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Marcus Tullius Cicero >> Letters of Cicero
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XIX
To ATTICUS (IN EPIRUS)
LAODTCEA, 22 FEBRUARY
I RECEIVED your letter on the fifth day before the Terminalia
(19th of February) at Laodicea. I was delighted to read it, for it
teemed with affection, kindness, and an active and obliging
temper. I will, therefore, answer it sentence by sentence--for such
is your request--and I will not introduce an arrangement of my
own, but will follow your order.
You say that the last letter you had of mine was from Cybistra,
dated 21st September, and you want to know which of yours I have
received. Nearly all you mention, except the one that you say that
you delivered to Lentulus's messengers at Equotuticus and
Brundisium. Wherefore your industry has not been thrown away,
as you fear, but has been exceedingly well laid out, if, that is to
say, your object was to give me pleasure. For I have never been
more delighted with anything. I am exceedingly glad that you
approve of my self-restraint in the case of Appius, and of my
independence even in the case of Brutus: and I had thought that it
might be somewhat otherwise. For Appius, in the course of his
journey, had sent me two or three rather querulous letters, because
I rescinded some of his decisions. It is exactly as if a doctor, upon
a patient having been placed under another doctor, should choose
to be angry with the latter if he changed some of his prescriptions.
Thus Appius, having treated the province on the system of
depletion, bleeding, and removing everything he could, and having
handed it over to me in the last state of exhaustion, he cannot bear
seeing it treated by me on the nutritive system. Yet he is
sometimes angry with me, at other times thanks me; for nothing I
ever do is accompanied with any reflexion upon him. It is only the
dissimilarity of my system that annoys him. For what could be a
more striking difference--under his rule a province drained by
charges for maintenance and by losses, under mine, not a penny
exacted either from private persons or public bodies? Why speak
of his praefecti, staff, and legates? Or even of acts of plunder,
licentiousness, and insult? While as things actually are, no private
house, by Hercules, is governed with so much system, or on such
strict principles, nor is so well disciplined, as is my whole
province. Some of Appius's friends put a ridiculous construction
on this, holding that I wish for a good reputation to set off his bad
one, and act rightly, not for the sake of my own credit, but in order
to cast reflexion upon him. But if Appius, as Brutus's letter
forwarded by you indicated, expresses gratitude to me, I am
satisfied. Nevertheless, this very day on which I write this, before
dawn, I am thinking of rescinding many of his inequitable
appointments and decisions.
I now come to Brutus, whose friendship I embraced with all
possible earnestness on your advice. I had even begun to feel
genuine affection for him--but here I pull myself up short, lest I
should offend you: for don't imagine that there is anything I wish
more than to fulfil his commissions, or that there is anything about
which I have taken more trouble. Now he gave me a volume of
commissions, and you had already spoken with me about the same
matters. I have pushed them on with the greatest energy. To begin
with, I put such pressure on Ariobarzanes, that he paid him the
talents which he promised me. As long as the king was with me,
the business was in excellent train: later on he begun to be pressed
by countless agents of Pompey. Now Pompey has by himself more
influence than all the rest put together for many reasons, and
especially because there is an idea that he is coming to undertake
the Parthian war. However, even he has to put up with the
following scale of payment: on every thirtieth day thirty-three Attic
talents (7,920 pounds), and that raised by special taxes: nor is it
sufficient for the monthly interest. But our friend Gnaeus is an
easy
creditor: he stands out of his capital, is content with the interest,
and even that not in full. The king neither pays anyone else, nor is
capable of doing so: for he has no treasury, no regular income, He
levies taxes after the method of Appius. They scarcely produce
enough to satisfy Pompey's interest. The king has two or three very
rich friends, but they stick to their own as energetically as you or I.
For my part, nevertheless, I do not cease sending letters asking,
urging, chiding the king. Delotarus also has informed me that he
has sent emissaries to him on Brutus's business: that they have
brought him back word that he has not got the money. And, by
Hercules, I believe it is the case; nothing can be stripped cleaner
than his kingdom, or be more needy than the king. Accordingly, I
am thinking either of renouncing my guardianship, or, as Scaevola
did on behalf of Glabrio, of stopping payment altogether--principal
and interest alike. However, I have conferred the prefectures which
I promised Brutus through you on M. Scaptius and L. Gavius, who
were acting as Brutus's agents in the kingdom: for they were not
carrying on business in my own province. You will remember that
I made that condition, that he might have as many prefectures as
he pleased, so long as it was not
for a man in business. Accordingly, I have given him two others
besides: but the men for whom he asked them had left the
province. Now for the case of the Salaminians, which I see came
upon you also as a novelty, as it did upon me. For Brutus never
told me that the money was his own. Nay, I have his own
document containing the words, "The Salaminians owe my friends
M. Scaptius and P. Matinius a sum of money." He recommends
them to me: he even adds, as though by way of a spur to me, that
he has gone surety for them to a large amount. I had succeeded in
arranging that they should pay with interest for six years at the rate
of twelve per cent, and added yearly to the capital sum. But
Scaptius demanded forty-eight per cent. I was afraid, if he got that,
you yourself would cease to have any affection for me. For I
should have receded from my own edict, and should have titterly
ruined a statc which was under the protection not only of Cato, but
also of Brutus himself, and had been the recipient of favours from
myself. When lo and behold! at this very juncture Scaptius comes
down upon me with a letter from Brutus, stating that his own
property is being imperilled--a fact that Brutus had never told
either me or you. He also begged that I would confer a prefecture
on Scaptius. That was the very reservation that I had made to
you--" not to a man in business": and if to anyone, to such a man as
that--no I for he has been a praefectus to Appius, and had, in fact,
had some squadrons of cavalry, with which he had kept the senate
under so close a siege in their own council chamber at Salamis,
that five senators died of starvation. Accordingly, the first day of
my entering my province, Cyprian legates having already visited
me at Ephesus, I sent orders for the cavalry to quit the island at
once. For these reasons I believe Scaptius has written some
unfavorable remarks about me to Brutus. However, my feeling is
this: if Brutus holds that I ought to have decided in favour of
forty-eight per cent., though throughout my province I have only
recognized twelve per cent., and had laid down that rule in my
edict with the assent even of the most grasping money-lenders; if
he complains of my refusal of a prefecture to a man in business,
which I refused to our friend Torquatus in the case of your prot‚g‚
Lamius, and to Pompey himself in the case of Sext. Statius,
without offending either of them; if, finally, he is annoyed at my
recall of the cavalry, I shall indeed feel some distress at his being
angry with me, but much greater distress at finding him not to be
the man that I had thought him. Thus much Scaptius will own--that
he had the opportunity in my court of taking away with him the
whole sum allowed by my edict. I will add a fact which I fear you
may not approve. The interest ought to have ceased to run (I mean
the interest allowed by my edict), but I induced the Salasninians to
say nothing about that. They gave in to me, it is true, but what will
become of them if Paullus comes here? However, I have granted
all this in favour of Brutus, who writes very kind letters to you
about me, but to me myself, even when he has a favour to ask,
writes usually in a tone of hauteur, arrogance, and offensive
superiority. You, however, I hope will write to him on this
business, in order that I may know how he takes what I have done.
For you will tell me. I have, it is true, written you a full and careful
account in a former letter, but I wished you clearly to understand
that I had not forgotten what you had said to me in one of your
letters: that if I brought home from this province nothing else
except his goodwill, I should have done enough. By all means,
since you will have it so: but I assume my dealings with him to be
without breach of duty on my part. Well, then, by my decree the
payment of the money to Statius is good at law: whether that is just
you must judge for yourself--I will not appeal even to Cato. But
don't think that I have cast your exhortations to the winds: they
have sunk deeply into my mind. With tears in your eyes you urged
me to be careful of my reputation. Have I ever got a letter from
you without the same subject being mentioned? So, then, let who
will be angry, I will endure it: "for the right is on my side,"
especially as I have given six books as bail, so to speak, for my
good conduct. I am very glad you like them, though in one
point--about Cn. Flavius, son of Annius--you question my history.
He, it is true, did not live before the decemvirs, for he was curule
aedile, an office created many years after the decemvirs. What
good did he do, then, by publishing the Fasti? It is supposed that
the tablet containing them had been kept concealed up to a certain
date, in order that information as to days for doing business might
have to be sought from a small coterie. And indeed several of our
authorities relate that a scribe named Cn. Flavius published the
Fasti and composed forms of pleading--so don't imagine that I, or
rather Africanus (for he is the spokesman), invented the fact. So
you noticed the remark about the "action of an actor," did you?
You suspect a malicious meaning: I wrote in all simplicity.
You say that Philotimus told you about my having been saluted
imperator. But I feel sure that, as you are now in Epirus, you have
received my own letters on the whole subject, one from
Pindenissus after its capture, another from Laodicea, both
delivered to your own messengers. On these events, for fear of
accidents at sea, I sent a public despatch to Rome in duplicate by
two different letter-carriers.
As to my Tullia, I agree with you, and I have written to her and to
Terentia giving my consent. For you have already said in a
previous letter to me, "and I could wish that you had returned to
your old set." There was no occasion to alter the letter you sent by
Memnius: for I much prefer to accept this man from Pontidia, than
the other from Servilia. Wherefore take our friend Saufeius into
council. He was always fond of me, and now I suppose all the
more so as he is bound to have accepted Appius's affection for me
with the rest of the property he has inherited. Appius often showed
how much he valued me, and especially in the trial of Bursa.
Indeed you will have relieved me of a serious anxiety.
I don't like Furnius's proviso. For, in fact, there is no state of things
that alarms me except just that of which he makes the only
exception. But I should have written at great length to you on this
subject if you had been at Rome. I don't wonder that you rest all
your hope of peace on Ponipey: I believe that is the truth, and in
my opinion you must strike out your word " insincerity." If my
arrangement of topics is somewhat random, blame yourself: for I
am following your own haphazard order.
My son and nephew are very fond of each other. They take their
lessons and their exercise together; but as Isocrates said of
Ephorus and Theopompus, the one wants the rein, the other the
spur. I intend giving Quintus the toga virilis on the Liberalia. For
his father commissioned me to do so. And I shall observe th‡ day
without taking intercalation into account. I am very fond of
Dionysius: the boys, however, say that he gets into mad passions.
But after all there could not be a man of greater learning, purer
character, or more attached to you and me. The praises you hear of
Thermus and Silius are thoroughly deserved: they conduct
themselves in the most honourable manner. You may say the same
of M. Nonius, Bibulus, and myself, if you like. I only wish Scrofa
had had an opportunity to do the same: for he is an excellent
fellow. The rest don't do much honour to Cato's policy. Many
thanks for commending my case to Hortensius. As for Amianus,
Dionysius thinks there is no hope. I haven't found a trace of
Terentius. Maeragenes has certainly been killed. I made a progress
through his district, in which there was not a single living thing
left. I didn't know about this, when I spoke to your man
Democritus. I have ordered the service of Rhosian ware. But,
hallo! what are you thinking of? You generally serve us up a
dinner of herbs on fern-pattern plates, and the most sparkling of
baskets: what am I to expect you to give on porcelain? I have
ordered a horn for Phemius: one will be sure to turn up; I only
hope he may play something worthy of it.
There is a threat of a Parthian war. Cassius's despatch was empty
brag: that of Bibulus had not arrived: when that is read I think the
senate will at length be roused. I am myself in serious anxiety. If,
as I hope, my government is not prolonged, I have only June and
July to fear. May it be so! Bibulus will keep them in check for two
months. What will happen to the man I leave in charge, especially
if it is my brother? Or, again, what will happen to me, if I don't
leave my province so soon? It is a great nuisance. However, I have
agreed with Deiotarus that he should join my camp in full force.
He has thirty cohorts of four hundred men apiece, armed in the
Roman fashion, and two thousand cavalry. That will be sufficient
to hold out till the arrival of Pompey, who in a letter he writes to
me indicates that the business will be put in his hands. The
Parthians are wintering in a Roman province. Orodes is expected
in person. In short, it is a serious matter. As to Bibulus's edict there
is nothing new, except the proviso of which you said in your letter,
"that it reflected with excessive severity on our order." I, however,
have a proviso in my own edict of equivalent force, but less openly
expressed (derived from the Asiatic edict of Q. Mucius, son of
Publius)--" provided that the agreement made is not such as cannot
hold good in equity." I have followed Scaevola in many points,
among others in this--which the Greeks regard as a charta of
liberty.--that Greeks are to decide controversies between each
other according to their own laws. But my edict was shortened by
my method of making a division, as I thought it well to publish it
under two heads: the first, exclusive.Iy applicable to a province,
concerned borough accounts, debt, rate of interest, contracts, all
regulations also referring to the publicani: the second, including
what cannot conveniently be transacted without an edict, related to
inheritances, ownership and sale, appointment of receivers, all
which are by custom brought into court and settled in accordance
with the edict: a third division, embracing the remaining
departments of judicial business, I left unwritten. I gave out that in
regard to that class of business I should accommodate my
decisions to those made at Rome: I accordingly do so, and give
general satisfaction. The Greeks, indeed, are jubilant because they
have non-Roman jurors.
"Yes," you will say, "a very poor kind." What does that matter?
They, at any rate, imagine themselves to have obtained
"autonomy." You at Rome, I suppose, have men of high character
in that capacity--Tupio the shoemaker and Vettius the broker! You
seem to wish to know how I treat the publicani. I pet, indulge,
compliment, and honour them: I contrive, however, that they
oppress no one. The most surprising thing is that even Servilius
maintained the rates of usury entered on their contracts. My line is
this: I mirrie a day fairly distant, before which, if they have paid, I
give out that I shall recognize only twelve per cent.: if they have
not paid, the rate shall be according to the contract. The result is
that the Greeks pay at a reasonable rate of interest, and the
publicani are thoroughly satisfied by receiving in full measure
what I mentioned--complimentary speeches and frequent
invitations. Need I say more? They are all on such terms with me
that each thinks himself my most intimate friend. However, (Greek
phrase)--you know the rest.
As to the statue of Africanus--what a mass of confusion I But that
was just what interested me in your letter. Do you really mean it?
Does the present Metellus Scipio not know that his
great-grandfather was never censor? Why, the statue placed at a
high elevation in the temple of Ops had no inscription except
CENS, while on the statue near the Hercules of Polycles there is
also the inscription CENS, and that this is the statue of the same
man is proved by attitude, dress, ring, and the likeness itself. But,
by Hercules, when I observed in the group of gilded equestrian
statues, placed by the present Metellus on the Capitol, a statue of
Africanus with the name of Serapio inscribed under it, I thought it
a mistake of the workman. I now see that it is an error of
Metellus's. What a shocking historical blunder! For that about
Flavius and the Fasti, if it is a blunder, is one shared in by all, and
you were quite right to raise the question. I followed the opinion
which runs through nearly all historians, as is often the case with
Greek writers. For example, do they not all say that Eupolis, the
poet of the old comedy, was thrown into the sea by Alcibiades on
his voyage to Sicily? Eratosthenes disproves it: for he produces
some plays exhibited by him after that date. Is that careful
historian, Duris of Samos, laughed out of court because he, in
common with many others, made this mistake? Has not, again,
every writer affirmed that Zaleucus drew up a constitution for the
Locrians? Are we on that account to regard Theophrastus as utterly
discredited, because your favourite Timams attacked his
statement? But not to know that one's own great-grandfather was
never censor is discreditable, especially as since his consulship no
Cornelius was censor in his lifetime.
As to what you say about Philotimus and the payment ot the
20,600 sestertia, I hear that Philotimus arrived in the Chersonese
about the 1st of January: but as yet I have not had a word from
him. The balance due to me Camillus writes me word that he has
received; I don't know how much it is, and I am anxious to know.
However, we will talk of this later on, and with greater advantage,
perhaps, when we meet?
+
But, my dear Atticus, that sentence almost at the end of your letter
gave me great uneasiness. For you say, "What else is there to say?"
and then you go on to entreat me in most affectionate terms not to
forget my vigilance, and to keep my eyes on what is going on.
Have you heard any-thing about anyone? I am sure nothing of the
sort has taken place. No, no, it can't be! It would never have eluded
my notice, nor will it. Yet that reminder of yours, so carefully
worded, seems to suggest something.
As to M. Octavius, I hereby again repeat that your answer was
excellent: I could have wished it a little more positive still. For
Caelius has sent me a freedman and a carefully written letter about
some panthers and also a grant from the states. I have written back
to say that, as to the latter, I am much vexed if my course of
conduct is still obscure, amid if it is not known at Rome that not a
penny has been exacted from my province except for the payment
of debt; and I have explained to him that it is improper both for me
to solicit the money and for him to receive it; and I have advised
him (for I am really attached to him) that, after prosecuting others,
he should be extra-careful as to his own conduct. As to the former
request, I have said that it is inconsistent with my character that
the people of Cibyra should hunt at the public expense while I am
governor.
Lepta jumps for joy at your letter. it is indeed prettily written, and
has placed me in a very agreeable light in his eyes. I am much
obliged to your little daughter for so earnestly bidding you send me
her love. It is very kind of Pilia also; but your daughter's kindness
is the greater, because she sends the message to one she has never
seen. Therefore pray give my love to both in return. The day on
which your letter was dated, the last day of December, reminded
me pleasantly of that glorious oath of mine, which I have not
forgotten. I was a civilian Magnus on that day.
There's your letter completely answered! Not as you were good
enough to ask, with "gold for bronze," but tit for tat. Oh, but here
is another little note, which I will not leave unanswered. Lucceius,
on my word, could get a good price for his Tusculan property,
unless, perchance, his flute-player is a fixture (for that's his way),
and I should like to know in what condition it is. Our friend
Lentulus, I hear, has advertised everything for sale except his
Tusculan property. I should like to see these men cleared of their
embarrassments, Cestius also, and you may add Caelius, to all of
whom the line applies,
"Ashamed to shrink and yet afraid to take."
I suppose you have heard of Curio's plan for recalling Memmius.
Of the debt due from Egnatius of Sidicinum I am not without some
hope, though it is a feeble one. Pinarius, whom you recommended
to me, is seriously ill, and is being very carefully looked after by
Deiotarus. So there's the answer to your note also.
Pray talk to me on paper as frequently as possible while I am at
Laodicea, where I shall be up to the 15th of May: and when you
reach Athens at any rate send me letter-carriers, for by that time
we shall know about the business in the city and the arrangements
as to the provinces, the settlement of all which has been fixed for
March.
But look here! Have you yet wrung out of Caesar by the agency of
Herodes the fifty Attic talents? In that matter you have, I hear,
roused great wrath on the part of Pompey. For he thinks that you
have snapped up money rightly his, and that Caesar will be no less
lavish in his building at the Nemus Diame.
I was told all this by P. Vedius, a hare-brained fellow enough, but
yet an intimate friend of Pompey's. This Vedius came to meet me
with two chariots, and a carriage and horses, and a sedan, and a
large suite of servants, for which last, if Curio has carried his law,
he will have to pay a toll of a hundred sestertii apiece. There was
also in a chariot a dog-headed baboon, as well as some wild asses.
I never saw a more extravagant fool. But the cream of the whole is
this. He stayed at Laodicea with Pompeius Vindullus. There he
deposited his properties when coming to see me. Meanwhile
Vindullus dies, and his property is supposed to revert to Pompeius
Magnus. Gaius Vennonius comes to Vindullus's house: when,
while putting a seal on all goods, he conies across the baggage of
Vedius. In this are found five small portrait busts of married
ladies, among which is one of the wife of your friend--" brute,"
indeed, to be intimate with such a fellow! and of the wife of
Lepidus-- as easy-going as his name to take this so calmly! I
wanted you to know these historiettes by the way; for we have both
a pretty taste in gossip. There is one other thing I should like you
to turn over in your mind. I am told that Appius is building a
propyheum at Eleusis. Should I be foolishly vain if I also built one
at the Academy? "I think so," you will say. Well, then, write and
tell me that that is your opinion. For myself, I am deeply attached
to Athens itself. I would like some memorial of myself to exist. I
loathe sham inscriptions on statues really representing other
people. But settle it as you please, and be kind enough to inform
me on what day the Roman mysteries fall, and how you have
passed the winter. Take care of your health. Dated the 765th day
since the battle of Leuctra!
XX
M. PORCIUS CATO TO CICERO (IN CILICIA)
ROME (JUNE)
I GLADLY obey the call of the state and of our friendship, in
rejoicing that your virtue, integrity, and energy, already known at
home in a most important crisis, when you were a civilian, should
be maintained abroad with the same painstaking care now that you
have military command. Therefore what I could conscientiously
do in setting forth in laudatory terms that the province had been
defended by your wisdom; that the kingdom of Ariobarzanes, as
well as the king, himself, had been preserved; and that the feelings
of the allies had been won back to loyalty to our empire--that I
have done by speech and vote. That a thanksgiving was decreed I
am glad, if you prefer our thanking the gods rather than giving you
the credit for a success which has been in no respect left to chance,
but has been secured for the Republic by your own eminent
prudence and self-control. But if you think a thanksgiving to be a
presumption in favour of a triumph, and therefore prefer fortune
having the credit rather than yourself, let me remind you that a
triumph does not always follow a thanksgiving; and that it is an
honour much more brilliant than a triumph for the senate to
declare its opinion, that a province has been retained rather by the
uprightness and mildness of its governor, than by the strength of an
army or the favour of heaven: and that is what I meant to express
by my vote. And I write this to you at greater length than I usually
do write, because I wish above all things that you should think of
mc as taking pains to convince you, both that I have wished for
you what I believed to be for your highest honour, and am glad that
you have got what you preferred to it. Farewell: continue to love
me; and by the way you conduct your home-journey, secure to the
allies and the Republic the advantages of your integrity and
energy.
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