Ad Atticum 15.13
Ad Atticum 15.13
Headnote
Cicero to Atticus, written from the villa at Puteoli on 25 October 44 BC — Perseus dateline Scr. in Puteolano viii K. Nov. a. 710 (44). The manuscript transmission has placed this letter amid the June correspondence of Book 15, but it belongs four months later: it was written after the First Philippic had already been delivered (early September) and as the Second Philippic was being drafted. The “speech” that Cicero has sent Atticus to vet, and that he half-dreads having his friend read, is almost certainly the Second Philippic, the most violent of his attacks on Antony — composed for circulation rather than delivery, and to be kept under wraps “until the Republic is restored.” Cicero’s caution is plain: he is writing in a Rome where Antony is consul and where the legions, including two newly arrived at Brundisium, will decide the contest.
The letter is a long, rambling answer to two of Atticus’s letters at once, and it tours all of Cicero’s preoccupations in the autumn of 44: the speech and its dissemination; the policy of giving no answer (anantiphonesia) which he proposes to adopt toward Antony in place of a formal truce; Varro’s promised dialogue in the Heraclidean form; financial business with Vettienus, Faberius, and Sestius, and a hopeless attribution-claim that Dolabella has been trying to recover for him; news from Servilia (Brutus’s mother) that the Alexandrian legions are stirring and Cassius is being awaited; and, almost in passing, the announcement that he is “unfolding magnificently” a work on the proper duties to be dedicated to his son — the De Officiis, then in composition. The letter closes in dread of Atticus’s verdict on the speech he has just sent.
On the 25th I received two letters from you. I shall answer the earlier one first. I agree with you: let us neither lead the column nor bring up the rear — but let us cheer it on. I have sent you the speech. Whether it should be kept under wraps or put out into the world I leave to your judgement. But when can I imagine the day on which you think it should be published?
viii Kal. duas a te accepi epistulas. respondebo igitur priori prius. adsentior tibi ut nec duces simus nec agmen cogamus, faveamus tamen. orationem tibi misi. eius custodiendae et proferendae arbitrium tuum. sed quando illum diem cum tu edendam putes?
The truce you write of I do not see how it can be made. Better is the policy of giving no answer anantiphonesia, which I think I shall employ. As for your news that two legions have come to Brundisium, you people have everything before us. So you will write whatever you hear.
indutias quas scribis non intellego fieri posse. melior est ἀναντιφωνησία qua me usurum arbitror. quod scribis legiones duas Brundisium venisse, vos omnia prius. scribes igitur quicquid audieris.
I am waiting for Varro’s dialogue. I already approve the Heraclidean Herakleideion form, particularly since you take such great delight in it; but I should like to know what sort you wish. As to what I wrote to you before — or rather earlier (since you prefer it so) — you have made me more eager to write by telling me the truth, for to your judgement, which I already knew, you have added the authority of Peducaeus, weighty indeed with me and singularly grave. I shall make every effort, then, that you should miss in me neither industry nor diligence. Vettienus, as you say, and Faberius I am cultivating. Of Clodius I think nothing malicious — though — well, let that be his affair. About preserving freedom, than which there is surely nothing sweeter, I agree with you. So, then, Gallus Caninius? What a worthless fellow! What else can I call him? And Marcellus a cautious man! I in the same way, but still not the most cautious of all.
Varronis διάλογον exspecto. iam probo Ἡρακλείδειον, praesertim cum tu tanto opere delectere; sed quale velis velim scire. quod ad te antea atque adeo prius scripsi (sic enim mavis), ad scribendum †tibi vere dicere† fecisti me alacriorem. ad tuum enim iudicium quod mihi erat notum addidisti Peducaei auctoritatem magnam quidem apud me et in primis gravem. enitar igitur ne desideres aut industriam meam aut diligentiam. Vettienum, ut scribis, et Faberium foveo. Clodium nihil arbitror malitiose; quamquam—sed quod egerit. de libertate retinenda, qua certe nihil est dulcius, tibi adsentior. itane Gallo Caninio? o hominem nequam! quid enim dicam aliud? cautum Marcellum! me sic, sed non tamen cautissimum.
I have answered the longer and earlier letter. Now what am I to answer to the shorter and nearer one except that it was most sweet to me? The Spanish business is going very well, if only I may see Balbillus safe and sound, the prop of our old age. The same with Annianus, since Visellia pays me close attention. But these are at any rate human affairs. About Brutus you say you know nothing, but that Servilia says M. Scaptius has arrived, and that he will come to her in secret though not with any ceremony, and that I shall learn everything; which I will pass on at once. Meanwhile she tells the same news — that a slave of Bassus has come reporting that the Alexandrian legions are under arms, that Bassus is being summoned, that Cassius is being awaited. What more? It looks as though the Republic is going to recover her rights. But not so fast! You know how practised these men are in brigandage, and how insensate.
longiori epistulae superiorique respondi. nunc breviori propiorique quid respondeam nisi eam fuisse dulcissimam? res Hispanienses valde bonae, modo Balbilium incolumem videam, subsidium nostrae senectutis. de Anniano item, quod me valde observat Visellia. sed haec quidem humana. de Bruto te nihil scire dicis, sed Servilia venisse M. Scaptium †eumque non qua pompa† ad se tamen clam venturum sciturumque me omnia; quae ego statim. interea narrat eadem Bassi servum venisse qui nuntiaret legiones Alexandrinas in armis esse, Bassum arcessi, Cassium exspectari. quid quaeris? videtur res publica ius suum reciperatura. sed ne quid ante. nosti horum exercitationem in latrocinio et amentiam.
Dolabella is the best of fellows — though just as I was writing, with the second course brought in, I was hearing that he had come to Baiae — yet from his place at Formiae he wrote to me a letter which I received as I came out of the bath, saying that he had done the utmost about the assignment. He blames Vettienus (the man is dithering like a tradesman over coinage), but says that our friend Sestius has taken on the whole affair, an excellent man indeed and most devoted to me. I ask, though, what on earth Sestius can do in this business that any of us could not do. But if anything beyond hope comes of it, you will let me know; if, as I think, the matter is hopeless, you will write anyway, and the thing will not move me.
Dolabella vir optimus, etsi, cum scribebam secunda mensa apposita, venisse eum ad Baias audiebam, tamen ad me ex Formiano scripsit, quas litteras cum e balineo exissem accepi, sese de attributione omnia summa fecisse. Vettienum accusat (tricatur scilicet ut monetalis), sed ait totum negotium Sestium nostrum suscepisse, optimum quidem illum virum nostrique amantissimum. quaero autem quid tandem Sestius in hac re facere possit quod non quivis nostrum. sed si quid praeter spem erit, facies ut sciam; sin est, ut arbitror, negotium perditum, scribes tamen neque ista res commovebit.
Here we philosophize philosophoumen — what else is there? — and unfold magnificently the question of the proper duties ta peri tou kathekontos, and dedicate prosphonoumen it to Cicero our son; for on what subject would a father rather address a son? Then other things. What more? The labour of this sojourn will leave something to show for itself. They thought Varro would come today or tomorrow; but I was hurrying on to my place at Pompeii, not that anything here is more beautiful, but that interrupters are less of a nuisance there. But write me out in full, please, what is the story of Myrtilus — I have heard he has paid the penalty — and whether it is clear enough by whom he was suborned.
nos hic φιλοσοφοῦμεν (quid enim aliud?) et τὰ περὶ τοῦ καθήκοντοσ magnifice explicamus προσφωνοῦμεν que Ciceroni; qua de re enim potius pater filio? deinde alia. quid quaeris? exstabit opera peregrinationis huius. Varronem hodie aut cras venturum putabant; ego autem in Pompeianum properabam, non quo hoc loco quicquam pulchrius sed interpellatores illic minus molesti. sed perscribe, quaeso, quae causa sit Myrtili (poenas quidem illum pependisse audivi) et satisne pateat unde corruptus.
While I was writing this, I was supposing the speech had just been carried through to you. Oh, how I dread your verdict on it! Though why should I? — since it will not go out to the world until the Republic is restored. And what I may hope on that score I do not dare to write.
haec cum scriberem, tantum quod existimabam ad te orationem esse perlatam. hui, quam timeo quid existimes! etsi quid ad me? quae non sit foras proditura nisi re publica reciperata. de quo quid sperem non audeo scribere.