Ad Atticum 7.1
Ad Atticum 7.1
Headnote
Cicero to Atticus, written from Athens on the seventeenth day before the Kalends of November 50 BC — 16 October — the opening letter of book 7 of the Ad Atticum, and the last surviving letter from the eastward voyage home from Cilicia. He had landed at the Piraeus on the 14th, written briefly the next day (book 6.9) and sent that off with Saufeius, and now — two days later, before sailing for Italy — sits down to the long, anxious letter he could not fit in the first time. The seal between books 6 and 7 is editorial, not biographical: the same voice continues.
Section 1 is the recap, deliberately laid down for the case in which the Saufeius letter does not arrive first — philosophers, as he says, do not walk fast. Sections 2–5 are the heart: the prayer for Atticus’s prudentia, the open citation of his own miscalculation in joining both Caesar and Pompey (ut neutri illorum quisquam esset me carior, “so that neither of them held anyone dearer than me”), and the rehearsal — in mock-Senate procedural form — of the impossible vote he sees coming: dic, M. Tulli. quid dicam? “Speak, Marcus Tullius. What shall I say?” The Greek thickens accordingly: a Homeric half-line about a heart never persuaded (ἀλλ’ ἐμὸν οὔποτε θυμὸν ἐνὶ στήθεσσιν ἔπειθεσ, Iliad 9.345 of Achilles to the embassy), an αἰδέομαι drawn from Hector’s speech in Iliad 22, and Πουλυδάμας μοι — “Polydamas first of all” — the first words of Hector’s self-reproach for refusing prudent counsel. He breaks off to answer his own question: who is the Polydamas? tu ipse — “you yourself.”
Sections 6–9 turn back to the manageable business: the provincial accounts (his unfashionable honesty in returning the surplus to the treasury, against the muttering of his own cohors), the thanksgiving and the triumph he hopes for, the lobbying of Hirrus, and the domestic Precius affair already glimpsed in 6.9 — the same φυρατής, “schemer,” now named outright as “Lartidius to the life.” The letter ends as it began: by handing Atticus the work to do. The Rubicon is two and a half months away.
I had in fact given a letter to Lucius Saufeius, and to you alone — because there was not time enough for me to write, but I was unwilling that a man so intimate with you should come to you without a letter from me. Still, given the pace at which philosophers travel, I think this one will reach you before that one does. If you have already received that letter, you know that I came to Athens on the day before the Ides of October; that on stepping off the ship at the Piraeus I received your letter from our friend Acastus; that I was thrown into confusion at your having arrived at Rome with a fever, but began to take heart because Acastus reported what I wanted to hear of the recovery of your body; that I shuddered, however, at what your letter brought about Caesar’s legions, and pressed you to see that the ambition of a certain person you know should do us no harm; and on a matter I had written to you about long ago, on which Turranius had told you otherwise at Brundisium (as I learned from a letter I received from Xeno, an excellent man), I set out briefly why I had not put my brother in charge of the province. That is essentially what was in that letter.
dederam equidem L. Saufeio litteras et dederam ad te unum, quod cum non esset temporis mihi ad scribendum satis, tamen hominem tibi tam familiarem sine meis litteris ad te venire nolebam; sed ut philosophi ambulant, has tibi redditum iri putabam prius. sin iam illas accepisti, scis me Athenas venisse pr. Idus Octobris, e navi egressum in Piraeum tuas ab Acasto nostro litteras accepisse, conturbatum quod cum febre Romam venisses, bono tamen animo esse coepisse quod Acastus ea quae vellem de adlevato corpore tuo nuntiaret, cohorruisse autem me eo quod tuae litterae de legionibus Caesaris adferrent, et egisse tecum ut videres ne quid φιλοτιμία eius quem nosti nobis noceret; et, de quo iam pridem ad te scripseram, Turranius autem secus tibi Brundisi dixerat (quod ex iis litteris cognovi quas a Xenone, optimo viro, accepi), cur fratrem provinciae non praefecissem exposui breviter. haec fere sunt in illa epistula.
Now hear the rest. By the fates! Bring all that love with which you have embraced me, and all that good sense of yours which by Hercules I judge to be unique in every field, to bear on this care: that you take thought for my whole position. For I seem to see in prospect a struggle so great — unless the same god who freed us from the Parthian war more handsomely than we dared to pray for has regard for the commonwealth — so great a struggle, I say, as has never been. Well, then; this evil is one I share with all. I lay nothing on you to ponder for me there. But that special problem that is my own — please, take it up. Do you see how, with you as my counsellor, I have embraced both men? And how I wish I had listened to you from the beginning, most lovingly as you warned me. But you never persuaded the spirit in my breast. At last, however, you did persuade me: to embrace the one because he had deserved supremely well of me, the other because he carried so much weight. So I did, and by every act of compliance I brought it about that neither of them held anyone dearer than me.
nunc audi reliqua. per fortunas! omnem tuum amorem quo me es amplexus omnemque tuam prudentiam quam me hercule in omni genere iudico singularem confer ad eam curam ut de omni statu meo cogites. videre enim mihi videor tantam dimicationem, nisi idem deus qui nos melius quam optare auderemus Parthico bello liberavit respexerit rem publicam,—sed tantam quanta numquam fuit. age, hoc malum mihi commune est cum omnibus. nihil tibi mando ut de eo cogites, illud meum proprium πρόβλημα, quaeso, suscipe. videsne ut te auctore sim utrumque complexus? ac vellem a principio te audisse amicissime monentem. ἀλλ’ ἐμὸν οὔποτε θυμὸν ἐνὶ στήθεσσιν ἔπειθεσ sed aliquando tamen persuasisti ut alterum complecterer quia de me erat optime meritus, alterum quia tantum valebat. feci igitur itaque effeci omni obsequio ut neutri illorum quisquam esset me carior.
For this is what we were reckoning on: that, joined with Pompey, I should never be forced to do wrong against the commonwealth, and that, holding with Caesar, I should never have to fight against Pompey — so close was their union. Now there hangs over us, as you point out and I see, the bitterest possible contest between them. And each numbers me as his own, unless one of them is dissembling: for Pompey does not doubt it; he is right to judge that what he now thinks about the commonwealth meets with my strong approval. From both of them I have received, at the same time as yours, letters of such a kind that neither seems to value any man alive more than me.
haec enim cogitabamus, nec mihi coniuncto cum Pompeio fore necesse peccare in re publica aliquando nec cum Caesare sentienti pugnandum esse cum Pompeio. tanta erat illorum coniunctio. nunc impendet, ut et tu ostendis et ego video, summa inter eos contentio. me autem uterque numerat suum, nisi forte simulat alter. nam Pompeius non dubitat; vere enim iudicat ea quae de re publica nunc sentiat mihi valde probari. utriusque autem accepi eius modi litteras eodem tempore quo tuas, ut neuter quemquam omnium pluris facere quam me videretur.
But what shall I do? I am not asking about the final extremity — if it should come to a fight in the field, I see that it is better to be defeated with the one than to conquer with the other — but about what will be done when I arrive: that there shall be no account taken of his absence; that he should disband his army. “Speak, Marcus Tullius.” What shall I say? “Wait, I beg you, until I have met with Atticus”? There is no room for evasion. Against Caesar, then? Where are those tight-clasped right hands? For it was I who helped to make this possible for him, asked by him in person at Ravenna over the tribune Caelius — by him in person, did I say? It was Gnaeus our friend, too, in that miraculous third consulship of his. If I take any other line, I shall be ashamed not before Pompey alone but before the men and women of Troy. Polydamas first of all —
verum quid agam? non quaero illa ultima (si enim castris res geretur, video cum altero vinci satius esse quam cum altero vincere), sed illa quae tum agentur cum venero, ne ratio absentis habeatur, ut exercitum dimittat. dic, M. Tulli. quid dicam? exspecta, amabo te, dum Atticum conveniam? non est locus ad tergiversandum. contra Caesarem? ubi illae sunt densae dexterae? nam ut illi hoc liceret adiuvi rogatus ab ipso Ravennae de Caelio tribuno pl. ab ipso autem? etiam a Gnaeo nostro in illo divino tertio consulatu. aliter sensero; αἰδέομαι non Pompeium modo sed Τρῶασ καὶ Τρῳάδασ. Πουλυδάμασ μοι
who? You yourself, of course, the one who praises both my deeds and my writings. So I have escaped this blow through the two earlier consulships of the Marcelli, when Caesar’s province was on the table; and shall I now fall headlong into the crisis itself? And so, as “the fool first gives his opinion,” my strong preference is to manoeuvre something out of the triumph — to stay outside the city on the most justifiable of pretexts. They will try all the same to elicit a vote from me. You will perhaps laugh at this point. How I wish I were still lingering in my province! It was plainly the thing to do, if all this was hanging over us. Even so, nothing more wretched. For — to give you this by the way — I want you to know: all those famous first moves, which you yourself were lifting to the skies in your letters, were a veneer.
quis? tu ipse scilicet laudator et factorum et scriptorum meorum. hanc ergo plagam effugi per duos superiores Marcellorum consulatus cum est actum de provincia Caesaris, nunc incido in discrimen ipsum? itaque †ut stultus† primus suam sententiam dicat, mihi valde placet de triumpho nos moliri aliquid, extra urbem esse cum iustissima causa. tamen dabunt operam ut eliciant sententiam meam. ridebis hoc loco fortasse. quam vellem etiam nunc in provincia morari! plane opus fuit, si hoc impendebat. etsi nil miserius. nam ὁδοῦ πάρεργον volo te hoc scire. omnia illa prima quae etiam tu tuis litteris in caelum ferebas ἐπίτηκτα fuerunt.
How not easy a thing virtue is, and how very difficult the long-drawn pretence of it! For when I thought it right and creditable, out of the yearly allowance which had been decreed me, to leave a yearly stipend to Gaius Coelius the quaestor and pay back into the treasury about a million sesterces, our company groaned: thinking the whole of it ought to be distributed to themselves, so that I should turn out a better friend to the treasuries of the Phrygians and the Cilicians than to our own. But they did not move me; for my good name weighed with me most of all, and yet there was no honour that could be done to anyone that I left out. But let this serve, as Thucydides says, as a digression — and not a useless one.
quam non est facilis virtus: quam vero difficilis eius diuturna simulatio! cum enim hoc rectum et gloriosum putarem, ex annuo sumptu qui mihi decretus esset me C. Coelio quaestori relinquere annuum, referre in aerarium ad HS †cIↃ†, ingemuit nostra cohors omne illud putans distribui sibi oportere, ut ego amicior invenirer Phrygum et Cilicum aerariis quam nostro. sed me non moverunt; nam et mea laus apud me plurimum valuit nec tamen quicquam honorifice in quemquam fieri potuit quod praetermiserim. sed haec fuerit ut ait Thucydides, ἐκβολὴ λόγου non inutilis.
You, then, will think about my situation: first, by what art we may keep the goodwill of Caesar; next, about the triumph itself — which I see, unless the times of the commonwealth get in the way, is easily within reach. I judge so both from my friends’ letters and from the thanksgiving. The man who voted against it voted for more than if he had voted against all the triumphs ever. Then to him assented one friend of mine, Favonius, and one enemy, Hirrus. Cato, on the other hand, both took part in the writing-up and sent me the most agreeable letter about his own vote. And yet, even as Caesar congratulates me on the thanksgiving, he celebrates a triumph over Cato’s vote — not writing what Cato actually said but only that he had not voted me the thanksgiving.
tu autem de nostro statu cogitabis primum quo artificio tueamur benevolentiam Caesaris, deinde de ipso triumpho; quem video, nisi rei publicae tempora impedient, εὐπόριστον. iudico autem cum ex litteris amicorum tum ex supplicatione. quam qui non decrevit, plus decrevit quam si omnis decresset triumphos. ei porro adsensus est unus familiaris meus, Favonius, alter iratus, Hirrus. Cato autem et scribendo adfuit et ad me de sententia sua iucundissimas litteras misit. sed tamen gratulans mihi Caesar de supplicatione triumphat de sententia Catonis nec scribit quid ille sententiae dixerit sed tantum supplicationem eum mihi non decrevisse.
I come back to Hirrus. You had begun to bring him round to me; finish the work. You have Scrofa, you have Silius; I have written to them already, and to Hirrus himself. For he had said to them that he could conveniently have blocked the matter, but had been unwilling: that, however, he had assented to Cato, my dearest friend, when he had given the most honourable opinion of me; and that I had sent no letter to him, while sending to everyone else. He spoke the truth. To him alone, and to Crassipes, I had not written.
redeo ad Hirrum. coeperas eum mihi placare; perfice. habes Scrofam, habes Silium. ad eos ego et iam antea scripsi ad ipsum Hirrum. locutus enim erat cum iis commode se potuisse impedire sed noluisse; adsensum tamen esse Catoni, amicissimo meo, cum is honorificentissimam in me sententiam dixisset; nec me ad se ullas litteras misisse, cum ad omnis mitterem. verum dicebat. ad eum enim solum et ad Crassipedem non scripseram.
And so much for the public business; let us come back home. I want to be quit of that man. He is a sheer schemer — a Lartidius to the life. But as for the rest, let us sort it out — this first, in that it has added care to my grief — but, all the same, this Precius business, whatever it is, I do not want mixed in with those accounts of mine that he handles. I have written to Terentia and to the man himself: that whatever I can in cash, towards the apparatus of the triumph I hope for, I shall be sending back to you. So I think it will be beyond reproach — but as you please. Take up this care also: by what means we are to bring it off. You yourself indicated something in certain letters sent from Epirus, or perhaps from Athens; and in that I will second you.
atque haec de rebus forensibus; redeamus domum. diiungere me ab illo volo. merus est φυρατήσ germanus Lartidius. ἀλλὰ τὰ reliqua expediamus, hoc primum—quod accessit cura dolori meo,—sed tamen hoc, quicquid est, Precianum cum iis rationibus quas ille meas tractat admisceri nolo. scripsi ad Terentiam, scripsi etiam ad ipsum, me quicquid possem nummorum ad apparatum sperati triumphi ad te redacturum. ita puto ἄμεμπτα fore; verum ut libebit. hanc quoque suscipe curam quem ad modum experiamur. id tu et ostendisti quibusdam litteris ex Epiro an Athenis datis et in eo ego te adiuvabo.