Ad Quintum Fratrem 1.2
Ad Quintum Fratrem 1.2
Headnote
Cicero to his brother Quintus, written at Rome between 27 October and 10 December 59 BC. Quintus is at the close of his proconsulship of Asia (the great instructional letter Q. fr. 1.1 of late 60 / early 59 BC opens this same governorship; this letter closes it). Statius, Quintus’s freedman whose manumission has been so much complained of in the contemporary Atticus letters, has just arrived at Rome. §1–3 take up Statius: his coming would have been disastrous had it coincided with Quintus’s, but coming alone it has at least let the Roman gossip exhaust itself before Quintus appears. Cicero is candid: even granting Statius’s fidelity, the appearance of so favoured a freedman has fed every detractor of Quintus, and what was before merely hostility to Quintus’s strictness has, since the manumission, not lacked talkers.
The body of the letter §4–14 is the brother-praetor’s catalogue of Quintus’s mistakes in the conduct of his governorship — written in the brother’s voice, not the consular’s: candid, often sharp, always loving. §4–5 on Cicero’s having patiently soothed all the Greek complainants from Hermippus of Dionysopolis to Nymphon of Colophon, against the Zeuxis-of-Blaundus matter where Quintus’s strictness had run to attempted entrapment (“two Mysians sewn up in a sack at Smyrna”). §6–9 on the angry letters: the Catienus letter (“the cross he sets up for himself, from which I had previously dragged him down”), the Fabius letter (“burn the kidnapper and his chick alive”), all written for “salt and humour” but read in cold ink as monstrous. The model of restraint is the Cyrus of Xenophon and Agesilaus, “those kings under whose supreme command no one ever heard a sharper word.” §10–11 on the Flavius–Fundanius case: Quintus’s edict ordering the heir Flavius not to diminish the estate before Fundanius is paid is unjust as a matter of law and will cost Cicero a friendship; Pompey and Caesar both commended Flavius. §12 reads as the centre of the piece: Cicero apologizes for his earlier angry letter on Hermias, written under the spell of Diodotus, Lucullus’s freedman.
§15–16 are the political coda. The spectacular incident: the young M. Cato, attempting to indict Gabinius for bribery, found the praetors inaccessible for days; he mounted the Rostra and called Pompey a private dictator. He was within an inch of being killed. “From this you can see the condition of the whole commonwealth.” Yet §16 is unexpectedly hopeful: the friendly tribunes-elect, the well-intentioned consuls, the keen praetors-elect (Domitius, Nigidius, Memmius, Lentulus); the old manus bonorum on fire with zeal. The hope of §16 will collapse with Clodius’s tribunate of 58 BC; the next surviving letter (Att. 3.1) is from the road into exile.
Statius came to me on the eighth day before the Kalends of November. His coming, since you wrote that you would be torn apart by your people while he was away, was troublesome to me; that, however, it took away the expectation of you and the throng which would have gathered if he had come back together with you and not been seen before — this seemed to me to have happened not inconveniently. For men’s talk has been spent and many such voices have been let out: but always some great fellow — which I am glad to have been ended in your absence. As for his being sent to me to clear himself, that was not at all necessary.
Statius ad me venit a. d. viii K. Novembr. eius adventus, quod ita scripsisti direptum iri te a tuis dum is abesset, molestus mihi fuit; quod autem exspectationem tui concursumque eum qui erat futurus si una tecum decederet neque antea visus esset sustulit, id mihi non incommode visum est accidisse. exhaustus est enim sermo hominum et multae emissae iam eius modi voces: ’ ἀλλὰ αἰεί τινα φῶτα μέγαν,’ quae te absente confecta esse laetor. quod autem idcirco a te missus est mihi ut se purgaret, id necesse minime fuit.
For in the first place, he was never under suspicion with me; nor what I wrote to you about him did I write on my own judgment, but, since the policy and safety of all of us who go into public life depend not on truth alone but on reputation, I always wrote out to you the talk of others, not my own judgments. How frequent and how grave that talk was, Statius himself learnt by his coming. He happened in upon some men’s complaints which were being made before me about him personally, and he could perceive that the talk of those who wished us ill burst out particularly upon his name.
primum enim numquam ille mihi fuit suspectus neque ego, quae ad te de illo scripsi, scripsi meo iudicio, sed cum ratio salusque omnium nostrum qui ad rem publicam accedimus non veritate solum sed etiam fama niteretur, sermones ad te aliorum semper, non mea iudicia perscripsi. qui quidem quam frequentes essent et quam graves adventu suo Statius ipse cognovit; etenim intervenit non nullorum querelis quae apud me de illo ipso, habebantur, et sentire potuit sermones iniquorum in suum potissimum nomen erumpere.
What used to move me most — when I heard that he had more weight with you than the gravity of your age, your office, your prudence demanded — how many men, do you think, have approached me to commend themselves to Statius? How often Statius himself in plain language laid down in conversation: “This did not please me; I warned, persuaded, deterred”! In which matters, even if his fidelity is the highest — which I fully believe, since you so judge — yet the very appearance of so favoured a freedman or slave can have no dignity. And take this for fact (since I ought neither to speak rashly nor to keep silent in cunning): every material for the talk of those who wished to detract from you was given by Statius. Before, only this much could be perceived: that some were angry at your strictness; once he was manumitted, talk did not fail those who were angry.
quod autem me maxime movere solebat, cum audiebam illum plus apud te posse quam gravitas istius aetatis, imperi, prudentiae postularet quam multos enim mecum egisse putas ut se Statio commendarem, quam multa autem ipsum ἀφελῶσ mecum in sermone ita posuisse: ’ id mihi non placuit; monui, suasi, deterrui’! quibus in rebus etiam si fidelitas summa est, (quod prorsus credo quoniam tu ita iudicas), tamen species ipsa tam gratiosi liberti aut servi dignitatem habere nullam potest. atque hoc sic habeto (nihil enim nec temere dicere nec astute reticere debeo), materiam omnem sermonum eorum qui de te detrahere vellent Statium dedisse; antea tantum intellegi potuisse, iratos tuae severitati esse non nullos, hoc manumisso iratis quod loquerentur non defuisse.
Now I shall reply to those letters which L. Caesius delivered to me, in whom, since I understand it is your wish, I shall fail in nothing. One of these is about Zeuxis of Blaundus, whom you write that I am intimately commending to you, the most certain of matricides. About this matter, and about this whole class of business, lest perhaps you wonder that I have been made too courtier-like to the Greeks, hear a few words. When I felt that the complaints of the Greeks were carrying too much weight on account of men’s natural readiness to be deceived, whoever I heard complaining about you, by every reason in my power I appeased him. First, I softened the people of Dionysopolis, who were our bitterest enemies; their leader, Hermippus, I bound to me not by my speech alone but by close friendship. I have embraced with all my civility Hephaestius of Apamea, that most fickle man Megaristus of Antandrus, Nicias of Smyrna, the most trifling characters; even Nymphon of Colophon. All this I did, not because either these men or the whole nation pleased me; I am thoroughly tired of their fickleness, their flattery, their minds serving not their duties but the times.
nunc respondebo ad eas epistulas quas mihi reddidit L. Caesius, quoi quoniam ita te velle intellego nullo loco deero; quarum altera est de Blaundeno Zeuxide, quem scribis certissimum matricidam tibi a me intime commendari. qua de re et de hoc genere toto, ne forte me in Graecos tam ambitiosum factum esse mirere pauca cognosce. ego cum Graecorum querelas nimium valere sentirem propter hominum ingenia ad fallendum parata, quoscumque de te queri audivi quacumque potui ratione placavi. primum Dionysopolitas qui erant inimicissimi mei lenivi; is quorum principem Hermippum non solum sermone meo sed etiam familiaritate devinxi. ego Apamensem Hephaestium, ego levissimum hominem, Megaristum Antandrium, ego Niciam Smyrnaeum, ego nugas maximas omni mea comitate complexus sum, Nymphontem etiam Colophonium. quae feci omnia, non quo me aut hi homines aut tota natio delectaret; pertaesum est levitatis, adsentationis, animorum non officiis sed temporibus servientium.
But to return to Zeuxis: when, in the conversation about M. Cascellius which you write of, he was uttering those very things, I stopped his speech and received the man into intimacy. What that great desire of yours was I do not know — since you write that you wished, having sewn up two Mysians at Smyrna in a sack, to set up in the upper part of your province a like example of your strictness, and that for that reason you wished to draw out Zeuxis by every means: the man whom, brought of his own accord into court, you ought perhaps not to have let go, but to have him sought out and drawn by flattery (as you write) to trial was not necessary, especially a man whom I learn daily, both from his fellow-citizens and from many others, to be all but more noble than his city.
sed ut ad Zeuxim revertar, cum is de M. Cascelli sermone secum habito quae tu scribis ea ipsa loqueretur, obstiti eius sermoni et hominem in familiaritatem recept tua autem quae fuerit cupiditas tanta nescio, quod scribis cupisse te, quoniam Smyrnae duos Mysos insuisses in culleum, simile in superiore parte provinciae edere exemplum severitatis tuae et idcirco Zeuxim elicere omni ratione voluisse, ultro quem adductum in iudicium fortasse dimitti non oportuerat, conquiri vero et elici blanditus, ut tu scribis, ad iudicium necesse non fuit, eum praesertim hominem quem ego et ex suis civibus et ex multis aliis cotidie magis cognosco nobiliorem esse prope quam civitatem suam.
“But I indulge the Greeks alone.” What? Have I not appeased Lucius Caecilius by every means? What a man, with what anger, what spirit! What man, in short, except Tuscenius, whose case cannot be cured, have I not softened? Look, here is over our heads a fickle and sordid fellow, but yet of equestrian census, Catienus. He too will be softened. That you were rather sharp with his father I do not blame; for I know certainly that you did it with cause. But what was the use of such a letter as you sent to him — “He is setting up his own cross, from which I had previously dragged him down; I shall see to it that he is burnt with smoke amid the applause of the whole province”? What of your letter to one Gaius Fabius (for that letter too Titus Catienus is carrying about): “I am told that Licinius the kidnapper, with his kite-coloured chick, is gathering the tribute”? You then ask Fabius to burn alive the father and the son if he can; if not, send them to you to be burnt by judgment. These letters, sent by you in jest to Gaius Fabius — if indeed they are yours — when they are read have an invidious atrocity of language.
at enim Graecis solis indulgeo. quid? L. Caecilium nonne omni ratione placavi? quem hominem, qua ira, quo spiritu! quem denique praeter Tuscenium cuius causa sanari non potest non mitigavi? ecce supra caput homo levis ac sordidus sed tamen equestri censu, Catienus. etiam is lenietur. cuius tu in patrem quod fuisti asperior non reprehendo; certo enim scio te fecisse cum causa. sed quid opus fuit eius modi litteris quas ad ipsum misisti, ’illum crucem sibi ipsum constituere, ex qua tu eum ante detraxisses; te curaturum fumo ut combureretur plaudente tota provincia’? quid vero ad C. Fabium nescio quem (nam eam quoque epistulam T. Catienus circumgestat), ’renuntiari tibi Licinium plagiarium cum suo pullo milvino tributa exigere’? deinde rogas Fabium ut et patrem et filium vivos comburat si possit; si minus, ad te mittat uti iudicio comburantur. eae litterae abs te per iocum missae ad C. Fabium, si modo sunt tuae, cum leguntur, invidiosam atrocitatem verborum habent.
And if you go back to the precepts of all my letters, you will see that nothing has been blamed by me except sharpness of speech and quickness to anger, and, perhaps occasionally, the carelessness of the letters sent. In which matters, if my authority — against either your nature, a little keener, or a certain sweetness in anger, or salt and humour in speaking — had carried more weight with you, there would be nothing for us to be sorry about. And do you think me only moderately pained when I hear in what reputation Gaius Vergilius is, in what reputation your neighbour Gaius Octavius? — for if you set yourself above your nearer neighbours, the men of Cilicia and Syria, you make much of yourself indeed! And the pain of it is, that, since the men I have named do not surpass you in innocence, they yet surpass you in the art of gathering goodwill — men who have known neither the Cyrus of Xenophon nor Agesilaus, those kings under whose supreme command no one ever heard a sharper word.
ac si omnium mearum praecepta litterarum repetes, intelleges esse nihil a me nisi orationis acerbitatem et iracundiam et, si forte, raro litterarum missarum indiligentiam reprehensam. quibus quidem in rebus si apud te plus auctoritas mea quam tua sive natura paulo acrior sive quaedam dulcedo iracundiae sive dicendi sal facetiaeque valuissent, nihil sane esset quod nos paeniteret. et mediocri me dolore putas adfici cum audiam qua sit existimatione C. Vergilius, qua tuus vicinus, C. Octavius? nam si te interioribus vicinis tuis, Ciliciensi et Syriaco, anteponis, valde magni facis! atque is dolor est quod, cum ii quos nominavi te innocentia non vincant, vincunt tamen artificio benevolentiae conligendae, qui neque Cyrum Xenophontis neque Agesilaum noverint, quorum regum summo imperio nemo umquam verbum ullum asperius audivit.
But, taking precautions on this point with you from the beginning, I am not unaware of how much I have profited. Yet now, leaving the province — as it seems to me you are doing already — leave behind, I beg you, a memory of yourself as pleasant as can be. You have a most affable successor; in everything else his arrival will make men miss you greatly. As to letter-sending, as I have often written you, you have shown yourself too open to entreaty. Take away all unfair ones, if you can, take away the unusual, take away those that contradict each other. Statius told me that letters written to you used to be brought to him, read by him, and, if they were unfair, you were informed; but before he himself came to you, no selection of letters had been made; from that came volumes of selected epistles which used to be censured.
sed haec a principio tibi praecipiens quantum profecerim non ignoro; nunc tamen decedens, id quod mihi iam facere videris, relinque, quaeso, quam iucundissimam memoriam tui. successorem habes perblandum; cetera valde illius adventu tua requirentur. in litteris mittendis, ut saepe ad te scripsi, nimium te exorabilem praebuisti. tolle omnis, si potes, iniquas, tolle inusitatas, tolle contrarias. Statius mihi narravit scriptas ad te solere adferri, ab se legi, et si iniquae sint fieri te certiorem; ante quam vero ipse ad te venisset, nullum delectum litterarum fuisse; ex eo esse volumina selectarum epistularum quae reprehendi solerent.
On this kind I do not now warn you (for it is too late), and you can know that I have warned you on much, in different ways, with diligence; but that which I gave Theopompus in charge, when I had been admonished by him — see to it through your friends, who love you, which is easy, that these classes of letters be removed: first the unfair, then the contradictory, then those absurdly and unusually written, last those insulting toward someone. And I do not think these things are as great as I hear; and if from your occupations they have been less attended to, look into the matter now and clean them up. I read a letter which Sulla your nomenclator was said to have written, not to be approved; I read several angry ones.
hoc de genere nihil te nunc quidem moneo (sero est enim) ac scire potes multa me varie diligenterque monuisse; illud tamen quod Theopompo mandavi cum essem admonitus ab ipso, vide per homines amantis tui, quod est facile, ut haec genera tollantur epistularum primum iniquarum, deinde contrariarum, tum absurde et inusitate scriptarum, postremo in aliquem contumeliosarum. atque ego haec tam esse quam audio non puto, et si sunt occupationibus tuis minus animadversa nunc perspice et purga. legi epistulam, quam ipse scripsisse Sulla nomenclator dictus est, non probandam, legi non nullas iracundas.
But to come at the right moment to the topic of letters: for as I was holding this page Lucius Flavius the praetor-elect, a man very intimate with me, came to me. He told me that you had sent letters to his procurators, which seemed most unfair to me, that they should diminish nothing of the goods which had been Lucius Octavius Naso’s, of whom Lucius Flavius is heir, before they had paid Gaius Fundanius the money; and likewise that you had sent to the people of Apollonis, that they should not allow anything to be diminished of the goods which had been Octavius’s, before the debt should be paid to Fundanius. These things did not seem to me likely; for they are far removed from your prudence. Should the heir not diminish? What if he denies the debt? What if he owes nothing at all? What? Is the praetor wont to judge that a debt is owed? What? Do I not love Fundanius, am I not his friend, am I not moved by pity? No one more so; but the path of right is in certain matters such that there is no place for favour. And so Flavius told me it was written in that letter, which he said was yours, that you would either grant favours to your friends, as it were, or bring troubles upon them as enemies.
sed tempore ipso de epistulis. nam cum hanc paginam tenerem L. Flavius, praetor designatus, ad me venit, homo mihi valde familiaris. is mihi te ad procuratores suos litteras misisse, quae mihi visae sunt iniquissimae, ne quid de bonis, quae L. Octavi Nasonis fuissent cui L. Flavius heres est, deminuerent, ante quam C. Fundanio pecuniam solvissent, itemque misisse ad Apollonidensis ne de bonis, quae Octavi fuissent, deminui paterentur, prius quam Fundanio debitum solutum esset. haec mihi veri similia non videnr0 tur; sunt enim a prudentia tua remotissima. ne deminuat heres? quid, si infitiatur? quid, si omnino non debet? quid? praetor solet iudicare deberi? quid? ego Fundanio non cupio, non amicus sum, non misericordia moveor? nemo magis; sed via iuris eius modi est quibusdam in rebus ut nihil sit loci gratiae. atque ita mihi dicebat Flavius scriptum in ea epistula quam tuam esse dicebat, te aut quasi amicis tuis gratias acturum aut quasi inimicis incommoda laturum.
Why say more? He took it heavily and made vehement complaint to me, and begged me to write to you as carefully as I could. Which I do, and I beg you very vehemently, again and again: yield to Flavius’s procurators on the question of diminishing, and give the people of Apollonis no further direction in writing that would be against Flavius. You will do everything both for Flavius’s sake and, of course, for Pompey’s. By Hercules, I do not wish to seem generous to him out of an injury done by you. But I beg you also to leave behind some authority and monument of a decree or letter of yours which is suited to Flavius’s affair and case; for the man takes it heavily, both as one most observant of me and as a man tenacious of his right and dignity, that he has carried his point with you neither by friendship nor by law. And, as I think, both Pompey and Caesar at one time commended Flavius’s case to you, and Flavius himself had written to you, and certainly I had. Therefore, if there is any matter you think should be done at my asking, let it be this. If you love me, take care, work hard, see it through, that Flavius give to you and to me the greatest thanks possible. I beg you so that I could not beg with greater eagerness.
quid multa? ferebat graviter et vehementer mecum querebatur orabatque ut ad te quam diligentissime scriberem. quod facio et te prorsus vehementer etiam atque etiam rogo ut te procuratoribus Flavi remittas de deminuendo et Apollonidensibus ne quid praescribas, quod contra Flavium sit, amplius. et Flavi causa et scilicet Pompei facies omnia. nolo medius fidius ex tua iniuria in illum tibi liberalem me videri, sed et te oro ut tu ipse auctoritatem et monumentum aliquod decreti aut litterarum tuarum relinquas quod sit ad Flavi rem et ad causam accommodatum; fert enim graviter homo et mei observantissimus et sui iuris dignitatisque retinens se apud te neque amicitia nec iure valuisse; et, ut opinor, Flavi aliquando rem et Pompeius et Caesar tibi commendarunt et ipse ad te scripserat Flavius et ego certe. qua re, si ulla res est quam tibi me petente faciendam putes, haec ea sit. si me amas, cura, elabora, perfice ut Flavius et tibi et mihi quam maximas gratias agat. hoc te ita rogo ut maiore studio rogare non possim.
What you write to me about Hermias was, by Hercules, very troublesome to me. I had written to you a letter scarcely fraternal; that letter, stirred by the speech of Diodotus, the freedman of Lucullus, about the bargain that had just been made — as I had heard — I had written rather angrily, and was wishing to call back. To this not-fraternal letter, you ought fraternally to grant pardon.
quod ad me de Hermia scribis mihi me hercule valde molestum fuit. Litteras ad te parum fraterne scripseram; quas oratione Diodoti, Luculli liberti, commotus, de pactione statim quod audieram, iracundius scripseram et revocare cupiebam. huic tu epistulae non fraterne scriptae fraterne debes ignoscere.
About Censorinus, Antonius, Cassius, Scaevola — that you are deeply loved by them, as you write, I am vehemently glad. The other things in the same letter were graver than I could have wished, keep the ship upright, and to die only once. Those things will be too great. My censures have been most full of love — which there are some, but moderate and rather small. I should never have thought you worthy of the slightest reproof in any matter, since you are bearing yourself most scrupulously, had we not many enemies. What I have written to you with any admonition or reproof, I wrote out of the diligence of my caution, in which I both stay and shall stay; and I shall not stop asking you to do likewise.
de Censorino, Antonio, cassus, Scaevola te ab iis diligi, ut scribis, vehementer gaudeo. cetera fuerunt in eadem epistula graviora quam vellem, ’ ὀρθὰν τὰν ναῦν,’ et ’ ἅπαξ θανεῖν.’ maiora ista erunt; meae obiurgationes fuerunt amoris plenissimae † quae sunt non nulla, sed tamen mediocria et parva potius. ego te numquam ulla in re dignum minima reprehensione putassem, cum te sanctissime gereres, nisi inimicos multos haberemus. quae ad te aliqua cum monitione aut obiurgatione scripsi, scripsi propter diligentiam cautionis meae, in qua et maneo et manebo et idem ut facias non desistam rogare.
Attalus of Hypaepa pleaded with me that you not stand in the way of the disbursement of the sum that had been decreed for the statue of Q. [Publicenius?]. About this I both ask you and admonish you, that you not wish the honour of so worthy a man, and one so much our intimate, to be diminished or hindered through you. Besides, Licinus, the slave of Aesopus our tragedian, well known to you, has run away. He was at Athens at the house of Patro the Epicurean, passing as free; thence he came to Asia. Afterwards a certain Plato of Sardis, an Epicurean, who is wont to be much at Athens and who had been at Athens when Licinus arrived there, after he had learned from Aesopus’s letters that the man was a runaway, arrested him and handed him over into custody at Ephesus — but whether public custody or the mill, we could not gather sufficiently from his letter. Whatever it is, since he is at Ephesus, I should like you to investigate the man and bring him with you, with the utmost care. Do not consider how much the man is worth; for one who is so worthless is of small price. But Aesopus is so distressed by the slave’s wickedness and audacity that you can do nothing more pleasing to him than to recover him through your help.
Attalus Hypaepenus mecum egit ut se ne impedires quo minus quod ad Q. †Publiceni† statuam decretum est erogaretur. quod ego te et rogo et admoneo ne talis viri tamque nostri necessari honorem minui per te aut impediri velis. praeterea Aesopi, nostri tragoedi familiaris, Licinus servus tibi notus aufugit. is Athenis apud Patronem Epicureum pro libero fuit; inde in Asiam venit. postea Plato quidam Sardianus, Epicureus, qui Athenis solet esse multum et qui tum Athenis fuerat cum Licinius eo venisset, cum eum fugitivum esse postea ex Aesopi litteris cognosset, hominem comprehendit et in custodiam Ephesi tradidit, sed in publicam an in pistrinum non satis ex litteris eius intellegere potuimus. tu, quoquo modo est, quoniam Ephesi est, hominem investiges velim summaque diligentia vel tecum deducas. noli spectare quanti homo sit; parvi enim preti est qui tam nihili sit. sed tanto dolore Aesopus est adfectus propter servi scelus et audaciam ut nihil ei gratius facere possis quam si illum per te reci perarit.
Now learn what you most desire to know. We have utterly lost the commonwealth — so much so that Cato, a young man of no judgment but yet a Roman citizen, and Cato by name, scarcely escaped alive, in that, when he wished to indict Gabinius for bribery, and the praetors could not be approached for several days nor would they grant him hearing, he mounted the Rostra and called Pompey “a private dictator.” He was within an inch of being killed. From this you can see what the condition of the whole commonwealth is.
nunc ea cognosce quae maxime exoptas. rem publicam funditus amisimus, adeo ut Cato, adulescens nullius consili sed tamen civis Romanus et Cato, vix vivus effugerit quod, cum Gabinium de ambitu vellet postulare neque praetores diebus aliquot adiri possent vel potestatem sui facerent, in contionem escendit et Pompeium ’privatum dictatorem’ appellavit. propius nihil est factum quam ut occideretur. ex hoc qui sit status totius rei publicae videre potes.
Yet to our cause men do not seem likely to be lacking; in a wonderful manner they declare themselves, offer their services, give pledges. For my part I am with the highest hope, and with even greater spirit; with hope, that we shall come out on top; with spirit, that I shall not even fear chance in this commonwealth. Yet the matter stands so: if he names the day to me, all Italy will run together, so that we may come away with our glory multiplied; if, however, he tries to act by force, I hope it will come about by the enthusiasm not only of friends but of strangers besides, that we may resist by force. All men are pledging both themselves and their friends, clients, freedmen, slaves, even their money. Our old band of good men is on fire with zeal and love for me. If any before were rather alien or rather lukewarm, now in hatred of these kings they join themselves to the good men. Pompey promises everything, and Caesar; whom I so trust that I diminish nothing of my own preparation. The tribunes-elect of the plebs are friends to us; the consuls show themselves at their best; we have praetors most friendly and citizens most keen — Domitius, Nigidius, Memmius, Lentulus; many other singular good men. Therefore make sure you keep up your great spirit and good hope. Yet about each particular thing that is happening from day to day I shall keep informing you frequently.
nostrae tamen causae non videntur homines defuturi; mirandum in modum profitentur, offerunt se, pollicentur. equidem cum spe sum maxima tum maiore etiam animo, spe, superiores fore nos, animo, ut in hac re publica ne casum quidem ullum pertimescam sed tamen se res sic habet.: si diem nobis dixerit, tota Italia concurret, ut multiplicata gloria discedamus; sin autem vi agere conabitur, spero fore studiis non solum amicorum sed etiam alienorum ut vi resistamus. omnes et se et suos amicos, clientis libertos, servos, pecunias denique suas pollicentur. nostra antiqua manus bonorum ardet studio nostri atque amore. si qui antea aut alieniores fuerant aut languidiores, nunc horum regum odio se cum bonis coniungunt. Pompeius omnia pollicetur et Caesar; quibus ego ita credo ut nihil de mea comparatione deminuam. tribuni pl. designati sunt nobis amici; consules se optime ostendunt; praetores habemus amicissimos et acerrimos civis, Domitium, Nigidium, Memmium, Lentulum; bonos etiam alios singularis. qua re magnum fac animum habeas et spem bonam de singulis tamen rebus quae cotidie gerantur faciam te crebro certiorem.