CLXI (f i, 10)
TO L. VALERIUS (IN CILICIA)
Rome
b.c. 54, æt. 52
M. Cicero wishes heath to L. Valerius, learned in the law. For why I should not pay you this compliment I don't know, especially considering that in these times one may employ impudence to supply the place of learning. I have written to our friend Lentulus, thanking him earnestly in your name. But I could wish that you would now cease using my letter of introduction and at last come back to us, and prefer a city where you are of some account, to a place where you appear to be the only man of legal learning. However, those who come from where you are either say you are proud because you give no "opinions," or insulting because you give bad ones.692 But I am now longing to crack a joke with you face to face. So come as soon as ever you can, and don't go and visit your native Apulia, that we may have the joy of welcoming your safe return. For if you go there, like another Ulysses, you will not recognize any of your friends.693
CLXII (f xiii, 49)
TO M. CURIUS (A PROCONSUL)
Rome
b.c. 54, æt. 52
Q. Pompeius, son of Sextus, has become my intimate friend from many causes of long standing. As he has often in the past been accustomed to defend his material interests, as well as his reputation and influence, by my recommendations, so on the present occasion assuredly, with you as governor of the province, he ought to be able to feel that he has never had a warmer recommendation to anyone. Wherefore I beg you with more than ordinary earnestness that, as you ought in view of our close friendship to regard all my friends as your own, you would give the bearer so high a place in your regard, that he may feel that nothing could have been more to his interest and honour than my recommendation. Farewell.
CLXIII (f xiii, 60)
TO C. MUNATIUS (IN A PROVINCE)
Rome
b.c. 54, æt. 52
L. Livineius Trypho is to begin with a freedman of my most intimate friend L. Regulus (whose disaster makes me more than ever anxious to do him some service—for as far as feeling goes I could not be warmer): but I also am attached to his freedman on his own account, for he shewed me very great kindness at that time in my career, when I was best able to see men's real goodwill and fidelity. I recommend him to you with all the warmth that one who is grateful and not oblivious should use in recommending those who have done him good service. You will have greatly gratified me if he is made to feel that in confronting many dangers for my security, and often undertaking voyages in the depths of winter, he has also put you under an obligation in view of your kind feeling towards me.
CLXIV (f xiii, 73)
TO Q. PHILIPPUS (PROCONSUL OF ASIA)
Rome
b.c. 54, æt. 52
I congratulate you on your safe return to your family from your province, without loss to your reputation or to the state. But if I had seen you at Rome I should also have thanked you for having looked after L. Egnatius, my most intimate friend, who is still absent, and L. Oppius, who is here. With Antipater of Derbe I have become not merely on visiting terms, but really very intimate. I have been told that you are exceedingly angry with him, and I was very sorry to hear it. I have no means of judging the merits of the case, only I am persuaded that a man of your character has done nothing without good reason. However, I do beg of you again and again that, in consideration of our old friendship, you will, for my sake if for anyone's, grant his sons, who are in your power, their liberty, unless you consider that in doing so your reputation may be injured. If I had thought that, I would never have made the request, for your fame is of more importance in my eyes than any friendship with him. But I persuade myself—though I may possibly be mistaken—that this measure will bring you honour rather than abuse. What can be done in the matter, and what you can do for my sake (for as to your willingness I feel no doubt), I should be obliged by your informing me, if it is not too much trouble to you.
CLXV (f ii, 1)
b.c. 53, Coss., M. Domitius Calvinus, M. Valerius Messalla.
This was the year in which Crassus was defeated and killed in Parthia, making thus the first break in the triumvirate, when already the ties between Pompey and Cæsar were weakened by the death of Iulia in the previous year. Cæsar, however, had been in great difficulties in Gaul. At the end of the previous year a fresh rising of the Nervii destroyed a Roman legion and put Q. Cicero in great danger. In the present year Quintus met with his disaster at the hands of the Sigambri. The chief event to Cicero personally was his election into the college of augurs, in place of the younger Crassus. Atticus appears to be in Rome, for there are no letters to him. There was a series of interregna this year owing to partisan conflicts, lasting till July, and when the consuls were at length appointed, they failed to hold the elections for b.c. 52.
TO C. SCRIBONIUS CURIO 694 (IN ASIA)
Rome (January or February)
b.c. 53, æt. 53
Though I am sorry that you have suspected me of neglect, yet it was not so annoying to me to have my lack of attention 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.695 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.
CLXVI (f vii, 11)
TO C. TREBATIUS TESTA (IN GAUL)
Rome (January or February)
b.c. 53, æt. 53
If you had not left Rome before, you certainly would have left it now. For who wants a lawyer when there are so many interregna? I shall advise all defendants in civil suits to ask each interrex for two adjournments for obtaining legal assistance.696 Do you think that I have taken a pretty good hint from you as to civil procedure? But come! How are you? What is happening? For I notice in your letter a tendency to be even jocose. These are better signs than the signa in my Tusculan villa.697 But I want to know what it means. You say, indeed, that you are consulted by Cæsar, but I should have preferred his consulting for you. If that is taking place, or you think it likely to take place, by all means persevere in your military service and stay on: I shall console myself for my loss of you by the hope that it will be your gain: but if, on the other hand, things are not paying with you, come back to us. For either something will turn up sooner or later here, or, if not, one conversation between you and me, by heaven, will be worth more than all the Samobrivæ698 in the world. Finally, if you return speedily, there will be no talk about it; but if you stay away much longer without getting anything, I am in terror not only of Laberius, but of our comrade Valerius also. For it would make a capital character for a farce—a British lawyer!699 I am not laughing though you may laugh, but, as usual, when writing to you, I jest on the most serious subject. Joking apart, I advise you in the most friendly spirit, that if you hold a position for yourself worthy of my introduction, you should put up with the loss of my society and farther your own career and wealth: but if things are stagnant with you there, come back to us. In spite of everything you will get all you want, by your own good qualities certainly, but also by my extreme affection for you.
CLXVII (f ii, 2)
TO C. SCRIBONIUS CURIO (IN ASIA)
Rome (? February)
b.c. 53, æt. 53
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.
CLXVIII (f ii, 3)
TO C. SCRIBONIUS CURIO (IN ASIA)
Rome (? February)
b.c. 53, æt. 53
Rupa700 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 and most excellent of exhibitions. You will certainly become aware that no one can be dearer or more precious than you are to me.
CLXIX (f vii, 12)
TO C. TREBATIUS TESTA (IN GAUL)
Rome (? February)
b.c. 53, æt. 53
I was wondering what had made you cease writing to me. My friend Pansa701 has informed me that you have become an Epicurean! What a wonderful camp yours must be! What would you have done if I had sent you to Tarentum702 instead of Samobriva? I was already a little doubtful about you, when I found you supporting the same doctrine as my friend Selius!703 But on what ground will you support the principles of civil law, if you act always in your own interest and not in that of your fellow citizens? What, too, is to become of the legal formula in cases of trust, "as should be done among honest men"? For who can be called honest who does nothing except on his own behalf? What principle will you lay down "in dividing a common property," when nothing can be "common" among men who measure all things by their own pleasure?704 How, again, can you ever think it right to swear by Iupiter lapis, when you know that Iupiter cannot be angry with anyone?705 What is to become of the people of Ulubræ,706 if you have decided that it is not right to take part in civic business? Wherefore, if you are really and truly a pervert from our faith, I am much annoyed; but if you merely find it convenient to humour Pansa, I forgive you. Only do write and tell us how you are, and what you want me to do or to look after for you.
CLXX (f vii, 13)
TO C. TREBATIUS TESTA (IN GAUL)
Rome, 4 March
b.c. 53, æt. 53
Did you suppose me to be so unjust as to be angry with you from the idea that you were not sufficiently persevering and were too eager to return, and do you think that that is the reason of my long silence? I was certainly annoyed by the uneasiness of your spirits, which your first letters conveyed to me; but there was absolutely no other reason for the interruption of my own, except my complete ignorance of your address. Are you still, at this time of day, finding fault with me, and do you refuse to accept my apology? Just listen to me, my dear Testa! Is it money that is making you prouder, or the fact that your commander-in-chief consults you? May I die if I don't believe that such is your vanity that you would rather be consulted by Cæsar than gilded707 by him! But if both reasons are true, who will be able to put up with you except myself, who can put up with anything? But to return to our subject—I am exceedingly glad that you are content to be where you are, and as your former state of mind was vexatious, so your present is gratifying, to me. I am only afraid that your special profession may be of little advantage to you: for, as I am told, in your present abode
"They lay no claim by joining lawful hands,
But challenge right with steel."708
But you are not wont709 to be called in to assist at a "forcible entry." Nor have you any reason to be afraid of the usual proviso in the injunction, "into which you have not previously made entry by force and armed men," for I am well assured that you are not a man of violence. But to give you some hint as to what you lawyers call "securities," I opine that you should avoid the Treviri; I hear they are real tresviri capitales—deadly customers: I should have preferred their being tresviri of the mint!710 But a truce to jesting for the present. Pray write to me in the fullest detail of all that concerns you.
4 March.
CLXXI (f vii, 14)
TO C. TREBATIUS TESTA (IN GAUL)
Rome (? March)
b.c. 53, æt. 53
Chrysippus Vettius, a freedman of the architect Cyrus, made me think that you had not quite forgotten me; for he has brought me a greeting in your words. You have grown a mighty fine gentleman, that you can't take the trouble of writing a letter to me—a man, I might almost say, of your own family! But if you have forgotten how to write, all the fewer clients will lose their causes by having you as their advocate! If you have forgotten me, I will take the trouble of paying you a visit where you are, before I have quite faded out of your mind. If it is a terror of the summer camp that is disheartening you, think of some excuse to get off, as you did in the case of Britain. I was glad to hear one thing from that same Chrysippus, that you were on friendly terms with Cæsar. But, by Hercules, I should have preferred, as I might fairly have expected, to be informed of your fortunes as frequently as possible from your own letters. And this would certainly have been the case, if you had been more forward to learn the laws of friendship than of suits in court. But this is all jest in your own vein, and to some degree in mine also. I love you very dearly, and I both wish to be loved by you and feel certain that I am.
CLXXII (f vii, 18)
TO C. TREBATIUS TESTA (IN GAUL)
A villa in the Ager Pomptinus, 8 April
b.c. 53, æt. 53
I have received several letters from you at the same time, written at various times, in which everything else gave me great pleasure; for they shewed that you were now sustaining your military service with a brave spirit, and were a gallant and resolute man. These are qualities which for a short time I felt to be lacking in you, though I attributed your uneasiness not so much to any weakness of your own spirit, as to your feeling your absence from us. Therefore go on as you have begun: endure your service with a stout heart: believe me, the advantages you will gain are many; for I will reiterate my recommendation of you, though I shall wait for the right moment of doing so. Be assured that you are not more anxious that your separation from me should be as profitable as possible to yourself than I am. Accordingly, as your "securities" are somewhat weak, I have sent you one in my poor Greek, written by my own hand.711 For your part, I should wish you to keep me informed of the course of the war in Gaul: for the less warlike my informant, the more inclined I am to believe him.
But to return to your letters. Everything else (as I said) is prettily written, but I do wonder at this: who in the world sends several identical letters, when he writes them with his own hand? For your writing on paper that has been used before, I commend your economy: but I can't help wondering what it was that you preferred to rub out of this bit of paper rather than not write such poor stuff as this—unless it were, perhaps, some of your legal formulas. For I don't suppose you rub out my letters to replace them with your own. Can it mean that there is no business going on, that you are out of work, that you haven't even a supply of paper? Well, that is entirely your own fault, for taking your modesty abroad with you instead of leaving it behind here with us. I will commend you to Balbus, when he starts to join you, in the good old Roman style. Don't be astonished if there is a somewhat longer interval than usual between my letters: for I intend being out of town in April. I write this letter in the Pomptine district, having put up at the villa of M. Æmilius Philemo, from which I could hear the noise of my clients, I mean those you confided to me! For at Ulubræ it is certain that an enormous mass of frogs have bestirred themselves to do me honour. Take care of your health.712
8 April, from the Ager Pomptinus.
P.S.—Your letter which I received from L. Arruntius I have torn up, though it didn't deserve it; for it had nothing in it which might not have been safely read in a public meeting. But not only did Arruntius say that such were your orders, but you had appended a similar injunction to your letter. Well, be it so! I am surprised at your not having written anything to me since, especially as you are in the midst of such stirring events.713
CLXXIII (f vii, 15)
TO C. TREBATIUS TESTA (IN GAUL)
Rome
b.c. 53, æt. 53
How wayward people are who love may be gathered from this: I was formerly annoyed that you were discontented at being where you are: now, on the contrary, it stings me to the heart that you write that you are quite happy there. For I did not like your not being pleased at my recommendation, and now I am vexed that you can find anything pleasant without me. But, after all, I prefer enduring your absence to your not getting what I hope for you. However, I cannot say how pleased I am that you have become intimate with that most delightful man and excellent scholar, C. Matius.714 Do your best to make him as fond of you as possible. Believe me, you can bring nothing home from your province that will give you greater pleasure. Take care of your health.