Three letters of yours I received the day after the Ides; they had been sent, however, on the fourth, the third, and the day before the Ides. Accordingly I shall reply to the oldest first. I agree with you that I should stay on at the Formian villa above all others; also about the Upper Sea — I shall consider plaboque, text corrupt, as I wrote to you before, by what method I can, with his goodwill, refrain from touching any part of the commonwealth. As for your praise of me because I wrote that I am forgetting our friend’s earlier acts and faults: I am, indeed, doing so. Nay more, I do not bear in mind that those very things which you recall were done by him against me otherwise than they were. I would have the gratitude for benefits weigh with me so much more than the resentment of wrongs. So let us do as you advise, and pull ourselves together. For I play the philosopher sophisteuō the moment I run down into the country, and in the running do not stop turning over my propositions theseis. But some of them are extremely hard to settle. About the optimates, very well, let it be as you wish; but you know that line, “Dionysus in — ”Dionysios en, text broken. Titinius’s son is with Caesar. As for your seeming, in a way, to fear that your advice may not please me — nothing else delights me but your counsel and your letters. So, as you propose, do not leave off writing me whatever comes into your mind. Nothing can be more welcome to me.

tris epistulas tuas accepi postridie Idus. erant autem iiii, iii, pridie Idus datae. igitur antiquissimae cuique primum respondebo. adsentio tibi, ut in Formiano potissimum commorer, etiam de supero mari, †plaboque†, ut antea ad te scripsi, ecquonam modo possim voluntate eius nullam rei publicae partem attingere. quod laudas quia oblivisci me scripsi ante facta et delicta nostri amici, ego vero ita facio. quin ea ipsa, quae a te commemorantur, secus ab eo in me ipsum facta esse non memini. tanto plus apud me valere benefici gratiam quam iniuriae dolorem volo. faciamus igitur, ut censes, conligamusque nos. σοφιστεύω enim simul ut rus decurro atque in decursu θέσεισ meas commentari non desino. sed sunt quaedam earum perdifficiles ad iudicandum. de optimatibus sit sane ita ut vis; sed nosti illud Διονύσιοσ ἐν. Titini filius apud Caesarem est. quod autem quasi vereri videris ne mihi tua consilia displiceant, me vero nihil delectat aliud nisi consilium et litterae tuae. qua re fac, ut ostendis, ne destiteris ad me quicquid tibi in mentem venerit scribere. mihi nihil potest esse gratius. >

I come now to the second letter. You are right not to believe the number of soldiers; Clodia wrote it just half too large. False also about the ships destroyed. Where you praise the consul, I too praise his spirit, but find fault with his judgment; for by their being scattered, that action toward peace which I was meditating has been swept away. So afterwards I sent Demetrius’s book on concord back to you and gave it to Philotimus. Nor do I doubt that a ruinous war hangs over us, of which the beginning will be drawn from famine. And yet I grieve that I have no part in this war! In which there will be such force of wickedness that, while it is unspeakable not to feed one’s parents, our leaders think the most ancient and most sacred parent of all, the fatherland, should be killed by starvation. And this I fear not by guesswork but as one who has been present at the talk. The whole of this fleet from Alexandria, Colchis, Tyre, Sidon, Aradus, Cyprus, Pamphylia, Lycia, Rhodes, Chios, Byzantium, Lesbos, Smyrna, Miletus, Cos is being prepared to cut off Italy’s supplies and to seize the grain-bearing provinces. And how full of anger he will come! and most of all against those who most wanted him safe, as though he had been deserted by those whom he himself deserted. So, for me as I hesitate what it is fitting for me to do, my goodwill toward him brings vast weight; remove that, and it would be better to perish in the fatherland than, by saving the fatherland, to overturn it. About the north of the country, plainly it is so. I fear that Epirus may be harassed; but what place in Greece do you think will not be plundered? For he openly proclaims, and shows to his soldiers, that in the very matter of largesse he will outdo this man here. That, too, is a fine point of yours: when I see him, not to speak too cringingly, and to speak rather with weight. Plainly that is how it must be done. I am thinking of Arpinum, after I have met with him, lest I should happen either to be absent when he comes or to be running this way and that on a very bad road. Bibulus, as you write, I hear has come and gone back the day before the Ides.

venio ad alteram nunc epistulam. recte non credis de numero militum; ipso dimidio plus scripsit Clodia. falsum etiam de corruptis navibus. quod consulem laudas, ego quoque animum laudo sed consilium reprehendo; dispersu enim illorum actio de pace sublata est quam quidem ego meditabar. itaque postea Demetri librum de concordia tibi remisi et Philotimo dedi. nec vero dubito quin exitiosum bellum impendeat cuius initium ducetur a fame. et me tamen doleo non interesse huic bello! in quo tanta vis sceleris futura est ut, cum parentis non alere nefarium sit, nostri principes antiquissimam et sanctissimam parentem, patriam, fame necandam putent. atque hoc non opinione timeo sed interfui sermonibus. omnis haec classis Alexandrea, Colchis, Tyro, Sidone, Arado, Cypro, Pamphylia, Lycia, Rhodo, Chio, Byzantio, Lesbo, Zmyrna, Mileto, Coo ad intercludendos commeatus Italiae et ad occupandas frumentarias provincias comparatur. at quam veniet iratus! et iis quidem maxime qui eum maxime salvum volebant, quasi relictus ab iis quos reliquit. itaque mihi dubitanti quid me facere par sit, permagnum pondus adfert benevolentia erga illum; qua dempta perire melius esset in patria quam patriam servando evertere. de septemtrione plane ita est. metuo ne vexetur Epirus; sed quem tu locum Graeciae non direptum iri putas? praedicat enim palam et militibus ostendit se largitione ipsa superiorem quam hunc fore. illud me praeclare admones, cum illum videro, ne nimis indigenter et ut cum gravitate potius loquar. plane sic faciendum. Arpinum, cum eum convenero, cogito, ne forte aut absim cum veniet aut cursem huc illuc via deterrima. Bibulum, ut scribis, audio venisse et redisse pridie Idus.

You were waiting, you say in the third letter, for Philotimus. But he set out from me on the Ides. So my letter, to which I had at once written back to that letter of yours, was delivered later than expected. About Domitius, as you write, I take it to be so — that he is on his estate at Cosa, and that his plans are not known. That most disgraceful and basest of men, who says that consular elections can be held by a praetor, is the same fellow he has always been in public life. So, no doubt, this is what Caesar means in that letter of which I sent you a copy — when he says he wants to use my advice (come, very well; that is open to all), my influence (an inept word, but I suppose he affects it for the sake of certain votes among the senators), my standing (a consular vote, perhaps). The last item is the sting: “and my resources of every kind.” I began to suspect, from your letter, that either this is exactly what it means or not far from it. For it is of great consequence to him that the matter not come to an interregnum. He gets that, if consuls are elected by a praetor. We have it in our books, however, that not only are consuls not lawfully elected by a praetor, but not even praetors — and that it has never been done; that for consuls the right does not exist, because the greater command may not lawfully be put up by the lesser; for praetors, because they are put up in such a way as to be colleagues of the consuls, whose command is the greater. He will not be far from wanting this decreed by me, and not be content with Galba, Scaevola, Cassius, Antonius. “Then let the wide earth gape for me” tote moi chanoi eureia chthōn.

Philotimum, ut ais in epistula tertia, exspectabas. at ille Idibus a me profectus est. eo serius ad tuam illam epistulam quoi ego statim rescripseram redditae sunt meae litterae. de Domitio, ut scribis, ita opinor esse ut et in Cosano sit et consilium eius ignoretur. iste omnium turpissimus et sordidissimus qui consularia comitia a praetore ait haberi posse est ille idem qui semper in re publica fuit. itaque nimirum hoc illud est quod Caesar scribit in ea epistula cuius exemplum ad te misi, se velle uti consilio meo (age, esto; hoc commune est), gratia (ineptum id quidem sed, puto, hoc simulat ad quasdam senatorum sententias), dignitate (fortasse sententia consulari). illud extremum est, ope omnium rerum. id ego suspicari coepi tum ex tuis litteris aut hoc ipsum esse aut non multo secus. nam permagni eius interest rem ad interregnum non venire. id adsequitur, si per praetorem consules creantur. nos autem in libris habemus non modo consules a praetore sed ne praetores quidem creari ius esse idque factum esse numquam; consules eo non esse ius quod maius imperium a minore rogari non sit ius, praetores autem quod ita rogentur ut conlegae consulibus sint quorum est maius imperium. aberit non longe quin hoc a me decerni velit neque sit contentus Galba, Scaevola, Cassio, Antonio, τότε μοι χάνοι εὐρεῖα χθών

But you see what a tempest is hanging over us. What senators have crossed over, I shall write to you when I know for certain. About the grain supply, you understand rightly — it cannot in any way be administered without revenues; and not without cause do you fear both the men around him, who demand everything, and an unspeakable war. Our Trebatius, although, as you write, he hopes for no good, I should still very much like to see. Do urge him to make haste; for it will fall out conveniently if he comes to me before Caesar’s arrival. About the Lanuvine place, as soon as I heard Phamea was dead, I hoped — if only there should be a commonwealth still — that some one of my friends would buy it; and yet I did not think of you, who are most of all my own. For I knew the yearly rate and the rate-per-acre you are accustomed to seek, and I had seen your land-plan diagramma not only at Rome but at Delos. All the same I value the property, though it is charming, at less than it was valued at in Marcellinus’s consulship, when I was thinking that those little gardens would be more pleasant to me because of an old house I then had near by, and at less expense than if I rebuilt the Tusculan place. I wanted to give five hundred thousand sesterces. I dealt through [a friend whose name the manuscript loses], that he should let me have it at that, since he had it for sale. He refused. But now I think all those things are flat, because of the scarcity of cash. To me, indeed — or rather to us both — it will be most suitable if you buy it; but do not despise the man’s strange fancies. The place is very pretty. And yet all those properties seem to me now made over to ruin. I have answered three letters, but I am looking for others; for thus far your letters have been my support. Given on the Liberalia.

sed quanta tempestas impendeat vides. qui transierint senatores scribam ad te cum certum habebo. de re frumentaria recte intellegis quae nullo modo administrari sine vectigalibus potest; nec sine causa et eos qui circum illum sunt omnia postulantis et bellum nefarium times. Trebatium nostrum, etsi, ut scribis, nihil bene sperat, tamen videre sane velim. quem fac horteris ut properet; opportune enim ad me ante adventum Caesaris venerit. de Lanuvino, statim ut audivi Phameam mortuum, optavi, si modo esset futura res publica, ut id aliquis emeret meorum neque tamen de te qui maxime meus es cogitavi. sciebam enim te quoto anno et quantum in solo solere quaerere neque solum Romae sed etiam Deli tuum διάγραμμα videram. verum tamen ego illud, quamquam est bellum, minoris aestimo quam aestimabatur Marcellino consule, cum ego istos hortulos propter domum antiquam quam tum habebam iucundiores mihi fore putabam et minore impensa quam si Tusculanum refecissem. volui HS Q. Egi per †predum ille daret tanti quom† haberet venale. noluit. sed nunc omnia ista iacere puto propter nummorum caritatem. mihi quidem erit aptissimum vel nobis potius si tu emeris; sed eius dementias cave contemnas. valde est venustum. quamquam mihi ista omnia iam addicta vastitati videntur. respondi epistulis tribus sed exspecto alias; nam me adhuc tuae litterae sustentarunt. D. Liberalibus.

C icero by Claude

Ad Atticum 9.9

Cite this passage

Support this project