DLXX (F XIII, 15)

TO C. IULIUS CESAR (IN SPAIN)

ASTURA (MARCH 1)

CICERO to Cæsar, imperator. I recommend Precilius to your special favour, the son of a connexion of your own, a very intimate friend of mine, and a most excellent man. For the young man himself I have an extraordinary affection on account of his rectitude, culture, and the spirit and affection he has displayed to myself: but of his father also I have had practical reason to know and thoroughly learn what a warm friend he has ever been to me. Now see! -this is the man that more than anyone else has been used to ridicule and chide me for not attaching myself to you, especially when invited to do so by you in the most complimentary manner :

"But in my breast my heart he ne'er could move."

For I heard our nobles shouting: "Be staunch, and unborn men shall speak thee fair."

"He spake, and on him fell black clouds of woe."

However, these same men give me consolation also: they wish even now-though once singed-to inflame me with the fire of glory, and speak thus:

"Nay, not a coward's death nor shorn of fame,

But after some high deed to live for aye."

"2

But they move me less than of yore, as you see. Accord

1 I leave this letter in the position it occupies in Tyrrell and Purser's work with great doubt. On the one hand, it seems very unlikely to have been written after Tullia's death; on the other, Cicero-who is careful in such matters-gives Cæsar the title of imperator, with which his soldiers greeted him on the 19th of February. Mueller puts it close to Letter CXLII.

1 Il. xxii. 304, quoted more than once before.

See vol. ii., p. 357.

ingly from the high style of Homer I transfer myself to the true maxims of Euripides:

"Out on the sage that cannot guide himself!"

This is a verse that the elder Precilius praises to the skies, and says that a man may be able to see both "before and behind," and yet

"Still may excel and rise above the crowd."

But to return to what I began with you will greatly oblige me, if you give this young man the benefit of the kindness which so distinguishes you, and will add to what I think you would do for the sake of the Precilii themselves as much as my recommendation may be worth. I have adopted a new style of letter to you, that you might understand that my recommendation is no common one.1

DLXXI (F v, 13)

ΤΟ L. LUCCEIUS

ASTURA (MARCH)

ALTHOUGH the consolation contained in your letter is in itself exceedingly gratifying to me-for it displays the greatest kindness joined to an equal amount of good sense-yet quite the greatest profit which I received from that letter was the assurance that you were shewing a noble disdain of human vicissitudes, and were thoroughly armed and pre

1 Cicero may well have apologized for the style of letter. The accumulation of not very apt tags from Homer, the rather flippant allusion to his own conduct to Cæsar, the familiar En, hic ille est, etc., all go to make up a letter very unlike even the most off-hand of Cicero's letters, though full of his usual phrases. It is not the sort of letter which one would expect to be written to the head of the state, and I should not be surprised if it was never sent.

The quotations from Homer are from Odyss. vii. 258; i. 302; xxiv. 315; Iliad, xxii. 304-5; i. 343; xi. 784. The line of Euripides is a fragment of some play not known.

pared against fortune. And I assert it to be the highest compliment to philosophy that a man should not depend upon externals, nor allow his calculations as to the happiness or unhappiness of his life to be governed by anything outside himself. Now this conviction, though it had never been altogether lost-for it had sunk deep-had yet by the violence of tempests and a combination of misfortunes been considerably shaken and loosened at its roots. I see that you are for giving it support, and I also feel that by your last letter you have actually done so, and that with considerable success. Therefore, in my opinion, I ought to repeat this often, and not merely hint to you, but openly to declare, that nothing could be more acceptable to me than your letter. But while the arguments which you have collected with such taste and learning help to console me, yet nothing does so more than the clear perception I have got of the unbending firmness and unshaken confidence of your spirit, not to imitate which I think would be an utter disgrace. And so I consider that I am even braver than yourself—who give me lessons in courage-in this respect, that you appear to me still to cherish a hope that things will be some day better: at least "the changes and chances of gladiatorial combats" and your illustrations, as well as the arguments collected by you in your essay, were meant to forbid me entirely to despair of the republic. Accordingly, in one respect it is not so wonderful that you should be braver, since you still cherish hope in another it is surprising that you should still have any hope. For what is there that is not so weakened as to make you acknowledge it to be practically destroyed and extinct? Cast your eye upon all the limbs of the republic, with which you are most intimately acquainted: you will not find one that is not broken or enfeebled. I would have gone into details, if I had seen things more clearly than you see them, or had been able to mention them without sorrow though in accordance with your lessons and precepts all sorrow ought to be put away. Therefore H will bear my domestic misfortunes in the spirit of your admonition, and those of the state perhaps with even a little more courage than even you, who admonish me. For you are supported, as you say, by some hope; but I shall keep up my courage though I despair of everything, as in spite

of that you exhort and admonish me to do. Yes, you give me pleasant reminders of what my conscience tells me I have done, and of those achievements which I performed with you among my foremost supporters. For I did for my country at least not less than I was bound to do, certainly more than was demanded from the spirit or wisdom of any one human being. Pray pardon my saying something about myself. You wished me to be relieved from my sorrow by thinking over these things. Well, even by mentioning them I obtain alleviation. Therefore, according to your advice, I will withdraw myself to the best of my power from all sorrows and anguish, and fix my mind on those topics by which prosperity receives an added charm, and adversity a support. I will be in your society also exactly as much as our respective age and health will allow; and if we cannot be together as much as we desire, we will so enjoy our union of hearts and community of tastes as to seem never separated.

DLXXII (F VI, 21)

TO C. TORANIUS (IN CORCYRA)

(ROME? MARCH?1)

ALTHOUGH at the moment of my writing this letter, the end of this most disastrous war appears to be approaching, and

1 There is nothing to shew where this letter was written, and only the allusion to the expectation of a decisive blow in Spain to put the time as late as March. Yet Cicero had begun speaking of expected news from Spain ever since January, and the absence of a reference to Tullia's death is an argument-though not quite decisive-of an earlier date. It does not much matter, however, as it represents 'Cicero's abiding view of the political situation, and is somewhat a relief in the rather monotonous lamentations for Tullia and plans for her memorial. C. Toranius was ædile with Octavius, father of Augustus, and one of the tutores of Augustus himself. He perished in the proscription of B.C. 43, betrayed by his son. Perhaps Augustus acquiesced in it because he had found him an unfaithful tutor. See Suet. Aug. 27; App. B. C. 4, 12, 18; Valer. Max. 9, 11, 5; Nic. Damasc. Vit. Aug. 2.

already some decisive blow to have been struck, yet I daily mention that you were the one man in that immense army who agreed with me and I with you, and that we two alone saw what terrible evil was involved in that war. For when all hope of peace was shut out, victory itself was likely to be calamitous in its results, since it meant death if you were on the losing, and slavery if on the winning, side. Accordingly I, whom at the time those brave and wise men the Domitii and Lentuli declared to be frightened and I was so without doubt, for I feared that what actually happened would occur-am now in my turn afraid of nothing, and am prepared for anything that may happen. So long as any precaution seemed possible, I was grieved at its being neglected. Now, however, when all is ruined, when no good can be done by wise policy, the only plan seems to be to bear with resignation whatever occurs: especially as death ends all, and my conscience tells me that, as long as I was able to do so, I consulted for the dignity of the republic and, when that was lost, determined to save its existence. I have written thus much, not with the object of talking about myself, but that you, who have been most closely united with me in sentiment and purpose, might entertain the same thoughts: for it is a great consolation to remember, even when there has been a disaster, that your presentiments were after all right and true. I only hope we may eventually enjoy some form of constitution, and may live to compare the anxieties which we endured at the time when we were looked upon as timid, because we said that what has actually happened would do so. For your own fortunes I assure you that you have nothing to fear beyond the destruction affecting the republic in general; and of me I would have you think as of one who, to the best of his ability, will ever be ready with the utmost zeal to support your safety and that of your children. Good-bye.

And

1 Reading voluisse with the MSS. The noluisse adopted by some appears to me to misrepresent what Cicero always maintains, that his joining Pompey was right and his duty to the constitution, yet that his abandoning the Pompeians after Pharsalia was necessary for the safety of the state. He did not refuse to maintain his own safety.