was not there. The rest indeed-Pompey, your friend Lentulus, Afranius--perished ingloriously. ⁴ But, it may be said, Cato died a noble death. Well, that at any rate is in our power when we will: let us only do our best to prevent its being as necessary to us as it was to him. That is what I am doing. So that is the first thing I had to say. The next is this: I am improving, in the first place in health, which I had lost from giving up all exercise of my lungs. In the second place, my oratorical faculty, such as it was, would have completely dried up, had I not gone back to these exercises. The last thing I have to say, which I rather think you will consider most important of all, is this: I have now demolished more peacocks than you have young pigeons) You there revel in Haterian ⁵ law-sauce, I here in Hirtian hot-sauce. ⁶ Come then, if you are half a man, and learn from me the maxims which you seek : yet it is a case of" a pig teaching Minerva." ⁷ But it will be my business to see to that: as for [p. 96] you, if you can't find purchasers for your foreclosures ⁸ and so fill your pot with denarii back you must come to Rome. It is better to die of indigestion here, than of starvation there. I see you have lost money: I hope these friends of yours ⁹ have done the same. You are a ruined man if you don't look out. You may possibly get to Rome on the only mule that you say you have left, since you have eaten up your pack horse. ¹⁰ Your seat in the school, as second master, will be next to mine: the honour of a cushion will come by-and-by.

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¹ Dolabella and Hirtius.

² Caesar, on his return from his victory in Africa.

³ Cicero tells the story again in Tusc. iii. § 27, but the proverb, "Dionysius in Corinth," in Att. 9.9(vol. ii., p.329) is not, I think, connected with it.

⁴ Pompey was assassinated in Egypt; Metellus Pius Scipio (Pompey's father-in-law), attempting after Thapsus to escape to Spain, threw himself into the sea to avoid capture; Afranius fell into the hands of Sittius after Thapsus and perished in a military riot. Cicero did not accompany Pompey's army to Pharsalia.

⁵ Haterius, probably a lawyer with whom Paetus was in some way engaged. There is doubtless a play on the double meaning of jus, "sauce" and "law." A similar metaphor was used on a celebrated occasion in recent years, when certain politicians were recommended to "stew in their Parnellite juice."

⁶ Of Hirtius, Cicero's instructor in the art of dining, pp.93, 98.

⁷ From a Greek proverb, hus Athênan. See Theocr. 5.53; Acad. 1, § 18.

⁸ aestimationes, properties taken over for debts at a valuation under Caesar's law. See p.93.

⁹ The other Caesarians at Naples.

¹⁰ I.e., sold it to buy necessaries. We don't know what grumbling about money losses from Paetus drew out all this chaff. For the mule to ride and the horse to carry luggage, see vol. ii., p.213.

CDLXXVI (F IX, 19)

TO L. PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

ROME (AUGUST)

What I you don't budge from your mischievous humour? You hint that Balbus was contented with very plain fare: your insinuation seems to be that when kings ¹ are so abstemious, much more ought mere consulars to be so. You don't know that I fished everything out of him; for he came straight from the city gate to my house--and I am not surprised that he did not prefer going to his own house, but that he didn't go to his own belle amie! However, my first three words were "How's our Paetus?" In answer he swore that he had never had a pleasanter visit anywhere. If you earned that compliment by your conversation, I will bring you a pair of ears no less discriminating: but if by your dainty fare, I beg you not to think stutterers ² worth more than men of eloquence. One thing after another stops me every day. But [p. 102] if I ever get myself sufficiently free to be able to come to your parts, I won't let you think that you haven't sufficient notice from me.

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¹ Caesarians, like Balbus, who are now in quasi-royal power. But rex often used for "patron" or "great man, as in Horace.

² Punning on the meaning of Balbus.

CDLXXIII (F IX, 20)

TO L. PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

ROME (AUGUST)

I was doubly charmed by your letter, first because it made me laugh myself' and secondly because I saw that you could still laugh. Nor did I in the least object to being overwhelmed with your shafts of ridicule, as though I were a light skirmisher in the war of wits. What I am vexed at is that I have not been able, as I intended, to run over to see you: for you would not have had a mere guest, but a [p. 98] brother-in-arms. And such a hero! not the man whom you used to do for by the hors d'oeuvre. I now bring an unimpaired appetite to the egg, and so the fight is maintained right up to the roast veal. The compliments you used to pay me in old times--"What a contented person!" "What an easy guest to entertain ! "--are things of the past. All my anxiety about the good of the state, all meditating of speeches to be delivered in the senate, all getting up of briefs I have cast to the winds. I have thrown myself into the camp of my old enemy Epicurus--not, however, with a view to the extravagance of the present day, but to that refined splendour of yours--I mean your old style when you had money to spend (though you never had more landed estate ¹ ). Therefore prepare! You have to deal with a man, who not only has a large appetite, but who also knows a thing or two. You are aware of the extravagance of your bourgeois gentilhomme. You must forget all your little baskets and your omelettes. I am now so far advanced in the art that I frequently venture to ask your friend Verrius and Camillus to dinner--what dandies! how fastidious! But think of my audacity: I even gave Hirtius a dinner, without a peacock however. In that dinner my cook could not imitate him in anything but the hot sauce.

So this is my way of life nowadays: in the morning I receive not only a large number of "loyalists," who, how ever, look gloomy enough, but also our exultant conquerors here, who in my case are quite prodigal in polite and affectionate attentions. When the stream of morning callers has ebbed, I wrap myself up in my books, either writing or reading. There are also some visitors who listen to my discourses under the belief of my being a man of learning, because I am a trifle more learned than themselves. After that all my time is given to my bodily comfort. I have mourned for my country more deeply and longer than any mother for her only son. But take care, if you love me, to keep your health, lest I should take advantage of your being laid up to eat you out of house and home. For I am resolved not to spare you even when you are ill. [p. 99]

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¹ Referring to the foreclosures on lands which Paetus had been obliged to take on the valuations (aestimationes) according to Caesar's law, which were unsaleable; so he had land on his hands and yet was short of money. See pp.93, 96.

CDXCV (F IX, 21)

TO PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

ROME (ABOUT OCTOBER)

You don't say so! You think yourself a madman for imitating the thunder of my eloquence, as you call it? ¹ You certainly would have been beside yourself if you had failed to do so: but since you even beat me at it, you ought to jeer at me rather than at yourself. So you had no need of that quotation from Trabea, ² rather the fiasco was mine. But, after all, what do you think of my style in letters? Don't I talk with you in the vulgar tongue? Why, of course one doesn't write always in the same style. For what analogy has a letter with a speech in court or at a public meeting? Nay, even as to speeches in court, it is not my practice to handle all in the same style. Private causes and such as are of slight importance we plead in simpler language; those that affect a man's civil existence or reputation, of course, in a more ornate style: but letters it is our custom to compose in the language of everyday life. Well, but letting that pass, how did it come into your head, my dear Paetus, to [p. 140] say that there never was a Papirius who was not a plebeian? For, in fact, there were patrician Papirii, of the lesser houses, of whom the first was L. Papirius Mugillanus, censor with L. Sempronius Atratinus--having already been his colleague in the consulship--in the 312th year of the city. But in those days they were called Papisii. After him thirteen sat in the curule chair before L. Papirius Crassus, who was the first to drop the form Papisius. This man was named dictator, with L. Papirius Cursor as Master of the Horse, in the 415th year of the city, and four years afterwards was consul with Kaeso Duilius. Cursor came next to him, a man who held a very large number of offices; ³ then comes L. Masso, who rose to the aedileship; then a number of Massones. The busts of these I would have you keep--all patricians. Then follow the Carbones and Turdi. These latter were plebeians, whom I opine that you may disregard. For, except the Gaius Carbo who was assassinated by Damasippus, there has not been one of the Carbones who was a good and useful citizen. We knew Gnaeus Carbo and his brother the wit: were there ever greater scoundrels? About the one who is a friend of mine, the son of Rubrius, I say nothing. There have been those three brothers Carbo--Gaius, Gnaeus, Marcus. Of these, Marcus, a great thief, was condemned for malversation in Sicily on the accusation of Publius Flaccus: Gaius, when accused by Lucius Crassus, is said to have poisoned himself with cantharides; he behaved in a factious manner as tribune, and was also thought to have assassinated Publius Africanus. ⁴ As to the other, ⁵ who was put to death by my friend Pompey at Lilybaeum, there was never, in my opinion, a greater scoundrel. Even his father, on being accused by M. Antonius, is thought to have escaped condemnation by a dose of shoemaker's vitriol. Wherefore my opinion is that you should revert to the patrician Papirii: you see what a bad lot the plebeians were. [p. 141]

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¹ Paetus had apparently compared his presumption to that of Salmoneus: "Demens, qui nimbos et non imitabile fulmen Aere et cornipedum pulsu simularet equorum" (Verg. Aen. 6.590).

² Quintus Trabea, a writer of comedies, who flourished about B.C. 120. Cicero quoted him before (see vol. ii., p. 80); but it does not appear what the quotation made by Paetus was-some think the remark about imitating thunder.

³ The hero of the second Samnite war was consul six times, dictator three times.

⁴ See Vol. ii., p.215. C. Papirius Carbo, a friend and supporter of Tib. Gracchus, and one of the commissioners (after the death of Tiberius) for carrying out his land law. He was tribune in B.C. 131.

⁵ Gnaeus Papirius Carbo, consul in B.C. 85, 84, and 82, the partisan of Marius. For his death at the hands of Pompey, see vol. ii., p.347.

DCXXXI (F IX, 22)

TO L. PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

(ROME, JULY?)

I like modesty in language: you prefer plain speaking. ¹ The latter I know was the doctrine of Zeno, a man by heaven! of keen insight, though our Academy had a serious quarrel with him. However, as I say, the Stoic doctrine is to call everything by its right name. ² They argue as follows: nothing is obscene, nothing unfit to be expressed: for if there is anything disgraceful in obscenity, it consists either in the thing meant or in the word: there is no third alternative. Now it is not in the thing meant. Accordingly, in tragedies as well as in comedies there is no concealment. [p. 294] For Comedy, take the character in the Demiurgus : ³ you know the monologue beginning "Lately by chance," and you remember how Roscius recited, "So naked has she left me": the whole speech is covert in language, in meaning is very immodest. As for tragedy, what do you say to this: "The woman who"--notice the expression--"uses more than one bed." Or again, "He dared intrude upon her bed, Pheres." Or again:

A virgin I, and sheer against my will Did luppiter achieve his end by force.

⁴ "Achieve his end" is a decent way of putting it; and yet it means the same as a coarser word, which however no one would have endured. You see then that though the thing meant is the same, yet, because the words are not so, there is thought to be no impropriety. Therefore obscenity is not in the thing meant: much less is it in the expressions. For if the thing meant by a word is not improper, the word which signifies it cannot be improper. For instance, you call the anus by another name; why not by its own? If mention of it is improper, don't mention it even under another name. If not, do so for choice by its own. The ancients called a tail a penis; whence comes the word penicillus ("paint-brush"), from its similarity in appearance. Nowadays penis is regarded as an obscene word. "But," you will say, "the famous Piso Frugi in his 'Annals' complains of young men being given up to lust (peni)." What you call in your letter by its own name, he, with more reserve, calls penis. Yes; but it is because many use the word in that sense that it has become as obscene as the word you used. Again, suppose we use the common phrase: "When we (cum nos) desired to visit you"--does that suggest obscenity? I remember once in the senate an eloquent consular expressing himself thus: [p. 295] "Am I to say that this or that is the greater culpability?" Could it have been expressed more obscenely ? ⁵ "Not so," you say, "for he did not mean it in that sense." Therefore obscenity does not consist in the word used: I have shewn that it does not do so in the thing meant: therefore it does not exist anywhere. How entirely decent is the expression: "To exert oneself for children "? Even fathers beg their sons to do so, though they do not venture to mention the name of the "exertion." Socrates was taught the lyre by a very famous musician named Connus: do you think the name obscene? When we use the numeral terni there is no suggestion of obscenity: but if I speak of bini there is. "Only to Greeks," ⁶ you will say. That shews that there is nothing obscene in a word, for I know Greek and yet use the word bini to you; and you assume that I am speaking Greek and not Latin. Again, we may speak without impropriety of "rue" (ruta) and "mint" (menta); but if I wish to use the diminutive of menta (mentula)-as one can perfectly well use that of ruta (rutula)-that is a forbidden word. So we may, without a breach of good manners, use the diminutive of tectoria (tectoriola); but if you try to do the same with pavimenta (pavimentula), you find yourself pulled up. Don't you see, then, that these are nothing but empty distinctions? That impropriety exists neither in word nor thing, and therefore is non-existent?

The fact is that we introduce obscene meaning into words in themselves pure. For instance, is not the word divisio beyond reproach? Yet in it there is a word (visium or visio, "a stench") which may have an improper meaning, to which the last syllables of the word intercapedo (pedo iripow) correspond. Are we, therefore, to regard these words as obscene? Again, we make a ridiculous distinction: if we say, "So-and--so strangled his father," we don't prefix any apologetic word. But if we use the word of Aurelia or Lollia we must use such an apology. Nay, more, words that are not obscene have come to be considered so. The word "grind," he says, is shameful; much more the [p. 296] word "knead." And yet neither is obscene. The world is full of fools. Testes is quite a respectable word in a Court of law: elsewhere not too much so. Again, "Lanuvinian bags " is a decent phrase; not so "bags" of Cliternum.

Again, can the same thing be at one time decent, at another indecent? Suppose a man to break wind--it is an outrage on decency. Presently he will be in a bath naked, and you will have no fault to find. Here is your Stoic decision--"The wise man will call a spade a spade."

What a long commentary on a single word of yours! I am pleased that you have no scruple in saying anything to me. For my own part I maintain and shall maintain Plato's modesty: and accordingly, in my letter to you, I have expressed in veiled language what the Stoics express in the broadest: for they say that breaking wind should be as free as a hiccough. All honour then to the Kalends of March! ⁷ Love me and keep yourself well.

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¹ Reading Amo verecundiam, tu potius libertatem loquendi. The MS. reading vel potius, etc., might be explained if libertatem could mean "freedom from the constraint of double entendre," as if Cicero had meant "I like a modest and simple use of language without suggestiveness." But it is very difficult.

² In the de Off. 1.127-128, Cicero attributes this to the Cynics or Stoics, who were almost Cynics, and expresses disapproval of it.

³ A comedy of Sextus Turpilius (died about B.C. 101). We have no clue to the context of the words, though the few fragments of the play (Ribbeck, p. 78) shew that a meretrix was an important character in it.

⁴ It is not known from what tragedies these scraps are taken (Ribbeck, Trg. fragm., p.217). Cicero quotes the first as from Accius in Orator 156.

⁵ The first syllable of culpam perhaps suggested culleus, the scrotum; illam dicam might produce laudica, the clitoris. But it is very far-fetched.

⁶ From the Greek binein.

⁷ The Matronalia, the feast of the matrons, when special respect was paid to women.

DII (F IX, 23)

TO L. PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

CUMAE, 17 NOVEMBER

I ARRIVED yesterday at my Cuman villa, tomorrow I shall perhaps come to see you. But as soon as I know for certain, I will send you word a little beforehand. However, M. Caeparius, who met me on the road at the Gallinarian wood, ¹ told me you were in bed with the gout. I was sorry to hear it, as in duty bound; nevertheless, I resolved to come to you, for the sake not only of seeing you and paying you a visit, but even of dining with you: for I don't suppose you have a cook who is gouty also. Expect therefore a guest, who is far from being a gourmet, and is a foe to extravagant dinners.

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¹ Along the Campanian coast, between the Volturnus and Cumae.

DCCCXVII (F Ix, 24)

TO LUCIUS PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

ROME (FEBRUARY)

Your friend Rufus, on whose behalf you have now twice written to me, I would have assisted to the best of my power, even if he had done me an injury, when I saw that you were so anxious in his favour. Since, however, both from your letter and from one which he has himself written to me, I perceive and am convinced that my safety has been a matter of much anxiety to him, I cannot fail to be his friend: and that not solely from your recommendation which has deservedly the greatest weight with me--but also from my own feeling and deliberate judgment For I wish you to know, my dear Paetus, that your own letter was the -origin of suspicion, caution, and careful inquiry on my part; and I afterwards received other letters from many quarters which were of like tone to yours. For both at Aquinum and Fabrateria plots were laid against me, of which I perceive that you have had some information; and as though these men divined how much trouble I was likely to give them, their design was nothing short of my complete ruin. Being then totally unsuspicious of this, I should have been more off my guard, had I not received this hint from you. Therefore that friend of yours requires no recommendation with me. Heaven send that the future of the Republic be such as to make it possible for him to appreciate my extreme gratitude! But enough of this.

I am sorry to hear that you have given up going out to dinner: for you have deprived yourself of a great source of amusement and pleasure. Again, I am even afraid-you'll allow me to speak frankly--that you will unlearn and partly forget that habit of yours--the giving of little dinners! For if even when you had models on which to form yourself, you made so little progress in the art, what am I to expect [p. 178] of you now? ¹ Spurinna, indeed, when I told him about it and described your former way of living, pointed out the serious danger to the state if you did not recur to your old habits with the first breath of Spring. It might, he said, be endured at this time of year, if you could not stand the cold! But, by Hercules, my dear Paetus, without joking I advise you to cultivate the society of good, agreeable, and affectionate friends, for that is the secret of happiness. Nothing, I say, is more satisfying or contributes more to a happy life. And I do not found this on mere pleasure, but on the social intercourse and companionship, and that unbending of the mind which is best secured by familiar conversation, nowhere found in a more captivating form than at dinner-parties. This is more wisely indicated by us Latins than by the Greeks. The latter talk ofsumposia and sundeipna, that is, "drinkings together" and "suppings together," we of "living together" (convivium), because in no other circumstance is life more truly lived than in company. ² Do you see I am using philosophy to try and lure you back to dinners? Take care of your health: that you will secure with least difficulty by dining out. But pray, as you love me, don't suppose that because I write jestingly I have cast off all care for the state. Be assured, my dear Paetus, that I work for nothing, care for nothing all day and night except the safety and freedom of my fellow citizens. I omit no occasion of warning, pleading, adopting precautions. In fact, my feeling is that, if I have to give my very life to this task and to pushing these measures, I shall think myself supremely fortunate. Goodbye! Good-bye! [p. 179]

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¹ Playful irony, for Paetus gave good though not extravagant dinners (vol. iii., p.98).

² Cicero is quoting ftom his own essay on Old Age. See de Sen. § 45. For his liking for dinner-parties, see vol. iii., p.103.

CCXLV (F IX, 25)

TO L. PAPINIUS PAETUS (AT ROME)

LAODICEA (FEBRUARY)

Your letter has made me a consummate general: I had really no idea that you were so accomplished a tactician. I see you have been poring over the treatises of Pyrrhus and Cineas. So I am thinking of obeying your maxims: more than that, I mean to have some light vessels on the coast: against your Parthian horse they say that no better equipment can be discovered. But why jest? You don't know what a great general you are talking to! The Cyropaedeia, which I had well thumbed over, I have thoroughly exemplified throughout my command. But we will have our joke out when we meet, and that I hope before very long. Now listen to the word of command, or rather "attention!" as they used to say in old times. With M. Fadius, as I think you know, I am very intimate, and I am much attached to him, as well from his extreme honesty and singular modesty of behaviour, as from the fact that I am accustomed to find him of the greatest help in the controversies which I have with your fellow tipplers the Epicureans. He came to see me at Laodicea, and I wanted him to stay with me, but he was suddenly agitated by a most distressing [p. 121] letter containing the announcement that an estate near Herculaneum, of which he is joint owner, had been advertised for sale by his brother Q. Fadius. M. Fadius was exceedingly annoyed at this, and thought that his brother (who is not a wise man) had taken that extreme step at the instigation of his own private enemies. In these circumstances, my dear Paetus, as you love me, take the whole case in hand and free Fadius from his distress. We want you to use your influence, to offer your advice, or even to make it a matter of personal favour. Don't let brothers go to law and engage in a suit discreditable to both. Two of Fadius's enemies are Mato and Pollio. Need I say more? I really cannot, by Hercules, express in writing how much I shall be obliged to you if you put Fadius at his ease. He thinks that this depends on you, and makes me think so also.

CDLXXVII (F IX, 26)

TO L. PAPIRIUS PAETUS (AT NAPLES)

ROME (AUGUST?)

I have just lain down to dinner at three o'clock, when I scribble a copy of this note to you in my pocket-book. ¹ You will say, "where?" With Volumnius Eutrapelus. One place above me is Atticus, one below Verrius, both friends of yours. Do you wonder that our slavery is made so gay? Well, what am I to do? I ask your advice as the pupil of a philosopher. ² Am I to be miserable, to torment myself? What should I get by that? And, moreover, how long? "Live with your books," say you. Well, do you suppose that I do anything else? Or could I have kept alive, had I not lived with my books? But even to them there is, I don't say a surfeit, but a certain limit. When I have left them, though I care very little about my dinner--the one problem which you put before the philosopher Dion--still, what better to do with my time before taking myself off to bed I cannot discover.

Now listen to the rest. Below Eutrapelus lay Cytheris. ³ At such a party as that, say you, was the famous Cicero, "To whom all looked with rev'rence, on whose face Greeks turned their eyes with wonder?" To tell you the truth, I had no suspicion that she would be [p. 103] there. But, after all, even the Socratic Aristippus himself did not blush when he was taunted with having Lais as his mistress: "Yes," quoth he, "Lais is my mistress, but not my master." It is better in Greek; ⁴ you must make a translation yourself, if you want one. As for myself, the fact is that that sort of thing never had any attraction for me when I was a young man, much less now I am an old one. I like a dinner party. I talk freely there, whatever comes upon the tapis, as the phrase is, and convert sighs into loud bursts of laughter. Did you behave better in jeering at a philosopher and saying, when he invited anyone to put any question he chose, that the question you asked the first thing in the morning was: "Where shall I dine?" The blockhead thought that you were going to inquire whether there was one heaven or an infinite number! What did you care about that? "Well, but, in heaven's name--you will say to me--"was a dinner a great matter to you, and there of all places ?" ⁵

Well then, my course of life is this. Every day something read or written: then, not to be quite churlish to my friends, I dine with them, not only without exceeding the law, but even within it, and that by a good deal. ⁶ So you have no reason to be terrified at the idea of my arrival. You will receive a guest of moderate appetite, but of infinite jest. [p. 104]

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¹ No doubt for his amanuensis to copy. Writing letters at the dinner table seems to have been no unusual thing with busy men. It was Caesar's constant habit (Plut. Caes. 63). And we have already heard of letters being delivered both to host and guest at dinner (p.76).

² Dion, a Stoic (Acad. ii. 4, § 12).

³ Of whom we have heard as accompanying Antony in his round of the Italian cities in B.C. 49 (vol. ii., p. 389). In the 2nd Philippic (§58) Cicero says her connexion with Volumnius was so notorious, that she was addressed then as Volumnia. Cytheris was her theatrical name.

⁴ echô ouk echomai (Diogen. Laert. Vita Aristippi, 74). Anecdotes of the famous Corinthian meretrix will be found in the 13th book of Athenaeus.

⁵ I have translated this as a retort which Cicero expects Paetus to make: "You chaff me about my neglecting philosophy for dinner: but why do you care for a dinner so much as to dine in such company?" It is not a very obvious or certain explanation, but neither are any of those given by others, which all differ. At naturally introduces a supposed objection. But the text is very doubtful.

⁶ Caesar's sumptuary law. Suetonius says that he carried it out so strictly, that he set inspectors in the provision market to seize forbidden dainties, and even sent lictors to remove them from the table if they had been procured. Of course, however, it failed (Suet. Iul. 43; cp. Dio, 43, 25).