For King Deiotarus
Pro Rege Deiotaro
Headnote
Delivered before Julius Caesar in November 45 BC, the third and last of Cicero’s three so-called “Caesarian” speeches — after Pro Marcello in the Senate (September 46) and Pro Ligario in the Forum (late November 46) — and the strangest in its setting of the three. The case was not heard in the Forum. Caesar, now Dictator for the fourth time and recently returned from the Spanish campaign against the younger Pompey, sat as sole judge in his own house on the Palatine, with no public audience and no conventus oratorum; Cicero felt and made plain his unease at speaking “within the walls of a private house” (§5). The defendant himself was not present. King Deiotarus of Galatia, an old Roman client of long standing whom Pompey had decorated and whom Caesar had visited at the royal estate after Zela in 47 BC, had been charged with having tried to murder Caesar on that very visit — with armed men hidden in a room at Blucium where the king’s gifts had been laid out, and a second alleged ambush at the bath. The accusers were two: Castor, the king’s own grandson, son of Deiotarus’s daughter and the Tarcondimotid Saocondarius, who hated his grandfather over a tetrarchal inheritance dispute; and Phidippus, a runaway slave from the king’s household, the king’s own physician, sent to Rome with the royal embassy and there suborned by Castor.
Cicero attacks the case on two fronts at once. First, the prosecution itself is a monstrosity (§3): by ancestral Roman law a slave may not even be examined under torture against his master — and here is a slave, untortured, accusing his master in open court. Second, the alleged plot is psychologically impossible: Deiotarus is a man of singular frugalitas (§26), too cautious to attempt murder by force when poison would have been easier (§18), too sane to send the supposed accomplice to Rome afterwards (§21), and bound to Caesar by hospitality sealed at his own household altars. The argument from ius hospitii runs throughout: in §8 Cicero swears Caesar to mercy “by that right hand which as guest you stretched out to the guest King Deiotarus,” and in §15 he piles up the impossibilities of killing a hospes in the sight of the household gods. §13 contains the most quoted line: Deiotarus came to Pompey ut ad fugientem, non ut ad insequentem — “as to one fleeing, not as to one pursuing” — so that he joined a partnership of peril, not of victory. The dancing-naked charge (§26) Cicero ridicules into a passing meditation on the kingly virtues, and the Blesamius letters (§33–34) he reduces to “the little spiteful gossip of the town,” adding the famous demurral that no one has fallen in Caesar’s victory except in arms.
The peroration (§40–43) drops forensic attack altogether and turns frankly to clemency, setting before Caesar the figure of two kings, father and son, whose royal title hangs on this single private hearing. The four embassy chiefs — Hieras, Blesamius, Antigonus, Dorylaus — offer their own bodies for their kings, and Hieras goes so far as to swear that he never left Caesar’s side during the visit and to volunteer himself as defendant in Deiotarus’s place. The verdict is not recorded; Caesar seems to have postponed judgement, and the matter was overtaken five months later by the Ides of March. Of the three Caesarian speeches this is the most subdued and the most plainly forensic — short on clementia-encomium, long on cross-examination — and it carries through it the discomfort of a speech delivered in conditions Cicero had never known before and would not see again.
Though in every more serious case, Gaius Caesar, I am wont at the outset of speaking to be more deeply stirred than either my practice or my years would seem to demand, in this case so many things unsettle me that, while my good faith brings to me as much zeal in the defending of the safety of King Deiotarus, fear takes from me as much in the way of ability. To begin with, I am pleading for the life and fortunes of a king — a thing which, though not unfair when it is your own life that has been at risk, is yet so unprecedented, a king to stand on trial for his life, that before this hour it has never been heard of.
cum in omnibus causis gravioribus, C. Caesar, initio dicendi commoveri soleam vehementius quam videtur vel usus vel aetas mea postulare, tum in hac causa ita multa me perturbant ut, quantum mea fides studi mihi adferat ad salutem regis Deiotari defendendam, tantum facultatis timor detrahat. primum dico pro capite fortunisque regis, quod ipsum, etsi non iniquum est in tuo dumtaxat periculo, tamen est ita inusitatum, regem reum capitis esse, ut ante hoc tempus non sit auditum.
Next, the king whom in former days I was wont to honour, with the whole Senate, for his unbroken services to our commonwealth — this same king I am now compelled to defend against a most atrocious charge. There is added the fact that I am thrown into confusion by the cruelty of the one accuser and the unfitness of the other. Cruel Castor — not to call him criminal and impious — a grandson who has brought his grandfather into peril of his life and has fastened the terror of his own youth upon the man whose old age he ought to have guarded and shielded, and has drawn the credential of his coming-of-age from impiety and from crime; who has bought off his grandfather’s slave with bribes to accuse his master, and has spirited him away from the feet of the king’s envoys.
deinde eum regem quem ornare antea cuncto cum senatu solebam pro perpetuis eius in nostram rem publicam meritis, nunc contra atrocissimum crimen cogor defendere. accedit ut accusatorum alterius crudelitate, alterius indignitate conturber. crudelis Castor, ne dicam sceleratum et impium, qui nepos avum in capitis discrimen adduxerit adulescentiaeque suae terrorem intulerit ei cuius senectutem tueri et tegere debebat, commendationemque ineuntis aetatis ab impietate et ab scelere duxerit; avi servum corruptum praemiis ad accusandum dominum impulerit, a legatorum pedibus abduxerit.
As for the runaway — when I saw the face of a slave accusing his master, and an absent master, and a master most devoted to our commonwealth, when I heard his words, I was not so much grieved at the stricken condition of the throne as I was alarmed for the common fortunes of us all. For though by the custom of our ancestors a slave may not be examined against his master even under torture — the examination in which pain can wring out the true word even from one unwilling — there has now sprung up a slave who, the very master whom he could not have called upon while on the rack, that master he accuses without his bonds.
fugitivi autem dominum accusantis et dominum absentem et dominum amicissimum nostrae rei publicae cum os videbam, cum verba audiebam, non tam adflictam regiam condicionem dolebam quam de fortunis communibus extimescebam. nam cum more maiorum de servo in dominum ne tormentis quidem quaeri liceat, in qua quaestione dolor elicere veram vocem possit etiam ab invito, exortus est servus qui, quem in eculeo appellare non posset, eum accuset solutus.
There is one other thing, Gaius Caesar, that troubles me at times — though, when I look closely at you, I cease to fear it. For it is in itself unfair, yet by your wisdom it is made altogether fair. I mean that to speak before the very man against whose life one is charged with having taken counsel of crime is, when you consider it in itself, a hard thing; for hardly any man, sitting as judge in his own peril, will show himself fairer to the defendant than to himself. But your surpassing and singular nature, Caesar, diminishes that fear for me. For I am not so afraid of what you will judge concerning King Deiotarus as I am aware of what you wish the rest of the world to judge concerning you.
perturbat me, C. Caesar, etiam illud interdum quod tamen, cum te penitus recognovi, timere desino: re enim iniquum est, sed tua sapientia fit aequissimum. nam dicere apud eum de facinore contra cuius vitam consilium facinoris inisse arguare, cum per se ipsum consideres, grave est; nemo enim fere est qui sui periculi iudex non sibi se aequiorem quam reo praebeat. sed tua, Caesar, praestans singularisque natura hunc mihi metum minuit. non enim tam timeo quid tu de rege Deiotaro, quam intellego quid de te ceteros velis iudicare.
I am moved also by the strangeness of the place itself, that I should be pleading a case as great as none ever brought into the lists of debate within the walls of a private house, that I should plead outside any public gathering and outside that thronged audience on which the zeal of orators is wont to rest its strength. In your eyes, in your face and looks, I find my repose; you alone I look upon, to you alone my whole speech is turned — circumstances which are most weighty for my hope of obtaining the truth, but slighter for the rousing of the spirit and for the whole onrush and strain of speaking.
moveor etiam loci ipsius insolentia, quod tantam causam quanta nulla umquam in disceptatione versata est dico intra domesticos parietes, dico extra conventum et eam frequentiam in qua oratorum studia niti solent: in tuis oculis, in tuo ore voltuque acquiesco, te unum intueor, ad te unum omnis spectat oratio: quae mihi ad spem obtinendae veritatis gravissima sunt, ad motum animi et ad omnem impetum dicendi contentionemque leviora.
For if I were pleading this case, Gaius Caesar, in the Forum, with you as both hearer and judge, how great a vigour the throng of the Roman people would bring me! For what citizen would not be favourable to the king whose every year, he would remember, has been spent in the wars of the Roman people? I should look upon the Senate-house, I should look out upon the Forum, I should at last call heaven itself to witness; thus, as I recalled the benefits both of the immortal gods and of the Roman people and of the Senate towards King Deiotarus, words could in no way fail me.
hanc enim, C. Caesar, causam si in foro dicerem eodem audiente et disceptante te, quantam mihi alacritatem populi Romani concursus adferret! quis enim civis ei regi non faveret cuius omnem aetatem in populi Romani bellis consumptam esse meminisset? spectarem curiam, intuerer forum, caelum denique testarer ipsum. sic, cum et deorum immortalium et populi Romani et senatus beneficia in regem Deiotarum recordarer, nullo modo mihi deesse posset oratio.
But since these walls make the scope narrower and the conduct of so great a case is enfeebled by the setting, it is for you, Caesar — who have so often pleaded for others — to refer my present state of mind to your own self, that both your fairness and your attentiveness in hearing may the more easily lessen this disquiet of mine. But before I speak about the accusation itself, let me say a few words about the accusers’ hope; who, though they seem to be strong neither in talent nor in practical experience, have nevertheless come to this case not without some hope and design.
quae quoniam angustiora parietes faciunt actioque maximae causae debilitatur loco, tuum est, Caesar, qui pro multis saepe dixisti, quid mihi nunc animi sit ad te ipsum referre, quo facilius cum aequitas tua tum audiendi diligentia minuat hanc perturbationem meam. sed ante quam de accusatione ipsa dico, de accusatorum spe pauca dicam; qui cum videantur neque ingenio neque usu atque exercitatione rerum valere, tamen ad hanc causam non sine aliqua spe et cogitatione venerunt.
They were not unaware that you had been angry with King Deiotarus; they remembered that he had been visited with certain inconveniences and losses on account of the offence given to your spirit, and they had come to know that you were both angry with him and friendly to themselves; and they thought that, since they were speaking before your very self about your own peril, a trumped-up charge would easily settle in a mind that had been chafed. From this fear, then, Caesar, set us free first of all, by your good faith and your steadiness and your clemency, so that we may not suspect any portion of your anger to be still seated in you. By that right hand of yours, I entreat you — which as guest you stretched out to the guest King Deiotarus — by that right hand, I say, more firm not so much in wars or in battles as in pledges and in good faith. You wished to enter his house, you wished to renew an old guest-friendship; you the household gods received, you as a friend and at peace the altars and hearths of King Deiotarus beheld.
iratum te regi Deiotaro fuisse non erant nescii; adfectum illum quibusdam incommodis et detrimentis propter offensionem animi tui meminerant, teque cum huic iratum, tum sibi amicum esse cognoverant, quodque apud ipsum te de tuo periculo dicerent, fore putabant ut in exulcerato animo facile fictum crimen insideret. quam ob rem hoc nos primum metu, Caesar, per fidem et constantiam et clementiam tuam libera, ne residere in te ullam partem iracundiae suspicemur. per dexteram istam te oro quam regi Deiotaro hospes hospiti porrexisti, istam, inquam, dexteram non tam in bellis neque in proeliis quam in promissis et fide firmiorem. tu illius domum inire, tu vetus hospitium renovare voluisti; te eius di penates acceperunt, te amicum et placatum Deiotari regis arae focique viderunt.
You are easily entreated, Caesar, and once entreated, you are won over. No enemy ever appeased you who felt that any leavings of bitterness had stayed behind in you. Yet who has not heard of your complaints against Deiotarus? You never accused him as an enemy, but as a friend who had discharged his duty too little, in that he had leaned towards Gnaeus Pompey’s friendship more than towards yours. For even this fault, you used to say, you would have pardoned him, if at that time he had sent auxiliaries to Pompey, or even if he had sent his son and pleaded his own age in excuse.
cum facile orari, Caesar, tum semel exorari soles. nemo umquam te placavit inimicus qui ullas resedisse in te simultatis reliquias senserit. quamquam cui sunt inauditae cum Deiotaro querelae tuae? numquam tu illum accusavisti ut hostem, sed ut amicum officio parum functum, quod propensior in Cn. Pompei amicitiam fuisset quam in tuam: cui tamen ipsi rei veniam te daturum fuisse dicebas, si tum auxilia Pompeio vel si etiam filium misisset, ipse aetatis excusatione usus esset.
Thus, when you were freeing him from the gravest charges, you were leaving him a very small fault. And so you not only inflicted no penalty on him: you freed him of every fear, you acknowledged him as your guest, you left him a king. For he was not carried forward by hatred of you, but slipped through the common error. That king whom the Senate had often addressed by that very title in decrees most full of honour, and who from his earliest youth had counted that order most weighty and most sacred — this man, a distant foreigner of another race, was thrown into the same confusion as ourselves, born and ever turning in the heart of the commonwealth.
ita cum maximis eum rebus liberares, perparvam culpam relinquebas. itaque non solum in eum non animadvertisti sed omni metu liberavisti, hospitem agnovisti, regem reliquisti. neque enim ille odio tui progressus, sed errore communi lapsus est. is rex quem senatus hoc nomine saepe honorificentissimis decretis appellavisset, quique illum ordinem ab adulescentia gravissimum sanctissimumque duxisset, isdem rebus est perturbatus homo longinquus et alienigena quibus nos in media re publica nati semperque versati.
When he heard that, by the authority of a Senate of one mind, arms had been taken up, that consuls, praetors, tribunes of the plebs, and we who were imperators had been given the commonwealth to defend, he was stirred in spirit, and being a man most friendly to this empire, he was in dread for the safety of the Roman people, in which he saw his own to be also bound up. Yet in this utmost fear he judged that he ought to keep quiet. He was most disturbed of all, however, when he heard that the consuls had fled out of Italy, that all the men of consular rank had fled — so it was reported to him — that the whole Senate, all of Italy, had streamed out. For to such messages and rumours the road eastward lay open, and no true report came after them. He heard nothing about your terms of settlement, nothing about your zeal for concord and peace, nothing about the conspiracy of certain men against your dignity. Such being the case, nevertheless he held himself in check up to the moment when envoys and letters from Gnaeus Pompey came to him.
cum audiret senatus consentientis auctoritate arma sumpta, consulibus, praetoribus, tribunis plebis, nobis imperatoribus rem publicam defendendam datam, movebatur animo et vir huic imperio amicissimus de salute populi Romani extimescebat, in qua etiam suam esse inclusam videbat. in summo tamen timore quiescendum esse arbitrabatur. maxime vero perturbatus est, ut audivit consules ex Italia profugisse, omnis consularis—sic enim ei nuntiabatur —cunctum senatum, totam Italiam effusam. talibus enim nuntiis et rumoribus patebat ad orientem via nec ulli veri subsequebantur. nihil ille de condicionibus tuis, nihil de studio concordiae et pacis, nihil de conspiratione audiebat certorum hominum contra dignitatem tuam. quae cum ita essent, tamen usque eo se tenuit quoad a Cn. Pompeio legati ad eum litteraeque venerunt.
Forgive him, forgive him, Caesar, if King Deiotarus yielded to the authority of that man whom we all followed; on whom, when gods and men had heaped every distinction, you yourself most of all had heaped distinctions both numerous and great. For if your own deeds have brought obscurity upon the praises of all the rest, we have not on that account forgotten the memory of Gnaeus Pompey. How great his name was, how great his resources, how great his glory in every kind of war, how great the honours paid him by the Roman people, how great by the Senate, how great by yourself — who does not know? He had so far surpassed those before him in glory as you have surpassed all men. And so the wars of Gnaeus Pompey, his victories, triumphs, consulships, we used to number with wonder: yours we cannot reckon up.
ignosce, ignosce, Caesar, si eius viri auctoritati rex Deiotarus cessit quem nos omnes secuti sumus; ad quem cum di atque homines omnia ornamenta congessissent, tum tu ipse plurima et maxima. nec enim, si tuae res gestae ceterorum laudibus obscuritatem attulerunt, idcirco Cn. Pompei memoriam amisimus. quantum nomen illius fuerit, quantae opes, quanta in omni genere bellorum gloria, quanti honores populi Romani, quanti senatus, quanti tui, quis ignorat? tanto ille superiores vicerat gloria quanto tu omnibus praestitisti. itaque Cn. Pompei bella, victorias, triumphos, consulatus admirantes numerabamus: tuos enumerare non possumus.
To him, then, King Deiotarus came, in this wretched and fated war — a man he had previously aided in just and lawful wars, a man with whom he was joined not only by guest-friendship but even by intimate familiarity; and he came either invited as a friend, or summoned as an ally, or called out as one who had learnt to obey the Senate: in short, he came as to one fleeing, not as to one pursuing, that is, into the partnership of peril, not of victory. And so, once the battle of Pharsalus had been fought, he withdrew from Pompey; he was unwilling to follow an unbounded hope; he held that satisfaction had been made — for duty, if he owed anything, for error, if anything had escaped his knowledge — and he betook himself home, and, while you were waging the Alexandrian war, served your interests.
ad eum igitur rex Deiotarus venit hoc misero fatalique bello quem antea iustis hostilibusque bellis adiuverat, quocum erat non hospitio solum verum etiam familiaritate coniunctus, et venit vel rogatus ut amicus, vel arcessitus ut socius, vel evocatus ut is qui senatui parere didicisset: postremo venit ut ad fugientem, non ut ad insequentem, id est ad periculi, non ad victoriae societatem. itaque Pharsalico proelio facto a Pompeio discessit; spem infinitam persequi noluit; vel officio si quid debuerat, vel errori si quid nescierat, satis factum esse duxit; domum se contulit, teque Alexandrinum bellum gerente utilitatibus tuis paruit.
It was he who sustained the army of Gnaeus Domitius, that most distinguished man, with his own roofs and supplies; it was he who sent money to Ephesus, to the man whom you had chosen out of your own people as the most loyal and the most approved by all; it was he who, holding auctions a second and a third time, gave money for you to use in the war; it was he who exposed his own body to peril, and stood with you in the battle-line against Pharnaces, and held your enemy to be his own. These things, indeed, were so received by you, Caesar, that you adorned him with the most ample title and name of king.
ille exercitum Cn. Domiti, amplissimi viri, suis tectis et copiis sustentavit; ille Ephesum ad eum quem tu ex tuis fidelissimum et probatissimum omnibus delegisti pecuniam misit; ille iterum, ille tertio auctionibus factis pecuniam dedit qua ad bellum uterere; ille corpus suum periculo obiecit, tecumque in acie contra Pharnacem fuit tuumque hostem esse duxit suum. quae quidem a te in eam partem accepta sunt, Caesar, ut eum amplissimo regis honore et nomine adfeceris.
This man, then, not only freed of peril by you but also adorned with the most ample honour, is now charged with having wished to murder you in his own house — which, unless you judge him utterly mad, you surely cannot even suspect. For to pass over how great a crime it would be to slay a guest in the very sight of the household gods, how great a savagery to extinguish the brightest light of all nations and all memory, how great a ferocity not to dread the conqueror of the world, how great an inhuman and ungrateful spirit to be found a tyrant by the man who had given him the name of king — to pass all this over, how great a madness it would have been to rouse against himself alone every king (and many were his neighbours), every free people, every ally, every province, in short, all the arms of all the world? In what way could he have been torn apart from his kingdom, his house, his wife, his most beloved son — a crime of such magnitude not only carried out but even conceived?
is igitur non modo a te periculo liberatus sed etiam honore amplissimo ornatus, arguitur domi te suae interficere voluisse: quod tu, nisi eum furiosissimum iudicas, suspicari profecto non potes. ut enim omittam cuius tanti sceleris fuerit in conspectu deorum penatium necare hospitem, cuius tantae importunitatis omnium gentium atque omnis memoriae clarissimum lumen exstinguere, cuius ferocitatis victorem orbis terrae non extimescere, cuius tam inhumani et ingrati animi, a quo rex appellatus esset, in eo tyrannum inveniri—ut haec omittam, cuius tanti furoris fuit omnis reges, quorum multi erant finitimi, omnis liberos populos, omnis socios, omnis provincias, omnia denique omnium arma contra se unum excitare? quonam ille modo cum regno, cum domo, cum coniuge, cum carissimo filio distractus esset, tanto scelere non modo perfecto sed etiam cogitato?
But, I suppose, this man, being rash and headlong, did not see these things. Who more thoughtful than he, who more guarded, who more prudent? Yet in this place I think that Deiotarus should be defended not so much by his talent and good sense as by the loyalty and the religion of his whole life. The man’s uprightness is known to you, Gaius Caesar; known his character, known his constancy. To anyone, again, who has merely heard the name of the Roman people, has not Deiotarus’s integrity, gravity, virtue, good faith been heard of? A deed, then, that would not fall to a man without sense by reason of fear of present ruin, nor to a criminal man unless he were also wholly out of his mind — this you fabricate as the design of the best of men and of a man by no means a fool?
at, credo, haec homo inconsultus et temerarius non videbat. quis consideratior illo, quis tectior, quis prudentior? quamquam hoc loco Deiotarum non tam ingenio et prudentia quam fide et religione vitae defendendum puto. nota tibi est hominis probitas, C. Caesar, noti mores, nota constantia. cui porro qui modo populi Romani nomen audivit, Deiotari integritas, gravitas, virtus, fides non audita est? quod igitur facinus nec in hominem imprudentem caderet propter metum praesentis exiti, nec in facinerosum, nisi esset idem amentissimus, id vos et a viro optimo et ab homine minime stulto cogitatum esse confingitis?
And how, not only not credibly, but not even plausibly! “When,” he says, “you came to Blucium and turned aside into the house of your royal host, there was a certain room in which had been laid out the things with which the king had decided to present you. To this place, after the bath, before you reclined at table, he wished to lead you. For armed men had been placed in that very room to murder you.” Behold the charge, behold the cause why a runaway accuses a king, a slave a master! For my part, by Hercules, Caesar, at the outset, when the case was first laid before me in this form, that Phidippus the physician, the king’s slave, who had been sent along with the envoys, had been bribed by that young man, I was struck by this suspicion: “He has suborned the physician as informer; clearly he will fabricate some charge of poison.” Though far from the truth, the thing was not far removed from the usual style of accusations.
at quam non modo non credibiliter, sed ne suspiciose quidem! cum inquit Blucium venisses et domum regis hospitis tui devertisses, locus erat quidam in quo erant ea composita quibus te rex munerari constituerat. huc te e balneo, prius quam accumberes, ducere volebat. erant enim armati ut te interficerent in eo ipso loco conlocati. en crimen, en causa, cur regem fugitivus, dominum servus accuset. ego mehercules, Caesar, initio, cum est ad me ita causa delata, Phidippum medicum, servum regium, qui cum legatis missus esset, ab isto adulescente esse corruptum, hac sum suspicione percussus: medicum indicem subornavit; finget videlicet aliquod crimen veneni. etsi a veritate longe, tamen a consuetudine criminandi non multum res abhorrebat.
What does the physician say? Nothing about poison. Yet that could have been done, first, more secretly — in a drink, in food; and secondly, more safely, because when done it can be denied. Had he killed you openly, he would have turned against himself not only the hatreds but the very arms of all nations: had he done it by poison, he could never have hidden it from the divine will of Jove the protector of hospitality, though men perhaps he could have hidden it from. What therefore he could have attempted with more secrecy and accomplished with more caution, this he refused to entrust to you (sic!) — to a cunning physician and to a slave he reckoned faithful: but about arms, about steel, about ambushes, he was unwilling to keep you in the dark?
quid ait medicus? nihil de veneno. at id fieri potuit primum occultius in potione, in cibo; deinde etiam impunius fit quod, cum est factum, negari potest. si palam te interemisset, omnium in se gentium non solum odia sed etiam arma convertisset: si veneno, Iovis illius hospitalis numen numquam celare potuisset, homines fortasse celasset. quod igitur et conari occultius et efficere cautius potuit, id tibi et medico callido et servo, ut putabat, fideli non credidit: de armis, de ferro, de insidiis celare te noluit?
And with what wit the charge is patched together! “Your usual luck,” he says, “which has often saved you, saved you then too: you said you did not wish to inspect them.” What followed? Did Deiotarus, since the deed was not at the moment accomplished, at once disband his army? Was there no other place for an ambush? “But you had said you were coming back to that same place after dinner, and so you did.” Was it then so great a matter to keep armed men for an hour or two in the same place where they had been stationed? When you had been at the dinner in friendly and pleasant fashion, you went over there, as you had said: in which place you found Deiotarus to be towards you such as King Attalus was towards Publius Africanus, to whom, as we read, he sent the most magnificent gifts from Asia, all the way to Numantia — gifts which Africanus accepted in the sight of the army. When Deiotarus, then present, had done the like in a kingly spirit and after the kingly fashion, you withdrew into the bedchamber.
at quam festive crimen contexitur! tua te inquit eadem quae saepe fortuna servavit: negavisti tum te inspicere velle. quid postea? an Deiotarus, re illo tempore non perfecta, continuo dimisit exercitum? nullus erat alius insidiandi locus? at eodem te, cum cenavisses, rediturum dixeras, itaque fecisti. Horam unam aut duas eodem loco armatos, ut conlocati fuerant, retineri magnum fuit? cum in convivio comiter et iucunde fuisses, tum illuc isti, ut dixeras: quo in loco Deiotarum talem erga te cognovisti qualis rex Attalus in P. Africanum fuit, cui magnificentissima dona, ut scriptum legimus, usque ad Numantiam misit ex Asia, quae Africanus inspectante exercitu accepit. quod cum praesens Deiotarus regio animo et more fecisset, tu in cubiculum discessisti.
I beseech you, Caesar, call back the memory of that hour, set before your eyes that day, recollect the looks of the men who gazed on you in admiration. Was there any trembling, any disturbance, anything that did not bear the stamp of a most weighty and most blameless man’s discipline? Modest, quiet, in keeping with the bearing of such a man? What reason, then, can be devised why he should have wished to kill you washed, but not when you had dined?
obsecro, Caesar, repete illius temporis memoriam, pone ante oculos illum diem, voltus hominum te intuentium atque admirantium recordare. num quae trepidatio, num qui tumultus, num quid nisi modeste, nisi quiete, nisi ex hominis gravissimi et sanctissimi disciplina? quid igitur causae excogitari potest cur te lautum voluerit, cenatum noluerit occidere?
“He put it off,” he says, “to the following day, so that, when you had come to the fortress, he might there carry out what he had planned.” I do not see any reason for changing the place, but still the matter is darkly handled. “When,” he says, “you had said that you wished to vomit after dinner, they began to lead you to the bath: for there the ambush was. Yet your same luck saved you: you said you preferred the bedchamber.” May the gods destroy you, runaway! So you are not only worthless and dishonest, but also a witless idiot. What? Had he set up bronze statues in the bath, which could not be moved from the bath into the bedchamber? You have the charges of the ambush: for he said nothing more. “Of these things,” he says, “I was an accomplice.” What then? Was Deiotarus so out of his wits that the very man he held as accomplice of so great a crime he would send away from himself, would even send to Rome, where he knew that both his bitterest enemy his grandson, and Gaius Caesar against whom he had laid an ambush, were to be found — especially when this was the one man who could give evidence about him in his absence?
in posterum inquit diem distulit ut, cum in castellum ventum esset, ibi cogitata perficeret. non video causam loci mutandi, sed tamen acta res criminose est. cum inquit vomere post cenam te velle dixisses, in balneum te ducere coeperunt: ibi enim erant insidiae. at te eadem tua fortuna servavit: in cubiculo malle dixisti. di te perduint, fugitive! ita non modo nihili et improbus, sed fatuus et amens es. quid? ille signa aenea in balneo posuerat, quae e balneo in cubiculum transire non possent? habes crimina insidiarum: nihil enim dixit amplius. horum inquit eram conscius. quid tum? ita ille demens erat ut eum quem conscium tanti sceleris habebat ab se dimitteret, Romam etiam mitteret ubi et inimicissimum sciret esse nepotem suum et C. Caesarem cui fecisset insidias, praesertim cum is unus esset qui posset de absente se indicare?
“And my brothers,” he says, “because they were accomplices, he cast in chains.” When, then, he was binding those whom he had with him, he was sending you, untied, to Rome — you who knew the same things which you say they knew? The rest of the accusation was twofold: one part, that the king had always been on the watch, alienated from you in spirit; the other, that he had got together a great army against you. About the army I shall speak briefly, as about the rest. Never did King Deiotarus have such forces as he could wage war upon the Roman people with — only such as he could guard his own borders from raids and brigands and could send as auxiliaries to our commanders. And in former days he could indeed maintain greater forces; now he can scarcely keep up the slender ones he has.
et fratres meos, inquit, quod erant conscii, in vincla coniecit. cum igitur eos vinciret quos secum habebat, te solutum Romam mittebat qui eadem scires quae illos scire dicis? reliqua pars accusationis duplex fuit: una regem in speculis semper fuisse, cum a te animo esset alieno, altera exercitum eum contra te magnum comparasse. de exercitu dicam breviter, ut cetera. numquam eas copias rex Deiotarus habuit quibus inferre bellum populo Romano posset, sed quibus finis suos ab excursionibus et latrociniis tueretur et imperatoribus nostris auxilia mitteret. atque antea quidem maiores copias alere poterat; nunc exiguas vix tueri potest.
“But he sent to a certain Caecilius”: only those whom he sent, because they refused to go, he cast in chains. I do not ask how likely it is either that the king had no others to send, or that those who had been sent disobeyed, or that those who in so great a matter were not obedient should rather have been chained than killed. But all the same, when he was sending to Caecilius, did he not know that that cause had been beaten — or did he think this Caecilius of yours a great man? A man whom assuredly the one who knows our people best would either despise because he did not know him, or, if he did know him, despise him for that very reason.
at misit ad nescio quem Caecilium: sed eos quos misit, quod ire noluerunt, in vincla coniecit. non quaero quam veri simile sit aut non habuisse regem quos mitteret aut eos qui missi essent non paruisse, aut, qui dicto audientes in tanta re non fuissent, eos vinctos potius quam necatos. sed tamen cum ad Caecilium mittebat, utrum causam illam victam esse nesciebat an Caecilium istum magnum hominem putabat? quem profecto is qui optime nostros homines novit vel quia non nosset vel si nosset, contemneret.
He adds also this: that the cavalry he sent were not of the best. I believe, Caesar, nothing to compare with your own cavalry: but he sent from those he had, picked men. He says that someone or other from that number was judged a slave. I do not so believe; I have not heard so. But even if it had been the case, I should reckon that no fault of the king’s. But “estranged in spirit from you” — in what way? He hoped, I suppose, that your Alexandrian campaign would have a difficult outcome on account of the nature of the country and of the river. Yet at that very time he gave money, he supported the army, he failed in nothing towards the man you had set in charge of Asia; he was at hand for you the victor not only for hospitality but for danger and for the battle-line.
addit etiam illud, equites non optimos misisse. credo, Caesar, nihil ad tuum equitatum, sed misit ex eis quos habuit electos. ait nescio quem ex eo numero servum iudicatum. non arbitror, non audivi: sed in eo, etiam si accidisset, culpam regis nullam fuisse arbitrarer. alieno autem a te animo quo modo? speravit, credo, difficilis tibi Alexandreae fore exitus propter regionum naturam et fluminis. at eo tempore ipso pecuniam dedit, exercitum aluit, ei quem Asiae praefeceras nulla in re defuit; tibi victori non solum ad hospitium sed ad periculum etiam atque ad aciem praesto fuit.
Then followed the African war. Grave rumours about you ran abroad, which even stirred up that crazy Caecilius. With what spirit was the king then — he who held auctions and chose rather to strip himself than not to supply you with money? “But at that very time,” he says, “he was sending men to Nicaea and Ephesus to catch the rumours from Africa and report them to him quickly.” And so when it had been reported to him that Domitius had perished in a shipwreck, that you were besieged in a fort, he said about Domitius a Greek verse to the same effect as the Latin one we ourselves have: “Let friends perish, provided enemies fall along with them.” But this verse he, if he had been your bitterest enemy, would still never have uttered: for he himself is mild, the verse savage. And how could he have been a friend to Domitius, while an enemy to you? An enemy, again, to you — and why? When he remembered that he, who by the law of war could even have been put to death, had by you been established as king together with his son.
secutum bellum est Africanum. graves de te rumores, qui etiam furiosum illum Caecilium excitaverunt. quo tum rex animo, qui auctionatus sit seseque spoliare maluerit quam tibi pecuniam non subministrare. at eo inquit tempore ipso Nicaeam Ephesumque mittebat qui rumores Africanos exciperent et celeriter ad se referrent. itaque cum esset ei nuntiatum Domitium naufragio perisse, te in castello circumsederi, de Domitio dixit versum Graecum eadem sententia qua etiam nos habemus Latinum: pereant amici, dum inimici una intercidant. quod ille, si tibi esset inimicissimus, numquam tamen dixisset: ipse enim mansuetus, versus immanis. qui autem Domitio poterat esse amicus, qui tibi esset inimicus? tibi porro inimicus cur esset a quo, cum vel interfici belli lege potuisset, regem et se et filium suum constitutos esse meminisset?
What next? Where does the rascal go on to? He says that Deiotarus, carried away by this joy, drowned himself in wine and danced naked at a banquet. What cross can bring punishment enough on this runaway? Did anyone ever see Deiotarus dancing, or drunken? All the virtues are in that king — which I do not think escapes you, Caesar — but most of all a singular and admirable frugality: though I know that kings are not usually praised by this word. To be called a thrifty man does not have much of praise in it for a king: brave, just, severe, weighty, of great spirit, generous, beneficent, liberal — these are the kingly praises; the other is for private life. Let each take it as he will: I, for my part, judge frugality, that is to say modesty and temperance, to be the greatest virtue. This he has had from his earliest years, marked and known by all Asia, by our magistrates and legates, and especially by the Roman knights who have done business in Asia.
quid deinde? furcifer quo progreditur? ait hac laetitia Deiotarum elatum vino se obruisse in convivioque nudum saltavisse. quae crux huic fugitivo potest satis supplici adferre? Deiotarum saltantem quisquam aut ebrium vidit umquam? omnes sunt in illo rege virtutes, quod te, Caesar, ignorare non arbitror, sed praecipue singularis et admiranda frugalitas: etsi hoc verbo scio laudari reges non solere. Frugi hominem dici non multum habet laudis in rege: fortem, iustum, severum, gravem, magni animi, largum, beneficum, liberalem: hae sunt regiae laudes, illa privata est. ut volet quisque, accipiat: ego tamen frugalitatem, id est modestiam et temperantiam, virtutem maximam iudico. haec in illo est ab ineunte aetate cum a cuncta Asia, cum a magistratibus legatisque nostris, tum ab equitibus Romanis qui in Asia negotiati sunt perspecta et cognita.
By many steps of services towards our commonwealth he climbed to this royal title; yet whatever time was free from the wars of the Roman people, he gave to acquaintances, friendships, business dealings and accounts with our countrymen, so that he was held not only a noble tetrarch but also a most excellent father of a family, and a most attentive farmer and cattle-breeder. He, then, who as a young man not yet endowed with so great glory did nothing except in the strictest and gravest fashion — did he, with such a reputation and at such an age, take to dancing?
multis ille quidem gradibus officiorum erga rem publicam nostram ad hoc regium nomen ascendit; sed tamen quicquid a bellis populi Romani vacabat, cum hominibus nostris consuetudines, amicitias, res rationesque iungebat, ut non solum tetrarches nobilis sed etiam optimus pater familias et diligentissimus agricola et pecuarius haberetur. qui igitur adulescens nondum tanta gloria praeditus nihil umquam nisi severissime et gravissime fecerit, is ea existimatione eaque aetate saltavit?
You ought, Castor, rather to imitate the character and the discipline of your grandfather, than to slander a man most excellent and most distinguished through a runaway’s mouth. Even if you had had a dancer for grandfather, and not a man from whom examples of modesty and chastity might be sought, still this abuse would suit his age not at all. The studies which he had imbibed from his earliest years — not how to dance, but how to handle weapons well and horses superbly — had now, with the whole of his age, failed him. And so, when many had lifted Deiotarus into the saddle, we used to wonder that as an old man he could keep his seat; but this young man — who was my soldier in Cilicia, my fellow-soldier in Greece — when in our army he was riding with the picked cavalry which his father had sent along with him to Pompey, what charges he used to make! how he displayed himself, how he showed himself off, how he yielded to no one in that cause in zeal and eagerness!
imitari, Castor, potius avi mores disciplinamque debebas quam optimo et clarissimo viro fugitivi ore male dicere. quod si saltatorem avum habuisses neque eum virum unde pudoris pudicitiaeque exempla peterentur, tamen hoc maledictum minime in illam aetatem conveniret. quibus ille studiis ab ineunte aetate se imbuerat, non saltandi, sed bene ut armis, optime ut equis uteretur, ea tamen illum cuncta iam aetate defecerant. itaque Deiotarum cum plures in equum sustulissent, quod haerere in eo senex posset, admirari solebamus: hic vero adulescens qui meus in Cilicia miles, in Graecia commilito fuit, cum in illo nostro exercitu equitaret cum suis delectis equitibus quos una cum eo ad Pompeium pater miserat, quos concursus facere solebat, quam se iactare, quam ostentare, quam nemini in illa causa studio et cupiditate concedere!
Then, when the army was lost, I, who had always been an advocate of peace, and after the battle of Pharsalus a counsellor not for laying down arms but for casting them away, could not bring this man over to my advice, both because he himself was burning with zeal for that war, and because he thought he owed it to his father to do so. Lucky is your house, which has obtained not only impunity but even licence to accuse: wretched is Deiotarus, who is accused both by a man who served in the same camp, and not only before you but by his own household. Are you, Castor, not able with your prosperous fortune to be content without the ruin of your kin?
tum vero exercitu amisso ego, qui pacis semper auctor, post Pharsalicum autem proelium suasor fuissem armorum non ponendorum, sed abiciendorum, hunc ad meam auctoritatem non potui adducere, quod et ipse ardebat studio illius belli et patri satis faciendum arbitrabatur. felix ista domus quae non impunitatem solum adepta sit sed etiam accusandi licentiam: calamitosus Deiotarus qui et ab eo qui in isdem castris fuerit, et non modo apud te sed etiam a suis accusetur! vos vestra secunda fortuna, Castor, non potestis sine propinquorum calamitate esse contenti?
Let there be enmities, by all means — though there ought not to have been: for it was King Deiotarus who called your family out of the darkness, cast down and obscure, into the light. Who heard of your father before he heard whose son-in-law he was? But however ungratefully and impiously you spurn the name of kinship, still you might have carried on the quarrel in human fashion: not pursue him with a fabricated charge, not strive after his life, not arraign him on a capital count. Be it so: let even this magnitude of bitterness and hatred be granted: should every right of life and of common safety, indeed of common humanity itself, be trampled upon? To solicit a slave by words, to corrupt him with hope and promises, to lead him away from his master’s home, to arm him against his master — this is to declare not against one kinsman but against every household a wicked war. For if this corrupting of a slave goes not only unpunished but is even ratified by so great an authority, no walls will guard our safety, no laws, no rights. For when what is within the house and is our own can fly out with impunity and fight against us, then in the master’s place is servitude, and in the slave’s place mastery.
sint sane inimicitiae, quae esse non debebant—rex enim Deiotarus vestram familiam abiectam et obscuram e tenebris in lucem evocavit: quis tuum patrem ante quis esset quam cuius gener esset audivit?—sed quamvis ingrate et impie necessitudinis nomen repudiaretis, tamen inimicitias hominum more gerere poteratis, non ficto crimine insectari, non expetere vitam, non capitis arcessere. esto: concedatur haec quoque acerbitatis et odi magnitudo: adeone ut omnia vitae salutisque communis atque etiam humanitatis iura violentur? servum sollicitare verbis, spe promissisque corrumpere, abducere domum, contra dominum armare, hoc est non uni propinquo, sed omnibus familiis nefarium bellum indicere. nam ista corruptela servi si non modo impunita fuerit sed etiam a tanta auctoritate approbata, nulli parietes nostram salutem, nullae leges, nulla iura custodient. Vbi enim id quod intus est atque nostrum impune evolare potest contraque nos pugnare, fit in dominatu servitus, in servitute dominatus.
O the times, O the manners! That Gnaeus Domitius whom we saw as boys — consul, censor, pontifex maximus — when as tribune of the plebs he had haled Marcus Scaurus, the chief man of the state, before the people’s court, and Scaurus’s slave had come secretly to his house and said that he was going to inform against his master, ordered the man to be seized and brought to Scaurus. See what a difference — though unfairly do I compare Castor with Domitius: yet that man sent back his enemy’s slave; you spirited him away from his grandfather. That man refused to hear him unbribed; you have bribed him. That man rejected the slave as helper against his master; you have even taken him on as accuser. But, you will say, this slave was bribed by you only once.
O tempora, o mores! Cn. Domitius ille quem nos pueri consulem, censorem, pontificem maximum vidimus, cum tribunus plebis M. Scaurum principem civitatis in iudicium populi vocavisset Scaurique servus ad eum clam domum venisset et crimina in dominum delaturum se esse dixisset, prendi hominem iussit ad Scaurumque deduci. vide quid intersit, etsi inique Castorem cum Domitio comparo: sed tamen ille inimico servum remisit, tu ab avo abduxisti; ille incorruptum audire noluit, tu corrupisti; ille adiutorem servum contra dominum repudiavit, tu etiam accusatorem adhibuisti. at semel iste est corruptus a vobis.
When he had been brought to you and had been with you, did he not run back to the envoys? Did he not come to this Gnaeus Domitius? Did he not, in the hearing of Servius Sulpicius, that most distinguished man, who happened then to be dining at Domitius’s, and of this Titus Torquatus, that excellent young man, confess that he had been bribed by you, that he had been driven into deceit by your promises? What is this so ungovernable, so cruel, so unbounded inhumanity? Did you come to this city for the purpose that you might corrupt this city’s rights and precedents, and stain our state’s humanity with your domestic savagery?
nonne, cum esset perductus et cum tecum fuisset, refugit ad legatos? nonne ad hunc Cn. Domitium venit? nonne audiente hoc Ser. Sulpicio, clarissimo viro, qui tum casu apud Domitium cenabat, et hoc T. Torquato, optimo adulescente, se a te corruptum, tuis promissis in fraudem impulsum esse confessus est? quae est ista tam impotens, tam crudelis, tam immoderata inhumanitas? idcirco in hanc urbem venisti ut huius urbis iura et exempla corrumperes domesticaque immanitate nostrae civitatis humanitatem inquinares?
And how shrewdly the charges are gathered together! “Blesamius” — for it was under his name, an excellent man and not unknown to you, that he was abusing you — “Blesamius,” he says, “used to write to the king that you were in disfavour, that you were thought a tyrant, that, by your statue’s being set among those of the kings, men’s minds were violently offended, that there was no applause for you.” Do you not see, Caesar, that these things have been gathered up by them out of the little spiteful gossip of the town? Was Blesamius likely to write that Caesar was a tyrant? For he would have seen the heads of many citizens, many men, by Caesar’s order, harried, scourged, put to death; many houses ruined and overturned; the Forum filled with armed soldiers! What we have always seen in civil victory, in your victory we have not seen.
at quam acute conlecta crimina! Blesamius inquit,—eius enim nomine, optimi viri nec tibi ignoti, male dicebat tibi— ad regem inquit scribere solebat te in invidia esse, tyrannum existimari, statua inter reges posita animos hominum vehementer offensos, plaudi tibi non solere. nonne intellegis, Caesar, ex urbanis malevolorum sermunculis haec ab istis esse conlecta? Blesamius tyrannum Caesarem scriberet? multorum enim capita civium viderat, multos iussu Caesaris vexatos, verberatos, necatos, multas adflictas et eversas domos, armatis militibus refertum forum! quae semper in civili victoria sensimus, ea te victore non vidimus.
You alone, I say, you, Gaius Caesar, are he in whose victory no one has fallen except in arms. And the man whom we, born free in the highest freedom of the Roman people, hold to be not only no tyrant but the most clement of victors — can he seem to Blesamius, who lives under a monarchy, a tyrant? As for the statue, who complains — and one statue at that, when he sees so many? For surely it is much to be envied that he should have statues, whose trophies we do not envy. For if the place gives the envy, there is no place at least, for a statue, more famous than the Rostra. About the applause, what shall I answer? An applause which has never been wanted by you, and which has sometimes been silenced by the very wonder of men struck dumb in admiration, and perhaps passed over because nothing common can be thought worthy of you.
solus, inquam, es, C. Caesar, cuius in victoria ceciderit nemo nisi armatus. et quem nos liberi in summa populi Romani libertate nati non modo non tyrannum sed etiam clementissimum in victoria ducimus, is Blesamio qui vivit in regno tyrannus videri potest? nam de statua quis queritur, una praesertim, cum tam multas videat? valde enim invidendum est eius statuis cuius tropaeis non invidemus. nam si locus adfert invidiam, nullus est ad statuam quidem rostris clarior. de plausu autem quid respondeam? qui nec desideratus umquam in te est et non numquam obstupefactis hominibus ipsa admiratione compressus est et fortasse eo praetermissus quia nihil volgare te dignum videri potest.
I think nothing has been omitted by me, but something has been reserved to the last part of the case. And what is this something? That my speech may quite reconcile you to Deiotarus. For I no longer fear that you may be angry with him; this I fear, that you may suspect him to be at all angry with you: which is very far off, believe me, Caesar. For what he remembers is what he keeps through you, not what he has lost: nor does he reckon that he has been punished by you, but, since you judged that much should be granted to many, he did not refuse that you should take it from him, who had been on the other side, that you might give it.
nihil a me arbitror praeteritum, sed aliquid ad extremam partem causae reservatum. id autem aliquid quid est? te ut plane Deiotaro reconciliet oratio mea. non enim iam metuo ne illi tu suscenseas; illud vereor ne tibi illum suscensere aliquid suspicere: quod abest longissime, mihi crede, Caesar. quid enim retineat per te meminit, non quid amiserit; neque se a te multatum arbitratur, sed, cum existimares multis tibi multa esse tribuenda, quo minus a se qui in altera parte fuisset ea sumeres non recusavit.
For indeed if Antiochus the Great, that king of Asia, when — after he had been overcome by Lucius Scipio and ordered to reign only as far as Taurus — he had lost all this Asia which is now our province, was wont to say that the Roman people had dealt kindly with him, in that, freed of an overlarge charge, he might use the modest bounds of his kingdom: how much more easily can Deiotarus comfort himself in the same way. For Antiochus had paid the penalty of his madness; this man has paid the penalty of his error. You have granted everything to Deiotarus, Caesar, in that you have left the royal title both to him and to his son. With this title kept and preserved, he holds that no benefit from the Roman people, no judgement of the Senate concerning him, has been diminished. He is of great and uplifted spirit; he will never sink under enemies, not even under fortune.
etenim si Antiochus Magnus ille, rex Asiae, cum, postea quam a L. Scipione devictus Tauro tenus regnare iussus est, omnem hanc Asiam quae est nunc nostra provincia amisisset, dicere est solitus benigne sibi a populo Romano esse factum, quod nimis magna procuratione liberatus modicis regni terminis uteretur, potest multo facilius hoc se Deiotarus consolari. ille enim furoris multam sustulerat, hic erroris. omnia tu Deiotaro, Caesar, tribuisti, cum et ipsi et filio nomen regium concessisti. hoc nomine retento atque servato nullum beneficium populi Romani, nullum iudicium de se senatus imminutum putat. Magno animo et erecto est, nec umquam succumbet inimicis, ne fortunae quidem.
He thinks that he has brought forth much by his deeds in the past, and that he holds much in spirit and virtue, which by no means can he lose. For what fortune, what chance, what so great a wrong, can blot out the decrees passed about Deiotarus by all our generals? He has been honoured by all who, after he was of age to be in the camp, waged wars in Asia, Cappadocia, Pontus, Cilicia, Syria: as for the Senate’s judgements about him, so many, so full of honour, recorded in the public letters and monuments of the Roman people, what age shall ever bury them, what oblivion so great wipe them out? What shall I say of his virtue, of his greatness of spirit, his weight, his constancy? Qualities which all the learned and wise have called the chief goods, and some indeed the only good, and have said that virtue is sufficient not only for living well, but for living happily.
multa se arbitratur et peperisse ante factis et habere in animo atque virtute, quae nullo modo possit amittere. quae enim fortuna aut quis casus aut quae tanta possit iniuria omnium imperatorum de Deiotaro decreta delere? ab omnibus est enim is ornatus qui, postea quam in castris esse potuit per aetatem, in Asia, Cappadocia, Ponto, Cilicia, Syria bella gesserunt: senatus vero iudicia de illo tam multa tamque honorifica, quae publicis populi Romani litteris monumentisque consignata sunt, quae umquam vetustas obruet aut quae tanta delebit oblivio? quid de virtute eius dicam, de magnitudine animi, gravitate, constantia? quae omnes docti atque sapientes summa, quidam etiam bona sola esse dixerunt, eisque non modo ad bene sed etiam ad beate vivendum contentam esse virtutem.
Reflecting on these things and pondering them day and night, he not only is not angry with you — for he would be not only ungrateful but mad — but he refers all the tranquillity and quiet of his old age to your clemency as a gift received. In which spirit, while he stood before, so I do not doubt that by your letters, of which I have read the copy, which you gave to this Blesamius for him at Tarraco, he has further raised himself up and shaken himself loose from every anxiety. For you bid him hope well and be of good cheer — which I know that you do not write to no purpose. For I remember that in almost the same words you wrote to me, and that I was bidden by your letters to hope well, and not to no purpose.
haec ille reputans et dies noctesque cogitans non modo tibi non suscenset—esset enim non solum ingratus sed etiam amens—, verum omnem tranquillitatem et quietem senectutis refert acceptam clementiae tuae. quo quidem animo cum antea fuit, tum non dubito quin tuis litteris, quarum exemplum legi, quas ad eum Tarracone huic Blesamio dedisti, se magis etiam erexerit ab omnique sollicitudine abstraxerit. iubes enim eum bene sperare et bono esse animo, quod scio te non frustra scribere solere. memini enim isdem fere verbis ad me te scribere meque tuis litteris bene sperare non frustra esse iussum.
I am indeed at pains for the cause of King Deiotarus, with whom the commonwealth has knit me in friendship, whom the will of each of us has joined to me in guest-friendship, whom intercourse has bound to me in intimacy, but with whom his great services to me and to my army have created the closest of ties: but while I am at pains for him, I am also at pains for many most distinguished men whom you ought once for all to have pardoned, that your benefit may not be called into doubt, that an everlasting anxiety may not settle in men’s minds, that it may not come about that any of those who have once been freed by you from fear should begin to fear you.
laboro equidem regis Deiotari causa quocum mihi amicitiam res publica conciliavit, hospitium voluntas utriusque coniunxit, familiaritatem consuetudo attulit, summam vero necessitudinem magna eius officia in me et in exercitum meum effecerunt: sed cum de illo laboro, tum de multis amplissimis viris quibus semel ignotum a te esse oportet, nec tuum beneficium in dubium vocari, nec haerere in animis hominum sollicitudinem sempiternam, nec accidere ut quisquam te timere incipiat eorum qui sint semel a te liberati timore.
I ought not, Caesar, to do what is wont to be done in such great perils: to try by what means I may stir your pity by speaking. There is no need. It is wont of itself to run to meet the suppliant and the unfortunate, called forth by no man’s speech. Set before yourself two kings, and gaze upon in your mind what you cannot in the eye: you will surely give to pity what you have denied to anger. There are many monuments of your clemency, but most of all the unimpaired safety of those to whom you have given safety. Which, if in private persons they are matters of glory, much more shall they be recounted in the case of kings. Always in this state has the royal name been sacred, but most sacred of all that of kings who are our allies and friends.
non debeo, Caesar, quod fieri solet in tantis periculis, temptare ecquonam modo dicendo misericordiam tuam commovere possim. nihil opus est. occurrere solet ipsa supplicibus et calamitosis, nullius oratione evocata. propone tibi duos reges et id animo contemplare quod oculis non potes: dabis profecto id misericordiae quod iracundiae denegasti. multa sunt monumenta clementiae tuae, sed maxime eorum incolumitates quibus salutem dedisti. quae si in privatis gloriosa sunt, multo magis commemorabuntur in regibus. semper regium nomen in hac civitate sanctum fuit, sociorum vero regum et amicorum sanctissimum.
That name these kings feared, with you as victor, that they should not lose; and now that it has been kept and by you confirmed, they trust that they will hand it on even to their descendants. Their bodies, for the safety of their kings, these royal envoys offer up — Hieras, and Blesamius, and Antigonus, long since known to you and to all of us, and Dorylaus, gifted with the same good faith and virtue, who lately was sent as envoy to you along with Hieras: men most beloved of their kings, and to you also, as I hope, approved.
quod nomen hi reges ne amitterent te victore timuerunt, retentum vero et a te confirmatum posteris etiam suis tradituros se esse confidunt. corpora sua pro salute regum suorum hi legati regii tradunt, Hieras et Blesamius et Antigonus, tibi nobisque omnibus iam diu noti, eademque fide et virtute praeditus Dorylaus, qui nuper cum Hiera legatus est ad te missus, cum regum amicissimi, tum tibi etiam, ut spero, probati.
Inquire of Blesamius whether he has written anything to the king against your dignity. Hieras for his part takes the whole case upon himself, and against those charges sets himself up as defendant in the king’s stead. He calls upon your memory, in which you are most powerful; he says that he never withdrew a foot from you in Deiotarus’s tetrarchy; that he was at hand for you on the first borders, escorted you to the last; that when you had come out of the bath, he was with you; when you had inspected those gifts after dinner; when you had lain down in the bedchamber; and that he showed you the same constant attendance on the next day.
exquire de Blesamio num quid ad regem contra dignitatem tuam scripserit. Hieras quidem causam omnem suscipit et criminibus illis pro rege se supponit reum. memoriam tuam implorat, qua vales plurimum; negat umquam se a te in Deiotari tetrarchia pedem discessisse; in primis finibus tibi praesto se fuisse dicit, usque ad ultimos prosecutum; cum e balneo exisses, tecum se fuisse, cum illa munera inspexisses cenatus, cum in cubiculo recubuisses; eandemque adsiduitatem tibi se praebuisse postridie.
Wherefore, if any of these things charged against him was conceived, he does not refuse that you should judge the deed his. For which reason, Gaius Caesar, I would have you reflect that your sentence on this day will bring either, with utmost dishonour, the most wretched ruin upon kings, or, with safety, unimpaired renown: of which the one is the wish of cruelty, the other — to preserve them — is for your clemency.
quam ob rem si quid eorum quae obiecta sunt cogitatum sit, non recusat quin id suum facinus iudices. Quocirca, C. Caesar, velim existimes hodierno die sententiam tuam aut cum summo dedecore miserrimam pestem importaturam esse regibus aut incolumem famam cum salute: quorum alterum optare illorum crudelitatis est, alterum conservare clementiae tuae.