I have now received three letters of yours: one from Marcus Cornelius, which you gave him at Tres Tabernae, I take it; another which your host of Canusium delivered me; the third which, as you write, you handed over with the anchor weighed, from your skiff. All of them, as the rhetoricians’ boys say, were both sprinkled with the salt of humanity and marked by the signs of love. By these letters I have indeed been provoked to write back, but I am the slower because I cannot find a faithful letter-carrier. For how few are there who can carry a letter of any weight without lightening it by reading it through? Add to this that nobody is now setting out for Epirus. For I take it that you, when the victims have been killed at your Amalthea, have at once set out for the besieging of Sicyon. But I do not know with any certainty when you set out for Antonius, or how much time you spend in Epirus. So I dare commit a letter of any frankness neither to Achaean nor to Epirote travellers.

accepi tuas tris iam epistulas, unam a M. Cornelio quam Tribus Tabernis, ut opinor, ei dedisti, alteram quam mihi Canusinus tuus hospes reddidit, tertiam quam, ut scribis, ancora soluta de phaselo dedisti; quae fuerunt omnes, ut rhetorum pueri loquuntur, cum humanitatis sparsae sale tum insignes amoris notis. quibus epistulis sum equidem abs te lacessitus ad rescribendum; sed idcirco sum tardior quod non invenio fidelem tabellarium. quotus enim quisque est qui epistulam paulo graviorem ferre possit nisi eam pellectione relevarit? accedit eo quod mihi non† ut quisque in Epirum proficiscitur. ego enim te arbitror caesis apud Amaltheam tuam victimis statim esse ad Sicyonem oppugnandum profectum neque tamen id ipsum certum habeo quando ad Antonium proficiscare aut quid in Epiro temporis ponas. ita neque Achaicis hominibus neque Epiroticis paulo liberiores litteras committere audeo.

Things have happened, since you went away from me, that deserve a letter; but they are not to be entrusted to such a risk that they could perish, or be opened, or be intercepted. First, then, know this: I have not been the first asked for my opinion in the senate; the pacificator of the Allobroges has been put before me, and that with the senate murmuring and not against my will. For I am free of having to humour a perverse man, and unbound, on the score of my own dignity in the commonwealth, from his goodwill. The second place in speaking holds the authority of nearly the first, and a goodwill not too much chained by a consul’s favour. The third is Catulus; the fourth, if you ask, Hortensius. The consul himself is small-spirited and crooked, but a sneerer in that sour way which is laughed at even without wit, ridiculous more by face than by joke, doing nothing for the commonwealth, cut off from the best men — a man from whom you would hope nothing good for the commonwealth because he does not wish it, nothing bad because he does not dare it. His colleague, however, is most respectful to me, and a zealous defender of the better party.

sunt autem post discessum a me tuum res dignae litteris nostris, sed non committendae eius modi periculo ut aut interire aut aperiri aut intercipi possint. primum igitur scito primum me non esse rogatum sententiam praepositumque esse nobis pacificatorem Allobrogum, idque admurmurante senatu neque me invito esse factum. sum enim et ab observando homine perverso liber et ad dignitatem in re publica retinendam contra illius voluntatem solutus, et ille secundus in dicendo locus habet auctoritatem paene principis et voluntatem non nimis devinctam beneficio consulis. Tertius est Catulus, quartus, si etiam hoc quaeris, Hortensius. consul autem ipse parvo animo et pravo tamen cavillator genere illo moroso quod etiam sine dicacitate ridetur, facie magis quam facetiis ridiculus, nihil agens cum re publica, seiunctus ab optimatibus, a quo nihil speres boni rei publicae quia non vult, nihil speres mali quia non audet. eius autem conlega et in me perhonorificus et partium studiosus ac defensor bonarum.

The two now slightly differ between themselves. But I fear that this thing left undone may creep further. For I take it you have heard that, at the rite pro populo held at Caesar’s house, a man came in dressed in women’s clothing; and that, when the Vestals had repeated the sacrifice, mention was made in the senate by Quintus Cornificius (he, that you may not chance to think it was one of us, was the first); afterwards the matter, by senate’s decree, was referred to the Vestals and the pontiffs, who declared it sacrilege; then, by senate’s decree, the consuls promulgated a bill; Caesar has sent his wife notice of divorce. In this case Piso, drawn by his friendship with Publius Clodius, gives his pains that the bill which he himself proposes, and proposes by senate’s decree and on a religious matter, should be repudiated. Messalla so far is acting vehemently and severely. The good men are being drawn off from the case by Clodius’s prayers; gangs are being got together; we ourselves, who from the start had been Lycurgean, are growing milder by the day; Cato presses on and urges. What more can I say? I fear that this matter, neglected by good men and defended by the wicked, may be the cause of great evils to the commonwealth.

qui nunc leviter inter se dissident. sed vereor ne hoc quod infectum est serpat longius. credo enim te audisse, cum apud Caesarem pro populo fieret, venisse eo muliebri vestitu virum, idque sacrificium cum virgines instaurassent, mentionem a Q. Cornificio in senatu factam (is fuit princeps, ne tu forte aliquem nostrum putes); postea rem ex senatus consulto ad virgines atque ad pontifices relatam idque ab iis nefas esse decretum; deinde ex senatus consulto consules rogationem promulgasse; uxori Caesarem nuntium remisisse. in hac causa Piso amicitia P. Clodi ductus operam dat ut ea rogatio quam ipse fert et fert ex senatus consulto et de religione antiquetur. Messalla vehementer adhuc agit severe. boni viri precibus Clodi removentur a causa, operae comparantur, nosmet ipsi, qui Lycurgei a principio fuissemus, cotidie demitigamur, instat et urget Cato. quid multa? vereor ne haec neglecta a bonis, defensa ab improbis magnorum rei publicae malorum causa sit.

As for that friend of yours — you know whom I mean — of whom you wrote to me that, when he no longer dared to find fault, he had begun to praise: us, as he shows, he is mighty fond of, embraces, loves, openly praises, secretly — but so that the thing is plain — envies. Nothing courteous, nothing simple, nothing in public affairs distinguished, en tois politikois, nothing honourable, nothing brave, nothing free. But of this I will write to you another time more closely; for I do not yet know it sufficiently, and I dare not commit a letter on such great matters to some son of earth or other.

tuus autem ille amicus (scin quem dicam?), de quo tu ad me scripsisti, postea quam non auderet reprehendere, laudare coepisse, nos, ut ostendit, admodum diligit, amplectitur, amat, aperte laudat, occulte sed ita ut perspicuum sit invidet. nihil come, nihil simplex, nihil ἐν τοῖς πολιτικοῖσ inlustre, nihil honestum, nihil forte, nihil liberum. sed haec ad te scribam alias subtilius; nam neque adhuc mihi satis nota sunt et huic terrae filio nescio cui committere epistulam tantis de rebus non audeo.

The praetors have not yet drawn lots for their provinces. The matter is in the same place where you left it. The topographical sketch topothesian of Misenum and Puteoli that you ask for, I shall include in my speech. “On the third day before the Nones of December” — I had noticed that there was a slip there. The things which you praise from the speeches, believe me, were greatly pleasing to me, but I did not dare to say so before; now indeed, since they have been approved by you, they seem to me much more in the Attic style Attikōtera. To that Metelline speech I have added some things. The book will be sent to you, since love of us has made you a lover of rhetoric philorhētora.

provincias praetores nondum sortiti sunt. res eodem est loci quo reliquisti. τοποθεσίαν quam postulas Miseni et Puteolorum includam orationi meae. A. d. iii Non. Decembr. mendose fuisse animadverteram. quae laudas ex orationibus, mihi crede, valde mihi placebant sed non audebam antea dicere; nunc vero quod a te probata sunt, multo mi Ἀττικώτερα videntur. in illam orationem Metellinam addidi quaedam. Liber tibi mittetur, quoniam te amor nostri φιλορήτορα reddidit.

Of news, what shall I write you? What? this. Messalla the consul has bought Autronius’s house for HS 13,400,000 (?). “What is that to me?” you will say. So much that, by that purchase, we ourselves have been judged to have bought well, and men have begun to understand that it is permitted, with friends’ resources, to attain in a purchase to some position. The Teucris affair is a slow business, but yet it is in hope. Settle that for us. From me expect a freer letter. Six days before the Kalends of February, in the consulship of Marcus Messalla and Marcus Piso.

novi tibi quidnam scribam? quid? etiam. Messalla consul Autronianam domum emit HS † C_X_X_X_I_I_I_I_ZZZ †. quid id ad me? inquies. tantum quod ea emptione et nos bene emisse iudicati sumus et homines intellegere coeperunt licere amicorum facultatibus in emendo ad dignitatem aliquam pervenire. Teucris illa lentum negotium est sed tamen est in spe. tu ista confice. a nobis liberiorem epistulam exspecta. vi Kal. Febr. M. Messalla, M. Pisone coss.

C icero by Claude

Ad Atticum 1.13

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