Cicero to Atticus, written from the Formian villa on the third day before the Ides of March 49 BC (the manuscript dateline: Scr.\ in Formiano iii Id.\ Mart.\ a.\ 705 (49)). Brundisium has not yet fallen; Pompey is still on the Italian coast, Caesar is moving down the peninsula, and Cicero — still at Formiae, still not embarked — has just received a full and consoling answer from Atticus to the long deliberative letter of a few days before. The reply arrived by the swift-footed courier whom Salvius had promised; it gave Cicero, in his own image, a little animulae instillatum, a few drops of life trickled in. The letter encloses copies of correspondence with the Caesarian intermediaries Balbus and Oppius and a letter of Caesar’s to them, sent on so that Atticus may judge the temper of the other camp.

The letter is heavily marked by Greek tags — the one thing essential, [Greek: to syn\’echon]; the meeting, [Greek: ap\’ant\=esis]; the political role of peace-broker, [Greek: pol\’iteuma]; the silent reservation [Greek: m\’e moi] that Pompey may turn against him; “I speak from knowledge,” [Greek: eid\’os soi l\’eg\=o]; the charge of ingratitude, [Greek: acharist\’ias]; the sailing season, [Greek: pl\’oos h\=ora\^ios]. Section 3 contains the famous formulation: beneficium sequor, non causam — “I am following the obligation, not the cause” — the same calculus as in his defence of Milo. Section 4 is the bleak diagnosis of Pompey’s strategy: starve Italy, ravage the fields, plunder the rich. Section 5 turns to the wished-for delay, in which the sailing season may steal up on the indecision; if Pompey’s health holds, Cicero believes, Caesar will not be left a roof-tile in Italy. The letter closes on a small, domestic note: Atticus must walk and take his rubdown, Cicero must sleep — the long letter has brought him sleep at last.