LIBRARY 
 
 ( SAN u/GO
 

 
 ANCIENT CLASSICS 
 
 FOR 
 
 ENGLISH READERS 
 
 EDITED BY THE 
 
 REV. W. LUCAS COLLINS, M.A. 
 
 CICERO 
 
 BY EEV. W. LUCAS COLLINS, M.A. 
 
 PLINY'S LETTERS 
 
 BY EEV. ALFRED CHURCH, M.A. 
 
 AND 
 
 REV. W. J. BRODRIBB, M.A. 
 
 WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS 
 EDINBURGH AND LONDON
 
 The subjects in this Series may be had separately, in cloth, price 
 2S. 6d. ; or two volumes bound in one, in leather back and' marbled 
 sides and edges, arranged as follows : 
 
 THE ILIAD AND 
 ODYSSEY. 
 
 HERODOTUS. 
 XENOPHON. 
 
 EURIPIDES. 
 ARISTOPHANES. 
 
 PLATO. 
 LUCIAN. 
 
 AESCHYLUS. 
 SOPHOCLES. 
 
 HESIOD AND THEOGNIS. 
 ANTHOLOGY. 
 
 VIRGIL. 
 HORACE. 
 
 JUVENAL. 
 
 PLAUTUS AND TERENCE. 
 
 CESAR. 
 TACITUS. 
 
 CICERO. 
 PLINY.
 
 CICERO 
 
 BY THE 
 
 REV. /W. LUCAS COLLINS, M.A. 
 
 v. -" 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 'KTONIANA,' 'THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS,' ETC. 
 
 WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS 
 
 EDINBURGH AND LONDON 
 MDCCCLXXI
 
 I HAVE to acknowledge my obligations to Mr Forsyth's 
 well-known ' Life of Cicero,' especially as a guide to 
 the biographical materials which abound in his Orations 
 and Letters. Mr Long's scholarly volumes have also 
 been found useful. For the translations, such as they 
 are, I am responsible. If I could have met with any 
 which seemed to me more satisfactory, I would gladly 
 have adopted them. 
 
 W. L. C.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 CHAP. I. BIOGRAPHICAL EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION, 1 
 
 ti II. n PUBLIC CAREER IMPEACH- 
 MENT OF VERRES, . . 13 
 
 n III. n THE CONSULSHIP AND CATI- 
 LINE, .... 30 
 
 n IV. ii EXILE AND RETURN, . . 51 
 
 n V. n CICERO AND &ESAR, . . 69 
 
 n VI. n CICERO AND ANTONY, . . 75 
 
 ii VII. CHARACTER AS POLITICIAN AND ORATOR, . 89 
 
 .. VIII. MINOR CHARACTERISTICS, .... 108 
 
 ii ix. CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE, . . . .116 
 
 ii X. ESSAYS ON 'OLD AGE 1 AND 'FRIENDSHIP,' . 140 
 
 n xi. CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY 153 
 
 n xii. CICERO'S RELIGION, 187
 
 CICERO. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION. 
 
 "WHEN we speak, in the language of our title-page, of 
 the 'Ancient Classics,' we must remember that the 
 word 'ancient' is to be taken with a considerable 
 difference, in one sense. Ancient all the Greek and 
 Roman authors are, as dated comparatively with our 
 modern era. But as to the antique character of 
 their writings, there is often a difference which is 
 not merely one of date. The poetry of Homer and 
 Hesiod is ancient, as having been sung and written 
 when the society in which the authors lived, and to 
 which they addressed themselves, was in its compara- 
 tive infancy. The chronicles of Herodotus are ancient, 
 partly from their subject-matter and partly from their 
 primitive style. But in this sense there are ancient 
 authors belonging to every nation which has a litera- 
 ture of its own. Viewed in this light, the history 
 A. c. vol. ix. A
 
 2 EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION. 
 
 of Thucydides, the letters and orations of Cicero, are not 
 ancient at all. Bede, and Chaucer, and Matthew of Paris, 
 and Froissart, are far more redolent of antiquity. The 
 several books which make up what we call the Bible are 
 all ancient, no doubt; but even between the Chronicles 
 of the Kings of Israel and the Epistles of St Paul there is 
 a far wider real interval than the mere lapse of centuries. 
 
 In one respect, the times of Cicero, in spite of their 
 complicated politics, should have more interest for a 
 modern reader than most of what is called Ancient 
 History. Forget the date but for a moment, and 
 there is scarcely anything ancient about them. The 
 scenes and actors are modern terribly modern; far 
 more so than the middle ages of Christendom. Be- 
 tween the times of our own Plantagenets and Georges, 
 for instance, there is a far wider gap, in all but years, 
 than between the consulships of Caesar and Napoleon. 
 The habits of life, the ways of thinking, the family 
 affections, the tastes of the Romans of Cicero's day, 
 were in many respects wonderfully like our own ; the 
 political jealousies and rivalries have repeated them- 
 selves again and again in the last two or three centuries 
 of Europe : their code of political honour and morality, 
 debased as it was, was not much lower than that which 
 was held by some great statesmen a generation or two 
 before us. Let us be thankful if the most frightful of 
 their vices were the exclusive shame of paganism. 
 
 It was in an old but humble country-house, near 
 the town of Arpinum, under the Volscian hills, that 
 Marcus Tullius Cicero was born, one hundred and six 
 years before the Christian era. The family was of an-
 
 HIS FATHER AND GRANDFATHER. 3 
 
 cient 'equestrian'* dignity, but as none of its members 
 had hitherto borne any office of state, it did not rank 
 as ' noble.' His grandfather and his father had borne 
 the same three names the last an inheritance from 
 some forgotten ancestor, who had either been success- 
 ful in the cultivation of vetches (deer), or, as less com- 
 plimentary traditions said, had a wart of that shape 
 upon his nose. The grandfather was still living when 
 the little Cicero was born ; a stout old conservative, 
 who had successfully resisted the attempt to introduce 
 vote by ballot into his native town, and hated the 
 Greeks (who were just then coming into fashion) as 
 heartily as his English representative, fifty years ago, 
 might have hated a Frenchman. " The more Greek a 
 man knew," he protested, " the greater rascal he turned 
 out." The father was a man of quiet habits, taking 
 no part even in local politics, given to books, and to 
 the enlargement and improvement of the old family 
 house, which, up to his time, seems not to have been 
 more than a modest grange. The situation (on a small 
 island formed by the little river Fibrenust) was beau- 
 tiful and romantic ; and the love for it, which grew up 
 with the young Cicero as a child, he never lost in the 
 
 * The Equites were originally those who served in the 
 Roman cavalry ; but latterly all citizens came to be reckoned 
 in the class who had a certain property qualification, and who 
 could prove free descent up to their grandfather. 
 
 f Now known as II Frame della Posta. Fragments of 
 Cicero's villa are thought to have been discovered built into 
 the walls of the deserted convent of San Dominico. The ruin 
 known as ' Cicero's Tower ' has probably no connection with 
 him.
 
 4 EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION. 
 
 busy days of his manhood. It was in his eyes, he 
 said, what Ithaca was to Ulysses, 
 
 " A rough, wild nurse-land, but whose crops are men." 
 
 There was an aptness in the quotation ; for at Arpinum, 
 a few years before, was born that Caius Marius, seven 
 times consul of Rome, who had at least the virtue of 
 manhood in him, if he had few besides. 
 
 But the quiet country gentleman was ambitious for 
 his son. Cicero's father, like Horace's, determined to 
 give him the best education in his power; and of 
 course the best education was to be found in Rome, 
 and the best teachers there were Greeks. So to Rome 
 young Marcus was taken in due time, with his younger 
 brother Quintus. They lodged with their uncle-in- 
 law, Aculeo, a lawyer of some distinction, who had a 
 house in rather a fashionable quarter of the city, and 
 moved in good society ; and the two boys attended the 
 Greek lectures with their town cousins. Greek was as 
 necessary a part of a Roman gentleman's education in 
 those days as Latin and French are with us now ; like 
 Latin, it was the key to literature (for the Romans 
 had as yet, it must be remembered, nothing worth 
 calling literature of their own); and, like French, it 
 was the language of refinement and the play of polished 
 society. Let us hope that by this time the good old 
 grandfather was gathered peacefully into his urn ; it 
 might have broken his heart to have seen how enthusias- 
 tically his grandson Marcus threw himself into this new- 
 fangled study; and one of those letters of his riper 
 years, stuffed full of Greek terms and phrases even to
 
 TRAINING FOR THE BAR. 5 
 
 affectation, would have drawn anything but blessings 
 from the old gentleman if he had lived to hear them 
 read. 
 
 Young Cicero went through the regular curriculum 
 grammar, rhetoric, and the Greek poets and his- 
 torians. Like many other youthful geniuses, he wrote 
 a good deal of poetry of his own, which his friends, as 
 was natural, thought very highly of at the time, and 
 of which he himself retained the same good opinion 
 to the end of his life, as would have "been natural to 
 few men except Cicero. But his more important 
 studies began after he had assumed the ' white gown ' 
 which marked the emergence of the young Roman 
 from boyhood into more responsible life at sixteen 
 years of age. He then entered on a special education for 
 the bar. It could scarcely be called a profession, for 
 an advocate's practice at Eome was gratuitous ; but it 
 was the best training for public life ; it was the ready 
 means, to an able and eloquent man, of gaining that 
 popular influence which would secure his election in 
 due course to the great magistracies which formed the 
 successive steps to political power. The mode of 
 studying law at Eome bore a very considerable resem- 
 blance to the preparation for the English bar. Our 
 modern law-student purchases his admission to the 
 chambers of some special pleader or conveyancer, 
 where he is supposed to learn his future business by 
 copying precedents and answering cases, and he also 
 attends the public lectures at the Inns of Court. So 
 at Rome the young aspirant was to be found (but 
 at a much earlier hour than would suit the Temple or
 
 6 EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION. 
 
 Lincoln's Inn) in the open hall of some great jurist's 
 house, listening to his opinions given to the throng of 
 clients who crowded there every morning ; while his 
 more zealous pupils would accompany him in his stroll 
 in the Forum, and attend his pleadings in the courts 
 or his speeches on the Eostra, either taking down upon 
 their tablets, or storing in their memories, his dicta 
 upon legal questions.* In such wise Cicero became the 
 pupil of Mucius Scayvola, whose house was called " the 
 oracle of Eome " scarcely ever leaving his side, as he 
 himself expresses it ; and after that great lawyer's 
 death, attaching himself in much the same way to a 
 younger cousin of the same name and scarcely less 
 reputation. Besides this, to arm himself at all points 
 for his proposed career, he read logic with Diodotus the 
 Stoic, studied the action of ^Esop and Eoscius then 
 the stars of the Eoman stage declaimed aloud like 
 Demosthenes in private, made copious notes, practised 
 translation in order to form a written style, and read 
 hard day and night. He trained severely as an intel- 
 lectual athlete; and if none of his contemporaries 
 attained such splendid success, perhaps none worked so 
 hard for it. He made use, too, of certain special advan- 
 tages which were open to him little appreciated, or 
 at least seldom acknowledged, by the men of his day 
 the society and conversation of elegant and accom- 
 plished women. In Scsevola's domestic circle, where 
 the mother, the daughters, and the grand -daughters 
 
 * These dicta, or 'opinions,' of the great jurists, acquired a 
 sort of legal validity in the Eoman law-courts, like 'cases' 
 with us.
 
 CAMPAIGN UNDER POMPEY. 7 
 
 successively seem to have been such charming talkers 
 that language found new graces from their lips, the 
 young advocate learnt some of his not least valuable 
 lessons. " It makes no little difference," said he in 
 his riper years, " what style of expression one becomes 
 familiar with in the associations of daily life." It was 
 another point of resemblance between the age of Cicero 
 and the times in which we live the influence of the 
 " queens of society," whether for good or evil. 
 
 But no man could be completely educated for a 
 public career at Home until he had been a soldier. By 
 what must seem to us a mistake in the Eepublican 
 system a mistake which we have seen made more 
 than once in the late American war high political 
 offices were necessarily combined with military com- 
 mand. The highest minister of state, consul or praetor, 
 however hopelessly civilian in tastes and antecedents^ 
 might be sent to conduct a campaign in Italy or 
 abroad at a few hours' notice. If a man was a heaven- 
 born general, all went well ; if not, he had usually a 
 chance of learning in the school of defeat. It was 
 desirable, at all events, that he should have seen what 
 war was in his youth. Young Cicero served his first 
 campaign, at the age of eighteen, under the father of 
 a man whom he was to know only too well in after 
 life Pompey the Great and in the division of the 
 army which was commanded by Sylla as lieutenant- 
 general He bore arms only for a year or two, and 
 probably saw no very arduous service, or we should 
 certainly have heard of it from himself ; and he never 
 was in camp again until he took the chief command,
 
 8 EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION. 
 
 thirty-seven years afterwards, as pro-consul in Cilicia. 
 He \vas at Rome, leading a quiet student-life happily 
 for himself, too young to be forced or tempted into an 
 active part during the bloody feuds between Sylla 
 and the younger Marius. 
 
 He seems to have made his first appearance as an 
 advocate when he was about twenty-five, in some suit 
 of which we know nothing. Two years afterwards he 
 undertook his first defence of a prisoner on a capital 
 charge, and secured by his eloquence the acquittal of 
 Sextus Roscius on an accusation of having murdered 
 his father. The charge appears to have been a mere 
 conspiracy, wholly unsupported by evidence ; but the 
 accuser was a favourite with Sylla, whose power was 
 all but absolute; and the innocence of the accused 
 was a very insufficient protection before a Roman jury 
 of those days. What kind of considerations, besides 
 the merits of the case and the rhetoric of counsel, did 
 usually sway these tribunals, we shall see hereafter. 
 In consequence of this decided success, briefs came in 
 upon the young pleader almost too quickly. Like 
 many other successful orators, he had to combat some 
 natural deficiencies ; he had inherited from his father 
 a somewhat delicate constitution ; his lungs were not 
 powerful, and his voice required careful management ; 
 and the loud declamation and vehement action which 
 he had adopted from his models and which were 
 necessary conditions of success in the large arena in 
 which a Roman advocate had to plead he found very 
 hard work. He left Rome for a while, and retired for 
 rest and change to Athens.
 
 STUDIES AT ATHENS. 9 
 
 The six months which he spent there, though busy 
 and studious, must have been very pleasant ones. To 
 one like Cicero, Athens was at once classic and holy 
 ground. It combined all those associations and attrac- 
 tions which we might now expect to find in a visit to 
 the capitals of Greece and of Italy, and a pilgrimage to 
 Jerusalem. Poetry, rhetoric, philosophy, religion all, 
 to his eyes, had their cradle there. It was the home 
 of all that was literature to him ; and there, too, were 
 the great Eleusinian mysteries which are mysteries 
 still, but which contained under their veil whatever faith 
 in the Invisible and Eternal rested in the mind of an 
 enlightened pagan. There can be little doubt but 
 that Cicero took this opportunity of initiation. His 
 brother Quintus and one of his cousins were with him 
 at Athens ; and in that city he also renewed his 
 acquaintance with an old schoolfellow, Titus Pompon- 
 ius, who lived so long in the city, and became so 
 thoroughly Athenian in his tastes and habits, that he 
 is better known to us, as he was to his contemporaries, 
 by the surname of Atticus, which was given him half 
 in jest, than by his more sonorous Eoman name. It 
 is to the accidental circumstance of Atticus remaining 
 so long a voluntary exile from Eome, and to the cor- 
 respondence which was maintained between the two 
 friends, with occasional intervals, for something like 
 four-and-twenty years, that we are indebted for a more 
 thorough insight into the character of Cicero than we 
 have as to any other of the great minds of antiquity ; 
 nearly four hundred of his letters to Atticus, written 
 in all the familiar confidence of private friendship by
 
 10 EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION. 
 
 a man by no means reticent as to his personal feel- 
 ings, having been preserved to us. Atticus's replies are 
 lost ; it is said that he was prudent enough, after his 
 friend's unhappy death, to reclaim and destroy them. 
 They would perhaps have told us, in his case, not very 
 much that we care to know beyond what we know 
 already. Eich, luxurious, with elegant tastes and easy 
 morality a true Epicurean, as he boasted himself to 
 be Atticus had nevertheless a kind heart and an 
 open hand. He has generally been called selfish, 
 somewhat unfairly ; at least his selfishness never took 
 the form of indifference or unkindness to others. In 
 one sense he was a truer philosopher than Cicero : for 
 he seems to have acted through life on that maxim of 
 Socrates which his friend professed to approve, but 
 certainly never followed, that " a wise man kept out 
 of public business." His vocation was certainly not 
 patriotism ; but the worldly wisdom which kept well 
 with men of all political colours, and eschewed the 
 wretched intrigues and bloody feuds of Rome, stands 
 out in no unfavourable contrast with the conduct of 
 many of her soi-disant patriots. If he declined to 
 take a side himself, men of all parties resorted to him 
 in their adversity ; and the man who befriended the 
 younger Marius in his exile, protected the widow of 
 Antony, gave shelter on his estates to the victims of 
 the triumvirate's proscription, and was always ready to 
 offer his friend Cicero both his house and his purse 
 whenever the political horizon clouded round him, 
 this man was surely as good a citizen as the noisiest 
 clamourer for "liberty" in the Forum, or the readiest
 
 TERENTIA. 11 
 
 hand with the dagger. He kept his life and his pro- 
 perty safe through all those years of peril and proscrip- 
 tion, with less sacrifice of principle than many who 
 had made louder professions, and died by a singular 
 act of voluntary starvation, to make short work with an 
 incurable disease at a ripe old age ; a godless Epicur- 
 ean, no doubt, but not the worst of them. 
 
 We must return to Cicero, and deal somewhat briefly 
 with the next few years of his life. He extended his 
 foreign tour for two years, visiting the chief cities of 
 Asia Minor, remaining for a short time at Rhodes to 
 take lessons once more from his old tutor Molo the 
 rhetorician, and everywhere availing himself of the 
 lectures of the most renowned Greek professors, to 
 correct and improve his own style of composition and 
 delivery. Soon after his return to Eome, he married. 
 Of the character of his wife Terentia very different 
 views have been taken. She appears to have written 
 to him very kindly during his long forced absences. 
 Her letters have not reached us ; but in all her hus- 
 band's replies she is mentioned in terms of apparently 
 the most sincere affection. He calls her repeatedly his 
 " darling" " the delight of his eyes" " the best of 
 mothers ;" yet he procured a divorce from her, for no 
 distinctly assigned reason, after a married life of thirty 
 years, during which we find no trace of any serious 
 domestic unhappiness. The imputations on her honour 
 made by Plutarch, and repeated by others, seem 
 utterly without foundation; and Cicero's own share 
 in the transaction is not improved by the fact of his 
 taking another wife as soon as possible a ward of his
 
 12 EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION. 
 
 own, an almost girl, with whom he did not live a year 
 before a second divorce released him. Terentia is said 
 also to have had an imperious temper ; but the only 
 ground for this assertion seems to have been that she 
 quarrelled occasionally with her sister-in-law Pom- 
 ponia, sister of Atticus and wife of Quintus Cicero; 
 and since Pomponia, by her own brother's account, 
 showed her temper very disagreeably to her hus- 
 band, the feud between the ladies was more likely to 
 have been her fault than Terentia's. But the very 
 low notion of the marriage relations entertained by 
 both the later Greeks and Romans helps to throw some 
 light upon a proceeding which would otherwise seem 
 very mysterious. Terentia, as is pretty plain from the 
 hints in her husband's letters, was not a good manager 
 in money matters ; there is room for suspicion that 
 she was not even an honest one in his absence, and 
 was "making a purse" for herself: she had thus failed 
 in one of the only two qualifications which, according 
 to Demosthenes an authority who ranked very high 
 in Cicero's eyes were essential in a wife, to be " a 
 faithful house-guardian" and " a fruitful mother." She 
 did not die of a broken heart ; she lived to be 104, 
 and, according to Dio Cassius, to have three more 
 husbands. Divorces were easy enough at Eome, and 
 had the lady been a rich widow, there might be 
 nothing so improbable in this latter part of the story, 
 though she was fifty years old at the date of this first 
 divorce.* 
 
 * Cato, who is the favourite impersonation of all the moral 
 virtues of his age, divorced his wife to oblige a friend !
 
 CHAPTEK II. 
 
 PUBLIC CAREER. IMPEACHMENT OF VERRES. 
 
 INCREASING reputation as a brilliant and successful 
 pleader, and the social influence which this brought 
 with it, secured the rapid succession of Cicero to the 
 highest public offices. Soon after his marriage he was 
 elected Quaestor the first step on the official ladder 
 which, as he already possessed the necessary property 
 qualification, gave him a seat in the Senate for life. 
 The .^dileship and Prstorship followed subsequently, 
 each as early, in point of age, as it could legally be 
 held.* His practice as an advocate suffered no interrup- 
 
 * The Qu<%stors (of whom there were at this time twenty) 
 acted under the Senate as State treasurers. The Consul or other 
 officer who commanded in chief during a campaign would be 
 accompanied by one of them as paymaster-general. 
 
 The jEdiles, who were four in number, had the care of all 
 public buildings, markets, roads, and the State property gene- 
 rally. They had also the superintendence of the national festi- 
 vals and public games. 
 
 The duties of the Praetors, of whom there were eight, were prin- 
 cipally judicial. The two seniors, called the ' City ' and 
 ' Foreign ' respectively, corresponded roughly to our Home and 
 Foreign Secretaries. These were all gradual steps to the office of 
 Consul.
 
 H PUBLIC CAREER. 
 
 tion, except that his Quaestorship involved his spending 
 a year in Sicily. The Prsetor who was appointed to 
 the government of that province* had under him two 
 quaestors, who were a kind of comptrollers of the 
 exchequer; and Cicero was appointed to the western 
 district, having his headquarters at Lilybaeum. In 
 the administration of his office there he showed himself 
 a thorough man of business. There was a dearth of 
 corn at Rome that year, and Sicily was the great 
 granary of the empire. The energetic measures which 
 the new Quaestor took fully met the emergency. He 
 was liberal to the tenants of the State, courteous and 
 accessible to all, upright in his administration, and, 
 above all, he kept his hands clean from bribes and 
 peculation. The provincials were as much astonished 
 as delighted : for Rome was not in the habit of send- 
 ing them such officers. They invented honours for him 
 such as had never been bestowed on any minister before. 
 
 * The provinces of Rome, in their relation to the mother-state 
 of Italy, may be best compared with our own government of 
 India, or such of our crown colonies as have no representative 
 assembly. They had each their governor or lieutenant-governor, 
 who must have been an ex-minister of Rome : a man who had 
 been Consul went out with the rank of "pro-consul," one 
 who had been Prsetor with the rank of "pro-praetor." These 
 held office for one or two years, and had the power of life 
 and death within their respective jurisdictions. They had 
 under them one or more officers who bore the title of Quaestor, 
 who collected the taxes and had the general management of 
 the revenues of the province. The provinces at this time were 
 Sicily, Sardinia with Corsica, Spain and Gaul (each in two divi- 
 sions) ; Greece, divided into Macedonia and Achaia (the Morea) ; 
 Asia, Syria, Cilicia, Bithynia, Cyprus, and Africa in four divi- 
 sions. Others were added afterwards, under the Empire.
 
 QU^ESTORSHIP IN SICILY. 15 
 
 No wonder the young official's head (he was not much 
 over thirty) was somewhat turned. " I thought," he 
 said, in one of his speeches afterwards introducing 
 with a quiet humour, and with all a practised orator's 
 skill, one of those personal anecdotes which relieve a 
 long speech " I thought in my heart, at the time, 
 that the people at Eome must be talking of nothing 
 but my qusestorship." And he goes on to tell his 
 audience how he was undeceived. 
 
 "The people of Sicily had devised for me unpre- 
 cedented honours. So I left the island in a state of 
 great elation, thinking that the Eoman people would at 
 once offer me everything without my seeking. But when 
 I was leaving my province, and on my road home, I 
 happened to land at Puteoli just at the time when a good 
 many of our most fashionable people are accustomed 
 to resort to that neighbourhood. I very nearly collapsed, 
 gentlemen, when a man asked me what day I had left 
 Eome, and whether there was any news stirring ? When 
 I made answer that I was returning from my province 
 * Oh ! yes, to be sure,' said he ; ' Africa, I believe ? ' 
 ' No,' said I to him, considerably annoyed and dis- 
 gusted; 'from Sicily.' Then somebody else, with the 
 air of a man who knew all about it, said to him 
 ' "What ! don't you know that he was Quaestor at Syra- 
 cuse ? ' [It was at Lilybaeum quite a different district. ] 
 No need to make a long story of it ; I swallowed my 
 indignation, and made as though I, like the rest, had 
 come there for the waters. But I am not sure, 
 gentlemen, whether that scene did not do me more 
 good than if everybody then and there had publicly
 
 16 IMPEACHMENT OF VERRES. 
 
 congratulated me. For after I had thus found out that 
 the people of Rome have somewhat deaf ears, but very 
 keen and sharp eyes, I left off cogitating what people 
 would hear about me; I took care that thenceforth 
 they should see me before them every day : I lived in 
 their sight, I stuck close to the Forum ; the porter at 
 my gate refused no man admittance my very sleep was 
 never allowed to be a plea against an audience." * 
 
 Did we not say that Cicero was modern, not 
 ancient 1 ? Have we not here the original of that 
 Cambridge senior wrangler, who, happening to enter 
 a London theatre at the same moment with the king, 
 bowed all round with a gratified embarrassment, think- 
 ing that the audience rose and cheered at him ? 
 
 It was while he held the office of ^dile that he made 
 his first appearance as public prosecutor, and brought 
 to justice the most important criminal of the day. 
 Verres, late Praetor in Sicily, was charged with high 
 crimes and misdemeanours in his government. The 
 grand scale of his offences, and the absorbing interest 
 of the trial, have led to his case being quoted as an 
 obvious parallel to that of Warren Hastings, though 
 with much injustice to the latter, so far as it may seem 
 to imply any comparison of moral character. This 
 Verres, the corrupt son of a corrupt father, had during 
 his three years' rule heaped on the unhappy province 
 every evil which tyranny and rapacity could inflict. 
 He had found it prosperous and contented : he left 
 it exhausted and smarting under its wrongs. He met 
 his impeachment now with considerable confidence. 
 * Defence of Plancius, c. 26, 27.
 
 
 THE ROMAN LAW-COURTS. 17 
 
 The gains of his first year of office were sufficient, 
 he said, for himself ; the second had been for his 
 friends; the third produced more than enough to bribe 
 a jury. 
 
 The trials at Rome took place in the Forum the 
 open space, of nearly five acres, lying between the 
 Capitoline and Palatine hills. It was the city mar- 
 ket-place, but it was also the place where the popula- 
 tion assembled for any public meeting, political 
 or other where the idle citizen strolled to meet 
 his friends and hear the gossip of the day, and 
 where the man of business made his appointments. 
 Courts for the administration of justice magnificent 
 halls, called basilicce had by this time been erected 
 on the north and south sides, and in these the ordinary 
 trials took place ; but for state trials the open Forum 
 was itself the court. One end of the wide area was 
 raised on a somewhat higher level a kind of dais 
 on a large scale and was separated from the rest by 
 the Rostra;* a sort of stage from which the orators 
 spoke. It was here that the trials were held. A 
 temporary tribunal for the presiding officer, with ac- 
 commodation for counsel, witnesses, and jury, was 
 erected in the open air; and the scene may perhaps 
 best be pictured by imagining the principal square 
 in some large town fitted up with open hustings on a 
 large scale for an old-fashioned county election, by no 
 means omitting the intense popular excitement and 
 mob violence appropriate to such occasions. Temples 
 of the gods and other public buildings overlooked the 
 area, and the steps of these, on any occasion of great 
 
 A. c. vol. ix. B
 
 18 IMPEACHMENT OF VERRES. 
 
 excitement, would be crowded by those who were 
 anxious to see at least, if they could not hear. 
 
 Verres, as a state criminal, would be tried before a 
 special commission, and by a jury composed at this 
 time entirely from the senatorial order, chosen by lot 
 (with a limited right of challenge reserved to both 
 parties) from a panel made out every year by the praetor. 
 This magistrate, who was a kind of minister of justice, 
 usually presided on such occasions, occupying the curule 
 chair, which was one of the well-known privileges of 
 high office at Rome. But his office was rather that of 
 the modern chairman who keeps order at a public 
 meeting than that of a judge. Judge, in our sense of 
 the word, there was none ; the jury were the judges 
 both of law and fact. They were, in short, the recog- 
 nised assessors of the praetor, in whose hands the 
 administration of justice was supposed to lie. The 
 law, too, was of a highly flexible character, and the 
 appeals of the advocates were rather to the passions 
 and feelings of the jurors than to the legal points of 
 the case. Cicero himself attached comparatively little 
 weight to this branch of his profession ; " Busy as 
 I am," he says in one of his speeches, " I could make 
 myself lawyer enough in three days." The jurors gave 
 each their vote by ballot, ' guilty,' ' not guilty,' or (as 
 in the Scotch courts) ' not proven,' and the majority 
 carried the verdict. 
 
 But such trials as that of Verres were much more 
 like an impeachment before the House of Commons 
 than a calm judicial inquiry. The men who would 
 have to try a defendant of his class would be, in very
 
 A ROMAN JURY. 19 
 
 few cases, honest and impartial weighers of the evi- 
 dence. Their large number (varying from fifty to 
 seventy) weakened the sense of individual responsibi- 
 lity, and laid them more open to the appeal of the 
 advocates to their political passions. Most of them 
 would come into court prejudiced in some degree by 
 the interests of party ; many would be hot partisans. 
 Cicero, in his treatise on 'Oratory,' explains clearly 
 for the pleader's guidance the nature of the tribunals 
 to which he had to appeal. " Men are influenced in 
 their verdicts much more by prejudice or favour, or 
 greed of gain, or anger, or indignation, or pleasure, or 
 hope or fear, or by misapprehension, or by some excite- 
 ment of their feelings, than either by the facts of the 
 case, or by established precedents, or by any rules or 
 principles whatever either of law or equity." 
 
 Verres was supported by some of the most powerful 
 families at Eome. Peculation on the part of governors 
 of provinces had become almost a recognised principle : 
 many of those who held offices of state either had done, 
 or were waiting their turn to do, much the same as the 
 present defendant ; and every effort had been made by 
 his friends either to put off the trial indefinitely, or to 
 turn it into a sham by procuring the appointment of a 
 private friend and creature of his own as public prosecu- 
 tor. On the other hand, the Sicilian families, whom he 
 had wronged and outraged, had their share of influence 
 also at Eome, and there was a growing impatience of the 
 insolence and rapacity of the old governing houses, 
 of whose worst qualities the ex-governor of Sicily was 
 a fair type. There were many reasons which would
 
 20 IMPEACHMENT OF VERRES. 
 
 lead Cicero to take up such a cause energetically. It 
 was a great opening for him in what we may call his 
 profession : his former connection with the government 
 of Sicily gave him a personal interest in the cause of 
 the province ; and, above all, the prosecution of a state 
 offender of such importance was a lift at once into the 
 foremost ranks of political life. He spared no pains to 
 get up his case thoroughly. He went all over the 
 island collecting evidence ; and his old popularity there 
 did him good service in the work. 
 
 There was, indeed, evidence enough against the late 
 governor. The reckless gratification of his avarice and 
 his passions had seldom satisfied him, without the addi- 
 tion of some bitter insult -to the sufferers. But there 
 was even a more atrocious feature in the case, of which 
 Cicero did not fail to make good use in his appeal to 
 a Roman jury. Many of the unhappy victims had 
 the Roman franchise. The torture of an unfortunate 
 Sicilian might be turned into a jest by a clever advo- 
 cate for the defence, and regarded by a philosophic 
 jury with less than the cold compassion with which we 
 regard the sufferings of the lower animals ; but " to 
 scourge a man that was a Roman and uncondemned," 
 even in the far-off province of Judea, was a thought 
 which, a century later, made the officers of the great 
 Empire, at its pitch of power, tremble before a wan- 
 dering teacher who bore the despised name of Chris- 
 tian. No one can possibly tell the tale so well as 
 Cicero himself; and the passage from his speech for 
 the prosecution is an admirable specimen both of his 
 power of pathetic narrative and scathing denunciation.
 
 CASE OF G A VI US. 21 
 
 " How shall I speak of Publius Gavius, a citizen of 
 Consa ? "With what powers of voice, with what force of 
 language, with what sufficient indignation of soul, can 
 I tell the tale? Indignation, at least, will not fail 
 me : the more must I strive that in this my pleading 
 the other requisites may be made to meet the gravity 
 of the subject, the intensity of my feeling. For the 
 accusation is such that, when it was first laid before 
 me, I did not think to make use of it ; though I knew 
 it to be perfectly true, I did not think it would be 
 credible. How shall I now proceed? when I have 
 already been speaking for so many hours on one sub- 
 ject his atrocious cruelty; when I have exhausted 
 upon other points well-nigh all the powers of language 
 such as alone is suited to that man's crimes ; when I 
 have taken no precaution to secure your attention by 
 any variety in my charges against him, in what 
 fashion can I now speak on a charge of this import- 
 ance ? I think there is one way one course, and only 
 one, left for me to take. I will place the facts before 
 you ; and they have in themselves such weight, that 
 110 eloquence I will not say of mine, for I have none 
 but of any man's, is needed to excite your feelings. 
 
 " This Gavius of Consa, of whom I speak, had been 
 among the crowds of Roman citizens who had been 
 thrown into prison under that man. Somehow he had 
 made his escape out of the Quarries,* and had got to 
 
 * This was one of the state prisons at Syracuse, so called, 
 said to have been constructed by the tyrant Dionysius. They 
 were the quarries from' which the stone was dug for building the 
 city, and had been converted to their present purpose. . Cicero,
 
 22 IMPEACHMENT OF VERRES. 
 
 Messana ; and when he saw Italy and the towers of 
 Ehegium now so close to him, and out of the horror 
 and shadow of death felt himself breathe with a new 
 life as he scented once more the fresh air of liberty and 
 the laws, he began to talk at Messana, and to complain 
 that he, a Roman citizen, had been put in irons 
 that he was going straight to Rome that he would be 
 ready there for Verres on his arrival. 
 
 "The wretched man little knew that he might as well 
 have talked in this fashion in the governor's palace before 
 his very face, as at Messana. For, as I told you before, 
 this city he had selected for himself as the accomplice 
 in his crimes, the receiver of his stolen goods, the con- 
 fidant of all his wickedness. So Gavius is brought 
 at once before the city magistrates; and, as it so 
 chanced, on that very day Verres himself came to 
 Messana. The case is reported to him ; that there is a 
 certain Roman citizen who complained of having been 
 put into the Quarries at Syracuse ; that as he was just 
 going on board ship, and was uttering threats really 
 too atrocious against Verres, they had detained him, 
 and kept him in custody, that the governor himself 
 might decide about him as should seem to him good. 
 Verres thanks the gentlemen, and extols their goodwill 
 and zeal for his interests. He himself, burning with 
 rage and malice, comes down to the court. His eyes 
 
 who no doubt had seen the one in question, describes it as sunk 
 to an immense depth in the solid rock. There was no roof ; and 
 the unhappy prisoners were exposed there "to the sun by day, 
 and to the rain and frosts by night. " In these places the survi- 
 vors of the unfortunate Athenian expedition against Syracuse 
 were confined, and died in great numbers.
 
 e l AM A ROMAN CITIZEN.' 23 
 
 flashed fire ; cruelty was written on every line of his face. 
 All present watched anxiously to see to what lengths 
 he meant to go, or what steps he would take ; when 
 suddenly he ordered the prisoner to be dragged forth, 
 and to be stripped and bound in the open forum, and 
 the rods to be got ready at once. The unhappy man 
 cried out that he was a Roman citizen that he had 
 the municipal franchise of Consa that he had served 
 in a campaign with Lucius Pretius, a distinguished 
 Eonian knight, now engaged in business at Panormus, 
 from whom Verres might ascertain the truth of his 
 statement. Then that man replies that he has dis- 
 covered that he, Gavius, has been sent into Sicily as a 
 spy by the ringleaders of the runaway slaves ; of which 
 charge there was neither witness nor trace of any kind, 
 or even suspicion in any man's mind. Then he ordered 
 the man to be scourged severely all over his body. 
 Yes a Roman citizen was cut to pieces with rods in 
 the open forum at Messana, gentlemen ; and as the 
 punishment went on, no word, no groan of the wretched 
 man, in all his anguish, was heard amid the sound of 
 the lashes, but this cry, ' I am a Roman citizen !' By 
 such protest of citizenship he thought he could at least 
 save himself from anything like blows could escape 
 the indignity of personal torture. But not only did 
 he fail in thus deprecating the insult of the lash, but 
 when he redoubled his entreaties and his appeal to 
 the name of Rome, a cross yes, I say, a cross was 
 ordered for that most unfortunate and ill-fated man, 
 who had never yet beheld such an abuse of a governor's 
 power.
 
 24 IMPEACHMENT OF VERRES. 
 
 " name of liberty, sweet to our ears ! rights of 
 citizenship, in which we glory ! laws of Porcius and 
 Sempronius ! O privilege of the tribune, long and sorely 
 regretted, and at last restored to the people of Rome ! 
 Has it all come to this, that a Roman citizen in a province 
 of the Roman people in a federal town is to be bound 
 and beaten with rods in the forum by a man who only 
 holds those rods and axes those awful emblems by 
 grace of that same people of Rome? What shall I 
 say of the fact that fire, and red-hot plates, and 
 other tortures were applied? Even if his agonised en- 
 treaties and pitiable cries did not check you, were 
 you not moved by the tears and groans which burst 
 from the Roman citizens who were present at the 
 scene? Did you dare to drag to the cross any man 
 who claimed to be a citizen of Rome ? I did not in- 
 tend, gentlemen, in my former pleading, to press this 
 case so strongly I did not indeed ; for you saw your- 
 selves how the public feeling was already embittered 
 against the defendant by indignation, and hate, and 
 dread of a common peril." 
 
 He then proceeds to prove by witnesses the facts of 
 the case and the falsehood of the charge against Gavius 
 of having been a spy. " However," he goes on to say, 
 addressing himself now to Verres, " we will grant, if 
 you please, that your suspicions on this point, if false, 
 were honestly entertained." 
 
 " You did not know who the man was ; you sus- 
 pected him of being a spy. I do not ask the 
 grounds of your suspicion. I impeach you on your 
 own evidence. He .said he was a Roman citizen.
 
 '/ AM A ROMAN CITIZEN: 25 
 
 Had you yourself, Verres, been seized and led out 
 to execution, in Persia, say, or in the farthest In- 
 dies, what other cry or protest could you raise but 
 that you were a Roman citizen? And if you, a 
 stranger there among strangers, in the hands of bar- 
 barians, amongst men who dwell in the farthest and 
 remotest regions of the earth, would have found pro- 
 tection in the name of your city, known and renowned 
 in every nation under heaven, could the victim whom 
 you were dragging to the cross, be he who he might 
 and you did not know who he was when he declared 
 he was a citizen of Rome, could he obtain from you, a 
 Eoman magistrate, by the mere mention and claim of 
 citizenship, not only no reprieve, but not even a brief 
 respite from death ] 
 
 " Men of neither rank nor wealth, of humble birth 
 and station, sail the seas ; they touch at some spot 
 they never saw before, where they are neither per- 
 sonally known to those whom they visit, nor can always 
 find any to vouch for their nationality. But in this 
 single fact of their citizenship they feel they shall be 
 safe, not only with our own governors, who are held in 
 check by the terror of the laws and of public opinion 
 not only among those who share that citizenship of 
 Home, and who are united with them by community of 
 language, of laws, and of many things besides but go 
 where they may, this, they think, will be their safe- 
 guard. Take away this confidence, destroy this safe- 
 guard for our Roman citizens once establish the prin- 
 ciple that there is no protection in the words, * I am a 
 citizen of Rome ' that praetor or other magistrate may
 
 26 IMPEACHMENT OF VERRES. 
 
 with impunity sentence to what punishment he will a 
 man who says he is a Roman citizen, merely because 
 somebody does not know it for a fact ; and at once, by 
 admitting such a defence, you are shutting up against 
 our Roman citizens all our provinces, all foreign states, 
 despotic or independent all the whole world, in short, 
 which has ever lain open to our national enterprise 
 beyond all." 
 
 He turns again to Verres. 
 
 "But why talk of Gavius? as though it were 
 Gavius on whom you were wreaking a private ven- 
 geance, instead of rather waging war against the 
 very name and rights of Roman citizenship. You 
 showed yourself an enemy, I say, not to the indivi- 
 dual man, but to the common cause of liberty. For 
 what meant it that, when the authorities of Mes- 
 sana, according to their usual custom, would have 
 erected the cross behind their city on the Pompeian 
 road, you ordered it to be set up on the side that looked 
 toward the Strait ? Nay, and added this which you 
 cannot deny, which you said openly in the hearing of 
 all that you chose that spot for this reason, that as 
 he had called himself a Roman citizen, he might be 
 able, from his cross of punishment, to see in the dis- 
 tance his country and his home ! And so, gentlemen, 
 that cross was the only one, since Messana was a city, 
 that was ever erected on that spot. A point which 
 commanded a view of Italy was chosen by the defend- 
 ant for the express reason that the dying sufferer, in 
 his last agony and torment, might see how the rights of 
 the slave and the freeman were separated by that
 
 RESULT OF THE TRIAL. 27 
 
 narrow streak of sea; that Italy might look upon a 
 son of hers suffering the capital penalty reserved for 
 slaves alone. 
 
 " It is a crime to put a citizen of Rome in bonds ; 
 it is an atrocity to scourge him ; to put him to death 
 is well-nigh parricide ; what shall I say it is to crucify 
 him ? Language has no word by which I may desig- 
 nate such an enormity. Yet with all this yon man 
 was not content. ' Let him look,' said he, ' towards 
 his country ; let him die in full sight of freedom and 
 the laws.' It was not Gavius ; it was not a single 
 victim, unknown to fame, a mere individual Eoman 
 citizen ; it was the common cause of liberty, the com- 
 mon rights of citizenship, which you there outraged 
 and put to a shameful death." 
 
 But in order to judge of the thrilling effect of such 
 passages upon a Eoman jury, they must be read in the 
 grand periods of the oration itself, to which no trans- 
 lation into a language so different in idiom and rhythm 
 as English is from Latin can possibly do justice. 
 The fruitless appeal made by the unhappy citizen to 
 the outraged majesty of Rome, and the indignant de- 
 mand for vengeance which the great orator founds 
 upon it proclaiming the recognised principle that, in 
 every quarter of the world, the humblest wanderer who 
 could say he was a Roman citizen should find protec- 
 tion in the name will be always remembered as hav- 
 ing supplied Lord Palmerston with one of his most 
 telling illustrations. But this great speech of Cicero's 
 perhaps the most magnificent piece of declamation 
 in any language though written and preserved to us,
 
 28 IMPEACHMENT OF VERRES. 
 
 was never spoken. The whole of the pleadings in the 
 case, which extend to some length, were composed for 
 the occasion, no doubt, in substance, and we have to 
 thank Cicero for publishing them afterwards in full. 
 But Verres only waited to hear the brief opening speech 
 of his prosecutor ; he did not dare to challenge a 
 verdict, but allowing judgment to go by default, with- 
 drew to Marseilles soon after the trial opened. He 
 lived there, undisturbed in the enjoyment of his 
 plunder, long enough to see the fall and assassination 
 of his great accuser, but only (as it is said) to share his 
 fate soon afterwards as one of the victims of Antony's 
 proscription. Of his guilt there can be no question ; 
 his fear to face a court in which he had many friends 
 is sufficient presumptive evidence of it ; but we must 
 hesitate in assuming the deepness of its dye from the 
 terrible invectives of Cicero. No sensible person will 
 form an opinion upon the real merits of a case, even in 
 an English court of justice now, entirely from the 
 speech of the counsel for the prosecution. And if we 
 were to go back a century or two, to the state trials of 
 those days, we know that to form our estimate of a 
 prisoner's guilt from such data only would be doing 
 him a gross injustice. We have only to remember the 
 exclamation of Warren Hastings himself, whose trial, 
 as has been said, has so many points of resemblance 
 with that of Verres, when Burke sat down after the 
 torrent of eloquence which he had hurled against the 
 accused in his opening speech for the prosecution ; "I 
 thought myself for the moment," said Hastings, " the 
 guiltiest man in England."
 
 HORTENS1US. 29 
 
 The result of this trial was to raise Cicero at once to 
 the leadership if so modern an expression may be 
 used of the Eoman bar. Up to this time the position 
 had been held by Hortensius, the counsel for Verres, 
 whom Cicero himself calls " the king of the courts." 
 He was eight years the senior of Cicero in age, and 
 many more professionally, for he is said to have made 
 his first public speech at nineteen. He had the ad- 
 vantage of the most extraordinary memory, a musical 
 voice, and a rich flow of language : but Cicero more 
 than implies that he was not above bribing a jury. It 
 was not more disgraceful in those days than bribing a 
 voter in our own. The two men were very unlike in 
 one respect ; Hortensius was a fop and an exquisite 
 (he is said to have brought an action against a colleague 
 for disarranging the folds of his gown), while Cicero's 
 vanity was quite of another kind. After Verres's trial, 
 the two advocates were frequently engaged together in 
 the same cause and on the same side : but Hortensius 
 seems quietly to have abdicated his forensic sovereignty 
 before the rising fame of his younger rival. They 
 became, ostensibly at least, personal friends. What 
 jealousy there was between them, strange to say, seems 
 always to have been on the side of Cicero, who could 
 not be convinced of the friendly feeling which, on 
 Hortensius's part, there seems no reason to doubt. 
 After his rival's death, however, Cicero did full justice 
 to his merits and his eloquence, and even inscribed to 
 his memory a treatise on ' Glory,' which has been lost.
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 THERE was no check as yet in Cicero's career. It had 
 been a steady cotirse of fame and success, honestly 
 earned and well deserved ; and it was soon to culmin- 
 ate in that great civil triumph which earned for him 
 the proud title of Pater Patrice the Father of his 
 Country. It was a phrase which the orator himself had 
 invented ; and it is possible that, with all his natural 
 self-complacency, he might have felt a little uncomfort- 
 able under the compliment, when he remembered on 
 whom he had originally bestowed it upon that Caius 
 Marius, whose death in his bed at a good old age, 
 after being seven times consul, he afterwards uses as 
 an argument, in the mouth of one of his imaginary 
 disputants, against the existence of an overruling Pro- 
 vidence. In the prime of his manhood he reached the 
 great object of a Roman's ambition he became virtu- 
 ally Prime Minister of the republic : for he was elected, 
 by acclamation rather than by vote, the first of the two 
 consuls for the year, and his colleague, Caius Antonius 
 (who had beaten the third candidate, the notorious
 
 CICERO'S CONSULSHIP. 31 
 
 Catiline, by a few votes only) was a man who valued 
 his office chiefly for its opportunities of peculation, 
 and whom Cicero knew how to manage. It is true 
 that this high dignity so jealous were the old re- 
 publican principles of individual power would last 
 only for a year ; but that year was to be a most eventful 
 one, both for Cicero and for Eome. The terrible days 
 of Marius and Sylla had passed, only to leave behind 
 a taste for blood and licence amongst the corrupt aris- 
 tocracy and turbulent commons. There were men 
 amongst the younger nobles quite ready to risk their 
 lives in the struggle for absolute power ; and the mob 
 was ready to follow whatever leader was bold enough 
 to bid highest for their support. 
 
 It is impossible here to do much more than glance 
 at the well-known story of Catiline's conspiracy. It 
 was the attempt of an able and desperate man to make 
 himself and his partisans masters of Eome by a bloody 
 revolution. Catiline was a member of a noble but im- 
 poverished family, who had borne arms under Sylla, and 
 had served an early apprenticeship in bloodshed under 
 that unscrupulous leader. Cicero has described his 
 character in terms which probably are not unfair, be- 
 cause the portrait was drawn by him, in the course of 
 his defence of a young friend who had been too much 
 connected with Catiline, for the distinct purpose of 
 showing the popular qualities which had dazzled and 
 attracted so many of the youth of Eome. 
 
 " He had about him very many of, I can hardly say 
 the visible tokens, but the adumbrations of the 
 highest qualities. There was in his character that
 
 32 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 which tempted him to indulge the worst passions, hut 
 also that which spurred him to energy and hard work. 
 Licentious appetites hurnt fiercely within him, hut there 
 was also a strong love of active military service. I be- 
 lieve that there never lived on earth such a monster of 
 inconsistency, such a compound of opposite tastes and 
 passions hrought into conflict with each other. Who 
 at one time was a greater favourite with our most 
 illustrious men ? Who was a closer intimate with our 
 very "basest? Who could he more greedy of money 
 than he was ? Who could lavish it more profusely 7 
 There were these marvellous qualities in the man, he 
 made friends so universally, he retained them hy his 
 ohliging ways, he was ready to share what he had with 
 them all, to help them at their need with his money, 
 his influence, his personal exertions not stopping 
 short of the most audacious crime, if there was need of 
 it. He could change his very nature, and rule himself 
 by circumstances, and turn and bend in any direction. 
 He lived soberly with the serious, he was a boon com- 
 panion with the gay ; grave with the elders, merry with 
 the young ; reckless among the desperate, profligate 
 with the depraved. With a nature so complex and 
 many-sided, he not only collected round him wicked 
 and desperate characters from all quarters of the world, 
 but he also attracted many brave and good men by his 
 simulation of virtue. It would have been impossible for 
 him to have organised that atrocious attack upon the 
 Commonwealth, unless that fierce outgrowth of de- 
 praved passions had rested on some under-stratum of 
 agreeable qualities and powers of endurance."
 
 CATILINE. 33 
 
 Born in the same year with Cicero, his unsuccessful 
 rival for the consulship, and hating him with the im- 
 placable hatred with which a bad, ambitious, and able 
 man hates an opponent who is his superior in ability 
 and popularity as well as character, Catiline seems to 
 have felt, as his revolutionary plot ripened, that be- 
 tween the new consul and himself the fates of Rome 
 must choose. He had gathered round him a band of 
 profligate young nobles, deep in debt like himself, and 
 of needy and unscrupulous adventurers of all classes. 
 He had partisans who were collecting and drilling 
 troops for him in several parts of Italy. The pro- 
 gramme was assassination, abolition of debts, confisca- 
 tion of property : so little of novelty is there in re- 
 volutionary principles. The first plan had been to 
 murder the consuls of the year before, and seize the 
 government. It had failed through his own impatience. 
 He now hired assassins against Cicero, choosing the 
 opportunity of the election of the incoming consuls, 
 which always took place some time before their en- 
 trance on office. But the plot was discovered, and the 
 election was put off. When it did take place, Cicero 
 appeared in the meeting, wearing somewhat ostenta- 
 tiously a corslet of bright steel, to show that he knew 
 his danger ; and Catiline's partisans found the place of 
 meeting already occupied by a strong force of the 
 younger citizens of the middle class, who had armed 
 themselves for the consul's protection. The election 
 passed off quietly, and Catiline was again rejected. A 
 second time he tried assassination, and it failed so 
 watchful and well informed was the intended victim. 
 
 A. c. vol. ix.
 
 34 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 And now Cicero, perhaps, was roused to a conscious- 
 ness that one or other must fall ; for in the unusually 
 determined measures which he took in the suppression 
 of the conspiracy, the mixture of personal alarm with 
 patriotic indignation is very perceptible. By a for- 
 tunate chance, the whole plan of the conspirators was 
 betrayed. Eebel camps had been formed not only in 
 Italy, but in Spain and Mauritania : Eome was to be 
 set on fire, the slaves to be armed, criminals let loose, 
 the friends of order to be put out of the way. The 
 consul called a meeting of the senate in the temple of 
 Jupiter Stator, a strong position on "the Palatine Hill, 
 and denounced the plot in all its details, naming even 
 the very day fixed for the outbreak. The arch-conspir- 
 ator had the audacity to be present, and Cicero addressed 
 him personally in the eloquent invective which has 
 come to us as his "First Oration against Catiline." 
 His object was to drive his enemy from the city to the 
 camp of his partisans, and thus to bring matters at 
 once to a crisis for which he now felt himself prepared. 
 This daily state of public insecurity and personal danger 
 had lasted too long, he said : 
 
 " Therefore, let these conspirators at once take their 
 side; let them separate themselves from honest citizens, 
 and gather themselves together somewhere else ; ' let 
 them put a wall between us, as I have often said. Let 
 us have them no longer thus plotting the assassination 
 of a consul in his own house, overawing our courts of 
 justice with armed bands, besieging the senate-house 
 with drawn swords, collecting their incendiary stores to 
 burn our city. Let us at last be able to read plainly
 
 SPEECH AGAINST CATILINE. 35 
 
 in every Eoman's face whether he bo loyal to his 
 country or no. I may promise you this, gentlemen of 
 the Senate there shall be no lack of diligence on the 
 part of your consuls ; there will be, I trust, no lack of 
 dignity and firmness on your own, of spirit amongst 
 the Eoman knights, of unanimity amongst all honest 
 men, but that when Catiline has once gone from us, 
 everything will be not only discovered and brought 
 into the light of day, but also crushed, ay, and 
 punished. Under such auspices, I bid you, Catiline, 
 go forth to wage your impious and unhallowed war, 
 go, to the salvation of the state, to your own over- 
 throw and destruction, to the ruin of all who have joined 
 you in your great wickedness and treason. And thou, 
 great Jupiter, whose worship Romulus founded here 
 coeval with our city ; whom we call truly the ' Stay' * 
 of our capital and our empire ; thou wilt protect thine 
 own altars and the temples of thy kindred gods, the walls 
 and roof-trees of our homes, the lives and fortunes of 
 our citizens, from yon man and his accomplices. These 
 enemies of all good men, invaders of their country, 
 plunderers of Italy, linked together in a mutual bond of 
 crime and an alliance of villany, thou wilt surely visit 
 with an everlasting punishment, living and dead ! " 
 
 Catiline's courage did not fail him. He had been 
 sitting alone for all the other senators had shrunk 
 away from the bench of which he had taken possession. 
 He rose, and in reply to Cicero, in a forced tone of 
 humility protested his innocence. He tried also an- 
 other point. Was he, a man of ancient and noble 
 * ' Stater.'
 
 36 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 family, to be hastily condemned by his fellow-nobles 
 on the word of this * foreigner,' as he contemptuously 
 called Cicero this parvenu from Arpinum ? But the 
 appeal failed ; his voice was drowned in the cries of 
 'traitor' which arose on all sides, and with threats 
 and curses, vowing that since he was driven to despera- 
 tion he would involve all Rome in his ruin, he rushed 
 out of the Senate-house. At dead of night he left the 
 city, and joined the insurgent camp at Faesulae. 
 
 When the thunders of Cicero's eloquence had driven 
 Catiline from the Senate-house, and forced him to 
 join his fellow-traitors, and so put himself in the 
 position of levying open war against the state, it re- 
 mained to deal with those influential conspirators who 
 had been detected and seized within the city walls. 
 In three subsequent speeches in the Senate he justi- 
 fied the course he had taken in allowing Catiline to 
 escape, exposed further particulars of the conspiracy, 
 and urged the adoption of strong measures to crush 
 it out within the city. Even now, not all Cicero's 
 eloquence, nor all the efforts of our imagination to 
 realise, as men realised it then, the imminence of 
 the public danger, can reconcile the summary pro- 
 cess adopted by the consul with our English notions 
 of calm and deliberate justice. Of the guilt of the 
 men there was no doubt ; most of them even admitted 
 it. But there was no formal trial ; and a few hours 
 after a vote of death had been passed upon them in a 
 hesitating Senate, Lentulus and Cethegus, two mem- 
 bers of that august body, with three of their com- 
 panions in guilt, were brought from their separate
 
 EXECUTION OF THE CONSPIRATORS. 37 
 
 places of confinement, with, some degree of secrecy (as 
 appears from different writers), carried down into the 
 gloomy prison -vaults of the Tullianum,* and there 
 quietly strangled, by the sole authority of the consul. 
 Unquestionably they deserved death, if ever poli- 
 tical criminals deserved it : the lives and liberties of 
 good citizens were in danger; it was necessary to 
 strike deep and strike swiftly at a conspiracy which 
 extended no man knew how widely, and in which men 
 like Julius Csesar and Crassus were strongly suspected 
 of being engaged. The consuls had been armed with 
 extra-constitutional powers, conveyed by special reso- 
 lution of the Senate in the comprehensive formula 
 that they " were to look to it that the state suffered 
 no damage." Still, without going so far as to call this 
 unexampled proceeding, as the German critic Momm- 
 sen does, " an act of the most brutal tyranny," it is 
 easy to understand how Mr Forsyth, bringing a calm 
 and dispassionate legal judgment to bear upon the 
 case, finds it impossible to reconcile it with our ideas 
 of dignified and even-handed justice, t It was the 
 hasty instinct of self-preservation, the act of a weak 
 government uncertain of its very friends, under the 
 influence of terror a terror for which, no doubt, there 
 were abundant grounds. When Cicero stood on the 
 prison steps, where he had waited to receive the report 
 
 * A state dungeon, said to have been built in the reign of Ser- 
 vius Tullius. It was twelve* feet under ground. Executions 
 often took place there, and the bodies of the criminals were 
 afterwards thrown down the Gemonian steps (which were close 
 at hand) into the Forum, for the people to see. 
 
 t Life of Cicero, p. 119.
 
 38 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 of those who were making sure work with the prisoners 
 within, and announced their fate to the assembled 
 crowd below in the single word " Vixerunt" (a 
 euphemism which we can only weakly translate into 
 "They have lived their life"), no doubt he felt that 
 he and the republic held theirs from that moment by 
 a firmer tenure ; no doubt very many of those who 
 heard him felt that they could breathe again, now that 
 the grasp of Catiline's assassins was, for the moment at 
 all events, off their throats ; and the crowd who fol- 
 lowed the consul home were sincere enough when they 
 hailed such a vigorous avenger as the ' Father of his 
 Country.' But none the less it was that which poli- 
 ticians have called worse than a crime it was a politi- 
 cal blunder ; and Cicero came to find it so in after 
 years ; though partly from his immense self-apprecia- 
 tion, and partly from an honest determination to stand 
 by his act and deed in all its consequences he never 
 suffered the shadow of such a confession to appear in 
 his most intimate correspondence. He claimed for 
 himself ever afterwards the sole glory of having saved 
 the state by such prompt and decided action ; and in 
 this he was fully borne out by the facts : justifiable 
 or unjustifiable, the act was his; and there were 
 burning hearts at Borne which dared not speak out 
 against the popular consul, but set it down to his sole 
 account against the day of retribution. 
 
 For the present, however, all went successfully. 
 The boldness of the consul's measures cowed the dis- 
 affected, and confirmed the timid and wavering. His 
 colleague Antonius himself by no means to be de-
 
 DEATH OF CATILINE. 39 
 
 pended on at this crisis, having but lately formed 
 a coalition with Catiline as against Cicero in the elec- 
 tion for consuls had, by judicious management, been 
 got away from Eome to take the command against the 
 rebel army in Etruria. He did not, indeed, engage in 
 the campaign actively in person, having just now a 
 fit of the gout, either real or pretended; but his 
 lieutenant-general was an old soldier who cared chiefly 
 for his duty, and Catiline's band reckless and des- 
 perate men who had gathered to his camp from all 
 motives and from all quarters were at length brought 
 to bay, and died fighting hard to the last. Scarcely a 
 man of them, except the slaves and robbers who had 
 swelled their ranks, either escaped or was made 
 prisoner. Catiline's body easily recognised by his 
 remarkable height was found, still breathing, lying 
 far in advance of his followers, surrounded by the dead 
 bodies of the Eoman legionaries for the loss on the 
 side of the Eepublic had been very severe. The last 
 that remained to him of the many noble qualities which 
 had marked his earlier years was a desperate personal 
 courage. 
 
 For the month that yet remained of his consulship, 
 Cicero was the foremost man in Eome and, as a 
 consequence, in the whole world. Nobles and com- 
 mons vied in doing honour to the saviour of the state. 
 Catulus and Cato men from whose lips words of 
 honour came with a double weight saluted him pub- 
 licly by that memorable title of Pater Patrice; and 
 not only the capital, but most of the provincial towns 
 of Italy, voted him some public testimony of his un-
 
 40 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 rivalled services. No man had a more profound appre- 
 ciation of those services than the great orator himself. 
 It is possible that other men have felt quite as vain of 
 their own exploits, and on far less grounds \ but surely 
 no man ever paraded his self-complacency like Cicero. 
 His vanity was indeed a thing to marvel at rather 
 than to smile at, because it was the vanity of so able 
 a man. Other great men have been either too really 
 great to entertain the feeling, or have been wise enougli 
 to keep it to themselves. But to Cicero it must have 
 been one of the enjoyments of his life. He harped 
 upon his consulship in season and out of season, in his 
 letters, in his judicial pleadings, in his public speeches 
 (and we may be sure in his conversation), until one 
 would think his friends must have hated the subject 
 even more than his enemies. He wrote accounts of it 
 in prose and verse, in Latin and Greek and, no doubt, 
 only limited them to those languages because they were 
 the only ones he knew. The well-known line which 
 provoked the ridicule of critics like Juvenal and Quin- 
 tilian, because of the unlucky jingle peculiarly unpleas- 
 ant to a Eoman ear 
 
 " O fortunatam natam me consule Komam ! " 
 
 expresses the sentiment which rhyme or no rhyme, 
 reason or no reason he was continually repeating in 
 some form or other to himself and to every one who 
 would listen. 
 
 His consulship closed in glory ; but on his very last 
 day of office there was a warning voice raised amidst 
 the triumph, which might have opened his eyes
 
 CLOSE OF HIS CONSULSHIP, 41 
 
 perhaps it did to the troubles which were to come. 
 He stood up in the Rostra to make the usual address 
 to the people on laying down his authority. Metellus 
 Nepos had "been newly elected one of the tribunes : 
 it was his office to guard jealously all the rights and 
 privileges of the Roman commons. Influenced, it is 
 said, by Csesar possibly himself an undiscovered parti- 
 san of Catiline he dealt a blow at the retiring consul 
 under cover of a discharge of duty. As Cicero was 
 about to speak, he interposed a tribune's ' veto ' ; no 
 man should be heard, he said, who had put Roman 
 citizens to death icithout a trial. There was consterna- 
 tion in the Forum. Cicero could not dispute what 
 was a perfectly legal exercise of the tribune's power ; 
 only, in a few emphatic words which he seized the 
 opportunity of adding to the usual formal oath on quit- 
 ting office, he protested that his act had saved Rome. 
 The people shouted in answer, " Thou hast said true !" 
 and Cicero went home a private citizen, but with that 
 hearty tribute from his grateful countrymen ringing 
 pleasantly in his ears. But the bitter words of Metel- 
 lus were yet to be echoed by his enemies again and 
 again, until that fickle popular voice took them up, 
 and howled them after the once popular consul. 
 
 Let us follow him for a while into private life ; a 
 pleasanter companionship for us, we confess, than the 
 unstable glories of the political arena at Rome. In 
 his family and social relations, the great orator wins 
 from us an amount of personal interest and sympathy 
 which he fails sometimes to command in his career 
 as a statesman. At forty-five years of age he has
 
 42 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 become a very wealthy man has bought for some- 
 thing like 30,000 a noble mansion on the Palatine 
 Hill ; and besides the old-fashioned family seat near 
 Arpinum now become his own by his father's death 
 he has built, or enlarged, or bought as they stood, villas 
 at Antium, at Formise, at Pompeii, at Cumae, at Puteoli, 
 and at half-a-dozen other places, besides the one fav- 
 ourite spot of all, which was to him almost what Ab- 
 botsford was to Scott, the home which it was the 
 delight of his life to embellish his country-house 
 among the pleasant hills of Tusculum.* It had once 
 belonged to Sulla, and was about twelve miles from 
 Eome. In that beloved building and its arrangements 
 he indulged, as an ample purse allowed him, not only 
 a highly-cultivated taste, but in some respects almost a 
 whimsical fancy. " A mere cottage," he himself terms 
 it in one place ; but this was when he was deprecating 
 accusations of extravagance which were brought against 
 him, and we all understand something of the pride 
 which in such matters " apes humility." He would 
 have it on the plan of the Academia at Athens, with 
 its palcestra and open colonnade, where, as he tells us, 
 he could walk and discuss politics or philosophy with 
 his friends. Greek taste and design were as fashion- 
 able among the Eomans of that day as the Louis 
 Quatorze style was with our grandfathers. But its 
 grand feature was a library, and its most valued furni- 
 ture was books. Without books, he said, a house was 
 but a body without a soul He entertained for these 
 
 * Near the modern town of Frascati. But there is no cer- 
 tainty as to the site of Cicero's villa.
 
 CICERO'S VILLA AT TUSCULUM. 43 
 
 treasures not only the calm love of a reader, but the 
 passion of a bibliophile ; he was particular about his 
 bindings, and admired the gay colours of the covers in 
 which the precious manuscripts were kept as well as 
 the more intellectual beauties within. He had clever 
 Greek slaves employed from time to time in making 
 copies of all such works as were not to be readily pur- 
 chased. He could walk across, too, as he tells us, to 
 his neighbour's, the young Lucullus, a kind of ward 
 of his, and borrow from the library of that splendid 
 mansion any book he wanted. His friend Atticus 
 collected for him everywhere manuscripts, paintings, 
 statuary; though for sculpture he professes not to 
 care much, except for such subjects as might form ap- 
 propriate decorations for his palaestra and his library. 
 Very pleasant must have been the days spent together 
 by the two friends so alike in their private tastes and 
 habits, so far apart in their chosen course of life when 
 they met there in the brief holidays which Cicero stole 
 from the law-courts and the Forum, and sauntered in 
 the shady walks, or lounged in the cool library, in 
 that home of lettered ease, where the busy lawyer and 
 politician declared that he forgot for a while all the 
 toils and vexations of public life. 
 
 He had his little annoyances, however, even in these 
 happy hours of retirement. Morning calls were an 
 infliction to which a country gentleman was liable in 
 ancient Italy as in modern England. A man like 
 Cicero was very good company, and somewhat of a 
 lion besides and country neighbours, wherever he set 
 np his rest, insisted on bestowing their tediousness on
 
 44 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 him. His villa at Forniiae, his favourite residence 
 next to Tusculum, was, he protested, more like a public 
 hall. Most of his visitors, indeed, had the considera- 
 tion not to trouble him after ten or eleven in the fore- 
 noon (fashionable calls in those days began uncomfort- 
 ably early) ; but there were one or two, especially his 
 next-door neighbour, Arrius, and a friend's friend, 
 named Sebosus, who were in and out at all hours : the 
 former had an unfortunate taste for philosophical dis- 
 cussion, and was postponing his return to Rome (he 
 was good enough to say) from day to day in order to 
 enjoy these long mornings in Cicero's conversation. 
 Such are the doleful complaints in two or three of the 
 letters to Atticus ; but, like all such complaints, they 
 were probably only half in earnest : popularity, even 
 at a watering-place, was not very unpleasant, and the 
 writer doubtless knew how to practise the social philo- 
 sophy which he recommends to others, and took his 
 place cheerfully and pleasantly in the society which 
 he found about him not despising his honest neigh- 
 bours because they had not all adorned a consulship 
 or saved a state. 
 
 There were times when Cicero fancied that this 
 rural life, with all its refinements of wealth and taste 
 and literary leisure, was better worth living than the 
 public life of the capital. His friends and his books, 
 he said, were the company most congenial to him ; 
 " politics might go to the dogs ; " to count the waves 
 as they rolled on the beach was happiness ; he " had 
 rather be mayor of Antium than consul at Rome " ; 
 " rather sit in his own library with Atticus in their
 
 LIFE IN TEE COUNTRY. 45 
 
 favourite seat under the bust of Aristotle than, in 
 the curule chair." It is true that these longings for 
 retirement usually followed some political defeat or 
 mortification ; that his natural sphere, the only life in 
 which he could be really happy, was in the keen ex- 
 citement of party warfare the glorious battle-field of 
 the Senate and the Forum. The true key-note of his 
 mind is to be found in these words to his friend Ccelius : 
 " Cling to the city, my friend, and live in her light : 
 all employment abroad, as I have felt from my earliest 
 manhood, is obscure and petty for those who have 
 abilities to make them famous at Borne." Yet the 
 other strain had nothing in it of aifectation or hypo- 
 crisy : it was the schoolboy escaped from work, thor- 
 oughly enjoying his holiday, and fancying that nothing 
 would be so delightful as to have holidays always. 
 In this, again, there was a similarity between Cicero's 
 taste and that of Horace. The poet loved his Sabine 
 farm and all its rural delights after his fashion ; and 
 perhaps thought honestly that he loved it more than 
 he really did. Above all, he loved to write about it. 
 With that fancy, half-real, perhaps, and half-afiected, 
 for pastoral simplicity, which has always marked a 
 state of over-luxurious civilisation, he protests to him- 
 self that there is nothing like the country. But per- 
 haps Horace discharges a sly jest at himself, in a sort 
 of aside to his readers, in the person of Alphius, the 
 rich city money-lender, who is made to utter that pretty 
 apostrophe to rural happiness :
 
 46 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 " Happy the man, in busy schemes unskilled, 
 Who, living simply, like our sires of old, 
 Tills the few acres which his father tilled, 
 Vexed by no thoughts of usury or gold." 
 
 Martin's ' Horace.' 
 
 And who, after thus expatiating for some stanzas on 
 the charms of the country, calls in all his money one 
 week in order to settle there, and puts it all out again 
 (no doubt at higher interest) the week after. " rus, 
 quando te aspiciam I " has been the cry of public men 
 before and since Cicero's day, to whom, as to the great 
 Roman, banishment from political life, and condemna- 
 tion to perpetual leisure, would have been a sentence 
 that would have crushed their very souls. 
 
 He was very happy at this time in his family. His 
 wife and he loved one another with an honest affection; 
 anything more would have been out of the natural course 
 of things in Eoman society at any date, and even so much 
 as this was become a notable exception in these later 
 days. It is paying a high honour to the character of 
 Cicero and his household and from all evidence that 
 has come down to us it may be paid with truth that 
 even in those evil times it might have presented the ori- 
 ginal of what Virgil drew as almost a fancy picture, or one 
 to be realised only in some happy retirement into which 
 the civilised vices of the capital had never penetrated 
 
 " Where loving children climb to reach a kiss 
 A home of chaste delights and wedded bliss." * 
 
 * " Interia dulces pendent circum oscula nati ; 
 Casta pudicitiam servat domus." 
 
 Georg. ii. 524.
 
 TULLIA AND MARCUS. 47 
 
 His little daughter, Tullia, or Tulliola, which was her 
 pet name (the Roman diminutives being formed some- 
 what more elegantly than ours, by adding a syllable 
 instead of cutting short), was the delight of his heart ; 
 in his earlier letters to Atticus he is constantly making 
 some affectionate mention of her sending her love, or 
 some playful message which his friend would under- 
 stand. She had been happily married (though she 
 was then but thirteen at the most) the year before his 
 consulship ; but the affectionate intercourse between 
 father and daughter was never interrupted until her 
 early death. His only son, Marcus, born after a consider- 
 able interval, who succeeded to Tullia's place as a house- 
 hold pet, is made also occasionally to send some child- 
 ish word of remembrance to his father's old friend : 
 " Cicero the Little sends his compliments to Titus the 
 Athenian " " Cicero the Philosopher salutes Titus the 
 Politician."* These messages are written inGreekat the 
 end of the letters. Abeken thinks that in the originals 
 they might have been added in the little Cicero's own 
 hand, " to show that he had begun Greek ;" "a conjec- 
 ture," says Mr Merivale, " too pleasant not to be readily 
 admitted." The boy gave his father some trouble in 
 after life. He served with some credit as an officer 
 of cavalry under Pompey in Greece, or at least got 
 into no trouble there. Some years after, he wished 
 to take service in Spain, under Caesar, against the 
 sons of Pompey ; but the father did not approve of 
 this change of side. He persuaded him to go to 
 
 * See 'Letters to Atticus,' ii. 9, 12 ; Merivale's translation of 
 Abeken's 'Cicero in Seinen Brief en,' p. 114.
 
 48 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 Athens to study instead, allowing him what both At- 
 ticus and himself thought a very liberal income not 
 sufficient, however, for him to keep a horse, which 
 Cicero held to be an unnecessary luxury. Probably 
 the young cavalry officer might not have been of the 
 same opinion ; at any rate, he got into more trouble 
 among the philosophers than he did in the army. He 
 spent a great deal more than his allowance, and one of 
 the professors, whose lectures he attended, had the 
 credit of helping him to spend it. The young man 
 must have shared the kindly disposition of his father. 
 He wrote a confidential letter to Tiro, the old family 
 servant, showing very good feeling, and promising re- 
 formation. It is doubtful how far the promise was 
 kept. He rose, however, subsequently to place and 
 power under Augustus, but died without issue ; and, 
 so far at least as history knows them, the line of the 
 Ciceros was extinct. It had flashed into fame with 
 the great orator, and died out with him. 
 
 All Cicero's biographers have found considerable 
 difficulty in tracing, at all satisfactorily, the sources of 
 the magnificent fortune which must have been required 
 to keep up, and to embellish in accordance with so 
 luxurious a taste, so many residences in all parts of 
 the country. True, these expenses often led Cicero 
 into debt and difficulties ; but what he borrowed from 
 his friends he seems always to have repaid, so that the 
 money must have come in from some quarter or other. 
 His patrimony at Arpinum would not appear to have 
 been large ; he got only some 3000 or 4000 dowry 
 with Terentia; and we find no hint of his making
 
 SOURCES OF INCOME. 49 
 
 money by any commercial speculations, as some Eoman 
 gentlemen did. On the other hand, it is the barest 
 justice to him to say that his hands were clean from 
 those ill-gotten gains which made the fortunes of many 
 of the wealthiest public men at Eome, who were crim- 
 inals in only a less degree than Verres peculation, 
 extortion, and downright robbery in the unfortunate 
 provinces which they were sent out to govern. Such 
 opportunities lay as ready to his grasp as to other 
 men's, but he steadily eschewed them. His declining 
 the tempting prize of a provincial government, which 
 was his right on the expiration of his prsetorship, may 
 fairly be attributed to his having in view the higher 
 object of the consulship, to secure which, by an early 
 and persistent canvass, he felt it necessary to remain 
 in Eome. But he again waived the right when his 
 consulship was over ; and when, some years afterwards, 
 he went unwillingly as proconsul to Cilicia, his admin- 
 istration there, as before in his lower office in Sicily, 
 was marked by a probity and honesty quite excep- 
 tional in a Eoman governor. His emoluments, con- 
 fined strictly within the legal bounds, would be only 
 moderate, and, whatever they were, came too late in 
 his life to be any explanation of his earlier expenditure. 
 He received many valuable legacies, at different times, 
 from personal friends or grateful clients who died 
 childless (be it remembered how the barrenness of the 
 marriage union had become then, at Eome, as it is said 
 to be in some countries now, the reproach of a sensual 
 and effete aristocracy) ; he boasts himself, in one of his 
 ' Philippics,' that he had received from this source 
 
 A. C. VOL IX. D
 
 50 THE CONSULSHIP AND CATILINE. 
 
 above 170,000. Mr Forsyth also notices the large 
 presents that were made by foreign kings and states to 
 conciliate the support and advocacy of the leading men 
 at Eome "we can hardly call them bribes, for in 
 many cases the relation of patron and client was avow- 
 edly established between a foreign state and some 
 influential Roman : and it became his duty, as of 
 course it was his interest, to defend it in the Senate 
 and before the people." In this way, he thinks, Cicero 
 held " retainers " from Dyrrachhim ; and, he might 
 have added, from Sicily. The great orator's own boast 
 was, that he never took anything for his services as an 
 advocate ; and, indeed, such payments were forbidden 
 by law.* But with all respect for Cicero's material 
 honesty, one learns from his letters, unfortunately, not 
 to put implicit confidence in him when he is in a 
 boasting vein ; and he might not look upon voluntary 
 gifts, after a cause was decided, in the light of pay- 
 ment. Psetus, one of his clients, gave him a valuable 
 library of books ; and one cannot believe that this was 
 a solitary instance of the quiet evasion of the Cincian 
 law, or that there were not other transactions of the 
 same nature which never found their way into any 
 letter of Cicero's that was likely to come down to us. 
 
 * The principle passed, like so many others, from the old 
 Roman law into our own, so that to this very day, a barrister's 
 fees, being considered in the nature of an honorarium, or vol- 
 untary present made to him for his services, are not recoverable 
 by law.
 
 CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 HIS EXILE AND RETURN. 
 
 WE must return to Rome. Cicero had never left it 
 but for his short occasional holiday. Though no longer 
 in office, the ex-consul was still one of the foremost 
 public men, and his late dignity gave him important 
 precedence in the Senate. He was soon to be brought 
 into contact, and more or less into opposition, with 
 the two great chiefs of parties in whose feuds he be- 
 came at length so fatally involved. Pompey and 
 Ceesar were both gradually becoming formidable, and 
 both had ambitious plans of their own, totally incon- 
 sistent with any remnant of republican liberty plans 
 which Cicero more or less suspected, and of that sus- 
 picion they were probably both aware. Both, by their 
 successful campaigns, had not only acquired fame and 
 honours, but a far more dangerous influence an 
 influence which was to overwhelm all others here- 
 after in the affection of their legions. Pompey was 
 still absent in Spain, but soon to return from his 
 long war against Mithridates, to enjoy the most splen- 
 did triumph ever seen at Rome, and to take the
 
 52 EXILE AND RETURN. 
 
 lead of the oligarchical party just so long and so 
 far as they would help Mm to the power he coveted. 
 The enemies whom Cicero had made by his strong 
 measures in the matter of the Catilinarian conspiracy 
 now took advantage of Pompey's name and popularity 
 to make an attack upon him. The tribune Metellus, 
 constant to his old party watchword, moved in the 
 Senate that the successful general, upon whom all ex- 
 pectations were centred, should be recalled to Rome 
 with his army " to restore the violated constitution." 
 All knew against whom the motion was aimed, and 
 what the violation of the constitution meant ; it was 
 the putting citizens to death without a trial The 
 measure was not passed, though Caesar, jealous of 
 Cicero even more than of Pompey, lent himself to the 
 attempt. 
 
 But the blow fell on Cicero at last from a very dif- 
 ferent quarter, and from the mere private grudge of a 
 determined and unprincipled man. Publius Clodius, 
 a young man of noble family, once a friend and sup- 
 porter of Cicero against Catiline, but who had already 
 made himself notorious for the most abandoned profli- 
 gacy, was detected, in a woman's dress, at the celebra- 
 tion of the rites of the Bona Dea a kind of religious 
 freemasonry amongst the Roman ladies, the mysteries 
 of which are very little known, and probably would in 
 any case be best left without explanation. But for a 
 man to have been present at them was a sacrilege 
 hitherto unheard of, and which was held to lay the 
 whole city under the just wrath of the offended god- 
 dess. The celebration had been held in the house of
 
 CLODIUS. 53 
 
 Caesar, as praetor, under the presidency of his wife 
 Pompeia ; and it was said that the object of the young 
 profligate was an intrigue with that lady. The circum- 
 stances are not favourable to the suspicion ; but Caesar 
 divorced her forthwith, with the often-quoted remark 
 that " Caesar's wife must not be even suspected." For 
 this crime unpardonable even in that corrupt society, 
 when crimes of far deeper dye passed almost unre- 
 proved Clodius was, after some delay, brought to 
 public trial. The defence set up was an' alibi, and 
 Cicero came forward as a witness to disprove it : he 
 had met and spoken with Clodius in Eome that very 
 evening. The evidence was clear enough, but the 
 jury had been tampered with by Clodius and his friends ; 
 liberal bribery, and other corrupting influences of even 
 a more disgraceful kind, had been successfully brought 
 to bear upon the majority of them, and he escaped con- 
 viction by a few votes. But he never forgave the part 
 which Cicero had taken against him; and from that 
 time forth the latter found a new, unscrupulous, inde- 
 fatigable enemy, of whose services his old opponents 
 gladly availed themselves. Cicero himself for some 
 time underrated this new danger. He lost no oppor- 
 tunity of taunting the unconvicted criminal in the bit- 
 terest terms in the Senate, and of exchanging with him 
 very much to the detriment of his own character 
 and dignity, in our modern eyes the coarsest jests 
 when they met in the street. But the temptation to 
 a jest, of whatever kind, was always irresistible to 
 Cicero : it was a weakness for which he more than 
 once paid dearly, for they were remembered against
 
 54 EXILE AND RETURN. 
 
 him when he had forgotten them. Meanwhile Clodius 
 a sort of milder Catiline, not without many popular 
 qualities had got himself elected tribune ; degrading 
 himself formally from his own order of nobles for 
 that purpose, since the tribune must be a man of the 
 commons. The powers of the office were formidable 
 for all purposes of obstruction and attack; Clodius had 
 taken pains to ingratiate himself with all classes ; and 
 the consuls of the year were men of infamous character, 
 for whom he had found a successful means of bribery 
 by the promise of getting a special law passed to secure 
 them the choice of the richest provincial governments 
 those coveted fields of plunder of which they would 
 otherwise have had to take their chance by lot. When 
 all was ripe for his revenge, he brought before the 
 people in full assembly the following bill of pains and 
 penalties : " Be it enacted, that whoever has put to 
 death a Roman citizen uncondemned in due form of 
 trial, shall be interdicted from fire and water." Such 
 was the legal form of words which implied banishment 
 from Eome, outlawry, and social excommunication. 
 Every man knew against whom the motion was level- 
 led. It was carried carried in spite of the indigna- 
 tion of all honest men in Rome, in spite of all Cicero's 
 humiliating efforts to obtain its rejection. 
 
 It was in vain that he put on mourning, as was the 
 custom with those who were impeached of public 
 crimes, and went about the streets thus silently im- 
 ploring the pity of his fellow-citizens. In vain the 
 whole of his own equestrian order, and in fact, as he 
 declares, " all honest men" (it was his favourite term
 
 DEPARTURE FROM ROME. 55 
 
 for men of his own party), adopted the same dress to 
 show their sympathy, and twenty thousand youths 
 of good family all in mourning accompanied him 
 through the city. The Senate even met and passed 
 a resolution that their whole house should put on 
 mourning too. But Gabinius, one of the consuls, at 
 once called a public meeting, and warned the people 
 not to make the mistake of thinking that the Senate 
 was Rome. 
 
 In vain, also, was any personal appeal which Cicero 
 could make to the only two men who might have had 
 influence enough to sway the popular vote. He was 
 ostensibly on good terms both with Pompey and Caesar; 
 in fact, he made it his policy so to be. He foresaw 
 that on their future course would probably depend 
 the fate of Eome, and he persuaded himself, perhaps 
 honestly, that he could make them " better citizens." 
 But he trusted neither ; and both saw in him an ob- 
 stacle to their own ambition. Cassar now looked on 
 coldly, not altogether sorry at the turn which affairs 
 had taken, and faintly suggested that perhaps some 
 " milder measure" might serve to meet the case. From 
 Pompey Cicero had a right to look for some active 
 support ; indeed, such had been promised in case of 
 need. He threw himself at his feet with prayers and 
 tears, but even this last humiliation was in vain ; and 
 he anticipated the execution of that disgraceful edict 
 by a voluntary withdrawal into exile. Piso, one of 
 the consuls, had satirically suggested that thus he 
 might " save Eome" a second time. His property was 
 at once confiscated; his villas at Tusculum and at For-
 
 56 EXILE AND RETURN. 
 
 miae were plundered and laid waste, the consuls claim- 
 ing the lion's share of the spoil; and Clodius, with his 
 armed mob, set fire to the noble house on the Palatine, 
 razed it to the ground, and erected on the site a temple 
 to Liberty ! 
 
 Cicero had friends who strongly urged him to defy 
 the edict; to remain at Rome, and call on all good 
 citizens to arm in his defence. Modern historians very 
 generally have assumed that, if he could have made up 
 his mind to such a course, it would probably have been 
 successful. He was to rely, we suppose, upon those 
 " twenty thousand Eoman youths " rather a broken 
 reed to trust to (remembering what those young gal- 
 lants were), with Caesar against him, now at the head 
 of his legions just outside the gates of Rome. He him- 
 self seriously contemplated suicide, and consulted his 
 friends as to the propriety of such a step in the gravest 
 and most business-like manner; though, with our 
 modern notions on the subject, such a consultation has 
 more of the ludicrous than the sublime. The sensible 
 and practical Atticus convinced him that such a solu- 
 tion of his difficulties would be the greatest possible 
 mistake a mistake, moreover, which could never be 
 rectified. 
 
 But almost any course would have become him better 
 than that which he chose. Had he remained and faced 
 Clodius and his bravos manfully or had he turned his 
 back upon Rome for ever, and shaken the dust off his 
 feet against the ungrateful city, and become a noble 
 pensioner upon Atticus at Buthrotum he would have 
 died a greater man. He wandered from place to place,
 
 BEE A V10UR IN EXILE. 57 
 
 sheltered by friends whose unselfish loyalty marks their 
 names with honour in that false and evil generation 
 Sica, and Flaccus, and Plancius bemoaning himself 
 like a woman, "too blinded with tears to write," 
 " loathing the light of day." Atticus thought he was 
 going mad. It is not pleasant to dwell upon this 
 miserable weakness of a great mind, which Cicero's 
 most eager eulogists admit, and which his detractors 
 have not failed to make the most of. Nor is it easy to 
 find excuse for him, but we will give him all the 
 benefit of Mr Forsyth's defence : 
 
 " Seldom has misfortune so crushed a noble spirit, and 
 never, perhaps, has the ' bitter bread of banishment ' seemed 
 more bitter to any one than to him. We must remember 
 that the love of country was a passion with the ancients to 
 a degree which it is now difficult to realise, and exile from 
 it even for a time was felt to be an intolerable evil. The 
 nearest approach to such a feeling was perhaps that of some 
 favourite under an European monarchy, when, frowned 
 upon by his sovereign, he was hurled from place and power, 
 and banished from the court. The change to Cicero was 
 indeed tremendous. Not only was he an exile from Rome, 
 the scene of all his hopes, his glories, his triumphs, but he 
 was under the ban of an outlaw. If found within a certain 
 distance from the capital, he must die, and it was death to 
 any one to give him food or shelter. His property was 
 destroyed, his family was penniless, and the people whom 
 he had so faithfully served were the authors of his ruin. 
 All this may be urged in his behalf, but still it would 
 have been only consistent with Roman fortitude to have 
 shown that he possessed something of the spirit of the 
 fallen archangel." * 
 
 * Forsyth's Life of Cicero, p. 190.
 
 58 EXILE AND RETURN. 
 
 His exile lasted nearly a year and a half. Long be- 
 fore that time there had come a reaction in his favour. 
 The new consuls were well disposed towards him; 
 Clodius's insolence had already disgusted Pompey; 
 Caesar was absent with his legions in Gaul ; his own 
 friends, who had all along been active in his favour 
 (though in his querulous mood he accused them of 
 apathy) took advantage of the change, his generous 
 rival Hortensius being amongst the most active ; and 
 all the frantic violence of Clodius and his party served 
 only to delay for a while the return which they could 
 not prevent. A motion for his recall was carried at 
 last by an immense majority. 
 
 Cicero had one remarkable ally on that occasion. 
 On one of the days when the Senate was known to be 
 discussing his recall, the 'Andromache' of Ennius was 
 being played in the theatre. The popular actor ^Esop, 
 whose name has come down to us in conjunction with 
 that of Roscius, was playing the principal character. 
 The great orator had been his pupil, and was evidently 
 regarded by him as a personal friend. With all the 
 force of his consummate art, he threw into Andro- 
 mache's lament for her absent father his own feelings 
 for Cicero. The words in the part were strikingly ap- 
 propriate, and he did not hesitate to insert a phrase or 
 two of his own when he came to speak of the man 
 
 " Who with a constant mind upheld the state, 
 Stood on the people's side in perilous times, 
 Ne'er recked of his own life, nor spared himself." 
 
 So significant and emphatic were his tone and ges-
 
 jESOP THE ACTOR. 59 
 
 ture as he addressed himself pointedly to his Roman 
 audience, that they recalled him, and, amid a storm of 
 plaudits, made him repeat the passage. He added to 
 it the words which were not set down for him 
 
 " Best of all friends in direst strait of war ! " 
 
 and the applause was redoubled. The actor drew 
 courage from his success. When, as the play went on, 
 he came to speak the words 
 
 " And you you let him live a banished man 
 See him driven forth and hunted from your gates !" 
 
 he pointed to the nobles, knights, and commons, as 
 they sat in their respective seats in the crowded rows 
 before him, his own voice broke with grief, and the 
 tears even more than the applause of the whole audience 
 bore witness alike to their feelings towards the exile, 
 and the dramatic power of the actor. " He pleaded 
 my cause before the Roman people," says Cicero (for 
 it is he that tells the story), "with far more weight of 
 eloquence than I could have pleaded for myself."* 
 
 He had been visited with a remarkable dream, while 
 staying with one of his friends in Italy, during the 
 earlier days of his exile, which he now recalled with 
 some interest. He tells us this story also himself, 
 though he puts it into the mouth of another speaker, 
 in his dialogue on " Divination." If few were so fond 
 of introducing personal anecdotes into every place 
 where he could find room for them, fewer still could 
 tell them so well. 
 
 * Defence of Sestius, c. 56, &c.
 
 60 EXILE AND RETURN. 
 
 " I had lain awake a great part of the night, and at 
 last towards dawn had begun to sleep soundly and 
 heavily. I had given orders to my attendant that, 
 in this case, though we had to start that very morning, 
 strict silence should he kept, and that I was on no 
 account to he disturbed ; when about seven o'clock I 
 awoke, and told him my dream. I thought I was wan- 
 dering alone in some solitary place, when Caius Marius 
 appeared to me, with his fasces bound with laurel, and 
 asked why I was so sad ? And when I answered that 
 I had been driven from my country, he caught my hand, 
 bade me be of good cheer, and put me under the guid- 
 ance of his own lictor to lead me to his monument ; 
 there, he said, I should find my deliverance." 
 
 So indeed it had turned out. The temple dedicated 
 to Honour and Virtue, in which the Senate sat when 
 they passed the first resolution for Cicero's recall, was 
 known as the " Monument of Marius." There is no 
 need to doubt the perfect good faith of the story 
 which he tells, and it may be set down as one of the 
 earliest authenticated instances of a dream coming true. 
 But if dreams are fashioned out of our waking imagi- 
 nations, it is easy to believe that the fortunes of his 
 great townsman Marius, and the scenes in the Senate 
 at Rome, were continually present to the exile's 
 thoughts. 
 
 His return was a triumphal progress. He landed at 
 Brundusium on his daughter's birthday. She had only 
 justlost her husband Piso, who had gallantly maintained 
 her father's cause throughout, but she was the first to 
 welcome him with tears of joy which overmastered her
 
 RETURN TO ROME. 61 
 
 sorrow. He was careful to lose no chance of making 
 his return impressive. He took his way to Eome with 
 the slow march of a conqueror. The journey which 
 Horace made easily in twelve days, occupied Cicero 
 twenty-four. But he chose not the shortest "but the 
 most public route, through Naples, Capua, Minturnae, 
 Terracina, and Aricia. 
 
 Let him tell the story of his own reception. If he 
 tells it (as he does more than once) with an undis- 
 guised pride, it is a pride with which it is impossible 
 not to sympathise. He boasted afterwards that he had 
 been "carried back to Eome on the shoulders of Italy; " 
 and Plutarch says it was a boast he had good right to 
 make. 
 
 " Who does not know what my return home was 
 like? How the people of Brundusium held out to me, 
 as I might say, the right hand of welcome on behalf of 
 all my native land ? From thence to Eome my progress 
 was like a march of all Italy. There was no district, no 
 town, corporation, or colony, from which a public de- 
 putation was not sent to congratulate me. Why need 
 I speak of my arrival at each place ? how the people 
 crowded the streets in the towns ; how they flocked 
 in from the country fathers of families with wives 
 and children ? How can I describe those days, when 
 all kept holiday, as though it were some high festival 
 of the immortal gods, in joy for my safe return 1 That 
 single day was to me like immortality; when I re- 
 turned to my own city, when I saw the Senate and 
 the population of all ranks come forth to greet me, 
 when Eome herself looked as though she had wrenched
 
 62 EXILE AND RETURN. 
 
 herself from her foundations to rush to embrace her 
 preserver. For she received me in such sort, that not 
 only all sexes, ages, and callings, men and women, of 
 every rank and degree, but even the very walls, the 
 houses, the temples, seemed to share the universal joy." 
 The Senate in a body came out to receive him on 
 the Appian road ; a gilded chariot waited for him at 
 the citv gates : the lower class of citizens crowded 
 
 / o y 
 
 the steps of the temples to see him as he passed; and so 
 he rode, escorted by troops of friends, more than a con- 
 queror, to the Capitol. 
 
 His exultation was naturally as intense as his de- 
 spair had been. He made two of his most florid 
 speeches (if indeed they be his, which is doubtful), 
 one in the Senate and another to the people assembled 
 in the Forum, in which he congratulated himself on 
 his return, and Rome on having regained her most 
 illustrious citizen. It is a curious note of the temper 
 and logical capacities of the mob, in all ages of the 
 world alike, that within a few hours of their applaud- 
 ing to the echo this speech of Cicero's, Clodius suc- 
 ceeded in exciting them to a serious riot by appealing 
 to the ruinous price of corn as one of the results of the 
 exile's return. 
 
 For nearly four years more, though unable to shake 
 Cicero's recovered position in the state for he was now 
 supported by Pompey Clodius and his partisans, 
 backed by a strong force of trained gladiators in their 
 pay, kept Eome in a state of anarchy which is almost 
 inexplicable. It was more than suspected that Crassus, 
 now utterly estranged from Pompey, supplied out of
 
 DEATH OF CLODIUS. 63 
 
 his enormous wealth the means of keeping on foot this 
 lawless agitation. Elections were overawed, meetings 
 of the Senate interrupted, assassinations threatened 
 and attempted. Already men began to look to mili- 
 tary rule, and to think a good cause none the worse 
 for being backed by " strong battalions." Things were 
 fast tending to the point where Pompey and Csesar, 
 trusty allies as yet in profession and appearance, deadly 
 rivals at heart, hoped to step in with their veteran le- 
 gions. Even Cicero, the man of peace and constitution- 
 al statesman, felt comfort in the thought that this final 
 argument could be resorted to by his own party. But 
 Clodius's mob-government, at any rate, was to be put 
 an end to somewhat suddenly. Milo, now one of the 
 candidates for the consulship, a man of determined and 
 unscrupulous character, had turned his own weapons 
 against him, and maintained an opposition patrol of 
 hired gladiators and wild-beast fighters. The Senate 
 quite approved, if they did not openly sanction, this 
 irregular championship of their order. The two par- 
 ties walked the streets of Rome like the Capulets and 
 Montagues at Verona ; and it was said that Milo had 
 been heard to swear that he would rid the city of 
 Clodius if he ever got the chance. It came at last, in a 
 casual meeting on the Appian road, near Bovilla?. A 
 scuffle began between their retainers, and Clodius was 
 killed his friends said, murdered. The excitement at 
 Rome was intense : the dead body was carried and laid 
 publicly on the Rostra, Riots ensued; Milo was obliged 
 to fly, and renounce his hopes of power ; and the Senate, 
 intimidated, named Pompey not indeed "Dictator,"
 
 64 EXILE AND RETURN. 
 
 for the name had become almost as hateful as that of 
 King but sole consul, for the safety of the state. 
 
 Cicero had resumed his practice as an advocate, and 
 was now called upon to defend Milo. But Pompey, 
 either from some private grudge, or in order to win 
 favour with the populace, determined that Milo should 
 be convicted. The jury were overawed by his presence 
 in person at the trial, and by the occupation by armed 
 soldiers of all the avenues of the court under colour of 
 keeping order. It was really as great an outrage upon 
 the free administration of justice as the presence of a 
 regiment of soldiers at the entrance to Westminster 
 Hall would be at a modern trial for high treason or 
 sedition. Cicero affected to see in Pompey's legionaries 
 nothing more than the maintainers of the peace of the 
 city. But he knew better ; and the fine passage in the 
 opening of his speech for the defence, as it has come 
 down to us, is at once a magnificent piece of irony, and 
 a vindication of the rights of counsel. 
 
 " Although I am conscious, gentlemen, that it is a 
 disgrace to me to show fear when I stand here to plead 
 in behalf of one of the bravest of men; and espe- 
 cially does such weakness ill become me, that when 
 Milo himself is far more anxious about the safety of 
 the state than about his own, I should be unable to 
 bring to his defence the like magnanimous spirit ; 
 yet this strange scene and strangely constituted court 
 does terrify my eyes, for, turn them where I will, I 
 look in vain for the ancient customs of the Forum, 
 and the old style of public trials. For your tribunal 
 to-day is girt with no such audience as was wont ; this
 
 DEFENCE OF MILO. 65 
 
 is no ordinary crowd that hems us in. Yon guards 
 whom you see on duty in front of all the temples, 
 though set to prevent violence, yet still do a sort of 
 violence to the pleader ; since in the Forum and the 
 court of justice, though the military force which sur- 
 rounds us be wholesome and needful, yet we cannot 
 even "be thus freed from apprehension without looking 
 with some apprehension on the means. And if I 
 thought they were set there in hostile array against 
 Milo, I would yield to circumstances, gentlemen, and 
 feel there was no room for the pleader amidst such 
 a display of weapons. But I am encouraged by the 
 advice of a man of great wisdom and justice of 
 Pompey, who surely would not think it compatible 
 with that justice, after committing a prisoner to the 
 verdict of a jury, then to hand him over to the swords 
 of his soldiers j nor consonant with his wisdom to 
 arm the violent passions of a mob with the authority 
 of the state. Therefore those weapons, those officers 
 and men, proclaim to us not peril but protection ; they 
 encourage us to be not only undisturbed but confident ; 
 they promise me not only support in pleading for 
 the defence, but silence for it to be listened to. As 
 to the rest of the audience, so far as it is composed 
 of peaceful citizens, all, I know, are on our side; 
 nor is there any single man among all those crowds 
 whom you see occupying every point from which a 
 glimpse of this court can be gained, looking on in 
 anxious expectation of the result of this trial, who, 
 while he approves the boldness of the defendant, 
 does not also feel that the fate of himself, his chil- 
 A. c. vol. ix. B
 
 66 EXILE AND RETURN. 
 
 dren, and his country, hangs upon the issue of to- 
 day." 
 
 After an elaborate argument to prove that the slay- 
 ing of Clodius by Milo was in self-defence, or, at the 
 worst, that it was a fate which he well deserved as a 
 public enemy, he closes his speech with a peroration, 
 the pathos of which has always been admired : 
 
 " I would it had been the will of heaven if I may 
 say .so with all reverence for my country, for I fear lest 
 my duty to my client may make me say what is dis- 
 loyal towards her I would that Publius Clodius were 
 not only alive, but that he were praetor, consul, dic- 
 tator even, before my eyes had seen this sight ! But 
 what says Milo ? He speaks like a brave man, and a 
 man whom it is your duty to protect ' Not so by 
 no means,' says he. ' Clodius has met the doom he 
 well deserved : I am ready, if it must be so, to meet 
 that which I do not deserve.' . . . But I must 
 stop ; I can no longer speak for tears ; and tears are 
 an argument which he would scorn for his defence. I 
 entreat you, I adjure you, ye who sit here in judg- 
 ment, that in your verdict you dare to give utterance 
 to what I know you feel." 
 
 But the appeal was in vain, or rather, as far as we can 
 ascertain, was never made, at least in such powerful 
 terms as those in which we read it. The great advo- 
 cate was wholly unmanned by the scene before him, 
 grew nervous, and broke down utterly in his speech 
 for the defence. This presence of a military force 
 under the orders of Pompey the man in whom he 
 saw, as he hoped, the good genius of Rome overawed
 
 GOVERNMENT OF CILICIA. 67 
 
 and disturbed him. The speech which we read is 
 almost certainly not that which he delivered, but, as 
 in the previous case of Verres, the finished and elabo- 
 rate composition of his calmer hours. Milo was con- 
 victed by a large majority ; in fact, there can be little 
 doubt but that he was legally guilty, however political 
 expediency might, in the eyes of Cicero and his party, 
 have justified his deed. Cato sat on the jury, and did 
 all he could to insure an acquittal, showing openly his 
 voting-paper to his fellow-jurors, with that scorn of the 
 " liberty of silence " which he shared with Cicero. 
 
 Milo escaped any worse penalty by at once going 
 into voluntary banishment at Marseilles. But he 
 showed more practical philosophy than his advocate; 
 for when he read the speech in his exile, he is said to 
 have declared that " it was fortunate for him it was 
 not spoken, or he should never have known the flavour 
 of the red mullet of Marseilles." 
 
 The removal of Clodius was a deliverance upon 
 which Cicero never ceased to congratulate himself. 
 That "battle of Bovillae," as he terms it, became an era 
 in his mental records of only less significance than his 
 consulship. His own public life continued to be hon- 
 ourable and successful. He was elected into the Col- 
 lege of Augurs, an honour which he had long coveted ; 
 and he was appointed to the government of Cilicia. 
 This latter was a greatness literally "thrust upon 
 him," and which he would gladly have declined, for it 
 took him away in these eventful days from his beloved 
 Rome ; and to these grand opportunities for enriching 
 himself he was, as has been said, honourably indiffe-
 
 68 EXILE AND RETURN. 
 
 rent. The appointment to a distant province was, in 
 fact, to a man like Cicero, little better than an honour- 
 able form of exile : it was like conferring on a man 
 who had been, and might hope one day to be again, 
 Prime Minister of England, the governor-generalship 
 of Bombay. 
 
 One consolation he found on reaching his new govern- 
 ment that even in the farthest wilds of Cilicia there 
 were people who had heard of " the consul who saved 
 Eome. " And again the astonished provincials marvelled 
 at a governor who looked upon them as having rights of 
 their own, and neither robbed nor ill-used them. He 
 made a little war, too, upon some troublesome hill-tribes 
 (intrusting the command chiefly to his brother Quintus, 
 who had served with distinction under Caesar in Gaul), 
 and gained a victory which his legions thought of suffi- 
 cient importance to salute him with the honoured title 
 of " imperator." Such military honours are especially 
 flattering to men who, like Cicero, are naturally and 
 essentially civilians ; and to Cicero's vanity they were 
 doubly delightful. Unluckily they led him to entertain 
 hopes of the further glory of a triumph; and this, but 
 for the revolution which followed, he might possibly 
 have obtained. As it was, the only result was his 
 parading about with him everywhere, from town to 
 town, for months after his return, the lictors with 
 laurelled fasces, which betokened that a triumph was 
 claimed a pompous incumbrance, which became, as 
 he confessed, a grand subject for evil-disposed jesters, 
 and a considerable inconvenience to himself.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 CICERO AND CAESAR. 
 
 THE future master of Rome was now coming home, 
 after nearly ten years' absence, at the head of the victo- 
 rious legions with which he had struck terror into the 
 Germans, overrun all Spain, left his mark upon Britain, 
 and " pacified" Gaul. But Cicero, in common with most 
 of the senatorial party, failed to see in Julius Caesar the 
 great man that he was. He hesitated a little Caesar 
 would gladly have had his support, and made him fair 
 offers ; but when the Rubicon was crossed, he threw in his 
 lot with Pompey. He was certainly influenced in part 
 by personal attachment : Pompey seems to have exer- 
 cised a degree of fascination over his weakness. He 
 knew Pompey's indecision of character, and confessed 
 that Cassar was "a prodigy of energy;" but though 
 the former showed little liking for him, he clung to 
 him nevertheless. He foreboded that, let the contest 
 end which way it would, " the result would certainly 
 be a despotism." He foresaw that Pompey's real 
 designs were as dangerous to the liberties of Rome as 
 any of which Caesar could be suspected. " Sullaturit
 
 70 CICERO AND CAESAR. 
 
 animus" he says of him in one of his letters, coining 
 a verb to put his idea strongly " he wants to be like 
 Sulla." And it was no more than the truth. He 
 found out afterwards, as he tells Atticus, that pro- 
 scription-lists of all Caesar's adherents had been pre- 
 pared by Pompey and his partisans, and that his old 
 friend's name figured as one of the victims. Only this 
 makes it possible to forgive him for the little feeling 
 that he showed when he heard of Pompey's own 
 miserable end. 
 
 Cicero's conduct and motives at this eventful crisis 
 have been discussed over and over again. It may be 
 questioned whether at this date we are in any position 
 to pass more than a very cautious and general judg- 
 ment upon them. "We want all the "state papers" 
 and political correspondence of the day not Cicero's 
 letters only, but those of Caesar and Pompey and Len- 
 tulus, and much information besides that was never 
 trusted to pen or paper in order to lay down 
 with any accuracy the course which a really unselfish 
 patriot could have taken. But there seems little 
 reason to accuse Cicero of double-dealing or trimming 
 in the worst sense. His policy was unquestionably, 
 from first to last, a policy of expedients. But expe- 
 diency is, and must be more or less, the watchword of 
 a statesman. If he would practically serve his country, 
 he must do to some extent what Cicero professed to 
 do make friends with those in power. " Sic vivitur " 
 " So goes the world ; " " Tempori servimdum est " 
 " We must bend to circumstances " these are not the 
 noblest mottoes, but they are acted upon continually
 
 PHARSALIA. 71 
 
 "by the most respectable men in public and private life, 
 who do not open their hearts to their friends so un- 
 reservedly as Cicero does to his friend Atticus. It 
 seemed to him a choice between Pompey and Csesar ; 
 and he probably hoped to be able so far to influence 
 the former, as to preserve some shadow of a constitu- 
 tion for Eome. What he saw in those " dregs of a 
 Republic," * as he himself calls it, that was worth pre- 
 serving ; how any honest despotism could seem to him 
 more to be dreaded than that prostituted liberty, this 
 is harder to comprehend. The remark of Abeken 
 seems to go very near the truth "His devotion to 
 the commonwealth was grounded not so much upon 
 his conviction of its actual merits, as of its fitness for 
 the display of his own abilities." 
 
 But that commonwealth was past saving even in 
 name. Within two months of his having been de- 
 clared a public enemy, all Italy was at Csesar's feet. 
 Before another year was past, the battle of Pharsalia 
 had been fought, and the great Pompey lay a headless 
 corpse on the sea-shore in Egypt. It was suggested 
 to Cicero, who had hitherto remained constant to the 
 fortunes of his party, and was then in their camp at 
 Dyrrachium, that he should take the chief command, 
 but he had the sense to decline ; and though men 
 called him " traitor," and drew their swords upon him, 
 he withdrew from a cause which he saw was lost, and 
 returned to Italy, though not to Eome. 
 
 The meeting between him and Caesar, which came 
 at last, set at rest any personal apprehensions from that 
 * "FsexRomuli."
 
 72 CICERO AND CAESAR. 
 
 quarter. Cicero does not appear to have made any 
 dishonourable submission, and the conqueror's beha- 
 viour was nobly forgetful of the past. They gradually 
 became on almost friendly terms. The orator paid the 
 Dictator compliments in the Senate, and found that, 
 in private society, his favourite jokes were repeated to 
 the great man, and were highly appreciated. With 
 such little successes he was obliged now to be content. 
 He had again taken up his residence in Rome ; but his 
 political occupation was gone, and his active mind had 
 leisure to employ itself in some of his literary works. 
 
 It was at this time that the blow fell upon him 
 which prostrated him for the time, as his exile had 
 done, and under which he claims our far more natural 
 sympathy. His dear daughter Tullia again married, 
 but unhappily, and just divorced died at his Tusculan 
 villa. Their loving intercourse had undergone no 
 change from her childhood, and his grief was for a 
 while inconsolable. He shut himself up for thirty 
 days. The letters of condolence from well-meaning 
 friends were to him as they so often are as the 
 speeches of the three comforters to Job. He turned 
 in vain, as he pathetically says, to philosophy for 
 consolation. 
 
 It was at this time that he wrote two of his philo- 
 sophical treatises, known to us as ' The True Ends of 
 Life,'* and the 'Tusculan Disputations,' of which 
 more will be said hereafter. In this latter, which he 
 named from his favourite country-house, he addressed 
 himself to the subjects which suited best with his own 
 * ' De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum 'a title hard to translate.
 
 DEATH OF TULLIA. 73 
 
 sorrowful mood under his recent bereavement. How 
 men might learn to shake off the terrors of death nay, 
 to look upon it rather as a release from pain and evil ; 
 how pain, mental and bodily, may best be borne ; how 
 we may moderate our passions ; and, lastly, whether the 
 practice of virtue be not all-sufficient for our happiness. 
 
 A philosopher does not always find in himself a 
 ready pupil. It was hardly so in Cicero's case. His 
 arguments were incontrovertible ; but he found them 
 fail .him sadly in their practical application to life. 
 He never could shake off from himself that dread of 
 death which he felt in a degree unusually vivid for a 
 Roman. He sought his own happiness afterwards, as 
 he had done before, rather in the exciting struggle of 
 public life than in the special cultivation of any form 
 of virtue; and he did not even find the remedy for 
 his present domestic sorrow in any of those general 
 moral reflections which philosophy, Christian as well 
 as pagan, is so ready to produce upon such occasions ; 
 which are all so undeniable, and all so utterly unen- 
 durable to the mourner. 
 
 Cicero found his consolation, or that diversion of 
 thought which so mercifully serves the purpose of con- 
 solation, where most men of active minds like his 
 seek for it and find it in hard work. The literary 
 effort of writing and completing the works which have 
 been just mentioned probably did more to soothe his 
 mind than all the arguments which they contained. 
 He resumed his practice as an advocate so far as to 
 plead a cause before Caesar, now ruling as Dictator at 
 Home the last cause, as events happened, that he was
 
 74 CICERO AND CAESAR. 
 
 ever to plead. It was a cause of no great importance 
 a defence of Deiotarus, titulary king of Armenia, 
 who was accused of having entertained designs against 
 the life of Caesar while entertaining him as a guest in 
 his palace. The Dictator reserved his judgment until 
 he should have made his campaign against the Par- 
 thians. That more convenient season never came : for 
 "before the spring campaign could open, the fatal " Ides 
 of March " cut short Caesar's triumphs and his life.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 CICERO AND ANTONY. 
 
 IT remained for Cicero yet to take a part in one 
 more great national struggle the last for Eome and 
 for himself. No doubt there was some grandeur in 
 the cause which he once more so vigorously espoused 
 the recovery of the liberties of Eome. But all the 
 thunders of Cicero's eloquence, and all the admiration 
 of modern historians and poets, fail to enlist our hearty 
 sympathies with the assassins of Caesar. That " con- 
 secration of the dagger" to the cause of liberty has 
 been the fruitful parent of too much evil ever since to 
 make its use anything but hateful. That Cicero was 
 among the actual conspirators is probably not true, 
 though his enemies strongly asserted it. But at least 
 he gloried in the deed when done, and was eager to 
 claim all the honours of a tyrannicide. Nay, he went 
 farther than the actual conspirators, in words at least ; 
 it is curious to find him so careful to disclaim com- 
 plicity in the act. " Would that you had invited me to 
 that banquet on the Ides of March ! there would then 
 have been no leavings from the feast," he writes to
 
 76 CICERO AND ANTONY. 
 
 Cassius. He would have had their daggers turned on 
 Antony, at all events, as well as on Caesar. He wishes 
 that " the gods may damn Caesar after he is dead ;" 
 professing on this occasion a belief in a future retribu- 
 tion, on which at other times he was sceptical. It is 
 but right to remember all this, when the popular tide 
 turned, and he himself came to be denounced to polit- 
 ical vengeance. The levity with which he continually 
 speaks of the assassination of Caesar a man who had 
 never treated him, at any rate, with anything but a 
 noble forbearance is a blot on Cicero's character 
 which his warmest apologists admit. 
 
 The bloody deed in the Capitol was done a deed 
 which was to turn out almost what Goethe called it 
 "the most absurd that ever was committed." The 
 great Dictator who lay there alone, a " bleeding piece 
 of earth," deserted by the very men who had sought of 
 late to crown him, was perhaps Rome's fittest master j 
 certainly not the worst of the many with whom a per- 
 sonal ambition took the place of principle. Three 
 slaves took up the dead body of their master, and 
 carried it home to his house. Poor wretches ! they 
 knew nothing about liberty or the constitution ; they 
 had little to hope, and probably little to fear j they 
 had only a humble duty to do, and did it. But when 
 we read of them, and of that freedman who, not long 
 before, sat by the dead body of Pompey till he could 
 scrape together wreck from the shore to light some sort 
 of poor funeral-pile, we return with a shudder of dis- 
 gust to those "noble Romans" who occupy at this 
 time the foreground of history.
 
 CICERO WITHDRAWS FROM ROME. 77 
 
 Caesar had been removed, but it is plain that Brutus 
 and Cassius and their party had neither the ability 
 nor the energy to make any real use of their bloody 
 triumph. Cicero soon lost all hope of seeing in them 
 the liberators of his country, or of being able to guide 
 himself the revolution which he hoped he had seen 
 begun. " We have been freed," he writes to Atticus, 
 " but we are not free." " "We have struck down the 
 tyrant, but the tyranny survives." Antony, in fact, had 
 taken the place of Caesar as master of Rome a change 
 in all respects for the worse. He had surrounded 
 himself with guards ; had obtained authority from the 
 Senate to carry out all decrees and orders left by the 
 late Dictator; and when he could not find, amongst 
 Caesar's memoranda, materials to serve his purpose, he 
 did not hesitate to forge them. Cicero had no power, 
 and might be in personal danger, for Antony knew his 
 sentiments as to state matters generally, and more par- 
 ticularly towards himself. Rome was no longer any 
 place for him, and he soon left it this time a volun- 
 tary exile. He wandered from place to place, and 
 tried as before to find interest and consolation in phil- 
 osophy. It was now that he wrote his charming 
 essays on ' Friendship ' and on ' Old Age,' and com- 
 pleted his work ' On the Nature of the Gods,' and 
 that on 'Divination.' His treatise 'De Officiis' (a 
 kind of pagan ' Whole Duty of Man ') is also of this 
 date, as well as some smaller philosophical works which 
 have been lost. He professed himself hopeless of his 
 country's future, and disgusted with political life, and 
 spoke of going to end his days at Athens.
 
 78 CICERO AND ANTONY. 
 
 But, as "before and always, his heart was in the 
 Forum at Some. Political life was really the only 
 atmosphere in which he felt himself breathe vigor- 
 ously. Unquestionably he had also an earnest patriot- 
 ism, which would have drawn him back to his country's 
 side at any time when he believed that she had need 
 of his help. He was told that he was needed there 
 now ; that there was a prospect of matters going better 
 for the cause of liberty; that Antony was coming 
 to terms of some kind with the party of Brutus, and 
 he returned. 
 
 For a short while these latter days brought with 
 them a gleam of triumph almost as bright as that 
 which had marked the overthrow of Catiline's con- 
 spiracy. Again, on his arrival at Rome, crowds rushed 
 to meet him with compliments and congratulations, as 
 they had done some thirteen years before. And in 
 so far as his last days were spent in resisting to the 
 utmost the basest of all Eome's bad men, they were to 
 him greater than any triumph. Thenceforth it was 
 a fight to the death between him and Antony ; so long 
 as Antony lived, there could be no liberty for Rome. 
 Cicero left it to his enemy to make the first attack. 
 It soon came. Two days after his return, Antony 
 spoke vehemently in the Senate against him, on the 
 occasion of moving a resolution to the effect that 
 divine honours should be paid to Caesar. Cicero had 
 purposely stayed away, pleading fatigue after his 
 journey ; really, because such a proposition was odious 
 to him. Antony denounced him as a coward and a 
 traitor, and threatened to send men to pull down his
 
 THE FIRST PHILIPPIC. 79 
 
 house about his head that house which had once 
 before been pulled down, and rebuilt for him by his 
 remorseful fellow-citizens. Cicero went down to the 
 Senate the following day, and there delivered a well- 
 prepared speech, the first of those fourteen which are 
 known to us as his ' Philippics ' a name which he 
 seems first to have given to them in jest, in remem- 
 brance of those which his favourite model Demosthenes 
 had delivered at Athens against Philip of Macedon. 
 He defended his own conduct, reviewed in strong but 
 moderate terms the whole policy of Antony, and 
 warned him still ostensibly as a friend against the 
 fate of Caesar. The speaker was not unconscious what 
 his own might possibly be. 
 
 " I have already, senators, reaped fruit enough from 
 my return home, in that I have had the opportunity 
 to speak words which, whatever may betide, will re- 
 main in evidence of my constancy in my duty, and 
 you have listened to me with much kindness and 
 attention. And this privilege I will use so often as I 
 may without peril to you and to myself ; when I can- 
 not, I will be careful of myself, not so much for my 
 own sake as for the sake of my country. For me, the 
 life that I have lived seems already wellnigh long 
 enough, whether I look at my years or my honours ; 
 what little span may yet be added to it should be your 
 gain and the state's far more than my own." 
 
 Antony was not in the house when Cicero spoke ; 
 he had gone down to his villa at Tibur. There he 
 remained for a fortnight, brooding over his reply 
 taking lessons, it was said, from professors in the art
 
 80 CICERO AND ANTONY. 
 
 of rhetorical self-defence. At last he came to Borne, 
 and answered his opponent. His speech has not 
 reached us ; but we know that it contained the old 
 charges of having put Eoman citizens to death without 
 trial in the case of the abettors of Catiline, and of 
 having instigated Milo to the assassination of Clodius. 
 Antony added a new charge that of complicity with 
 the murderers of Caesar. Above all, he laughed at 
 Cicero's old attempts as a poet ; a mode of attack 
 which, if not so alarming, was at least as irritating as 
 the rest. Cicero was not present he dreaded per- 
 sonal violence ; for Antony, like Pompey at the trial 
 of Milo, had planted an armed guard of his own men 
 outside and inside the Senate-house. Before Cicero 
 had nerved himself to reply, Antony had left Home 
 to put himself at the head of his legions, and the two 
 never met again. 
 
 The reply, when it came, was the terrible second 
 Philippic ; never spoken, however, but only handed 
 about in manuscript to admiring friends. There is 
 little doubt, as Mr Long observes, that Antony had 
 also some friend kind enough to send him a copy ; and 
 if we may trust the Roman poet Juvenal, who is at 
 least as likely to have been well informed upon the 
 subject as any modern historian, this composition 
 eventually cost the orator his life. It is not difficult 
 to understand the bitter vindictiveness of Antony. 
 Cicero had been not merely a political opponent ; he 
 had attacked his private character (which presented 
 abundant grounds for such attack) with all the venom 
 of his eloquence. He had said, indeed, in the first of
 
 THE SECOND PHILIPPIC. 81 
 
 these powerful orations, that he had never taken this 
 line. 
 
 " If I have abused his private life and character, I 
 have no right to complain if he is my enemy : but if I 
 have only followed my usual custom, which I have 
 ever maintained in public life, I mean, if I have only 
 spoken my opinion on public questions freely, then; 
 in the first place, I protest against his being angry 
 with me at all : or, if this be too much to expect, I 
 demand that he should be angry with me only as with 
 a fellow-citizen." 
 
 If there had been any sort of reticence on this point 
 hitherto on the part of Cicero, he made up for it in 
 this second speech. Nothing can equal its bitter 
 personality, except perhaps its rhetorical power. He 
 begins the attack by declaring that he will not tell all 
 he knows "in order that, if we have to do battle 
 again hereafter, I may come always fresh-armed to the 
 attack ; an advantage which the multiplicity of that 
 man's crimes and vices gives me in large measure." 
 Then he proceeds : 
 
 "Would you like us, then, to examine into your 
 course of life from boyhood 1 I conclude you would. 
 Do you remember that before you put on the robe of 
 manhood, you were a bankrupt? That was my father's 
 fault, you will say. I grant it it is a defence that 
 speaks volumes for your feelings as a son. It was 
 your own shamelessness, however, that made you take 
 your seat in the stalls of honourable knights, whereas 
 by law there is a fixed place for bankrupts, even when 
 they have become so by fortune's fault, and not their 
 
 A. C. Vol. ix. F
 
 82 CICERO AND ANTONY. 
 
 own. You put on the robe which was to mark your 
 maniiood, on your person it became the flaunting 
 gear of a harlot." 
 
 It is not desirable to follow the orator through 
 some of his accusations ; when he had to lash a man 
 whom he held to be a criminal, he did not much care 
 where or how he struck. He even breaks off himself 
 after saying a good deal. 
 
 " There are some things, which even a decent enemy 
 hesitates to speak of. ... Mark, then, his subse- 
 quent course of life, which I will trace as rapidly as I 
 can. For though these things are better known to 
 you than even to me, yet I ask you to hear me with 
 attention as indeed you do; for it is right that in 
 such cases men's feelings should be roused not merely 
 by the knowledge of the facts, but by calling them 
 back to their remembrance ; though we must dash at 
 once, I believe, into the middle of his history, lest we 
 should be too long in getting to the end." 
 
 The peroration is noble and dignified, in the orator's 
 best style. He still supposes himself addressing his 
 enemy. He has warned Antony that Caesar's fate 
 may be his : and he is not unconscious of the peril in 
 which his own life may stand. 
 
 " But do you look to yourself I will tell you how 
 it stands with me. I defended the Commonwealth 
 when I was young I will not desert it now I am old. 
 I despised the swords of Catiline I am not likely to 
 tremble before yours. Nay, I shall lay my life down 
 gladly, if the liberty of Eome can be secured by my 
 death, so that this suffering nation may at last bring to
 
 THE SIXTH PHILIPPIC. 83 
 
 the birth that which it has long been breeding.* If, 
 twenty years ago, I declared in this house that death 
 could never be said to have come before its time to 
 a man who had been consul of Rome, with how much 
 more truth, at my age, may I say it now ! To me 
 indeed, gentlemen of the Senate, death may well be a 
 thing to be even desired, when I have done what I have 
 done and reaped the honours I have reaped. Only 
 two wishes I have, the one, that at my death I may 
 leave the Roman people free the immortal gods can 
 give me no greater boon than this ; the other, that 
 every citizen may meet with such reward as his con- 
 duct towards the state may have deserved." 
 
 The publication of this unspoken speech raised for 
 the time an enthusiasm against Antony, whom Cicero 
 now openly declared to be an enemy to the state. He 
 hurled against him Philippic after Philippic. The 
 appeal at the end of that which comes the sixth in 
 order is eloquent enough. 
 
 "The time is come at last, fellow- citizens; some- 
 what too late, indeed, for the dignity of the people of 
 Rome, but at least the crisis is so ripe, that it cannot 
 now be deferred an instant longer. We have had one 
 calamity sent upon us, as I may say, by fate, which 
 we bore with in such sort as it might be borne. If 
 another befalls us now, it will be one of our own 
 choosing. That this Roman people should serve any 
 master, when the gods above have willed us to be the 
 masters of the world, is a crime in the sight of heaven. 
 The question hangs now on its last issue. The struggle 
 * I.e., the making away with Antony.
 
 84 CICERO AND ANTONY. 
 
 is for our liberties. You must either conquer, 
 Romans, and this, assuredly, with such patriotism 
 and such unanimity as I see here, you must do, or 
 you must endure anything and everything rather than 
 be slaves. Other nations may endure the yoke of 
 slavery, but the birthright of the people of Rome is 
 liberty." 
 
 Antony had left Rome, and thrown himself, like 
 Catiline, into the arms of his soldiers, in his province 
 of Cisalpine Gaul. There he maintained himself in 
 defiance of the Senate, who at last, urged by Cicero, 
 declared him a public enemy. Caesar Octavianus (great- 
 nephew of Julius) offered his services to the state, and 
 with some hesitation they were accepted. The last 
 struggle was begun. Intelligence soon arrived that An- 
 tony had been defeated at Mutina by the two last con- 
 suls of the Republic, Hirtius and Pansa. The news was 
 dashed, indeed, afterwards by the further announce- 
 ment that both consuls had died of their wounds. 
 But it was in the height of the first exultation that 
 Cicero addressed to the Senate his fourteenth Philippic 
 the last oration which he was ever to make. For 
 the moment, he found himself once more the fore- 
 most man at Rome. Crowds of roaring patriots had 
 surrounded his house that morning, escorted him in 
 triumph up to the Capitol, and back to his own house, 
 as they had done in the days of his early glory. 
 Young Caesar, who had paid him much personal 
 deference, was professing himself a patriot ; the Com- 
 monwealth was safe again and Cicero almost thought 
 that he again himself had saved it.
 
 THE TRIUMVIRATE. 85 
 
 But Eome now belonged to those who had the 
 legions. It had come to that : and when Antony 
 succeeded in joining interests with Octavianus (after- 
 wards miscalled Augustus) " the boy," as both Cicero 
 and Antony called him a boy in years as yet, but 
 premature in craft and falsehood who had come " to 
 claim his inheritance," and succeeded in rousing in the 
 old veterans of his uncle the desire to take vengeance 
 on his murderers, the fate of the Eepublic and of 
 Cicero was sealed. 
 
 It was on a little eyot formed by the river Eeno, 
 near Bologna, that Antony, young Caesar, and Lepidus 
 (the nominal third in what is known as the Second 
 Triumvirate) met to arrange among themselves the 
 division of power, and what they held to be necessary 
 to the securing it for the future the proscription 
 of their several enemies. No private affections or 
 interests were to be allowed to interfere with this 
 merciless arrangement. If Lepidus would give up his 
 brother, Antony would surrender an obnoxious uncle. 
 Octavianus made a cheaper sacrifice in Cicero, whom 
 Antony, we may be sure, with those terrible Philip- 
 pics ringing in his ears, demanded with an eager ven- 
 geance. All was soon amicably settled ; the proscrip- 
 tion-lists were made out, and the Triumvirate occupied 
 Eome. 
 
 Cicero and his brother whose name was known to 
 be also on the fatal roll heard of it while they were 
 together at the Tusculan villa. Both took immediate 
 measures to escape. But Quintus had to return to 
 Eome to get money for their flight, and, as it would
 
 86 CICERO AND ANTONY. 
 
 appear, to fetch, his son. The emissaries of the Trium- 
 virate were sent to search the house : the father had 
 hid himself, but the son was seized, and refusing to 
 give any information, was put to the torture. His 
 father heard his cries of agony, came forth from his 
 hiding-place, and asked only to be put to death first. 
 The son in his turn made the same request, and the 
 assassins were so far merciful that they killed both at 
 once. 
 
 Cicero himself might yet have escaped, but for some- 
 thing of his old indecision. He had gone on board a 
 small vessel with the intention of joining Brutus in 
 Macedonia, when he suddenly changed his mind, and 
 insisted on being put on shore again. He wandered 
 about, half-resolving (for the third time) on suicide. 
 He would go to Rome, stab himself on the altar-hearth 
 in young Csesa/s house, and call down the vengeance 
 of heaven upon the traitor. The accounts of these last 
 hours of his life are, unfortunately, somewhat con- 
 tradictory, and none of the authorities to be entirely 
 depended on ; Abeken has made a careful attempt 
 to harmonise them, which it will be best here to 
 follow. 
 
 Urged by the prayers of his slaves, the faithful 
 adherents of a kind master, he once more embarked, 
 and once more (Appian says, from sea-sickness, which 
 he never could endure) landed near Caieta, where he 
 had a seaside villa. Either there, or, as other accounts 
 say, at his house at Formiae, he laid himself down to 
 pass the night, and wait for death. "Let me die," 
 said he, " in my own country, which I have so often
 
 DEATH OF CICERO. 87 
 
 saved." But again the faithful slaves aroused him, 
 forced him into a litter, and hurried him down through 
 the woods to the sea-shore for the assassins were in 
 hot pursuit of him. They found his house shut up ; 
 but some traitor showed them a short cut by which 
 to overtake the fugitive. As he lay reading (it is said), 
 even during these anxious moments, a play of his 
 favourite Euripides, every line of whom he used to 
 declare contained some maxim worth remember- 
 ing, he heard their steps approaching, and ordered 
 the litter to be set down. He looked out, and re- 
 cognised at the head of the party an officer named 
 Lsenas, whom he had once successfully defended on 
 a capital charge ; but he saw no gratitude or mercy 
 in the face, though there were others of the band 
 who covered their eyes for pity, when they saw the 
 dishevelled grey hair and pale worn features of the 
 great Eoman (he was within a month of sixty-four). 
 He turned from Lsenas to the centurion, one Heren- 
 nius, and said, " Strike, old soldier, if you understand 
 your trade !" At the third blow by one or other of 
 those officers, for both claimed the evil honour his 
 head was severed. They carried it straight to Antony, 
 where he sat on the seat of justice in the Forum, and 
 demanded the offered reward. The triumvir, in his 
 joy, paid it some ten times over. He sent the bloody 
 trophy to his wife ; and the Roman Jezebel spat in the 
 dead face, and ran her bodkin through the tongue 
 which had spoken those bold and bitter truths against 
 her false husband. The great orator fulfilled, almost 
 in the very letter, the words which, treating of the
 
 88 CICERO AND ANTONY. 
 
 liberty of the pleader, he had put into the mouth of 
 Crassus " You must cut out this tongue, if you would 
 check my free speech : nay, even then, my very breath- 
 ing should protest against your lust for power." The 
 head, by Antony's order, was then nailed upon the 
 Eostra, to speak there, more eloquently than ever 
 the living lips had spoken, of the dead liberty of 
 Eome.
 
 CHAPTEE VII. 
 
 CHARACTER AS A POLITICIAN AND AN ORATOR. 
 
 CICERO shared very largely in the feeling which is 
 common to all men of ambition and energy, a desire 
 to stand well not only with their own generation, but 
 with posterity. It is a feeling natural to every man 
 who knows that his name and acts must necessarily 
 become historical. If it is more than usually patent 
 in Cicero's case, it is only because in his letters to 
 Atticus we have more than usual access to the inmost 
 heart of the writer j for surely such a thoroughly con- 
 fidential correspondence has never been published be- 
 fore or since. " What will history say of me six 
 hundred years hence ? " he asks, unbosoming himself 
 in this sort to his friend. More than thrice the six 
 hundred years have passed, and, in Cicero's case, his- 
 tory has hardly yet made up its mind. He has been 
 lauded and abused, from his own times down to the 
 present, in terms as extravagant as are to be found in 
 the most passionate of his own orations ; both his 
 accusers and his champions have caught the trick of 
 his rhetorical exaggeration more easily than his elo-
 
 90 CHARACTER AS A POLITICIAN. 
 
 quence. Modern German critics like Drumann and 
 Mommsen have attacked him with hardly less bitter- 
 ness, though with more decency, than the historian 
 Dio Cassius, who lived so near his own times. Conyers 
 Middleton, on the other hand, in those pleasant and 
 comprehensive volumes which are still to this day the 
 great storehouse of materials for Cicero's biography, 
 is as blind to his faults as though he were himself 
 delivering a panegyric in the Eostra at Eome. Per- 
 haps it is the partiality of this author's view which 
 has produced a reaction in the minds of sceptical 
 German scholars, and of some modern writers of our 
 own. It is impossible not to sympathise in some 
 degree with that Athenian who was tired of always 
 hearing Aristides extolled as " the Just ; " and there 
 was certainly a strong temptation to critics to pick 
 holes in a man's character who was perpetually, during 
 his lifetime and for eighteen centuries after his death, 
 having a trumpet sounded before him to announce 
 him as the prince of patriots as well as philosophers ; 
 worthy indeed, as Erasmus thought, to be canonised 
 as a saint of the Catholic Church, but for the single 
 drawback of his not having been a Christian. 
 
 On one point some of his eulogists seem manifestly 
 unfair. They say that the circumstances under which 
 we form our judgment of the man are exceptional in 
 this that we happen to possess in his case all this 
 mass of private and confidential letters (there are 
 nearly eight hundred of his own which have come 
 down to us), giving us an insight into his private 
 motives, his secret jealousies, and hopes, and fears, and
 
 CHARACTER AS A POLITICIAN. 91 
 
 ambitions, of which in the case of other men we have 
 no such revelation. It is quite true ; but his advocates 
 forget that it is from the very same pages which reveal 
 his weaknesses, that they draw their real knowledge of 
 many of those characteristics which they most admire 
 his sincere love for his country, his kindness of heart, 
 his amiability in all his domestic relations. It is true 
 that we cannot look into the private letters of Caasar, 
 or Pompey, or Brutus, as we can into Cicero's ; but it is 
 not so certain that if we could, our estimate of their 
 characters would be lowered. We might discover, in 
 their cases as in his, many traces of what seems insin- 
 cerity, timidity, a desire to sail with the stream ; we 
 might find that the views which they expressed in 
 public were not always those which they entertained 
 in private ; but we might also find an inner current of 
 kindness, and benevolence, and tenderness of heart, for 
 which the world gives them little credit. One enthu- 
 siastic advocate, Wieland, goes so far as to wish that 
 this kind of evidence could, in the case of such a 
 man as Cicero, have been " cooked," to use a modern 
 phrase : that we could have had only a judicious selec- 
 tion from this too truthful mass of correspondence; 
 ythat his secretary, Tiro, or some judicious friend, had 
 destroyed the whole packet of letters in which the 
 great Eoman bemoaned himself, during his exile from 
 Eome, to his wife, to his brother, and to Atticus. The 
 partisan method of writing history, though often prac- 
 tised, has seldom been so boldly professed. 
 
 But it cannot be denied, that if we know too much 
 of Cicero to judge him merely by his public life, as we
 
 92 CHARACTER AS A POLITICIAN. 
 
 are obliged to do with so many heroes of history, \ve 
 also know far too little of those stormy times in which 
 he lived, to pronounce too strongly upon his behaviour 
 in such difficult circumstances. The true relations 
 between the various parties at Borne, as we have tried 
 to sketch them, are confessedly puzzling even to the 
 careful student. And without a thorough understand- 
 ing of these, it is impossible to decide, with any hope 
 of fairness, upon Cicero's conduct as a patriot and a 
 politician. His character was full of conflicting ele- 
 ments, like the times in which he lived, and was 
 necessarily in a great degree moulded by them. The 
 egotism which shows itself so plainly alike in his 
 public speeches and in his private writings, more than 
 once made him personal enemies, and brought him 
 into trouble, though it was combined with great kind- 
 ness of heart and consideration for others. He saw 
 the right clearly, and desired to follow it, but his good 
 intentions were too often frustrated by a want of firm- 
 ness and decision. His desire to keep well with men 
 of all parties, so long as it seemed possible (and this 
 not so much from the desire of self-aggrandisement, as 
 from a hope through their aid to serve the common- 
 wealth) laid him open on more than one occasion to 
 the charge of insincerity. 
 
 There is one comprehensive quality which may be 
 said to have been wanting in his nature, which clouded 
 his many excellences, led him continually into false 
 positions, and even in his delightful letters excites in 
 the reader, from time to time, an impatient feeling of 
 contempt. He wanted manliness. It was a quality
 
 CHARACTER AS A POLITICIAN. 93 
 
 which was fast dying out, in his day, among even the 
 best of the luxurious and corrupt aristocracy of Rome. 
 It was perhaps "but little missed in his character by 
 those of his contemporaries who knew and loved him 
 best. But without that quality, to an English mind, 
 it is hard to recognise in any man, however brilliant 
 and amiable, the true philosopher or hero. 
 
 The views which this great Roman politician held 
 upon the vexed question of the ballot did not differ 
 materially from those of his worthy grandfather before- 
 mentioned.* The ballot was popular at Rome, for 
 many reasons, some of them not the most creditable 
 to the characters of the voters; and because it was 
 popular, Cicero speaks of it occasionally, in his forensic 
 speeches, with a cautious praise ; but of his real esti- 
 mate of it there can be no kind of doubt. " I am 
 of the same opinion now," he writes to his brother, 
 " that ever I was ; there is nothing like the open 
 suffrage of the lips." So in one of his speeches, he 
 uses even stronger language : " The ballot," he says, 
 " enables men to open their faces, and to cover up 
 their thoughts ; it gives them licence to promise what- 
 ever they are asked, and at the same time to do what- 
 ever they please." Mr Grote once quoted a phrase of 
 Cicero's, applied to the voting-papers of his day, as a 
 testimony in favour of this mode of secret suffrage 
 grand words, and wholly untranslatable into anything 
 like corresponding English " Tdbella vindex tacitce 
 libertatis" "the tablet which secures the liberty of 
 silence." But knowing so well as Cicero did what was 
 
 * See p. 3.
 
 94 CHARACTER AS POLITICIAN AND ORATOR. 
 
 the ordinary character of Roman jurors and Roman 
 voters, and how often this "liberty of silence" was a 
 liberty to take a bribe and to vote the other way, one 
 can almost fancy that we see upon his lips, as he utters 
 the sounding phrase, that playful curve of irony which 
 is said to have been their characteristic expression.* 
 Mr Grote forgot, too, as was well pointed out by a 
 writer in the ' Quarterly Review/ 1 that in the very 
 next sentence the orator is proud to boast that he 
 himself was not so elected to office, but " by the living 
 voices" of his fellow-citizens. 
 
 The character of his eloquence may be understood 
 in some degree by the few extracts which have been 
 given from his public speeches ; always remembering 
 how many of its charms are necessarily lost by losing 
 the actual language in which his thoughts were clothed. 
 We have lost perhaps nearly as much in another way, 
 in that we can only read the great orator instead of 
 listening to him. Yet it is possible, after all, that 
 this loss to us is not so great as it might seem. Some 
 of his best speeches, as we know those, for instance, 
 against Verres and in defence of Milo were written 
 in the closet, and never spoken at all ; and most of the 
 others were reshaped and polished for publication. 
 Nor is it certain that his declamation, which some of 
 his Roman rivals found fault with as savouring too 
 much of the florid Oriental type, would have been agree- 
 
 * No bust, coin, or gem is known which bears any genuine 
 likeness of Cicero. There are several existing which purport to 
 be such, but all are more or less apocryphal, 
 t Quart. Rev., Ixi. 522.
 
 HIS ORATORY. 95 
 
 able to our colder English taste. He looked upon gesture 
 and action as essential elements of the orator's power, 
 and had studied them carefully from the artists of the 
 theatre. There can be no doubt that we have his own 
 views on this point in the words which he has put 
 into the mouth of his " Brutus," in the treatise on 
 oratory which bears that name. He protests against the 
 "Attic coldness" of style which, he says, would soon 
 empty the benches of their occupants. He would 
 have the action and bearing of the speaker to be such 
 that even the distant spectator, too far off to hear, 
 should " know that there was a Roscius on the stage." 
 He would have found a French audience in this re- 
 spect more sympathetic than an English one.* His 
 own highly nervous temperament would certainly tend 
 to excited action. The speaker, who, as we are told, 
 " shuddered visibly over his whole body when he first 
 began to speak," was almost sure, as he warmed to his 
 work, to throw himself into it with a passionate 
 energy. 
 
 He has put on record his own ideas of the qualifica- 
 tions and the duties of the public speaker, whether in 
 the Senate or at the bar, in three continuous treatises 
 
 * Our speakers certainly fall into the other extreme. The 
 British orator's style of gesticulation may still be recognised, 
 mutatis mutandis, in Addison's humorous sketch of a century 
 ago : "You may see many a smart rhetorician turning his hat 
 in his hands, moulding it into several different cocks, examin- 
 ing sometimes the lining and sometimes the button, during the 
 whole course of his harangue. A deaf man would think that he 
 was cheapening a beaver, when he is talking perhaps of the 
 fate of the British nation."
 
 96 CHARACTER AS POLITICIAN AND ORATOR. 
 
 on the subject, entitled respectively, ' On Oratory,' 
 ' Brutus,' and ' The Orator,' as well as in some other 
 works of which we have only fragments remaining. 
 With the first of these works, which he inscribed to 
 his brother, he was himself exceedingly well satisfied, 
 and it perhaps remains still the ablest, as it was the 
 first, attempt to reduce eloquence to a science. The 
 second is a critical sketch of the great orators of Rome : 
 and in the third we have Cicero's view of what the 
 perfect orator should be. His ideal is a high one, and 
 a true one ; that he should not be the mere rhetorician, 
 any more than the mere technical lawyer or keen 
 partisan, but the man of perfect education and perfect 
 taste, who can speak on all subjects, out of the fulness 
 of his mind, " with variety and copiousness." 
 
 Although, as has been already said, he appears to 
 have attached but little value to a knowledge of the 
 technicalities of law, in other respects his preparation 
 for his work was of the most careful kind; if we 
 may assume, as we probably may, that it is his own 
 experience which, in his treatise on Oratory, he puts 
 into the mouth of Marcus Antonius, one of his greatest 
 predecessors at the Roman bar. 
 
 " It is my habit to have every client explain to me 
 personally his own case ; to allow no one else to be 
 present, that so he may speak more freely. Then I 
 take the opponent's side, while I make him plead his 
 own cause, and bring forward whatever arguments he 
 can think of. Then, when he is gone, I take upon 
 myself, with as much impartiality as I can, three dif- 
 ferent characters my own, my opponent's, and that of
 
 RULES FOR THE PLEADER. 97 
 
 the jury. Whatever point seems likely to help the 
 case rather than injure it, this I decide must be brought 
 forward ; when I see that anything is likely to do 
 more harm than good, I reject and throw it aside alto- 
 gether. So I gain this, that I think over first what 
 I mean to say, and speak afterwards ; while a good 
 many pleaders, relying on their abilities, try to do 
 both at once."* 
 
 He reads a useful lesson to young and zealous advo- 
 cates in the same treatise that sometimes it may be 
 wise not to touch at all in reply upon a point which 
 makes against your client, and to which you have no 
 real answer; and that it is even more important to 
 say nothing which may injure your case, than to omit 
 something which might possibly serve it. A maxim 
 which some modern barristers (and. some preachers 
 also) might do well to bear in mind. 
 
 Yet he did not scorn to use what may almost be called 
 the tricks of his art, if he thought they would help to 
 secure him a verdict. The outward and visible appeal 
 to the feelings seems to have been as effective in the 
 Eoman forum as with a British jury. Cicero would 
 have his client stand by his side dressed in mourn- 
 ing, with hair dishevelled, and in tears, when he 
 meant to make a pathetic appeal to the compassion of 
 the jurors ; or a family group would be arranged, as 
 circumstances allowed, the wife and children, the 
 mother and sisters, or the aged father, if present- 
 able, would be introduced in open court to create 
 a sensation at the right moment. He had tears ap- 
 * De Oratore, II. 24, 72. 
 
 A. c. vol. ix. G
 
 98 CHARACTER AS POLITICIAN AND ORATOR. 
 
 patently as ready at his command as an eloquent 
 and well-known English Attorney-General. Nay, the 
 tears seem to hare been marked down, as it were, upon 
 his brief. " My feelings prevent my saying more," he 
 declares in his defence of Publius Sylla. "I weep 
 while I make the appeal " " I cannot go on for tears " 
 he repeats towards the close of that fine oration in 
 behalf of Milo the speech that never was spoken. 
 Such phrases remind us of the story told of a French 
 preacher, whose manuscripts were found to have mar- 
 ginal stage directions : " Here take out your handker- 
 chief;" " here cry if possible." But such were held 
 to be the legitimate adjuncts of Roman oratory, and it 
 is quite possible to conceive that the advocate, like 
 more than one modern tragedian who could be named, 
 entered so thoroughly into the spirit of the part that 
 the tears flowed quite naturally. 
 
 A far less legitimate weapon of oratory offensive 
 and not defensive was the bitter and coarse person- 
 ality in which he so frequently indulged. Its use was 
 held perfectly lawful in the Roman forum, whether in 
 political debate or in judicial pleadings, and it was 
 sure to be highly relished by a mixed audience. There 
 is no reason to suppose that Cicero had recourse to it 
 in any unusual degree; but employ it he did, and 
 most unscrupulously. It was not only private charac- 
 ter that he attacked, as in the case of Antony and 
 Clodius, but even personal defects or peculiarities were 
 made the subject of bitter ridicule. He did not hesi- 
 tate to season his harangue by a sarcasm on the cast 
 in the prosecutor's eye, or the wen on the defendant's 
 neck, and to direct the attention of the court to these
 
 USE OF PERSONALITIES. 99 
 
 points, as though they were corroborative evidence of 
 a moral deformity. The most conspicuous instance 
 of this practice of his is in the invective which he 
 launched in the Senate against Piso, who had made a 
 speech reflecting upon him. Referring to Cicero's exile, 
 he had made that sore subject doubly sore by declaring 
 that it was not Cicero's unpopularity, so much as his 
 unfortunate propensity to bad verse, which had been the 
 cause of it. A jingling line of his to the effect that 
 
 " The gown wins grander triumphs than the sword " * 
 
 had been thought to be pointed against the recent 
 victories of Pompey, and to have provoked him. to use 
 his influence to get rid of the author. But this an- 
 notation of Cicero's poetry had not been Piso's only 
 offence. He had been consul at the time of the exile, 
 and had given vent, it may be remembered, to the 
 witticism that the " saviour of Rome " might save the 
 city a second time by his absence. Cicero was not 
 the man to forget it. The beginning of his attack 
 on Piso is lost, but there is quite enough remaining. 
 Piso was of a swarthy complexion, approaching pro- 
 bably to the negro type. " Beast " is the term by 
 which Cicero addresses him. " Beast ! there is no 
 mistaking the evidence of that slave-like hue, those 
 bristly cheeks, those discoloured fangs. Your eyes, 
 your brows, your face, your whole aspect, are the tacit 
 index to your soul."t 
 
 * " Cedant arma togse, concedat laurea linguae." 
 \ Such flowers of eloquence are not encouraged at the modem 
 bar. But they were common enough, even in the English law- 
 courts, in former times. Mr Attorney-General Coke's language
 
 100 CHARACTER AS POLITICIAN AND ORATOR. 
 
 It is not possible, -within the compass of these pages, 
 to give even the briefest account of more than a few of 
 the many causes (they are twenty-four in number) in 
 which the speeches made by Cicero, either for the 
 prosecution or the defence, have been preserved to us. 
 Some of them have more attraction for the English 
 reader than others, either from the facts of the case 
 being more interesting or more easily understood, or 
 from their affording more opportunity for the display 
 of the speaker's powers. 
 
 Mr Fox had an intense admiration for the speech 
 in defence of Cselius. The opinion of one who was 
 no mean orator himself, on his great Roman predeces- 
 sor, may be worth quoting : 
 
 " Argumentative contention is not what he excels in ; 
 and lie is never, I think, so happy as when he has an op- 
 portunity of exhibiting a mixture of philosophy and pleas- 
 antry, and especially when he can interpose anecdotes and 
 references to the authority of the eminent characters in the 
 history of his own country. No man appears, indeed, to 
 have had such a real respect for authority as he ; and there- 
 fore when he speaks on that subject he is always natural 
 and earnest." * 
 
 to Ealeigh at his trial "Thou viper!" comes quite up to 
 Cicero's. Perhaps the Irish House of Parliament, while it ex- 
 isted, furnished the choicest modern specimens of this style of 
 oratory. Mr O'Flanagan, in his ' Lives of the Lord Chancellors 
 of Ireland,' tells us that a member for Galway, attacking an 
 opponent when he knew that his sister was present during the 
 debate, denounced the whole family " from the toothless old 
 hag that is now grinning in the gallery, to the white-livered 
 scoundrel that is shivering on the floor." 
 
 * Letter to G. "Wakefield Correspondence, p. 35.
 
 DEFENCE OF CJ2LIUS. 101 
 
 There is anecdote and pleasantry enough in this 
 particular oration ; but the scandals of Koman society 
 of that day, into which the defence of Cselius was 
 obliged to enter, are not the most edifying subject 
 for any readers. Cselius was a young man of " eques- 
 trian " rank, who had been a kind of ward of Cicero's, 
 and must have given him a good deal of trouble by 
 his profligate habits, if the guardianship was anything 
 more than nominal. But in this particular case the 
 accusation brought against him of trying to murder 
 an ambassador from Egypt by means of hired assassins, 
 and then to poison the lady who had lent him the 
 money to bribe them with was probably untrue. 
 Clodia, the lady in question, was the worthy sister of the 
 notorious Clodius, and bore as evil a reputation as it 
 was possible for a woman to bear in the corrupt society 
 of Eome which is saying a great deal. She is the 
 real mover in the case, though another enemy of 
 Caelius, the son of a man whom he had himself brought 
 to trial for bribery, was the ostensible prosecutor. 
 Cicero, therefore, throughout the whole of his speech, 
 aims the bitter shafts of his wit and eloquence at 
 Clodia. His brilliant invectives against this lady, who 
 was, as he pointedly said, " not only noble but notori- 
 ous," are not desirable to quote. But the opening of 
 the speech is in the advocate's best style. The trial, 
 it seems, took place on a public holiday, when it was 
 not usual to take any cause unless it were of pressing 
 importance. ^ 
 
 " If any spectator be here present, gentlemen, who 
 knows nothing of our laws, our courts of justice, or
 
 102 CHARACTER AS POLITICIAN AND ORATOR. 
 
 our national customs, he will not fail to wonder what 
 can be the atrocious nature of this case, that on a day 
 of national festival and public holiday like this, when 
 all other business in the Forum is suspended, this 
 single trial should be going on ; and he will entertain 
 no doubt but that the accused is charged with a crime 
 of such enormity, that if it were not at once taken 
 cognisance of, the constitution itself would be in peril. 
 And if he heard that there was a law which enjoined 
 that in the case of seditious and disloyal citizens who 
 should take up arms to attack the Senate-house, or use 
 violence against the magistrates, or levy war against 
 the commonwealth, inquisition into the matter should 
 be made at once, on the very day ; he would not find 
 fault with such a law : he would only ask the nature 
 of the charge. But when he heard that it was no such 
 atrocious crime, no treasonable attempt, no violent out- 
 rage, which formed the subject of this trial, but that a 
 young man of brilliant abilities, hard-working in pub- 
 lic life, and of popular character, was here accused by 
 the son of a man whom he had himself once prosecuted, 
 and was still prosecuting, and that all a bad woman's 
 wealth and influence was being used against him, 
 he might take no exception to the filial zeal of Atra- 
 tinus ; but he would surely say that woman's infamous 
 revenge should be baffled and punished. ... I can 
 excuse Atratinus ; as to the other parties, they deserve 
 neither excuse nor forbearance." 
 
 It was a strange story, the case for the prosecution, 
 especially as regarded the alleged attempt to poison 
 Clodia. The poison was given to a friend of Cselius,
 
 DEFENCE OF CJELIUS. 103 
 
 he was to give it to some slaves of Clodia whom he 
 was to meet at certain baths frequented "by her, and 
 they were in some way to administer it. But the slaves 
 betrayed the secret; and the lady employed certain 
 gay and profligate young men, who were hangers-on 
 of her own, to conceal themselves somewhere in the 
 baths, and pounce upon Cselius's emissary with the 
 poison in his possession. But this scheme was said 
 to have failed. Clodia's detectives had rushed from 
 their place of concealment too soon, and the bearer of 
 the poison escaped. The counsel for the prisoner 
 makes a great point of this. 
 
 " Why, 'tis the catastrophe of a stage-play nay, of 
 a burlesque; when no more artistic solution of the 
 plot can be invented, the hero escapes, the bell rings, 
 and the curtain falls ! For I ask why, when Licinius 
 was there trembling, hesitating, retreating, trying to 
 escape why that lady's body-guard let him go out of 
 their hands ? Were they afraid lest, so many against 
 one, such stout champions against a single helpless 
 man, frightened as he was and fierce as they were, 
 they could not master him ? I should like exceedingly 
 to see them, those curled and scented youths, the 
 bosom-friends of this rich and noble lady ; those stout 
 men-at-arms who were posted by their she- captain in 
 this ambuscade in the baths. And I should like to 
 ask them how they hid themselves, and where ? A 
 bath 1 why, it must rather have been a Trojan horse, 
 which bore within its womb this band of invincible 
 heroes who went to war for a woman ! I would make 
 them answer this question, why they, being so many
 
 104 CHARACTER AS POLITICIAN AND ORATOR. 
 
 and so brave, did not either seize this slight stripling, 
 whom you see before you, where he stood, or overtake 
 him when he fled ? They will hardly be able to ex- 
 plain themselves, I fancy, if they get into that witness- 
 box, however clever and witty they may be at the 
 banquet, nay, even eloquent occasionally, no doubt, 
 over then- wine. But the air of a court of justice is 
 somewhat different from that of the banquet-hall ; the 
 benches of this court are not like the couches of a 
 supper-table ; the array of this jury presents a differ- 
 ent spectacle from a company of revellers ; nay, the 
 broad glare of sunshine is harder to face than the 
 glitter of the lamps. If they venture into it, I shall 
 have to strip them of their pretty conceits and fools' 
 gear. But, if they will be ruled by me, they will be- 
 take themselves to another trade, win favour in another 
 quarter, flaunt themselves elsewhere than in this court. 
 Let them carry their brave looks to their lady there ; 
 let them lord it at her expense, cling to her, lie at her 
 feet, be her slaves ; only let them make no attempt 
 upon the life and honour of an innocent man." 
 
 The satellites of Clodia could scarcely have felt com- 
 fortable under this withering fire of sarcasm. The 
 speaker concluded with an apology much required 
 for his client's faults, as those of a young man, and a 
 promise on his behalf on the faith of an advocate 
 that he would behave better for the future. He 
 wound up the whole with a point of sensational 
 rhetoric which was common, as has been said, to 
 the Roman bar as to our own an appeal to the 
 jurymen as fathers. He pointed to the aged father of
 
 DEFENCE OF LIGARIUS. 105 
 
 the defendant, leaning in the most approved attitude 
 upon the shoulder of his son. Either this, or the want 
 of evidence, or the eloquence of the pleader, had its 
 due effect. Cselius was triumphantly acquitted ; and 
 it is a proof that the young man was not wholly grace- 
 less, that he rose afterwards to high public office, and 
 never forgot his obligations to his eloquent counsel, to 
 whom he continued a stanch friend. He must have 
 had good abilities, for he was honoured with frequent 
 letters from Cicero when the latter was governor of 
 Cilicia. He kept up some of his extravagant tastes ; 
 for when he was ^dile (which involved the taking 
 upon him the expense of certain gladiatorial and wild- 
 beast exhibitions), he wrote to beg his friend to send 
 him. out of his province some panthers for his show. 
 Cicero complied with the request, and took the oppor- 
 tunity, so characteristic of him, of lauding his own ad- 
 ministration of Cilicia, and making a kind of pun at 
 the same time. " I have given orders to the hunters 
 to see about the panthers ; but panthers are very scarce, 
 and the few there are complain, people say, that in the 
 whole province there are no traps laid for anybody but 
 for them." Catching and skinning the unfortunate 
 provincials, which had been a favourite sport with 
 governors like Verres, had been quite done away with 
 in Cilicia, we are to understand, under Cicero's rule. 
 
 His defence of Ligarius, who was impeached of trea- 
 son against the state in the person of Caesar, as having 
 borne arms against him in his African campaign, has 
 also been deservedly admired. There was some courage 
 in Cicero's undertaking his defence ; as a known parti-
 
 106 CHARACTER AS POLITICIAN AND ORATOR. 
 
 san of Pompey, he was treading on dangerous and 
 delicate ground. Csesar was dictator at the time ; and 
 the case seems to have been tried before him as the 
 sole judicial authority, without pretence of the inter- 
 vention of anything like a jury. The defence if de- 
 fence it may be called is a remarkable instance of the 
 common appeal, not to the merits of the case, but to 
 the feelings of the court. After making out what case 
 he could for his client, the advocate as it were throws 
 up his brief, and rests upon the clemency of the judge. 
 Csesar himself, it must be remembered, had begun 
 public life, like Cicero, as a pleader : and, in the opin- 
 ion of some competent judges, such as Tacitus and 
 Quintilian, had bid fair to be a close rival. 
 
 " I have pleaded many causes, Csesar some, in- 
 deed, in association with yourself, while your public 
 career spared you to the courts ; but surely I never 
 yet used language of this sort, ' Pardon him, sirs, he 
 has offended : he has made a false step : he did not 
 think to do it ; he never will again.' This is language 
 we use to a father. To the court it must be, ' He 
 did not do it : he never contemplated it : the evidence 
 is false ; the charge is fabricated.' If you tell me you 
 sit but as the judge of the fact in this case, Caesar, if 
 you ask me where and when he served against you, I 
 am silent ; I will not now dwell on the extenuating cir- 
 cumstances, which even before a judicial tribunal might 
 have their weight. "We take this course before a judge, 
 but I am here pleading to a father. ' I have erred I 
 have done wrong, I am sorry : I take refuge in your 
 clemency ; I ask forgiveness for my fault ; I pray you,
 
 DEFENCE OF LIQARIUS. 107 
 
 pardon me.' . . . There is nothing so popular, believe 
 me, sir, as kindness ; of all your many virtues none 
 wins men's admiration and their love like mercy. In 
 nothing do men reach so near the gods, as when they 
 can give life and safety to mankind. Fortune has 
 given you nothing more glorious than the power, your 
 own nature can supply nothing more noble than the 
 will, to spare and pardon wherever you can. The case 
 perhaps demands a longer advocacy your gracious 
 disposition feels it too long already. So I make an 
 end, preferring for my cause that you should argue 
 with your own heart, than that I or any other should 
 argue with you. I will urge nothing more than this, 
 the grace which you shall extend to my client in his 
 absence, will be felt as a boon by all here present." 
 
 The great conqueror was, it is said, visibly affected 
 by the appeal, and Ligarius was pardoned.
 
 CHAPTEE VIII. 
 
 MINOR CHARACTERISTICS. 
 
 content with his triumphs in prose, Cicero had 
 always an ambition to be a poet. Of his attempts in 
 this way we have only some imperfect fragments, 
 scattered here and there through his other works, 
 too scanty to form any judgment upon. His poetical 
 ability is apt to be unfairly measured by two lines 
 which his opponents were very fond of quoting and 
 laughing at, and which for that reason have become 
 the best known. But it is obvious that if Wordsworth 
 or Tennyson were to be judged solely by a line or two 
 picked out by an unfavourable reviewer say from 
 ' Peter Bell' or from the early version of the ' Miller's 
 Daughter' posterity would have a very mistaken 
 appreciation of their merits. Plutarch and the younger 
 Pliny, who had seen more of Cicero's poetry than we 
 have, thought highly of it. So he did himself; but 
 so it was his nature to think of most of his own per- 
 formances ; and such an estimate is common to other 
 authors besides Cicero, though few announce it so 
 openly. Montaigne takes him to task for this, with
 
 CICERO AS A POET. 109 
 
 more wit, perhaps, than fairness. " It is no great 
 fault to write poor verses ; but it is a fault not to be 
 able to see how unworthy such poor verses were of his 
 reputation." Voltaire, on the other hand, who was 
 perhaps as goojd a judge, thought there was " nothing 
 more beautiful" than some of the fragments of his 
 poem on ' Marius,' who was the ideal hero of his 
 youth. Perhaps the very fact, however, of none of his 
 poems having been preserved, is some argument that 
 such poetic gift as he had was rather facility than 
 genius. He wrote, besides this poem on ' Marius,' a 
 ' History of my Consulship,' and a ' History of my Own 
 Times,' in verse, and some translations from Homer. 
 
 He had no notion of what other men called relaxation : 
 he found his own relaxation in a change of work. He 
 excuses himself in one of his orations for this strange 
 taste, as it would seem to the indolent and luxurious 
 Eoman nobles with whom he was so unequally yoked. 
 
 " Who after all shall blame me, or who has any 
 right to be angry with me, if the time which is not 
 grudged to others for managing their private business, 
 for attending public games and festivals, for pleasures 
 of any other kind, nay, even for very rest of mind 
 and body, the time which others give to convivial 
 meetings, to the gaming-table, to the tennis-court, 
 this much I take for myself, for the resumption of my 
 favourite studies]" 
 
 In this indefatigable appetite for work of all kinds, 
 he reminds us of no modern politician so much as of 
 Sir George Cornewall Lewis ; yet he would not have 
 altogether agreed with him in thinking that life would
 
 110 MINOR CHARACTERISTICS. 
 
 be very tolerable if it were not for its amusements. 
 He was, as we have seen, of a naturally social disposi- 
 tion. " I like a dinner-party," he says in a letter to 
 one of his friends, " where I can say just what comes 
 uppermost, and turn my sighs and sorrows into a hearty 
 laugh. I doubt whether you are much better yourself, 
 when you can laugh as you did even at a philosopher. 
 When the man asked ' Whether anybody wanted to 
 know anything ? ' you said you had been wanting to 
 know all day when it would be dinner-time. The 
 fellow expected you to say you wanted to know 
 how many worlds there were, or something of that 
 kind."* 
 
 He is said to have been a great laugher. Indeed, he 
 confesses honestly that the sense of humour was very 
 powerful with him "I am wonderfully taken by 
 anything comic," he writes to one of his friends. He 
 reckons humour also as a useful ally to the orator. 
 " A happy jest or facetious turn is not only pleasant, 
 but also highly useful occasionally;" but he adds that 
 this is an accomplishment which must come naturally, 
 and cannot be taught under any possible system.t 
 There is at least sufficient evidence that he was much 
 given to making jokes, and some of them which have 
 come down to us would imply that a Roman audience 
 was not very critical on this point. There is an air 
 of gravity about all courts of justice which probably 
 
 * These professional philosophers, at literary dinner-parties, 
 offered to discuss and answer any question propounded by the 
 company. 
 
 t De Orat. II. 54.
 
 PUNS. HI 
 
 makes a very faint amount of jocularity hailed as a 
 relief. Even in an English law-court, a joke from the 
 bar, much more from the bench, does not need to be 
 of any remarkable brilliancy in order to be secure of, 
 raising a laugh ; and we may fairly suppose that the 
 same was the case at Eome. Cicero's jokes were fre- 
 quently nothing more than puns, which it would be 
 impossible, even if it were worth while, to reproduce 
 to an English ear. Perhaps the best, or at all events 
 the most intelligible, is his retort to Hortensius during 
 the trial of Verres. The latter was said to have feed 
 his counsel out of his Sicilian spoils especially, there 
 was a figure of a sphinx, of some artistic value, which 
 had found its way from the house of the ex-governor 
 into that of Hortensius. Cicero was putting a witness 
 through a cross-examination of which his opponent 
 could not see the bearing. " I do not understand all 
 this," said Hortensius ; " I am no hand at solving rid- 
 dles." "That is strange, too," rejoined Cicero, "when 
 you have a sphinx at home." In the same trial 
 he condescended, in the midst of that burning elo- 
 quence of which we have spoken, to make two puns on 
 the defendant's name. The word " Verres " had two 
 meanings in the old Latin tongue : it signified a " boar- 
 pig," and also a " broom " or " sweeping-brush." One 
 of Verres's friends, who either was or had the reputa- 
 tion of being a Jew, had tried to get the management 
 of the prosecution out of Cicero's hands. " What has 
 a Jew to do with pork ? " asked the orator. Speaking, 
 in the course of the same trial, of the way in which 
 the governor had made " requisitions " of all the most
 
 112 MINOR CHARACTERISTICS. 
 
 valuable works of art throughout the island, " the 
 broom" said he, " swept clean." He did not disdain 
 the comic element in poetry more than in prose; for 
 we fmd in Quintilian* a quotation from a punning 
 epigram in some collection of such trifles which in his 
 time bore Cicero's name. Tiro is said to have collected 
 and published three volumes of his master's good 
 things after his death; but if they were not better than 
 those which have come down to us, as contained in his 
 other writings, there has been no great loss to literature 
 in Tiro's ' Ciceroniana.' He knew one secret at least 
 of a successful humourist in society : for it is to 
 him that we owe the first authoritative enunciation of 
 a rule which is universally admitted "that a jest 
 never has so good an effect as when it is uttered with 
 a serious countenance." 
 
 Cicero had a wonderful admiration for the Greeks. 
 " I am not ashamed to confess," he writes to his 
 brother, " especially since my life and career have been 
 such that no suspicion of indolence or want of energy 
 can rest upon me, that all my own attainments are due 
 to those studies and those accomplishments which have 
 been handed down to us in the literary treasures and 
 the philosophical systems of the Greeks." It was no 
 mere rhetorical outburst, when in his defence of 
 Valerius Flaccus, accused like Verres, whether truly or 
 falsely, of corrupt administration in his province, he 
 thus introduced the deputation from Athens and Lace- 
 dsemon who appeared as witnesses to the character of 
 his client. 
 
 * 'Libellus Jocularis,' Quint, viii. G.
 
 ESTIMATE OF THE GREEKS. 113 
 
 " Athenians are here to-day, amongst whom civilisa- 
 tion, learning, religion, agriculture, public law and jus- 
 tice, had their birth, and whence they have been dis- 
 seminated over all the world : for the possession of 
 whose city, on account of its exceeding beauty, even 
 gods are said to have contended : which is of such an- 
 tiquity, that she is said to have bred her citizens within 
 herself, and the same soil is termed at once their mo- 
 ther, their nurse, and their country : whose importance 
 and influence is such that the name of Greece, though 
 it has lost much of its weight and power, still holds 
 its place by virtue of the renown of this single city." 
 
 He had forgotten, perhaps, as an orator is allowed to 
 forget, that in the very same speech, when his object was 
 to discredit the accusers of his client, he had said, what 
 was very commonly said of the Greeks at Eome, that 
 they were a nation of liars. There were excellent men 
 among them, he allowed thinking at the moment of the 
 counter-evidence which he had ready for the defendant 
 but he goes on to make this sweeping declaration : 
 
 " I will say this of the whole race of the Greeks : I 
 grant them literary genius, I grant them skill in vari- 
 ous accomplishments, I do not deny them elegance in 
 conversation, acuteness of intellect, fluent oratory; 
 to any other high qualities they may claim I make no 
 objection : but the sacred obligation that lies upon a 
 witness to speak the truth is what that nation has 
 never regarded." * 
 
 There was a certain proverb, he went on to say, 
 " Lend me your evidence," implying " and you shall 
 
 * Defence of Val. Flaccus, c. 4. 
 A. c. vol. ix. H
 
 114 MINOR CHARACTERISTICS. 
 
 have mine when you want it ;" a Greek proverb, of 
 course, and men knew these three words of Greek who 
 knew no Greek besides. What he loved in the Greeks, 
 then, was rather the grandeur of their literature and 
 the charm of their social qualities (a strict regard for 
 truth is, unhappily, no indispensable ingredient in this 
 last) ; he had no respect whatever for their national 
 character. The orator was influenced, perhaps, most 
 of all by his intense reverence for the Athenian De- 
 mosthenes, whom, as a master in his art, he imitated 
 and wellnigh worshipped. The appreciation of his 
 own powers which every able man has, and of which 
 Cicero had at least his share, fades into humility when 
 he comes to speak of his great model. " Absolutely 
 perfect," he calls him in one place ; and again in an- 
 other, "What I have attempted, Demosthenes has 
 achieved." Yet he felt also at times, when the fervour 
 of genius was strong within him, that there was an 
 ideal of eloquence enshrined in his own inmost mind, 
 " which I can feel," he says, " but which I never knew 
 to exist in any man." 
 
 He could not only write Greek as a scholar, but 
 seems to have spoken it with considerable ease and 
 fluency; for on one occasion he made a speech in that 
 language, a condescension which some of his friends 
 thought derogatory to the dignity of a Roman. 
 
 From the Greeks he learnt to appreciate art. How 
 far his taste was really cultivated in this respect is 
 difficult for us to judge. Some passages in his letters 
 to Atticus might lead us to suspect that, as Disraeli 
 concludes, he was rather a collector than a real lover
 
 LOVE OF GREEK ART. 115 
 
 of art. His appeals to his friend to buy up for him 
 everything and anything, and his surrender of himself 
 entirely to Atticus's judgment in such purchases, do 
 not bespeak a highly critical taste. In a letter to an- 
 other friend, he seems to say that he only bought 
 statuary as " furniture " for the gymnasium at his 
 country-seat; and he complains that four figures of 
 Bacchanals, which this friend had just bought for him, 
 had cost more than he would care to give for all the 
 statues that ever were made. On the other hand, 
 when he comes to deal with Verres's wholesale plunder 
 of paintings and statues in Sicily, he talks about the 
 several works with considerable enthusiasm. Either 
 he really understood his subject, or, like an able advo- 
 cate, he had thoroughly got up his brief. But the 
 art-notices which are scattered through his works show 
 a considerable acquaintance with the artist-world of 
 his day. He tells us, in his own admirable style, the 
 story of Zeuxis, and the selection which he made from 
 all the beauties of Crotona, in order to combine their 
 several points of perfection in his portrait of Helen ; 
 he refers more than once, and always in language 
 which implies an appreciation of the artist, to the 
 works of Phidias, especially that which is said to have 
 cost him his life the shield of Minerva; and he dis- 
 cusses, though it is but by way of illustration, the 
 comparative points of merit in the statues of Calamis, 
 and Myron, and Polycletus, and in the paintings of the 
 earlier schools of Zeuxis, Polygnotus, and Timanthes, 
 with their four primitive colours, as compared with 
 the more finished schools of Protogenes and Apelles.
 
 I. ATTICU8. 
 
 IT seems wonderful how, in the midst of all his work, 
 Cicero found time to keep up such a voluminous 
 correspondence. Something like eight hundred of his 
 letters still remain to us, and there were whole volumes 
 of them long preserved which are now lost,* to say 
 nothing of the very many which may never have 
 been thought worth preserving. The secret lay in his 
 wonderful energy and activity. We find him writing 
 letters before day -break, during the service of his 
 meals, on his journeys, and dictating them to an 
 amanuensis as he walked up and down to take needful 
 exercise. 
 
 His correspondents were of almost all varieties of 
 position and character, from Caesar and Pompey, the 
 great men of the day, down to his domestic servant 
 
 * Collections of his letters to Caesar, Brutus, Cornelius Nepos 
 the historian, Hirtius, Pansa, and to his son, are known to have 
 existed.
 
 ATTICUS. 117 
 
 and secretary, Tiro. Amongst them were rich and 
 ease -loving Epicureans like Atticus and Psetus, and 
 even men of pleasure like Cselius : grave Stoics like 
 Cato, eager patriots like Brutus and Cassius, authors 
 such as Cornelius Nepos and Lucceius the historians, 
 Varro the grammarian, and Metius the poet ; men who 
 dabbled with literature in a gentleman-like way, like 
 Hirtius and Appius, and the accomplished literary 
 critic and patron of the day himself of no mean 
 reputation as poet, orator, and historian Caius Asinius 
 Pollio. Cicero's versatile powers found no difficulty 
 in suiting the contents of his own letters to the various 
 tastes and interests of his friends. Sometimes he 
 sends to his correspondent what was in fact a political 
 journal of the day rather one-sided, it must be con- 
 tessed, as all political journals are, but furnishing us 
 with items of intelligence which throw light, as nothing 
 else can, on the history of those latter days of the 
 Eepublic. Sometimes he jots down the mere gossip 
 of his last dinner-party; sometimes he notices the 
 speculations of the last new theorist in philosophy, or 
 discusses with a literary friend some philological ques- 
 tion the latter being a study in which he was very 
 fond of dabbling, though with little success, for the 
 science of language was as yet unknown. 
 
 His chief correspondent, as has been said, was his 
 old school-fellow and constant friend through life, 
 Pomponius Atticus. The letters addressed to him 
 which still remain to us cover a period of twenty-four 
 years, with a few occasional interruptions, and the 
 correspondence only ceased with Cicero's death. The
 
 118 CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 Athenianised Eoman, though he had deliberately with- 
 drawn himself from the distracting factions of his 
 native city, which he seldom revisited, kept on the 
 best terms with the leaders of all parties, and seems 
 to have taken a very lively interest, though merely in 
 the character of a looker-on, in the political events 
 which crowded so fast upon each other during the fifty 
 years of his voluntary expatriation. Cicero's letters 
 were to him what an English newspaper would be 
 now to an English gentleman who for his own reasons 
 preferred to reside in Paris, without forswearing his 
 national interests and sympathies. At times, when 
 Cicero was more at leisure, and when messengers were 
 handy (for we have to remember that there was nothing 
 like our modern post), Cicero would despatch one of 
 these letters to Atticus daily. We have nearly four 
 hundred of them in all. They are continually gar- 
 nished, even to the point of affectation, with Greek 
 quotations and phrases, partly perhaps in compliment 
 to his friend's Athenian tastes, and partly from the 
 writer's own passion for the language. 
 
 So much reference has been made to them through- 
 out the previous biographical sketch, for they supply 
 us with some of the most important materials for 
 Cicero's life and times, that it may be sufficient to 
 give in this place two or three of the shorter as speci- 
 mens of the collection. One which describes a visit 
 which he received from Julius Caesar, already dictator, 
 in his country-house near Puteoli, is interesting, as 
 affording a glimpse behind the scenes in those mo- 
 mentous days when no one knew exactly whether the
 
 ATTICUS. 119 
 
 great captain was to turn out a patriot or a conspirator 
 against the liberties of Rome. 
 
 " To think that I should have had such a tremen- 
 dous visitor ! But never mind ; for all went off very 
 pleasantly. But when he arrived at Philippus's house* 
 on the evening of the second day of the Saturnalia, 
 the place was so full of soldiers that they could hardly 
 find a spare table for Csesar himself to dine at. There 
 were two thousand men. Eeally I was in a state of 
 perplexity as to what was to be done next day : but 
 Barba Cassius came to my aid, he supplied me with 
 a guard. They pitched their tents in the grounds, and 
 the house was protected. He stayed with Philippus 
 until one o'clock on the third day of the Saturnalia, 
 and would see no one. Going over accounts, I suppose, 
 with Balbus. Then he walked on the sea-shore. After 
 two he had a bath : then he listened to some verses on 
 Mamurra, without moving a muscle of his countenance : 
 then dressed,t and sat down to dinner. He had taken 
 a precautionary emetic, and therefore ate and drank 
 heartily and unrestrainedly. We had, I assure you, a 
 very good dinner, and well served ; and not only that, 
 but 
 
 ' The feast of reason and the flow of soul' J 
 
 besides. His suite were abundantly supplied at three 
 other tables : the freedmen of lower rank, and even 
 
 * This was close to Cicero's villa, on the coast. 
 
 t Literally, ' ' he got himself oiled. " The emetic was a disgust- 
 ing practice of Roman lion vivants who were afraid of indigestion. 
 
 t The yerse which Cicero quotes from Lucilius is fairly equiva- 
 lent to this.
 
 120 CICERO 'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 the slaves, were well taken care of. The higher class 
 had really an elegant entertainment. Well, no need to 
 make a long story; we found we were both 'flesh and 
 blood.' Still he is not the kind of guest to whom you 
 would say ' Now do, pray, take us in your way on 
 your return.' Once is enough. "We had no conversa- 
 tion on business, but a good deal of literary talk. In 
 short, he seemed to be much pleased, and to enjoy 
 himself. He said he should stay one day at Puteoli, 
 and another at Baise. So here you have an account of 
 this visit, or rather quartering of troops upon me, 
 which I disliked the thoughts of, but which really, as 
 I have said, gave me no annoyance. I shall stay here 
 a little longer, then go to my house at Tusculum. 
 When Caesar passed Dolabella's villa, all the troops 
 formed up on the right and left of his horse, which 
 they did nowhere else.* I heard that from Nicias." 
 
 In the following, he is anticipating a visit from his 
 friend, and from the lady to whom he is betrothed. 
 
 " I had a delightful visit from Cincius on the 30th 
 of January, before daylight. For he told me that you 
 were in Italy, and that he was going to send off some 
 messengers to you, and would not let them go without 
 a letter from me. Not that I have much to write 
 about (especially when you are all but here), except 
 to assure you that I am anticipating your arrival with 
 the greatest delight. Therefore fly to me, to show your 
 own affection, and to see what affection I bear you. 
 Other matters when we meet I have written this in 
 a hurry. As soon as ever you arrive, bring all your 
 
 * Probably by way of salute ; or possibly as a precaution.
 
 PJSTDS. 121 
 
 people to my house. You will gratify me very much 
 by coming. You will see how wonderfully well Tyr- 
 rannio has arranged my books, the remains of which 
 are much better than I had thought. And I should 
 be very glad if you could send me a couple of your 
 library clerks whom Tyrrannio could make use of as 
 binders, and to help him in other ways ; and tell them 
 to bring some parchment to make indices syllabuses, 
 I believe you Greeks call them. But this only if quite 
 convenient to you. But, at any rate, be sure you come 
 yourself, if you can make any stay in our parts, and 
 bring Pilia with you, for that is but fair, and Tullia 
 wishes it much. Upon my word you have bought 
 a very fine place. I hear that your gladiators fight 
 capitally. If you had cared to hire them out, you 
 might have cleared your expenses at these two last 
 public shows. But we can talk about this hereafter. 
 Be sure to come : and do your best about the clerks, 
 if you love me." 
 
 The Eoman gentleman of elegant and accomplished 
 tastes, keeping a troop of private gladiators, and think- 
 ing of hiring them out, to our notions, is a curious 
 combination of character ; but the taste was not essen- 
 tially more brutal than the prize-ring and the cock- 
 fights of the last century. 
 
 II. P.ETUS. 
 
 Another of Cicero's favourite correspondents was 
 Papirius Psetus, who seems to have lived at home at 
 ease, and taken little part in the political tumults of
 
 122 CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 his day. Like Atticus, he was an Epicurean, and 
 thought more of the pleasures of life than of its cares 
 and duties. Yet Cicero evidently took great pleasure 
 in his society, and his letters to him are written in the 
 same familiar and genial tone as those to his old school- 
 fellow. Some of them throw a pleasant light upon 
 the social habits of the day. Cicero had had some 
 friends staying with him at his country-seat at Tus- 
 culum, to whom, he says, he had been giving lessons 
 in oratory. Dolabella, his son-in-law, and Hirtius, the 
 future consul, were among them. " They are my 
 scholars in declamation, and I am theirs in dinner- 
 eating ; for I conclude you have heard (you seem to 
 hear everything) that they come to me to declaim, and 
 I go to them for dinners. Tis all very well for you 
 to swear that you cannot entertain me in such grand 
 fashion as I am used to, but it is of use. . . . Better 
 be victimised by your friend than by your debtors, as 
 you have been. After all, I don't require such a ban- 
 quet as leaves a great waste behind it ; a little will do, 
 only handsomely served and well cooked. I remember 
 your telling me about a dinner of Phamea's well, it 
 need not be such a late affair as that, nor so grand in 
 other respects ; nay, if you persist in giving me one of 
 your mother's old family dinners, I can stand even 
 that. My new reputation for good living has reached 
 you, I find, before my arrival, and you are alarmed at 
 it; but, pray, put no trust in your ante-courses I 
 have given up that altogether. I used to spoil my 
 appetite, I remember, upon your oil and sliced sausages. 
 . . . One expense I really shall put you to ; I must
 
 123 
 
 have my warm bath. My other habits, I assure you, 
 are quite unaltered ; all the rest is joke." 
 
 Psetus seems to answer him with the same good- 
 humoured badinage. Balbus, the governor of Africa, 
 had been to see him, he says, and he had been content 
 with such humble fare as he feared Cicero might 
 despise. So much, at least, we may gather from 
 Cicero's answer. 
 
 " Satirical as ever, I see. You say Balbus was con- 
 tent with very modest fare. You seem to insinuate 
 that when grandees are so moderate, much more ought 
 a poor ex-consul like myself so to be. You don't 
 know that I fished it all out of your visitor himself, 
 for he came straight to my house on his landing. The 
 very first words I said to him were, ' How did you 
 get on with our friend Psetus?' He swore he had 
 never been better entertained. If this referred to the 
 charms of your conversation, remember, I shall be 
 quite as appreciative a listener as Balbus ; but if it 
 meant the good things on the table, I must beg you 
 will not treat us men of eloquence worse than you do 
 a ' Lisper.' " * 
 
 They carry on this banter through several letters. 
 Cicero regrets that he has been unable as yet to pay 
 his threatened visit, when his friend would have seen 
 what advances he had made in gastronomic science. 
 He was able now to eat through the whole bill of fare 
 " from the eggs to the roti" 
 
 " I [Stoic that used to be] have gone over with my 
 whole forces into the camp of Epicurus. You will 
 * One of Cicero's puns. Balbus means ' Lisper.'
 
 124 CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 have to do with a man who can eat, and who knows 
 what's what. You know how conceited we late 
 learners are, as the proverb says. You will have to 
 unlearn those little ' plain dinners ' and makeshifts of 
 yours. We have made such advances in the art, that 
 we have been venturing to invite, more than once, 
 your friends Verrius and Camillus (what elegant and 
 fastidious gentlemen they are !). But see how auda- 
 cious we are getting ! I have even given Hirtius a 
 dinner but without a peacock. My cook could imi- 
 tate nothing in his entertainments except the hot 
 soup." 
 
 Then he hears that his friend is in bed with the 
 gout. 
 
 "I am extremely sorry to hear it, as in duty bound; 
 still, I am quite determined to come, that I may see 
 you, and pay my visit, yes, and have my dinner : for 
 I suppose your cook has not got the gout as well." 
 
 Such were the playful epistles of a busy man. But 
 even in some of these lightest effusions we see the 
 cares of the statesman showing through. Here is a 
 portion of a later letter to the same friend. 
 
 " I am very much concerned to hear you have given 
 up going out to dinner ; for it is depriving yourself of 
 a great source of enjoyment and gratification. Then, 
 again, I am afraid for it is as well to speak honestly 
 lest you should unlearn certain old habits of yours, 
 and forget to give your own little dinners. For if for- 
 merly, when you had good examples to imitate, you 
 were still not much of a proficient in that way, how 
 can I .suppose you will get on now? Spurina, indeed,
 
 HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 125 
 
 when I mentioned the thing to him, and explained 
 your previous habits, proved to demonstration that 
 there would he danger to the highest interests of the 
 state if you did not return to your old ways in the 
 spring. But indeed, my good Psetus, I advise you, 
 joking apart, to associate with good fellows, and pleas- 
 ant fellows, and men who are fond of you. There is 
 nothing hetter worth having in life, nothing that makes 
 life more happy. . . . See how I employ philo- 
 sophy to reconcile you to dinner-parties. Take care 
 of your health ; and that you will best do by going 
 out to dinner. . . . But don't imagine, as you 
 love me, that because I write jestingly I have thrown 
 off all anxiety about public affairs. Be assured, my 
 dear Psetus, that I seek nothing and care for nothing, 
 night or day, but how my country may be kept 
 safe and free. I omit no opportunity of advising, 
 planning, or acting. I feel in my heart that if in 
 securing this I have to lay down my life, I shall have 
 ended it well and honourablv." 
 
 III. HIS BROTHER QUINTtTS. 
 
 Between Marcus Cicero and his younger brother 
 Quintus there existed a very sincere and cordial affec- 
 tion somewhat warmer, perhaps, on the side of the 
 elder, inasmuch as his wealth and position enabled 
 him rather to confer than to receive kindnesses ; the 
 rule in such cases being (so cynical philosophers tell 
 us) that the affection is lessened rather than increased 
 by the feeling of obligation. He almost adopted the
 
 126 CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 younger Quiutus, his nephew, and had him educated 
 with his own son ; and the two cousins received their 
 earlier training together in one or other of Marcus 
 Cicero's country-houses under a clever Greek freedman 
 of his, who was an excellent scholar, and what was 
 less usual amongst his countrymen, unless Cicero's 
 estimate of them does them great injustice a very 
 honest man, but, as the two boys complained, terribly 
 passionate. Cicero himself, however, was the head 
 tutor an office for which, as he modestly writes, his 
 Greek studies fully qualified him. Quintus Cicero 
 behaved ill to his brother after the battle of Pharsalia, 
 making what seem to have been very unjust accusa- 
 tions against him in order to pay court to Caesar ; but 
 they soon became friends again. 
 
 Twenty-nine of the elder Cicero's letters to his 
 brother remain, written in terms of remarkable kind- 
 ness and affection, which go far to vindicate the Roman 
 character from a charge which has sometimes been 
 brought against it of coldness in these family relation- 
 ships. Few modern brothers, probably, would write to 
 each other in such terms as these : 
 
 " Afraid lest your letters bother me ? I wish you 
 would bother me, and re-bother me, and talk to me 
 and at me ; for what can give me more pleasure ? I 
 swear that no muse-stricken rhymester ever reads his 
 own last poem with more delight than I do what you 
 write to me about matters public or private, town or 
 country. Here now is a letter from you full of pleas- 
 ant matter, but with this dash of the disagreeable in 
 it, that you have been afraid nay, are even now
 
 HIS BROTHER QUINTUS. 127 
 
 afraid of being troublesome to me. I could quarrel 
 with you about it, if that were not a sin. But if I 
 have reason to suspect anything of that sort again, I 
 can only say that I shall always be afraid lest, when 
 we are together, I may be troublesome to you." 
 
 Or take, again, the pathetic apology which he makes 
 for having avoided an interview with Quintus in those 
 first days of his exile when he was so thoroughly 
 unmanned : 
 
 " My brother, my brother, my brother ! Did you 
 really fear that I was angry, because I sent off the 
 slaves without any letter to you ? And did you even 
 think that I was unwilling to see you ? I angry with 
 you ? Could I possibly be angry with you ? . . . 
 When I miss you, it is not a brother only that I miss. 
 To me you have always been the pleasantest of com- 
 panions, a son in dutiful affection, a father in counsel. 
 What pleasure ever had I without you, or you with- 
 out me?" 
 
 Quintus had accompanied Caesar on his expedition 
 into Britain as one of his lieutenants, and seems to 
 have written home to his brother some notices of the 
 country ; to which the latter, towards the end of his 
 reply, makes this allusion : 
 
 "How delighted I was to get your letter from 
 Britain ! I had been afraid of the voyage across, 
 afraid of the rock-bound coast of the island. The 
 other dangers of such a campaign I do not mean to de- 
 spise, but in these there is more to hope than to fear, 
 and I have been rather anxiously expecting the result 
 than in any real alarm about it. I see you have a
 
 128 CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 capital subject to write about. What novel scenery, 
 what natural curiosities and remarkable places, what 
 strange tribes and strange customs, what a campaign, 
 and what a commander you have to describe ! I will 
 willingly help you in the points you request ; and I 
 will send you the verses you ask for though it is 
 sending ' an owl to Athens,' * I know." 
 
 In another letter he says, " Only give me Britain to 
 paint with your colours and my own pencil." But 
 either the Britons of those days did not, after all, 
 seem to afford sufficient interest for poem or history, 
 or for some other reason this joint literary undertaking, 
 which seems once to have been contemplated, was 
 never carried out, and we have missed what would 
 beyond doubt have been a highly interesting volume 
 of Sketches in Britain by the brothers Cicero. 
 
 Quintus was a poet, as well as his brother nay, a 
 better poet, in the latter's estimation, or at least he 
 was polite enough to say so more than once. In quan- 
 tity, at least, if not in quality, the younger must have 
 been a formidable rival, for he wrote, as appears from 
 one of these letters, four tragedies in fifteen days 
 possibly translations only from the Greek. 
 
 One of the most remarkable of all Cicero's letters, 
 and perhaps that which does him most credit both as 
 a man and a statesman, is one which he wrote to his 
 brother, who was at the time governor of Asia. In- 
 deed, it is much more than a letter; it is rather a grave 
 and carefully weighed paper of instructions on the 
 duties of such a position. It is full of sound practical 
 
 * A Greek proverb, equivalent to our 'coals to Newcastle.'
 
 (LV THE DUTIES OF A GOVERNOR, 129 
 
 sense, and lofty principles of statesmanship very 
 different from the principles which too commonly ruled 
 the conduct of Roman governors abroad. The province 
 which had fallen to the lot of Quintus Cicero was one 
 of the richest belonging to the Empire, and which pre- 
 sented the greatest temptations and the greatest facil- 
 ities for the abuse of power to selfish purposes. Though 
 called Asia, it consisted only of the late kingdom of 
 Pergamus, and had come under the dominion of Rome, 
 not by conquest, as was the case with most of the 
 provinces, but by way of legacy from Attalus, the last 
 of its kings ; who, after murdering most of his 
 own relations, had named the Roman people as his 
 heirs. The seat of government was at Ephesus. The 
 population was of a very mixed character, consisting 
 partly of true Asiatics, and partly of Asiatic Greeks, 
 the descendants of the old colonists, and containing 
 also a large Roman element merchants who were 
 there for purposes of trade, many of them bankers 
 and money-lenders, and speculators who farmed the 
 imperial taxes, and were by no means scrupulous in 
 the matter of fleecing the provincials. These latter 
 the ' Publicani,' as they were termed might prove 
 very dangerous enemies to any too zealous reformer. 
 If the Roman governor there really wished to do his 
 duty, what with the combined servility and double- 
 dealing of the Orientals, the proverbial lying of the 
 Greeks, and the grasping injustice of the Roman 
 officials, he had a very difficult part to play. How 
 Quintus had been playing it is not quite clear. His 
 brother, in this admirable letter, assumes that he had 
 A. c. vol. ix. I
 
 130 CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 done all that was right, and urges him to maintain the 
 same course. But the advice would hardly have been 
 needed if all had gone well hitherto. 
 
 " You will find little trouble in holding your subor- 
 dinates in check, if you can but keep a check upon 
 yourself. So long as you resist gain, and pleasure, and 
 all other temptations, as I am sure you do, I cannot 
 fancy there will be any danger of your not being able 
 to check a dishonest merchant or an extortionate col- 
 lector. For even the Greeks, when they see you living 
 thus, will look upon you as some hero from their old 
 annals, or some supernatural being from heaven, come 
 down into their province. 
 
 " I write thus, not to urge you so to act, but that you 
 may congratulate yourself upon having so acted, now 
 and heretofore. For it is a glorious thing for a man to 
 have held a government for three years in Asia, in such 
 sort that neither statue, nor painting, nor work of art 
 of any kind, nor any temptations of wealth or beauty 
 (in all which temptations your province abounds) could 
 draw you from the strictest integrity and self-control : 
 that your official progresses should have been no cause 
 of dread to the inhabitants, that none should be im- 
 poverished by your requisitions, none terrified at the 
 news of your approach ; but that you should have 
 brought with you, wherever you came, the most hearty 
 rejoicings, public and private, inasmuch as every town 
 saw in you a protector and not a tyrant every family 
 received you as a guest, not as a plunderer. 
 
 " But in these points, as experience has by this time 
 taught you> it is not enough for you to have these
 
 ON THE DUTIES OF A GOVERNOR. 131 
 
 virtues yourself, but you must look to it carefully, that 
 in this guardianship of the province not you alone, 
 but every officer under you, discharges his duty to our 
 subjects, to our fellow-citizens, and to the state. . . . 
 If any of your subordinates seem grasping for his 
 own interest, you may venture to bear with him so 
 long as he merely neglects the rules by which he ought 
 to be personally bound; never so far as to allow him to 
 abuse for his own gain the power with which you have 
 intrusted him to maintain the dignity of his office. 
 For I do not think it well, especially since the cus- 
 toms of official life incline so much of late to laxity 
 and corrupt influence, that you should scrutinise too 
 closely every abuse, or criticise too strictly every one 
 of your officers, but rather place trust in each in pro- 
 portion as you feel confidence in his integrity. 
 
 " For those whom the state has assigned you as com- 
 panions and assistants in public business, you are answer- 
 able only within the limits I have just laid down ; but 
 for those whom you have chosen to associate with 
 yourself as members of your private establishment and 
 personal suite, you will be held responsible not only for 
 all they do, but for all they say. 
 
 " Your ears should be supposed to hear only what you 
 publicly listen to, not to be open to every secret and 
 false whisper for the sake of private gain. Your official 
 seal should be not as a mere common tool, but as 
 though it were yourself; not the instrument of other 
 men's wills, but the evidence of your own. Your offi- 
 cers should be the agents of your clemency, not of their 
 own caprice ; and the rods and axes which they bear
 
 132 CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 should be the emblems of your dignity, not merely of 
 your power. In short, the whole province should feel 
 that the persons, the families, the reputation, and the 
 fortunes of all over whom you rule, are held by you 
 very precious. Let it be well understood that you will 
 hold that man as much your enemy who gives a bribe, 
 if it comes to your knowledge, as the man who receives 
 it. But no one will offer bribes, if this be once made 
 clear, that those who pretend to have influence of this 
 kind with you have no power, after all, to gain any 
 favour for others at your hands. 
 
 "Let such, then, be the foundations of your dignity; 
 first, integrity and self-control on your own part ; a 
 becoming behaviour on the part of all about you ; a 
 very careful and circumspect selection of your intimates, 
 whether Greeks or provincials ; a grave and firm disci- 
 pline maintained throughout your household. For if 
 such conduct befits us in. our private and everyday 
 relations, it becomes wellnigh godlike in a govern- 
 ment of such extent, in a state of morals so depraved, 
 and in a province which presents so many temptations. 
 Such a line of conduct and such rules will alone enable 
 you to uphold that severity in your decisions and de- 
 crees which you have employed in some cases, and by 
 which we have incurred (and I cannot regret it) the jeal- 
 ousy of certain interested parties. . . . You may 
 safely use the utmost strictness in the administration 
 of justice, so long as it is not capricious or partial, but 
 maintained at the same level for all Yet it will be of 
 little use that your own decisions be just and carefully
 
 TIRO. 133 
 
 weighed, unless tlie same course be pursued by all to 
 whom you delegate any portion of your judicial autho- 
 rity. Such firmness and dignity must be employed 
 as may not only be above partiality, but above the 
 suspicion of it. To this must be added readiness to 
 give audience, calmness in deciding, care in weighing 
 the merits of the case and in satisfying the claims of 
 the parties." 
 
 Yet he advises that justice should be tempered with 
 leniency. 
 
 "If such moderation be popular at Eome, where 
 there is so much self-assertion, such unbridled freedom, 
 so much licence allowed to all men ; where there are 
 so many courts of appeal open, so many means of help, 
 where the people have so much power and the Senate 
 so much authority; how grateful beyond measure will 
 moderation be in the governor of Asia, a province 
 where all that vast number of our fellow-citizens and 
 subjects, all those numerous states and cities, hang upon 
 one man's nod ! where there is no appeal to the tri- 
 bune, no remedy at law, no Senate, no popular assembly. 
 Wherefore it should be the aim of a great man, and 
 one noble by nature and trained by education and 
 liberal studies, so to behave himself in the exercise of 
 that absolute power, as that they over whom he pre- 
 sides should never have cause to wish for any authority 
 other than his." 
 
 Of all Cicero's correspondence, his letters to Tiro 
 supply the most convincing evidence of his natural
 
 134 CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 kindness of heart. Tiro was a slave ; but this must 
 be taken with some explanation. The slaves in a 
 household like Cicero's would vary in position from 
 the lowest menial to the important major-domo and 
 the confidential secretary. Tiro was of this higher 
 class. He had probably been born and brought up in 
 the service, like Eliezer in the household of Abraham, 
 and had become, like him, the trusted agent of his 
 master and the friend of the whole family. He was 
 evidently a person of considerable ability and accom- 
 plishments, acting as literary amanuensis, and indeed 
 in some sort as a domestic critic, to his busy master. 
 He had accompanied him to his government in Cilicia, 
 and on the return home had been taken ill, and obliged 
 to be left behind at Patrse. And this is Cicero's affec- 
 tionate letter to him, written from Leucas (Santa 
 Maura) the day afterwards : 
 
 " I thought I could have borne the separation from 
 you better, but it is plainly impossible ; and although 
 it is of great importance to the honours which I am 
 expecting * that I should get to Eome as soon as pos- 
 sible, yet I feel I made a great mistake in leaving 
 you behind. But as it seemed to be your wish not 
 to make the voyage until your health was restored, 
 I approved your decision. Nor do I think otherwise 
 now, if you are still of the same opinion. But if here- 
 after, when you are able to eat as usual, you think 
 you can follow me here, it is for you to decide. I sent 
 
 * The triumph for the victory gained under his nominal com- 
 mand over the hill-tribes in Cilicia, during his governorship of 
 that province (p. 68).
 
 TIRO. 135 
 
 Mario to you, telling him either to join me with you 
 as soon as possible, or, if you are delayed, to come 
 back here at once. But be assured of this, that if it 
 can be so without risk to your health, there is nothing 
 I wish so much as to have you with me. Only, if you 
 feel it necessary for your recovery to stay a little 
 longer at Patrse, there is nothing I wish so much as 
 for you to get well. If you sail at once, you will 
 catch us at Leucas. But if you want to get well first, 
 take care to secure pleasant companions, fine weather, 
 and a good ship. Mind this, my good Tiro, if you 
 love me let neither Mario's visit nor this letter hurry 
 you. By doing what is best for your own health, you 
 will be best obeying my directions. Consider these 
 points with your usual good sense. I miss you very 
 much ; but then I love you, and my affection makes 
 me wish to see you well, just as my want of you 
 makes me long to see you as soon as possible. But 
 the first point is the most important. Above all, 
 therefore, take care to get well : of all your innumer- 
 able services to me, this will be the most acceptable." 
 Cicero writes to him continually during his own 
 journey homewards with the most thoughtful kind- 
 ness, begs that he will be cautious as to what vessel 
 he sails in, and recommends specially one very careful 
 captain. He has left a horse and a mule ready for 
 him when he lands at Brundusium. Then he hears 
 that Tiro had been foolish enough to go to a concert, 
 or something of the kind, before he was strong, for 
 which he mildly reproves him. He has written to the 
 physician to spare no care or pains, and .to charge,
 
 136 CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 apparently, what he pleases. Several of his letters to 
 his friend Atticus, at this date, speak in the most 
 anxious and affectionate terms of the serious illness of 
 this faithful servant. Just as he and his party are 
 starting from Leucas, they send a note " from Cicero 
 and his son, and Quintus the elder and younger, to 
 their best and kindest Tiro." Then from Rome comes 
 a letter in the name of the whole family, wife* and 
 daughter included : 
 
 " Marcus Tullius Cicero, and Cicero the younger, and 
 Terentia, and Tullia, and Brother Quintus, and 
 Quintus's Son, to Tiro send greeting. 
 
 "Although I miss your able and willing service 
 every moment, still it is not on my own account so much 
 as yours that I am sorry you are not well. But 
 as your illness has now taken the form of a quartan 
 fever (for so Curius writes), I hope, if you take care of 
 yourself, you will soon be stronger. Only be sure, if 
 you have any kindness for me, not to trouble yourself 
 about anything else just now, except how to get well 
 as soon as may be. I am quite aware how much you 
 regret not being with me ; but everything will go 
 right if you get well. I would not have you hurry, 
 or undergo the annoyance of sea-sickness while you 
 are weak, or risk a sea-voyage in winter." Then he 
 tells him all the news from Eome ; how there had 
 been quite an ovation on his arrival there ; how Caesar 
 was (he thought) growing dangerous to the state ; and 
 how his own coveted " triumph " was still postponed. 
 "All this," he says, "I thought you would like to
 
 TIRO AND SOSITHEUS. 137 
 
 know." Then he concludes: "Over and over again, 
 I beg you to take care to get well, and to send me a 
 letter whenever you have an opportunity. Farewell, 
 again and again." 
 
 Tiro got well, and outlived his kind master, who, 
 very soon after this, presented him with his freedom. 
 It is to him that we are said to be indebted for the 
 preservation and publication of Cicero's correspond- 
 ence. He wrote, also, a biography of him, which 
 Plutarch had seen, and of which he probably made 
 use in his own ' Life of Cicero,' but which has not 
 come down to us. 
 
 There was another of his household for whom 
 Cicero had the same affection. This was Sositheus, 
 also a slave, but a man, like Tiro, of some considerable 
 education, whom he employed as his reader. His 
 death affected Cicero quite as the loss of a friend. 
 Indeed, his anxiety is such, that his Eoman dignity 
 is almost ashamed of it. "I grieve," he says, "more 
 than I ought for a mere slave." Just as one might 
 now apologise for making too much fuss about a 
 favourite dog ; for the slave was looked upon in 
 scarcely a higher light in civilised Rome. They spoke 
 of him in the neuter gender, as a chattel ; and it was 
 gravely discussed, in case of danger in a storm at sea, 
 which it would be right first to cast overboard to 
 lighten the ship, a valuable horse or an indifferent 
 slave. Hortensius, the rival advocate who has been 
 mentioned, a man of more luxurious habits and less 
 kindly spirit than Cicero, who was said to feed the 
 pet lampreys in his stews much better than he did his
 
 138 CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 slaves, and to have shed tears at the death of one of 
 these ugly favourites, would have probably laughed at 
 Cicero's concern for Sositheus and Tiro. 
 
 But indeed every glimpse of this kind which Cicero's 
 correspondence affords us gives token of a kindly heart, 
 .and makes us long to know something more. Some 
 have suspected him of a want of filial affection, owing 
 to a somewhat abrupt and curt announcement in a 
 letter to Atticus of his father's death ; and his stanch 
 defenders propose to adopt, with Madvig, the reading, 
 discessit "left us," instead of decessit " died." 
 There really seems no occasion. Unless Atticus knew 
 the father intimately, there was no need to dilate upon 
 the old man's death ; and Cicero mentions subsequently, 
 in terms quite as brief, the marriage of his daughter 
 and the birth of his son events in which we are 
 assured he felt deeply interested. If any further ex- 
 planation of this seeming coldness be required, the fol- 
 lowing remarks of Mr Forsyth are apposite and true : 
 
 " The truth is, that what we call sentiment was almost 
 unknown to the ancient Romans, in whose writings it 
 would be as vain to look for it as to look for traces of 
 Gothic architecture amongst classic ruins. And this is 
 something more than a mere illustration. It suggests a 
 reason for the absence. Eomance and sentiment came 
 from the dark forests of the North, when Scandinavia and 
 Germany poured forth their hordes to subdue and people 
 the Roman Empire. The life of a citizen of the Republic 
 of Rome was essentially a public life. The love of country 
 was there carried to an extravagant length, and was para- 
 mount to, and almost swallowed up, the private and social 
 affections. The state was everything, the individual com-
 
 HIS FATHER'S DEATH. 139 
 
 paratively nothing. In one of the letters of the Emperor 
 Marcus Aurelius to Fronto, there is a passage in which he 
 says that the Roman language had no word corresponding 
 with the Greek ptXoon-opyta, the affectionate love for 
 parents and children. Upon this Niebuhr remarks that the 
 feeling was ' not a Roman one ; but Cicero possessed it in 
 a degree which few Romans could comprehend, and hence 
 he was laughed at for the grief which lie felt at the death 
 of his daughter Tullia.' "
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 ESSAYS OX ' OLD AGE ' AND ' FRIENDSHIP.' 
 
 THE treatise on ' Old Age,' which is thrown into the 
 form of a dialogue, is said to have "been suggested by 
 the opening of Plato's ' Republic,' in which Cephalus 
 touches so pleasantly on the enjoyments peculiar to 
 that time of life. So far as light and graceful treat- 
 ment of his subject goes, the Roman essayist at least 
 does not fall short of his model. Montaigne said of 
 it, that " it made one long to grow old;" * but Mon- 
 taigne was a Frenchman, and such sentiment was 
 quite in his way. The dialogue, whether it produce this 
 effect on many readers or not, is very pleasant read- 
 ing: and when we remember that the author wrote 
 it when he was exactly in his grand climacteric, and 
 addressed it to his friend Atticus, who was within a 
 year of the same age, we get that element of personal 
 interest which makes all writings of the kind more 
 attractive. The argument in defence of the paradox 
 that it is a good thing to grow old, proceeds upon the 
 only possible ground, the theory of compensations. It 
 * " II donne 1'appetit de vieiller."
 
 ESSAY ON 'OLD AGE: 141 
 
 is put into the mouth of Cato the Censor, who had 
 died about a century before, and who is introduced as 
 giving a kind of lecture on the subject to his young 
 friends Scipio and Loelius, in his eighty-fourth year. 
 He was certainly a remarkable example in his own 
 case of its being possible to grow old gracefully and 
 usefully, if, as he tells us, he was at that age still able 
 to take part in the debates in the Senate, was busy 
 collecting materials for the early history of Rome, had 
 quite lately begun the study of Greek, could enjoy 
 a country dinner-party, and had been thinking of 
 taking lessons in playing on the lyre. 
 
 He states four reasons why old age is so commonly 
 considered miserable. First, it unfits us for active em- 
 ployment; secondly, it weakens the bodily strength; 
 thirdly, it deprives us of nearly all pleasures ; fourthly 
 and lastly, it is drawing near death. As to the first, the 
 old senator argues very fairly that very much of the 
 more important business of life is not only transacted 
 by old men, but in point of fact, as is confessed by the 
 very name and composition of the Roman Senate, it is 
 thought safest to intrust it to the elders in the state. 
 The pilot at the helm may not be able to climb the 
 mast and run up and down the deck like the younger 
 sailor, but he steers none the worse for being old. He 
 quotes some well-known examples of tbis from Roman 
 annals; examples which might be matched by obvious 
 instances in modern English history. The defence 
 which he makes of old age against the second charge 
 loss of muscular vigour is rather more of the 
 nature of special pleading. He says little more than
 
 142 ESSAY ON 'OLD AGE.' 
 
 that mere muscular strength, after all, is not much 
 wanted for our happiness : that there are always com- 
 parative degrees of strength; and that an old man 
 need no more make himself unhappy because he has 
 not the strength of a young man, than the latter does 
 because he has not the strength of a bull or an ele- 
 phant. It was very well for the great wrestler Milo 
 to be able to carry an ox round the arena on his 
 shoulders; but, on the whole, a man does not often 
 want to walk about with a bullock on his back. 
 The old are said, too, to lose their memory. Cato 
 thinks they can remember pretty well all that they 
 care to remember. They are not apt to forget who 
 owes them money; and "I never knew an old man 
 forget," he says, " where he had buried his gold." 
 Then as to the pleasures of the senses, which age un- 
 doubtedly diminishes our power of enjoying. " This," 
 says Cato, " is really a privilege, not a deprivation ; 
 to be delivered from the yoke of such tyrants as our 
 passions to feel that we have 'got our discharge' 
 from such a warfare is a blessing for which men ought 
 rather to be grateful to their advancing years." And 
 the respect and authority which is by general consent 
 conceded to old age, is a pleasure more than equivalent 
 to the vanished pleasures of youth. 
 
 There is one consideration which the author has not 
 placed amongst his four chief disadvantages of growing 
 old, which, however, he did not forget, for he notices 
 it incidentally in the dialogue, the feeling that we 
 are growing less agreeable to our friends, that our com- 
 pany is less sought after, and that we are, in short,
 
 ESSAY ON 'OLD AGE.' 143 
 
 becoming rather ciphers in society. This, in a con- 
 dition of high civilisation, is really perhaps felt by 
 most of us as the hardest to bear of all the ills to 
 which old age is liable. "We should not care so much 
 about the younger generation rising up and making us 
 look old, if we did not feel that they are " pushing us 
 from our stools." Cato admits that he had heard some 
 old men complain that " they were now neglected by 
 those who had once courted their society," and he 
 quotes a passage from the comic poet Csecilius : 
 
 " This is the bitterest pang in growing old, 
 To feel that we grow hateful to our fellows." 
 
 But he dismisses the question briefly in his own case 
 by observing with some complacency that he does not 
 think his young friends find his company disagreeable 
 an assertion which Scipio and Leelius, who occa- 
 sionally take part in the dialogue, are far too well 
 bred to contradict. He remarks also, sensibly enough, 
 that though some old persons are no doubt considered 
 disagreeable company, this is in great measure their 
 own fault : that testiness and ill - nature (qualities 
 which, as he observes, do not usually improve with 
 age) are always disagreeable, and that such persons 
 attributed to their advancing years what was in truth 
 the consequence of their unamiable tempers. It is not 
 all wine which turns sour with age, nor yet all tem- 
 pers ; much depends on the original quality. The old 
 Censor lays down some maxims which, like the pre- 
 ceding, have served as texts for a goo'd many modern 
 writers, and may be found expanded, diluted, or
 
 144 ESSAY ON 'OLD AGE. 
 
 strengthened, in the essays of Addison and Johnson, 
 and in many of their followers of less repute. " I 
 never could assent," says Cato, " to that ancient and 
 inuch-bepraised proverb, that * you must become an 
 old man early, if you wish to be an old man long.' " 
 Yet it was a maxim which was very much acted upon 
 by modern Englishmen a generation or two back. 
 It was then thought almost a moral duty to retire 
 into old age, and to assume all its disabilities as well as 
 its privileges, after sixty years or even earlier. At 
 present the world sides with Cato, and rushes perhaps 
 into the other extreme ; for any line at which old age 
 now begins would be hard to trace either in dress or 
 deportment. " We must resist old age, and fight 
 against it as a disease." Strong words from the old 
 Roman ; but, undoubtedly, so long as we stop short 
 of the attempt to affect juvenility, Cato is right. "We 
 should keep ourselves as young as possible. He speaks 
 shrewd sense, again, when he says " As I like to see 
 a young man who has something old about him, so I 
 like to see an old man in whom there remains some- 
 thing of the youth : and he who follows this maxim 
 may become an old man in body, but never in heart." 
 " What a blessing it is," says Southey, " to have a 
 boy's heart ! " Do we not all know these charming 
 old people, to whom the young take almost as heartily 
 as to their own equals in age, who are the favourite 
 consultees in all amusements, the confidants in all 
 troubles ? 
 
 Cato is made to place a great part of his own enjoy- 
 ment, in these latter years of his, in the cultivation of
 
 USSAF O.r 'OLD AGE.' 145 
 
 his farm and garden (he had written, we must remem- 
 ber, a treatise 'De Ee Eustica,' a kind of Eoman 
 ' Book of the Farm,' which we have still remaining). 
 He is enthusiastic in his description of the pleasures 
 of a country gentleman's life, and, like a good farmer, 
 as no doubt he was, becomes eloquent upon the grand 
 subject of manures. Gardening is a pursuit which he 
 holds in equal honour that " purest of human plea- 
 sures," as Bacon calls it. On the subject of the country 
 life generally he confesses an inclination to become 
 garrulous the one failing which he admits may be 
 fairly laid to the charge of old age. The picture of 
 the way of living of a Eoman gentleman-farmer, as he 
 draws it, must have presented a strong contrast with 
 the artificial city-life of Eome. 
 
 " Where the master of the house is a good and care- 
 ful manager, his wine-cellar, his oil-stores, his larder, 
 are always well stocked ; there is a fulness throughout 
 the whole establishment; pigs, kids, lambs, poultry, 
 milk, cheese, honey, all are in abundance. The pro- 
 duce of the garden is always equal, as our country-folk 
 say, to a second course. And all these good things 
 acquire a double relish from the voluntary labours of 
 fowling and the chase. What need to dwell upon 
 the charm of the green fields, the well-ordered planta- 
 tions, the beauty of the vineyards and olive-groves 1 
 In short, nothing can be more luxuriant in produce, 
 or more delightful to the eye, than a well-cultivated 
 estate ; and,- to the enjoyment of this, old age is so far 
 from being any hindrance, that it rather invites and 
 allures us to such pursuits." 
 
 A. c. vol. ix. K
 
 146 ESSAY ON 'OLD AGE.' 
 
 He has no patience with what has been called the 
 despondency of old age the feeling, natural enough at 
 that time of life, hut not desirable to be encouraged, that 
 there is no longer any room for hope or promise in the 
 future which gives so much of its interest to the present. 
 He will not listen to the poet when he says again 
 
 " He plants the tree that shall not see the fruit." 
 
 The answer which he would make has been often put 
 into other and more elaborate language, but has a 
 simple grandeur of its own. " If any should ask the 
 aged cultivator for whom he plants, let him not hesi- 
 tate to make this reply, ' For the immortal gods, who, 
 as they willed nie to inherit these possessions from my 
 forefathers, so would have me hand them on to those 
 that shall come after.' " 
 
 The old Eoman had not the horror of country society 
 which so many civilised Englishmen either have or 
 affect. "I like a talk," he says, " over a cup of wine." 
 " Even when I am down at my Sabine estate, I daily 
 make one at a party of my country neighbours, and 
 we prolong our conversation very frequently far into 
 the night." The words are put into Cato's mouth, but 
 the voice is the well-known voice of Cicero. We find 
 him here, as in his letters, persuading himself into the 
 belief that the secret of happiness is to be found in the 
 retirement of the country. And his genial and social 
 nature beams through it all. We are reminded of his 
 half-serious complaints to Atticus * of his importunate 
 visitors at.Formise, the dinner-parties which he was, as 
 
 * See p. 44.
 
 JSSSAY ON 'OLD AGE.' 147 
 
 we say now, " obliged to go to," and which he so evi- 
 dently enjoyed.* 
 
 He is careful, however, to remind his readers that 
 old age, to be really either happy or venerable, must 
 not be the old age of the mere voluptuary or the de- 
 bauchee ; that the grey head, in order to be, even in 
 his pagan sense, " a crown of glory," must have been 
 "found in the way of righteousness." Shakespeare 
 might have learned from Cicero in these points the 
 moral which he puts into the mouth of his Adam 
 
 " Therefore mine age is as a lusty winter, 
 Frosty but kindly." 
 
 It is a miserable old age, says the Eoman, which is 
 obliged to appeal to its grey hairs as its only claim 
 to the respect of its juniors. " Neither hoar hairs nor 
 wrinkles can arrogate reverence as their right. It 
 is the life whose opening years have been honourably 
 spent which reaps the reward of reverence at its close." 
 In discussing the last of the evils which accompany 
 old age, the near approach of death, Cicero rises to 
 something higher than his usual leveL His Cato will 
 not have death to be an evil at all ; it is to him the 
 escaping from " the prison of the body," the " getting 
 the sight of land at last after a long voyage, and com- 
 ing into port." Nay, he does not admit that death is 
 
 * "A clergyman was complaining of the want of society in 
 the country where he lived, and said, ' They talk of nmts ' 
 (i.e., young cows). 'Sir,' said Mr Salusbury, 'Mr Johnson 
 would learn to talk of runts ; ' meaning that I was a man who 
 would make the most of my situation, whatever it was. " Bos- 
 well's Life. Cicero was like Dr Johnson.
 
 148 ESSAY ON 'OLD AGE.' 
 
 death. " I have never been able to persuade myself," 
 he says, quoting the words of Cyrus in Xenophon, "that 
 our spirits were alive while they were in these mortal 
 bodies, and died only when they departed out of them; 
 or that the spirit then only becomes void of sense 
 when it escapes from a senseless body; but that rather 
 when freed from all admixture of corporality, it is pure 
 and uncontaminated, then it most truly has sense." 
 " I am fully persuaded," he says to his young listeners, 
 " that your two fathers, my old and dearly - loved 
 friends, are living now, and living that life which 
 only is worthy to be so called." And he winds up the 
 dialogue with the very beautiful apostrophe, one of the 
 last utterances of the philosopher's heart, well known, 
 yet not too well known to be here quoted 
 
 " It likes me not to mourn over departing life, as 
 many men, and men of learning, have done. Nor can 
 I regret that I have lived, since I have so lived that I 
 may trust I was not born in vain ; and I depart out of 
 life as out of a temporary lodging,, not as out of my 
 home. For nature has given it to us as an inn to 
 tarry at by the way, not as a place to abide in. O 
 glorious day ! when I shall set out to join that blessed 
 company and assembly of disembodied spirits, and 
 quit this crowd and rabble of life ! For I shall go my 
 way, not only to those great men of whom I spoke, 
 but to my own son Cato, than whom was never better 
 man born, nor more full of dutiful affection ; whose 
 body I kid on the funeral pile an office he should 
 rather have done for me.* But his spirit has never left 
 
 * Burke touches the same key in speaking of his son : " I
 
 JESSA Y ON 'FRIENDSHIP.' U9 
 
 me ; it still looks fondly back upon me, though it has 
 gone assuredly into those abodes where he knew that 
 I myself should follow. And this my great loss I 
 seemed to bear with calmness ; not that I bore it un- 
 disturbed, but that I still consoled myself with the 
 thought that the separation between us could not be 
 for long. And if I err in this in that I believe the 
 spirits of men to be immortal I err willingly ; nor 
 would I have this mistaken belief of mine uprooted so 
 long as I shall live. But if, after I am dead, I shall 
 have no consciousness, as some curious philosophers 
 assert, then I am not afraid of dead philosophers 
 laughing at my mistake." 
 
 The essay on ' Friendship '. is dedicated by the author 
 to Atticus an appropriate recognition, as he says, of 
 the long and intimate friendship which had existed 
 between themselves. It is thrown, like the other, into 
 the form of a dialogue. The principal speaker here is 
 one of the listeners in the former case Laelius, sur- 
 named the Wise who is introduced as receiving a visit 
 from his two sons-in-law, Fannius and Scaevola (the 
 great lawyer before mentioned*), soon after the sudden 
 death of his great friend, the younger Scipio Afri- 
 canus. Laelius takes the occasion, at the request of the 
 young men, to give them his views and opinions on 
 the subject of Friendship generally. This essay is per- 
 
 live in an inverted order. They who ought to have succeeded 
 me have gone before me : they who should have been to me as 
 posterity are in the place of ancestors. " 
 * P. 6.
 
 150 ESSAY ON 'FRIENDSHIP' 
 
 haps more original than that upon ' Old Age,' but cer- 
 tainly is not so attractive to a modern reader. Its 
 great merit is the grace and polish of the language ; 
 but the arguments brought forward to prove what an 
 excellent thing it is for a man to have good friends, 
 and plenty of them, in this world, and the rules for his 
 behaviour towards them, seem to us somewhat trite 
 and commonplace, whatever might have been their 
 effect upon a Roman reader. 
 
 Cicero is indebted to the Greek philosophers for the 
 main outlines of his theory of friendship, though his 
 acquaintance with the works of Plato and Aristotle was 
 probably exceedingly superficial. He holds, with them, 
 that man is a social animal; that " we are so constituted 
 by nature that there must be some degree of association 
 between us all, growing closer in proportion as we are 
 brought into more intimate relations one with another." 
 So that the social bond is a matter of instinct, not of 
 calculation ; not a cold commercial contract of profit 
 and loss, of giving and receiving, but the fulfilment 
 of one of the yearnings of our nature. Here he is in 
 full accordance with the teaching of Aristotle, who, of 
 all the various kinds of friendship to which he allows 
 the common name, pronounces that which is founded 
 merely upon interest upon mutual interchange, by 
 tacit agreement, of certain benefits to be the least 
 worthy of such a designation. Friendship is defined 
 by Cicero to be " the perfect accord upon all questions, 
 religious and social, together with mutual goodwill and 
 affection." This " perfect accord," it must be confessed, 
 is a very large requirement. He follows his Greek
 
 ESSAY ON 'FRIENDSHIP: 151 
 
 masters again in holding that true friendship can 
 exist only amongst the good ; that, in fact, all friendship 
 must assume that there is something good and lovable 
 in the person towards whom the feeling is entertained : 
 it may occasionally be a mistaken assumption ; the 
 good quality we think we see in our friend may 
 hare no existence save in our own partial imagination ; 
 but the existence of the counterfeit is an incontestable 
 evidence of the true original. And the greatest attrac- 
 tion, and therefore the truest friendships, will always 
 be of the good towards the good. 
 
 He admits, however, the notorious fact, that good 
 persons are sometimes disagreeable ; and he confesses 
 that we have a right to seek in our friends amiability 
 as well as moral excellence. " Sweetness," he says 
 anticipating, as all these ancients so provokingly do, 
 some of our most modern popular philosophers 
 " sweetness, both in language and in manner, is a very 
 powerful attraction in the formation of friendships." 
 He is by no means of the same opinion as Sisyphus in 
 Lord Lytton's < Tale of Miletus ' 
 
 " Now, then, I know thoii really art my friend, 
 None but true friends choose such unpleasant words." 
 
 He admits that it is the office of a friend to tell un- 
 pleasant truths sometimes ; but there should be a cer- 
 tain amount of this indispensable " sweetness " to 
 temper the bitterness of the advice. There are some 
 friends who are continually reminding you of what 
 they have done for you " a disgusting set of people 
 verily they aro," cays our author. And there are others
 
 152 ESSAY ON 'FRIENDSHIP: 
 
 who are always thinking themselves slighted ; "in 
 which case there is generally something of which they 
 are conscious in themselves, as laying them open to 
 contemptuous treatment." 
 
 Cicero's own character displays itself in this short 
 treatise. Here, as everywhere, he is the politician. 
 He shows a true appreciation of the duties and the 
 qualifications of a true friend ; but his own thoughts 
 are running upon political friendships. Just as when, 
 in many of his letters, he talks about "all honest 
 men," he means " our party ; " so here, when he talks 
 of friends, he cannot help showing that it was of the 
 essence of friendship, in his view, to hold the same 
 political opinions, and that one great use of friends was 
 that a man should not be isolated, as he had sometimes 
 feared he was, in his political course. When he puts 
 forward the old instances of Coriolanus and Gracchus, 
 and discusses the question whether their " friends" were 
 or were not bound to aid them in their treasonable 
 designs against the state, he was surely thinking of the 
 factions of his own times, and the troublesome brother- 
 hoods which had gathered round Catiline and Clodius. 
 Be this as it may, the advice which he makes Laelius 
 give to his younger relatives is good for all ages, modern 
 or ancient : " There is nothing in this world more valu- 
 able than friendship." " Next to the immediate blessing 
 and providence of Almighty God," Lord Clarendon was 
 often heard to say, " I owe all the little I know, and 
 the little good that is in me, to the friendships and 
 conversation I have still been used to, of the most excel- 
 lent men in their several kinds that lived in that age."
 
 CHAPTEE XL 
 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 'THE TRUE ENDS OF LIFE.'* 
 
 PHILOSOPHY was to the Eoman what religion is to us. 
 It professed to answer, so far as it might be answered, 
 Pilate's question, "What is truth?" or to teach men, 
 as Cicero described it, " the knowledge of things 
 human and divine." Hence the philosopher invests 
 his subject with all attributes of dignity. To him 
 Philosophy brings all blessings in her train. She is 
 the guide of life, the medicine for his sorrows, " the 
 fountain-head of all perfect eloquence the mother of 
 all good deeds and good words." He invokes with 
 affectionate reverence the great name of Socrates the 
 sage who had " first drawn wisdom down from heaven." 
 No man ever approached his subject more richly 
 laden with philosophic lore than Cicero. Snatching 
 every leisure moment that he could from a busy life, 
 he devotes it to the study of the great minds of former 
 ages. Indeed, he held this study to be the duty of 
 * 'De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum."
 
 154 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 the perfect orator ; a knowledge of the human mind 
 was one of his essential qualifications. Nor could he 
 conceive of real eloquence without it ; for his defini- 
 tion of eloquence is, "wisdom speaking fluently."* 
 But such studies were also suited to his own natural 
 tastes. And as years passed on, and he grew weary of 
 civil discords and was harassed by domestic troubles, 
 the great orator turns his back upon the noisy city, 
 and takes his parchments of Plato and Aristotle to be 
 the friends of his councils and the companions of his 
 solitude, seeking by their light to discover Truth, 
 which Democritus had declared to be buried in the 
 depths of the sea. 
 
 Yet, after all, he professes to do little more than 
 translate. So conscious is he that it is to Greece that 
 Home is indebted for all her literature, and so con- 
 scious, also, on the part of his countrymen, of what he 
 terms " an arrogant disdain for everything national," 
 that he apologises to his readers for writing for the 
 million in their mother-tongue. Yet he is not content, 
 as he says, to be " a mere interpreter." He thought 
 that by an eclectic process adopting and rearranging 
 such of the doctrines of his Greek masters as approved 
 themselves to his own judgment he might make his 
 own work a substitute for theirs. His ambition is to 
 achieve what he might well regard as the hardest of 
 tasks a popular treatise on philosophy ; and he has 
 certainly succeeded. He makes no pretence to origi- 
 nality ; all he can do is, as he expresses it, " to array 
 Plato in a Latin dress," and "present this stranger 
 * " Copiose loquens sapientia,"
 
 'THE TRUE ENDS OF LIFE: 155 
 
 from beyond the seas with the freedom of his native 
 city." And so this treatise on the Ends of Life a 
 grave question even to the most careless thinker is, 
 from the nature of the case, both dramatic and rhetor- 
 ical. Representatives of the two great schools of philo- 
 sophy the Stoics and Epicureans plead and counter- 
 plead in his pages, each in their turn; and their 
 arguments are based on principles broad and universal 
 enough to be valid even now. For now, as then, 
 men are inevitably separated into two classes amiable 
 men of ease, who guide their conduct by the rudder- 
 strings of pleasure who for the most part " leave the 
 world " (as has been finely said) " in the world's debt, 
 having consumed much and produced nothing ;"* or, 
 on the other hand, zealous men of duty, 
 
 " Who scorn delights and live laborious days," 
 
 and act according to the dictates of their honour or 
 their conscience. In practice, if not in theory, a man 
 must be either Stoic or Epicurean. 
 
 Each school, in this dialogue, is allowed to plead its 
 own cause. "Listen" (says the Epicurean) "to the 
 voice of nature that bids you pursue pleasure, and do 
 not be misled by that vulgar conception of pleasure as 
 mere sensual enjoyment ; our opponents misrepresent 
 us when they say that we advocate this as the highest 
 good ; we hold, on the contrary, that men often obtain 
 the greatest pleasure by neglecting this baser kind. 
 Your highest instances of martyrdom of Decii 
 devoting themselves for their country, of consuls 
 * Lord Derby.
 
 156 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 putting their sons to death to preserve discipline 
 are not disinterested acts of sacrifice, but the choice 
 of a present pain in order to procure a future pleasure. 
 Vice is but ignorance of real enjoyment. Temperance 
 alone can bring peace of mind ; and the wicked, even 
 if they escape public censure, 'are racked night and 
 day by the anxieties sent upon them by the immortal 
 gods.' We do not, in this, contradict your Stoic ; we, 
 too, affirm that only the wise man is really happy. 
 Happiness is as impossible for a mind distracted by 
 passions, as for a city divided by contending fac- 
 tions. The terrors of death haunt the guilty wretch, 
 ' who finds out too late that he has devoted him- 
 self to money or power or glory to no purpose.' But 
 the wise man's life is unalloyed happiness. Kejoicing 
 in a clear conscience, 'he remembers the past with 
 gratitude, enjoys the blessings of the present, and 
 disregards the future.' Thus the moral to be drawn 
 is that which Horace (himself, as he expresses it, ' one 
 of the litter of Epicurus ') impresses on his fair friend 
 Leuconoe : 
 
 ' Strain your wine, and prove your wisdom ; life is short ; 
 
 should hope be more ? 
 In the moment of our talking envious time has slipped 
 
 away. 
 Seize the present, trust to-morrow e'en as little as you may.' " 
 
 Passing on to the second book of the treatise, we 
 hear the advocate of the counter-doctrine. Why, ex- 
 claims the Stoic, introduce Pleasure to the councils of 
 Virtue ? Why uphold a theory so dangerous in prac- 
 tice ? Your Epicurean soon turns Epicure, and a class
 
 'THE TRUE ENDS OF LIFE: 157 
 
 of men start up who have never seen the sun rise or 
 set, who squander fortunes on cooks and perfumers, 
 on costly plate and gorgeous rooms, and ransack sea 
 and land for delicacies to supply their feasts. Epicurus 
 gives his disciples a dangerous discretion in their choice. 
 There is no harm in luxury (he tells us) provided it be 
 free from inordinate desires. But who is to fix the 
 limit to such vague concessions ? 
 
 Nay, more, he degrades men to the level of the 
 brute creation. In his view, there is nothing admir- 
 able beyond this pleasure no sensation or emotion of 
 the mind, no soundness or health of body. And what 
 is this pleasure which he makes of such high account ? 
 How short-lived while it lasts ! how ignoble when we 
 recall it afterwards ! But even the common feeling 
 and sentiments of men condemn so selfish a doctrine. 
 We are naturally led to uphold truth and abhor 
 deceit, to admire Regulus in his tortures, and to 
 despise a lifetime of inglorious ease. And then fol- 
 lows a passage which echoes the stirring lines of 
 Scott 
 
 " Sound, sound the clarion, fill the fife ! 
 
 To all the sensual world proclaim, 
 One crowded hour of glorious life 
 Is worth an age without a name." 
 
 Do not then (concludes the Stoic) take good words in 
 your mouth, and prate before applauding citizens of 
 honour, duty, and so forth, while you make your 
 private lives a mere selfish calculation of expediency. 
 We were surely born for nobler ends than this, and none
 
 158 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 who is worthy the name of a man would subscribe to 
 doctrines which destroy all honour and all chivalry. 
 The heroes of old time won their immortality not by 
 weighing pleasures and pains in the balance, but by 
 being prodigal of their lives, doing and enduring all 
 things for the sake of their fellow-men. 
 
 The opening scene in the third book is as lively and 
 dramatic as (what was no doubt the writer's model) 
 the introduction of a Platonic dialogue. Cicero has 
 walked across from his Tusculan villa to borrow some 
 manuscripts from the well -stocked library of his 
 young friend Lucullus * a youth whose high promise 
 was sadly cut short, for he was killed at Philippi, 
 when he was not more than twenty-three. There, 
 "gorging himself with books," Cicero finds Marcus 
 Cato a Stoic of the Stoics who expounds in a high 
 tone the principles of his sect. 
 
 Honour he declares to be the rule, and " life accord- 
 ing to nature " the end of man's existence. And wrong 
 and injustice are more really contrary to this nature 
 than either death, or poverty, or bodily suffering, or 
 any other outward evil."t Stoics and Peripatetics 
 are agreed at least on one point that bodily plea- 
 sures fade into nothing before the splendours of 
 virtue, and that to compare the two is like holding 
 a candle against the sunlight, or setting a drop of 
 
 * See p. 43. 
 
 t So Bishop Butler, in the preface to his Sermons upon ' Hu- 
 man Nature,' says they were " intended to explain what is 
 meant by the nature of man, when it is said that virtue con- 
 sists in following, and vice in deviating from it. "
 
 'THE TRUE ENDS OF LIFE.' 159 
 
 brine against the waves of the ocean. Your Epi- 
 curean would have each man live in selfish isolation, 
 engrossed in his private pleasures and pursuits. "VVe, 
 on the, other hand, maintain that " Divine Providence 
 has appointed the world to be a common city for men 
 and gods," and each one of us to be a part of this vast 
 social system. And thus every man has his lot and 
 place in life, and should take for his guidance those 
 golden rules of ancient times^-"0bey God; know 
 thyself; shun excess." Then, rising to enthusiasm, 
 the philosopher concludes : " Who cannot but admire 
 the incredible beauty of such a system of morality? 
 What character in history or in fiction can be grander 
 or more consistent than the ' wise man ' of the Stoics ? 
 All the riches and glory of the world are his, for he 
 alone can make a right use of all things. He is ' free,' 
 though he be bound by chains; 'rich,' though in the 
 midst of poverty j ' beautiful,' for the mind is fairer 
 than the body; 'a king,' for, unlike the tyrants of 
 the world, he is lord of himself; 'happy,' for he has 
 no need of Solon's warning to ' wait till the end,' since 
 a life virtuously spent is a perpetual happiness." 
 
 In the fourth book, Cicero himself proceeds to 
 vindicate the wisdom of the ancients the old Aca- 
 demic school of Socrates and his pupils against what 
 he considers the novelties of Stoicism. All that the 
 Stoics have said has been said a hundred times before 
 by Plato and Aristotle, but in nobler language. They 
 merely " pick out the thorns" and " lay bare the bones " 
 of previous syste*ms, using newfangled terms and misty 
 arguments with a " vainglorious parade." Their fine
 
 160 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 talk about citizens of the world and the ideal wise 
 man is rather poetry than philosophy. They rightly 
 connect happiness with virtue, and virtue with wisdom; 
 but so did Aristotle some centuries before them. 
 
 But their great fault (says Cicero) is, that they 
 ignore the practical side of life. So broad is the line 
 which they draw between the " wise " and " foolish," 
 that they would deny to Plato himself the possession 
 of wisdom. They take no account of the thousand 
 circumstances which go to form our happiness. To a 
 spiritual being, virtue might be the chief good ; but 
 in actual life our physical is closely bound up with 
 our mental enjoyment, and pain is one of those stern 
 facts before which all theories are powerless. ' Again, 
 by their fondness for paradox, they reduce all offences 
 to the same dead level. It is, in their eyes, as impious 
 to beat a slave as to beat a parent : because, as they 
 say, " nothing can be more virtuous than virtue, 
 nothing more vicious than vice." And lastly, this 
 stubbornness of opinion affects their personal char- 
 acter. They too often degenerate into austere critics 
 and bitter partisans, and go far to banish from among 
 us love, friendship, gratitude, and all the fair humani- 
 ties of life. 
 
 The fifth book carries us back some twenty years, 
 when we find Cicero once more at Athens, taking his 
 afternoon walk among the deserted groves of the 
 Academy. "With him are his brother Quintus, his 
 cousin Lucius, and his friends Piso and Atticus. The 
 scene, with its historic associations, irresistibly carries 
 their minds back to those illustrious spirits who had
 
 'THE TRUE ENDS OF LIFE.' 161 
 
 once made the place their own. Among these trees 
 Plato himself had walked ; under the shadow of that 
 Porch Zeno had lectured to his disciples ; * yonder 
 Quintus points out the " white peak of Colonus," de- 
 scribed by Sophocles in " those sweetest lines ; " while 
 glistening on the horizon were the waves of the Phaleric 
 harbour, which Demosthenes, Cicero's own great proto- 
 type, had outvoiced with the thunder of his declama- 
 tion. So countless, indeed, are the memories of the 
 past called up by the genius of the place, that (as one 
 of the friends remarks) " wherever we plant our feet, 
 we tread upon some history." Then Piso, speaking 
 at Cicero's request, begs his friends to turn from the 
 degenerate thinkers of their own day to those giants 
 of philosophy, from whose writings all liberal learning, 
 all history, and all elegance of language may be de- 
 rived. More than all, they should turn to the leader 
 of the Peripatetics, Aristotle, who seemed (like Lord 
 Bacon after him) to have taken all knowledge as 
 his portion. From these, if from no other source, we 
 may learn the secret of a happy life. But first we must 
 settle what this ' chief good ' is this end and object of 
 our efforts and not be carried to and fro, like ships 
 without a steersman, by every blast of doctrine. 
 
 * The Stoics took their name from the ' stoa,' or portico in 
 the Academy, where they sat at lecture, as the Peripatetics (tha 
 school of Aristotle) from the little knot of listeners who fol- 
 lowed their master as he walked. Epicurus's school were 
 known as the philosophers of 'the Garden,' from the place 
 where he taught. The ' Old Academy ' were the disciples of 
 Plato ; the ' New Academy ' (to whose tenets Cicero inclined) 
 revived the great principle of Socrates of affirming nothing. 
 
 A. c. vol. ix. L
 
 162 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 If Epicurus was wrong in placing Happiness 
 " In corporal pleasure and in careless ease," 
 
 no less wrong are they who say that " honour " requires 
 pleasure to be added to it, since they thus make honour 
 itself dishonourable. And again, to say with others 
 that happiness is tranquillity of mind, is simply to beg 
 the question. 
 
 Putting, then, all such theories aside, we bring the 
 argument to a practical issue. Self-preservation is 
 the first great principle of nature ; and so strong is 
 this instinctive love of life both among men and 
 animals, that we see even the iron-hearted Stoic shrink 
 from the actual pangs of a voluntary death. Then 
 comes the question, What is this nature that is so 
 precious to each of us ? Clearly it is compounded of 
 body and mind, each with many virtues of its own ; 
 but as the mind should rule the body, so reason, as 
 the dominant faculty, should rule the mind. Virtue 
 itself is only " the perfection of this reason," and, call it 
 what you will, genius or intellect is something divine. 
 
 Furthermore, there is in man a gradual progress of 
 reason, growing with his growth until it has reached 
 perfection. Even in the infant there are " as it were 
 sparks of virtue " half-unconscious principles of love 
 and gratitude ; and these germs bear fruit, as the child 
 develops into the man. We have also an instinct 
 which attracts us towards the pursuit of wisdom; 
 such is the true meaning of the Sirens' voices in the 
 Odyssey, says the philosopher, quoting from the poet 
 of all time :
 
 'THE TRUE ENDS OF LIFE.' 163 
 
 "Turn thy swift keel and listen to our lay; 
 Since never pilgrim to these regions came, 
 But heard our sweet voice ere he sailed away, 
 And in his joy passed on, with ampler mind." * 
 
 It is wisdom, not pleasure, which they offer. Hence 
 it is that men devote their days and nights to litera- 
 ture, without a thought of any gain that may accrue 
 from it ; and philosophers paint the serene delights of 
 a life of contemplation in the islands of the blest. 
 
 Again, our minds can never rest. "Desire for 
 action grows with us ; " and in action of some sort, 
 be it politics or science, life (if it is to be life at all) 
 must be passed by each of us. Even the gambler 
 must ply the dice-box, and the man of pleasure seek 
 excitement in society. But in the true life of action, 
 still the ruling principle should be honour. 
 
 Such, in brief, is Piso's (or rather Cicero's) vindica- 
 tion of the old masters of philosophy. Before they 
 leave the place, Cicero fires a parting shot at the Stoic 
 paradox that the ' wise man ' is always happy. How, 
 he pertinently asks, can one in sickness and poverty, 
 blind, or childless, in exile or in torture, be possibly 
 called happy, except by a monstrous perversion of 
 language ? t 
 
 Here, somewhat abruptly, the dialogue closes; and 
 Cicero pronounces no judgment of his own, but leaves 
 the great question almost as perplexed as when he 
 
 * Odyss. xii. 185 ("Worsley). 
 
 t In a little treatise called " Paradoxes," Cicero discusses six 
 of these scholastic quibbles of the Stoics.
 
 164 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 started the discussion. But, of the two antagonistic 
 theories, he leans rather to the Stoic than to the Epi- 
 curean. Self-sacrifice and honour seem, to his view, 
 to present a higher ideal than pleasure or expediency. 
 
 ii. 'ACADEMIC QUESTIONS.' 
 
 Fragments of two editions of this work have come 
 down to us ; for almost before the first copy had 
 reached the hands of his friend Atticus, to whom it was 
 sent, Cicero had rewritten the whole on an enlarged 
 scale. The first hook (as we have it now) is dedicated 
 to Varro, a noble patron of art and literature. In his 
 villa at Cumse were spacious porticoes and gardens, and 
 a library with galleries and cabinets open to all comers. 
 Here, on a terrace looking seawards, Cicero, Atticus, 
 and Varro himself pass a long afternoon in discussing 
 the relative merits of the old and new Academies ; and 
 hence we get the title of the work. Varro takes the 
 lion's share of the first dialogue, and shows how from 
 the " vast and varied genius of Plato" both Academics 
 and Peripatetics drew all their philosophy, whether it 
 related to morals, to nature, or to logic. Stoicism 
 receives a passing notice, as also does what Varro con- 
 siders the heresy of Theophrastus, who strips virtue 
 of all its beauty, by denying that happiness depends 
 upon it. 
 
 The second book is dedicated to another illustrious 
 name, the elder Lucullus, not long deceased half- 
 statesman, half-dilettante, "with almost as divine a 
 memory for facts," says Cicero, with something of envy,
 
 'ACADEMIC QUESTIONS.' 165 
 
 " as Hortensius had for words." This time it is at his 
 villa, near Tusculum, amidst scenery perhaps even now 
 the loveliest of all Italian landscapes, that the philo- 
 sophic dialogue takes place. Lucullus condemns the 
 scepticism of the New Academy those reactionists 
 against the dogmatism of past times, who disbelieve 
 their very eyesight. If (he says) we reject the testi- 
 mony of the senses, there is neither body, nor truth, 
 nor argument, nor anything certain left us. These 
 perpetual doubters destroy every ground of our belief. 
 Cicero ingeniously defends this scepticism, which 
 was, in fact, the bent of his own mind. After 
 all, what is our eyesight worth 1 The ship sailing 
 across the bay yonder seems to move, but to the sailors 
 it is the shore that recedes from their view. Even the 
 sun, "which mathematicians affirm to be eighteen 
 times larger than the earth, looks but a foot in diame- 
 ter." And as it is with these things, so it is with 
 all knowledge. Bold indeed must be the man who 
 can define the point at which belief passes into cer- 
 tainty. Even the " fine frenzy " of the poet, his pic- 
 tures of gods and heroes, are as lifelike to himself and 
 to his hearers as though he actually saw them ; 
 
 " See how Apollo, fair-haired god, 
 Draws in and bends his golden bow, 
 While on the left fair Dian waves her torch." 
 
 Xo we are sure of nothing ; and we are happy if, like 
 Socrates, we only know this that we know nothing. 
 Then, as if in irony, or partly influenced perhaps by the 
 advocate's love of arguing the case both ways, Cicero
 
 166 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 demolishes that grand argument of design which else- 
 where he so carefully constructs,* and reasons in the 
 very language of materialism : " You assert that all the 
 universe could not have been so ingeniously made with- 
 out some godlike wisdom, the majesty of which you 
 trace down even to the perfection of bees and ants. 
 Why, then, did the Deity, when he made everything 
 for the sake of man, make such a variety (for instance) 
 of venomous reptiles ? Your divine soul is a fiction ; 
 it is better to imagine that creation is the result of the 
 laws of nature, and so release the Deity from a great 
 deal of hard work, and me from fear ; for which of us, 
 when he thinks that he is an object of divine care, 
 can help feeling an awe of the divine power day and 
 night 1 But we do not understand even our own 
 bodies ; how, then, can we have an eyesight so pierc- 
 ing as to penetrate the mysteries of heaven and earth?" 
 The treatise, however, is but a disappointing frag- 
 ment, and the argument is incomplete. 
 
 in. THE 'TTTSCULAN DISPUTATIONS.' 
 
 The scene of this dialogue is Cicero's villa at Tuscu- 
 lum. There, in his long gallery, he walks and discus- 
 ses with his friends the vexed questions of morality. 
 Was death an evil ? Was the soul immortal 1 How 
 could a man best bear pain and the other miseries of 
 life ? Was virtue any guarantee for happiness ? 
 
 Then, as now, death was the great problem of hu- 
 manity " to die and go we know not where." The 
 * See p. 168.
 
 'TUSCULAN DISPUTATIONS.' 167 
 
 old belief in Elysium and Tartarus had died away ; 
 as Cicero himself boldly puts it in another place, such 
 things were no longer even old wives' fables. Either 
 death brought an absolute unconsciousness, or the soul 
 soared into space. "Lex non pcena tnors" "Death 
 is a law, not a penalty " was the ancient saying. It 
 was, as it were, the close of a banquet or the fall of 
 the curtain. " While we are, death is not ] when 
 death has come, we are not." 
 
 Cicero brings forward the testimony of past ages to 
 prove that death is not a mere annihilation. Man 
 cannot perish utterly. Heroes are deified; and the 
 spirits of the dead return to us in visions of the night. 
 Somehow or other (he says) there clings to our minds 
 a certain presage of future ages ; and so we plant, that 
 our children may reap ; we toil, that others may enter 
 into our labours ; and it is this life after death, the 
 desire to live in men's mouths for ever, which inspires 
 the patriot and the martyr. Fame to the Roman, 
 even more than to us, was " the last infirmity of noble 
 minds." It was so in a special degree to Cicero. The 
 instinctive sense of immortality, he argues, is strong 
 within us ; and as, in the words of the English poet, 
 
 " Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting," 
 
 so also in death, the Roman said, though in other 
 words 
 
 " Our souls have sight of that immortal sea 
 Which brought us hither." 
 
 Believe not then, says Cicero, those old wives' tales, 
 those poetic legends, the terrors of a material hell, or
 
 168 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 the joys of a sensual paradise. Rather hold -with 
 Plato that the soul is an eternal principle of life, which 
 has neither beginning nor end of existence ; for if it 
 were not so, heaven and earth would "be overset, and 
 all nature would stand at gaze. " Men say they can- 
 not conceive or comprehend what the soul can be, dis- 
 tinct from the body. As if, forsooth, they could 
 comprehend what it is, when it is in the body, its 
 conformation, its magnitude, or its position there. . . . 
 To me, when I consider the nature of the soul, there 
 is far more difficulty and obscurity in forming a con- 
 ception of what the soul is while in the body, in 
 a dwelling where it seems so little at home, than 
 of what it will be when it has escaped into the 
 free atmosphere of heaven, which seems its natural 
 abode." * And as the poet seems to us inspired, as the 
 gifts of memory and eloquence seem divine, so is the 
 soul itself, in its simple essence, a god dwelling in the 
 breast of each of us. What else can be this power 
 which enables us to recollect the past, to foresee the 
 future, to understand the present ? 
 
 There follows a passage on the argument from design 
 which anticipates that fine saying of Voltaire "Si 
 Dieu n'existait pas, il faudrait 1'inventer ; mais toute 
 la nature crie qu'il existe." " The heavens," says even 
 the heathen philosopher, " declare the glory of God." 
 Look on the sun and the stars ; look on the alternation 
 of the seasons, and the changes of day and night ; look 
 again at the earth bringing forth her fruits for the use 
 of men; the multitude of cattle; and man himself, 
 * I. c. 22.
 
 TUSCULAN DISPUTATIONS: 169 
 
 made as it were to contemplate and adore the heavens 
 and the gods. Look on all these things, and doubt 
 not that there is some Being, though you see him not, 
 who has created and presides over the world. 
 
 " Imitate, therefore, the end of Socrates ; who, with 
 the fatal cup in his hands, spoke with the serenity of 
 one not forced to die, but, as it were, ascending into 
 heaven ; for he thought that the souls of men, when 
 they left the body, went by different roads ; those pol- 
 luted by vice and unclean living took a road wide 
 of that which led to the assembly of the gods ; while 
 those who had kept themselves pure, and on earth had 
 taken a divine life as their model, found it easy to 
 return to those beings from whence they came." Or 
 learn a lesson from the swans, who, with a prophetic 
 instinct, leave this world with joy and singing. Yet 
 do not anticipate the time of death, "for the Deity 
 forbids us to depart hence without his summons ; but, 
 on just cause given (as to Socrates and Cato), gladly 
 should we exchange our darkness for that light, and, 
 like men not breaking prison but released by the law, 
 leave our chains with joy, as having been discharged 
 by God." 
 
 The feeling of these ancients with regard to suicide, 
 we must here remember, was very different from our 
 own. There was no distinct idea of the sanctity of life ; 
 no social stigma and consequent suffering were brought 
 on the family of the suicide. Stoic and Epicurean phil- 
 osophers alike upheld it as a lawful remedy against the 
 pangs of disease, the dotage of old age, or the caprices 
 of a tyrant. Every man might, they contended, choose .
 
 170 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 his own route on the last great journey, and sleep well, 
 when he grew wearied out with life's fitful fever. The 
 door was always open (said Epictetus) when the play 
 palled on the senses. You should quit the stage with 
 dignity, nor drain the flask to the dregs. Some phil- 
 osophers, it is true, protested against it as a mere de- 
 vice of cowardice to avoid pain, and as a failure in our 
 duties as good citizens. Cicero, in one of his latest 
 works, again quotes with approval the opinion of Py- 
 thagoras, that "no man should abandon his post in 
 life without the orders of the Great Commander." But 
 at Rome suicide had been glorified by a long roll of 
 illustrious names, and the protest was made in vain. 
 
 But why, continues Cicero, why add to the miseries 
 of life by brooding over death ? Is life to any of us 
 such unmixed pleasure even while it lasts ? Which of 
 us can tell whether he be taken away from good or 
 from evil ? As our birth is but " a sleep and a forget- 
 ting," so our death may be but a second sleep, as last- 
 ing as Endymion's. Why then call it wretched, even 
 if we die before our natural time ? Nature has lent us 
 life, without fixing the day of payment ; and uncer- 
 tainty is one of the conditions of its tenure. Compare 
 our longest life with eternity, and it is as short-lived 
 as that of those ephemeral insects whose life is meas- 
 ured by a summer day; and " who, when the sun sets, 
 have reached old age." 
 
 Let us, then, base our happiness on strength of 
 
 mind, on a contempt of earthly pleasures, and on the 
 
 strict observance of virtue. Let us recall the last noble 
 
 . words of Socrates to his judges. " The death," said
 
 ' TUSCULAN DISPUTATIONS: 171 
 
 he. " to which you condemn me, I count a gain rather 
 than a loss. Either it is a dreamless sleep that knows 
 no waking, or it carries me where I may converse with 
 the spirits of the illustrious dead. I go to death, you 
 to life ; but which of us is going the better way, God 
 only knows." 
 
 No man, then, dies too soon who has run a course 
 of perfect virtue ; for glory follows like a shadow in 
 the wake of such a life. "Welcome death, therefore, 
 as a blessed deliverance from evil, sent by the special 
 favour of the gods, who thus bring us safely across a 
 sea of troubles to an eternal haven. 
 
 The second topic Avhich Cicero and his friends dis- 
 cuss is, the endurance of pain. Is it an unmixed evil 1 
 Can anything console the sufferer 1 ? Cicero at once 
 condemns the sophistry of Epicurus. The wise man 
 cannot pretend indifference to pain ; it is enough that 
 he endure it with courage, since, beyond all question, 
 it is sharp, bitter, and hard to bear. And what is 
 this courage? Partly excitement, partly the impulse 
 of honour or of shame, partly the habituation which 
 steels the endurance of the gladiator. Keep, therefore 
 this is the conclusion stern restraint over the 
 feminine elements of your soul, and learn not only to 
 despise the attacks of pain, but also 
 
 " The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune." 
 
 From physical, the discussion naturally passes to 
 mental, suffering. For grief, as well as for pain, he 
 prescribes the remedy of the Stoics cequanimitas 
 " a calm serenity of mind." The wise man, ever serene
 
 172 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 and composed, is moved neither by pain or sorrow, by 
 fear or desire. He is equally undisturbed by the malice 
 of enemies or the inconstancy of fortune. But what 
 consolation can we bring to ease the pain of the 
 Epicurean ? " Put a nosegay to his nostrils burn 
 perfumes before him crown him with roses and wood- 
 bine ! " But perfumes and garlands can do little in 
 such case ; pleasures may divert, but they can scarcely 
 console. 
 
 Again, the Cyrenaics bring at the best but Job's 
 comfort. No man will bear his misfortunes the more 
 lightly by bethinking himself that they are unavoid- 
 able that others have suffered before him that pain 
 is part and parcel of the ills which flesh is heir to. 
 Why grieve at all? Why feed your misfortune by 
 dwelling on it? Plunge rather into active life and 
 forget it, remembering that excessive lamentation over 
 the trivial accidents of humanity is alike unmanly and 
 unnecessary. And as it is with grief, so it is with 
 envy, lust, anger, and those other "perturbations of 
 the mind " which the Stoic Zeno rightly declares to 
 be "repugnant to reason and nature." From such 
 disquietudes it is the wise man who is free. 
 
 The fifth and last book discusses the great question, 
 Is virtue of itself sufficient to make life happy ? The 
 bold conclusion is, that it is sufficient. Cicero is not 
 content with the timid qualifications adopted by the 
 school of the Peripatetics, who say one moment that 
 external advantages and worldly prosperity are nothing, 
 and then again admit that, though man may be happy 
 without them, he is happier with them, which is
 
 TREATISE 'ON MORAL DUTIES: 173 
 
 making the real happiness imperfect after all. Men 
 differ in their views of life. As in the great Olympic 
 games, the throng are attracted, some by desire of gain, 
 some by the crown of wild olive, some merely by the 
 spectacle ; so, in the race of life, we are all slaves to 
 some ruling idea, it may be glory, or money, or wis- 
 dom. But they alone can be pronounced happy whose 
 minds are like some tranquil sea "alarmed by no 
 fears, wasted by no griefs, inflamed by no lusts, ener- 
 vated by no relaxing pleasures, and such serenity 
 virtue alone can produce." 
 
 These ' Disputations ' have always been highly ad- 
 mired. But their popularity was greater in times 
 when Cicero's Greek originals were less read or under- 
 stood. Erasmus carried his admiration of this treatise 
 to enthusiasm. " I cannot doubt," he says, " but that 
 the mind from which such teaching flowed was in- 
 spired in some sort by divinity." 
 
 IV. THE TREATISE ' ON MORAL DUTIES.' 
 
 The treatise 'De Officiis,' known as Cicero's ' Offices,' 
 to which we pass next, is addressed by the author to 
 his son, while studying at Athens under Cratippus ; 
 possibly in imitation of Aristotle, who inscribed his 
 Ethics to his son Nicomachus. It is a treatise on 
 the duties of a gentleman "the noblest present," 
 says a modern writer, "ever made by parent to a 
 child."* "Written in a far higher tone than Lord 
 Chesterfield's letters, though treating of the same sub- 
 * Kelsall.
 
 174 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 ject, it proposes and answers multifarious questions 
 which must occur continually to the modern Christian 
 as well as to the ancient philosopher. " What makes 
 an action right or wrong ? What is a duty ? What is 
 expediency? How shall I learn to choose between 
 my principles and my interests t And lastly (a point 
 of casuistry which must sometimes perplex the strict- 
 est conscience), of two ' things honest,' * which is most 
 so?" 
 
 The key-note of his discourse throughout is Honour ; 
 and the word seems to carry with it that magic force 
 which Burke attributed to chivalry " the unbought 
 grace of life the nurse of heroic sentiment and manly 
 enterprise." Noblesse oblige, and there is no state of 
 life, says Cicero, without its obligations. In their due 
 discharge consists all the nobility, and in their neglect 
 all the disgrace, of character. There should be no 
 selfish devotion to private interests. We are born not 
 for ourselves only, but for our kindred and fatherland. 
 We owe duties not only to those who have benefited 
 but to those who have wronged us. We should render 
 to all their due ; and justice is due even to the lowest 
 of mankind : what, for instance (he says with a hard- 
 ness which jars upon our better feelings), can be lower 
 than a slave ? Honour is that " unbought grace " which 
 adds a lustre to every action. In society it produces 
 
 * The English " Honesty " and " Honour " alike fail to con- 
 vey the full force of the Latin honestits. The word expresses 
 a progress of thought from comeliness and grace of person to 
 a noble and graceful character all whose works are done in 
 honesty and honour.
 
 TREATISE 'OX MORAL DUTIES.' 175 
 
 courtesy of manners ; in business, under the form of 
 truth, it establishes public credit. Again, as equity, it 
 smooths the harsh features of the la\v. In war it pro- 
 duces that moderation and good faith between contend- 
 ing armies which are the surest basis of a lasting peace. 
 And so in honour are centred the elements of all the 
 virtues wisdom and justice, fortitude and temperance; 
 and "if," he says, reproducing the noble words of 
 Plato, as applied by him to Wisdom, " this ' Honour ' 
 could but be seen in her full beauty by mortal eyes, 
 the whole world would fall in love with her." 
 
 Such is the general spirit of this treatise, of which 
 only the briefest sketch can be given in these pages. 
 
 Cicero bases honour on our inherent excellence of 
 nature, paying the same noble tribute to humanity as 
 Kant some centuries after : " On earth there is nothing 
 great but man ; in man there is nothing great but 
 mind." Truth is a law of our nature. Man is only 
 " lower than the angels ; " and to him belong prero- 
 gatives which mark him off from the brute creation 
 the faculties of reason and discernment, the sense of 
 beauty, and the love of law and order. And from this 
 arises that fellow-feeling which, in one sense, " makes 
 the whole world kin " the spirit of Terence's famous 
 line, which Cicero notices (applauded on its recitation, 
 as Augustin tells us, by the cheers of the entire audi- 
 ence in the theatre) 
 
 " Homo sum human! nihil a me alienum puto ; " * 
 
 * " I am a man I hold that nothing which concerns man- 
 kind can be matter of unconcern to me. "
 
 176 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY . 
 
 for (he continues) " all men by nature love one another, 
 and desire an intercourse of words and action." Hence 
 spring the family affections, friendship, and social ties ; 
 hence also that general love of combination, which 
 forms a striking feature of the present age, resulting 
 in clubs, trades - unions, companies, and generally in 
 what Mr Carlyle terms " swannery." 
 
 Next to truth, justice is the great duty of mankind. 
 Cicero at once condemns " communism " in matters of 
 property. Ancient immemorial seizure, conquest, or 
 compact, may give a title ; but " no man can say that 
 he has anything his own by a right of nature." In- 
 justice springs from avarice or ambition, the thirst of 
 riches or of empire, and is the more dangerous as it 
 appears in the more exalted spirits, causing a dissolu- 
 tion of all ties and obligations. And here he takes oc- 
 casion to instance " that late most shameless attempt 
 of Caesar's to make himself master of Rome." 
 
 There is, besides, an injustice of omission. You 
 may wrong your neighbour by seeing him wronged 
 without interfering. Cicero takes the opportunity of 
 protesting strongly against the selfish policy of those 
 lovers of ease and peace, who, " from a desire of 
 furthering their own interests, or else from a churlish 
 temper, profess that they mind nobody's business but 
 their own, in order that they may seem to be men of 
 strict integrity and to injure none," and thus shrink 
 from taking their part in "the fellowship of life." 
 He would have had small patience with our modern 
 doctrine of non-intervention and neutrality in nations 
 any more than in men. Such conduct arises (he says)
 
 TREATISE 'ON MORAL DUTIES. 1 177 
 
 from the false logic with which men cheat their con- 
 science ; arguing reversely, that whatever is the best 
 policy is honesty. 
 
 There are two ways, it must be remembered, in 
 which one man may injure another force and fraud ; 
 but as the lion is a nobler creature than the fox, so 
 open violence seems less odious than secret villany. 
 No character is so justly hateful as 
 
 K A rogue in grain, 
 Veneered with sanctimonious theory." 
 
 Nations have their obligations as well as individuals, 
 and war has its laws as well as peace. The struggle 
 should be carried on in a generous temper, and not in 
 the spirit of extermination, when "it has sometimes 
 seemed a question between two hostile nations, not 
 which should remain a conqueror, but which should 
 remain a nation at alL" 
 
 !N"o mean part of justice consists in liberality, and 
 this, too, has its duties. It is an important question, 
 how, and when, and to whom, we should give ? It is 
 possible to be generous at another person's expense : 
 it is possible to injure the recipient by mistimed 
 liberality ; or to ruin one's fortune by open house and 
 prodigal hospitality. A great man's bounty (as he 
 says in another place) should be a common sanctuary 
 for the needy. " To ransom captives and enrich the 
 meaner folk is a nobler form of generosity than pro- 
 viding wild beasts or shows of gladiators to amuse the 
 mob." Charity should begin at home ; for relations 
 
 A. C. Vol. ix. M
 
 178 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 and friends hold the first place in our affections ; but 
 the circle of our good deeds is not to be narrowed 
 by the ties of blood, or sect, or party, and " our 
 country comprehends the endearments of all." We 
 should act in the spirit of the ancient law "Thou 
 shalt keep no man from the running stream, or from 
 lighting his torch at thy hearth." Our liberality 
 should be really liberal, like that charity which 
 Jeremy Taylor describes as "friendship to all the 
 world." 
 
 Another component principle of this honour is cour- 
 age, or " greatness of soul," which (continues Cicero) 
 has been well denned by the Stoics as " a virtue con- 
 tending for justice and honesty ; " and its noblest form 
 is a generous contempt for ordinary objects of ambi- 
 tion, not " from a vain or fantastic humour, but from 
 solid principles of reason." The lowest and commoner 
 form of courage is the mere animal virtue of the 
 fighting-cock. 
 
 But a character should not only be excellent, it 
 should be graceful. In gesture and deportment men 
 should strive to acquire that dignified grace of manners 
 " which adds as it were a lustre to our lives." They 
 should avoid affectation and eccentricity ; " not to care 
 a farthing what people think of us is a sign not so 
 much of pride as of immodesty." The want of tact 
 the saying and doing things at the wrong time and 
 place produces the same discord in society as a false 
 note in music ; and harmony of character is of more 
 consequence than harmony of sounds. There is a 
 grace in words as well as in conduct : we should
 
 TREATISE 'Otf MORAL DUTIES.' 179 
 
 avoid unseasonable jests, " and not lard our talk with 
 Greek quotations." * 
 
 In the path of life, each should follow the bent of 
 his own genius, so far as it is innocent 
 
 " Honour and shame from no condition rise ; 
 Act well your part there all the honour lies." 
 
 Nothing is so difficult (says Cicero) as the choice of 
 a profession, inasmuch as " the choice has commonly 
 to be made when the judgment is weakest." Some 
 tread in their father's steps, others beat out a fresh 
 line of their own ; and (he adds, perhaps not without 
 a personal reference) this is generally the case with 
 those born of mean parents, who propose ta carve 
 their own way in the world. But the parvenu of 
 Arpinum the 'new man,' as aristocratic jealousy 
 always loved to call him is by no means insensible 
 to the true honours of ancestry. " The noblest inher- 
 itance," he says, "that can ever be left by a father to 
 his son, far excelling that of lands and houses, is the 
 fame of his virtues and glorious actions ; " and saddest 
 of all sights is that of a noble house dragged through 
 the mire by some degenerate descendant, so as to be a 
 by-word among the populace, "which may" (he con- 
 cludes) " be justly said of but too many in our times." 
 
 The Roman's view of the comparative dignity of 
 professions and occupations is interesting, because his 
 prejudices (if they be prejudices) have so long main- 
 
 * This last precept Cicero must have considered did not 
 apply to letter-writing, otherwise he was a notorious offender 
 against his own rule.
 
 180 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 tained their ground amongst us moderns. Tax-gather- 
 ers and usurers are as unpopular now as ever the 
 latter very deservedly so. Eetail trade is despicable, 
 we are told, and " all mechanics are by their profes- 
 sion mean." Especially such trades as minister to 
 mere appetite or luxury butchers, fishmongers, and 
 cooks; perfumers, dancers, and suchlike. But medi- 
 cine, architecture, education, farming, and even whole- 
 sale business, especially importation and exportation, 
 are the professions of a gentleman. " But if the mer- 
 chant, satisfied with his profits, shall leave the seas and 
 from the harbour step into a landed estate, such a man 
 seems justly deserving of praise." "We seem to be 
 reading the verdict of modern English society delivered 
 by anticipation two thousand years ago. 
 
 The section ends with earnest advice to all, that they 
 should put their principles into practice. " The deepest 
 knowledge of nature is but a poor and imperfect busi- 
 ness, unless it proceeds into action. As justice con- 
 sists in no abstract theory, but in upholding society 
 among men, as " greatness of soul itself, if it be iso- 
 lated from the duties of social life, is but a kind of un- 
 couth churlishness," so it is each citizen's duty to leave 
 his philosophic seclusion of a cloister, and take his place 
 in public life, if the times demand it, " though he be 
 able to number the stars and measure out the world." 
 
 The same practical vein is continued in the next 
 book. What, after all, are a man's real interests ? what 
 line of conduct will best advance the main end of his 
 life ? Generally, men make the fatal mistake of assum- 
 ing that honour must always clash with their interests ;
 
 TREATISE 'ON MORAL DUTIES.' 181 
 
 while in reality, says Cicero, " they would obtain their 
 ends best, not by knavery and underhand dealing, but 
 by justice and integrity." The right is identical with 
 the expedient. " The way to secure the favour of the 
 gods is by upright dealing ; and next to the gods, no- 
 thing contributes so much to men's happiness as men 
 themselves." It is labour and co-operation which have 
 given us all the goods which we possess. 
 
 Since, then, man is the best friend to man, and 
 also his most formidable enemy, an important question 
 tobe discussed is the secret of influence and popularity 
 " the art of winning men's affections." For to govern 
 by bribes or by force is not really to govern at all ; and 
 no obedience based on fear can be lasting " no force 
 of power can bear up long against a current of public 
 hate." Adventurers who ride rough-shod over law (he 
 is thinking again of Csesar) have but a short-lived reign ; 
 and " liberty, when she has been chained up a while, 
 bites harder when let loose than if she had never been 
 chained at all." * Most happy was that just and moder- 
 ate government of Eome in earlier times, when she was 
 " the port and refuge for princes and nations in their 
 hour of need." Three requisites go to form that popu- 
 .lar character which has a just influence over others; 
 we must win men's love, we must deserve their confi- 
 
 * It is curious to note how, throughout the whole of this 
 argument, Cicero, whether consciously or unconsciously, works 
 upon the principle that the highest life is the political life, and 
 that the highest object a man can set before him is the obtain- 
 ing, by legitimate means, influence and authority amongst his 
 fellow-citizens.
 
 182 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 dence, and we must inspire them with an admiration 
 for our abilities. The shortest and most direct road to 
 real influence is that which Socrates recommends " for 
 a man to be that which he wishes men to take him 
 for."* 
 
 Then follow some maxims which show how thor- 
 oughly conservative was the policy of our philosopher. 
 The security of property he holds to be the security 
 of the state. There must be no playing with vested 
 rights, no unequal taxation, no attempt to bring all 
 things to a level, no cancelling of debts and redistribu- 
 tion of land (he is thinking of the baits held out by 
 Catiline), none of those traditional devices for winning 
 favour with the people, which, tend to destroy that 
 social concord and unity which make a common- 
 wealth. " What reason is there," he asks, " why, 
 when I have bought, built, repaired, and laid out much 
 money, another shall come and enjoy the fruits of it 1 " 
 
 And as a man should be careful of the interests of the 
 social body, so he should be of his own. But Cicero 
 feels that in descending to such questions he is 
 somewhat losing sight of his dignity as a moralist. 
 " You will find all this thoroughly discussed," he says 
 to his son, " in Xenophon's (Economics a book 
 which, when I was just your age, I translated from 
 the Greek into Latin." [One wonders whether young 
 Marcus took the hint.] " And if you want instruction 
 in money matters, there are gentlemen sitting on the 
 
 * "Not being less but more than all 
 The gentleness he seemed to be." 
 
 Tennyson : ' In Memoriam.'
 
 TREATISE 'ON MORAL DUTIES.' 183 
 
 Exchange who will teach you much better than the 
 philosophers." 
 
 The last book opens with a saying of the elder 
 Cato's, which Cicero much admires, though he says 
 modestly that he was never able in his own case quite 
 to realise it " I am never less idle than when I am 
 idle, and never less alone than when alone." Retire- 
 ment and solitude are excellent things, Cicero always 
 declares ; generally contriving at the same time to 
 make it plain, as he does here, that his own heart is in 
 the world of public life. But at least it gives him time 
 for writing. He " has written more in this short time, 
 since the fall of the Commonwealth, than in all the 
 years during which it stood." 
 
 He here resolves the question, If honour and interest 
 seem to clash, which is to give way? Or rather, it has 
 been resolved already ; if the right be always the ex- 
 pedient, the opposition is seeming, not real. He puts 
 a great many questions of casuistry, but it all amounts 
 to this : the good man keeps his oath, " though it were 
 to his own hindrance." But it is never to his hin- 
 drance ; for a violation of his conscience would be the 
 greatest hindrance of all. 
 
 In this treatise, more than in any of his other phi- 
 losophical works, Cicero inclines to the teaching of the 
 Stoics. In the others, he is rather the seeker after 
 truth than the maintainer of a system. His is the 
 critical eclecticism of the ' New Academy ' the spirit 
 so prevalent in our own day, which fights against the 
 shackles of dogmatism. And with all his respect for 
 the nobler side of Stoicism, he is fully alive to its de-
 
 184 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 fects ; though it was not given to him to see, as Mil- 
 ton saw after him, the point wherein that great system 
 really failed the " philosophic pride " which was the 
 besetting sin of all disciples in the school, from Cato to 
 Seneca : 
 
 " Ignorant of themselves, of God much more, 
 **#*## 
 
 Much of the soul they talk, but all awry ; 
 And in themselves seek virtue, and to themselves 
 All glory arrogate, to God give none ; 
 Kather accuse Him under usual names, 
 Fortune, or Fate, as one regardless quite 
 Of mortal things." * 
 
 Yet, in spite of this, such men were as the salt of the 
 earth in a corrupt age ; and as we find, throughout the 
 more modern pages of history, great preachers de- 
 nouncing wickedness in high places, Bourdaloue and 
 Massillon pouring their eloquence into the heedless 
 ears of Louis XIV. and his courtiers Sherlock and 
 Tillotson declaiming from the pulpit in such stirring 
 accents that " even the indolent Charles roused him- 
 self to listen, and the fastidious Buckingham forgot to 
 sneer " t so, too, do we find these "monks of heathen- 
 dom," as the Stoics have been not unfairly called, 
 protesting in their day against that selfish profligacy 
 which was fast sapping all morality in the Roman 
 empire. No doubt (as Mr Lecky takes care to tell us), 
 their high principles were not always consistent with 
 their practice (alas ! whose are 1) ; Cato may have ill- 
 used his slaves, Sallust may have been rapacious, and 
 * Paradise Regained. t Macaulay.
 
 THE STOICS. 185 
 
 Seneca wanting in personal courage. Yet it was surely 
 something to have set up a noble ideal, though they 
 might not attain to it themselves, and in " that hideous 
 carnival of vice" to have kept themselves, so far as 
 they might, unspotted from the world. Certain it is 
 that no other ancient sect ever came so near the light 
 of revelation. Passages from Seneca, from Epictetus, 
 from Marcus Aurelius, sound even now like fragments 
 of the inspired writings. The Unknown God, whom 
 they ignorantly worshipped as the Soul or Reason of 
 the World, is in spite of Milton's strictures the 
 beginning and the end of their philosophy. Let us 
 listen for a moment to their language. " Prayer should 
 "be only for the good." " Men should act according to 
 the spirit, and not according to the letter of their 
 faith." " Wouldest thou propitiate the godsl Be 
 good : he has worshipped them sufficiently who has 
 imitated them." It was from a Stoic poet. Aratus, 
 that St Paul quoted the great truth which was the 
 rational argument against idolatry " For we are also 
 His offspring, and " (so the original passage concludes) 
 " we alone possess a voice, which is the image of 
 reason:" It is in another poet of the same school that 
 we find what are perhaps the noblest lines in all Latin 
 poetry. Persius concludes his Satire on the common 
 hypocrisy of those prayers and offerings to the gods 
 which were but a service of the lips and hands, in 
 words of which an English rendering may give the 
 sense but not the beauty : " Nay, then, let us offer 
 to the gods that which the debauched sons of great 
 Messala can never bring on their broad chargers,
 
 186 CICERO'S PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 a soul wherein the laws of God and man are 
 blended, a heart pure to its inmost depths, a 
 breast ingrained with a noble sense of honour. 
 Let me but bring these with me to the altar, and I 
 care not though my offering be a handful of corn." 
 "With these grand words, fit precursors of a purer 
 creed to come, we may take our leave of the Stoics, 
 remarking how thoroughly, even in their majestic 
 egotism, they represented the moral force of the nation 
 among whom they nourished ; a nation, says a modern 
 preacher, "whose legendary and historic heroes could 
 thrust their hand into the flame, and sec it consumed 
 without a nerve shrinking ; or come from captivity on 
 parole, advise their countrymen against a peace, and 
 then go back to torture and certain death ; or devote 
 themselves by solemn self-sacrifice like the DeciL 
 The world must bow before such men ; for, uncon- 
 sciously, here was a form of the spirit of the Cross 
 self-surrender, unconquerable fidelity to duty, sacrifice 
 for others." * 
 
 * F. W. Robertson, Sermons, i 218. 
 
 Portions of three treatises by Cicero upon Political 
 Philosophy have come down to us : 1. 'De Republica'; a 
 dialogue on Government, founded chiefly on the 'Re- 
 public ' of Plato : 2. ' De Legibus ' ; a discussion on Law 
 in the abstract, and on national systems of legislation : 
 3. ' De Jure Civili ' ; of which last only a few fragments 
 exist His historical works have all perished.
 
 CHAPTEE XII. 
 
 CICERO'S RELIGION. 
 
 IT is. difficult to separate Cicero's religion from his 
 philosophy. Iri both he was a sceptic, "but in the 
 better sense of the word. His search after truth was 
 in no sneering or incredulous spirit, but in that of a 
 reverent inquirer. "We must remember, in justice to 
 him, that an earnest - minded man in his day could 
 hardly take higher ground than that of the sceptic. 
 The old polytheism was dying out in everything but. 
 in name, and there was nothing to take its place. 
 
 His religious belief, so far as we can gather it, 
 was rather negative than positive. In the speculative 
 treatise which he has left us, ' On the Nature of the 
 Gods,' he examines all the current creeds of the day, 
 but leaves his own quite undefined. 
 
 The treatise takes the form, like the rest, of an 
 imaginary conversation. This is supposed to have taken 
 place at the house of Aurelius Cotta, then Pontifex 
 Maximus an office which answered nearly to that of 
 Minister of religion. The other speakers are Balbus, 
 Velleius, and Cicero himself, who acts, however,
 
 188 CICERO'S RELIGION. 
 
 rather in the character of moderator than of disputant. 
 The debate is still, as in the more strictly philosophical 
 dialogues, between the different schools. Velleius first 
 sets forth the doctrine of his master Epicurus ; speaking 
 about the gods, says one of his opponents, with as much 
 apparent intimate knowledge " as if he had just come 
 straight down from heaven." All the speculations of 
 previous philosophers which he reviews one after the 
 other are, he assures the company, palpable errors. 
 The popular mythology is a mere collection of fables. 
 Plato and the Stoics, with their Soul of the world and 
 their pervading Providence, are entirely wrong; the 
 disciples of Epicurus alone are right. There are gods ; 
 that much, the universal belief of mankind in all ages 
 sufficiently establishes. But that they should be the 
 laborious beings which the common systems of theology 
 would make them, that they should employ them- 
 selves in the manufacture of worlds, is manifestly 
 absurd. Some of this argument is ingenious. " "What 
 should induce the Deity to perform the functions of 
 an ^Edile, to light up and decorate the world ? If it 
 was to supply better accommodation for himself, then 
 he must have dwelt of choice, up to that time, in the 
 darkness of a dungeon. If such improvements gave 
 him pleasure, why should he have chosen to be without 
 them so long?" 
 
 No the gods are immortal and happy beings j and 
 these very attributes imply that they should be wholly 
 free from the cares of business exempt from labour, 
 as from pain and death. They are in human form, but 
 of an ethereal and subtile essence, incapable of our
 
 <ON THE NATURE OF THE GODS.' 189 
 
 passions or desires. Happy in their own perfect wisdom 
 and virtue, they 
 
 " Sit beside their nectar, careless of mankind." 
 
 Cotta speaking in behalf of the New Academy 
 controverts these views. Be these your gods, Epicurus? 
 as well say there are no gods at all. What reverence, 
 what love, or what fear can men have of beings who 
 neither wish them, nor can work them, good or ill? 
 Is idleness the divinest life] "Why, 'tis the very 
 heaven of schoolboys ; yet the schoolboys, on their 
 holiday, employ themselves in games." Nay, he con- 
 cludes, what the Stoic Posidonius said of your master 
 Epicurus is true " He believed there were no gods, 
 and what he said about their nature he said only to 
 avoid popular odium." He could not believe that the 
 Deity has the outward shape of a man, without any 
 solid essence ; that he has all the members of a man, 
 without the power to use them ; that he is a shadowy 
 transparent being, who shows no favour and confers no 
 benefits on any, cares for nothing and does nothing ; 
 this is to allow his existence of the gods in word, but 
 to deny it in fact. 
 
 Velleius compliments his opponent on his clever 
 argument, but desires that Balbus would state his 
 views upon the question. The Stoic consents ; and, 
 at some length, proceeds to prove (what neither dis- 
 putant has at all denied) the existence of Divine 
 beings of some kind. Universal belief, well-authen- 
 ticated instances of their appearance to men, and of 
 the fulfilment of prophecies and omens, are all evi-
 
 190 CICERO'S RELIGION. 
 
 dences of their existence. He dwells much, too, on 
 the argument from design, of which so much use has 
 been made by modern theologians. He furnishes 
 Paley with the idea for his well-known illustration of 
 the man who finds a watch ; " when we see a dial or 
 a water-clock, we believe that the hour is shown 
 thereon by art, and not by chance." * He gives also 
 an illustration from the poet Attius, which from a 
 poetical imagination has since become an historical 
 incident ; the shepherds who see the ship Argo ap- 
 proaching take the new monster for a thing of life, as 
 the Mexicans regarded the ships of Cortes. Much 
 more, he argues, does the harmonious order of the 
 world bespeak an intelligence within. But his con- 
 clusion is that the Universe itself is the Deity; or that 
 the Deity is the animating Spirit of the Universe ; 
 and that the popular mythology, which gives one god to 
 the Earth, one to the Sea, one to Fire, and so on, is in 
 fact a distorted version of this truth. The very form 
 of the universe the sphere is the most perfect of all 
 forms, and therefore suited to embody the Divine. 
 
 Then Gotta who though, as Pontifex, he is a 
 national priest by vocation, is of that sect in philo- 
 sophy which makes doubt its creed resumes his ob- 
 jections. He is no better satisfied with the tenets of 
 the Stoics than with those of the Epicureans. He 
 believes that there are gods ; but, coming to the dis- 
 cussion as a dispassionate and philosophical observer, 
 he finds such proofs as are offered of their existence 
 insufficient. But this third book is fragmentary, and 
 * De Nat Deor. ii. 34. Paley's Nat. Theol. ch. i.
 
 'ON THE NATURE OF THE GODS.' 191 
 
 the continuity of Cotta's argument is broken "by con- 
 siderable gaps in all the manuscripts. There is a 
 curious tradition, that these portions were carefully 
 torn out by the early Christians, because they might 
 prove too formidable weapons in the hands of un- 
 believers. Cotta professes throughout only to raise 
 his objections in the hope that they may be refuted; 
 but his whole reasoning is destructive of any belief 
 in an overruling Providence. He confesses himself 
 puzzled by that insoluble mystery the existence of 
 Evil in a world created and ruled by a beneficent 
 Power. The gods have given man reason, it is said; 
 but man abuses the gift to evil ends. " This is the 
 fault," you say, " of men, not of the gods. As though 
 the physician should complain of the virulence of the 
 disease, or the pilot of the fury of the tempest ! Though 
 these are but mortal men, even in them it would seem 
 ridiculous. Who would have asked your help, we 
 should answer, if these difficulties had not arisen 1 May 
 we not argue still more strongly in the case of the 
 gods? The fault, you say, lies in the vices of men. 
 But you should have given men such a rational 
 faculty as would exclude the possibility of such 
 crimes." He sees, as David did, " the ungodly in pros- 
 perity." The laws of Heaven are mocked, crimes are 
 committed, and " the thunders of Olympian Jove are 
 silent." He quotes, as it would always be easy to 
 quote, examples of this from all history : the most 
 telling and original, perhaps, is the retort of Diagoras, 
 who was called the Atheist, when they showed him 
 in the temple at Samothrace the votive tablets (as they
 
 192 CICERO'S R.ELIGION. 
 
 may be seen in some foreign churches now) offered by 
 those shipwrecked seamen who had been saved from 
 drowning. " Lo, thou that deniest a Providence, be- 
 hold here how many have been saved by prayer to 
 the gods ! " " Yea," was his 'reply ; " but where are 
 those commemorated who were drowned ? " 
 
 The Dialogue ends with no resolution of the diffi- 
 culties, and no conclusion as to the points in question. 
 Cicero, who is the narrator of the imaginary confer- 
 ence, gives it as his opinion that the arguments of the 
 Stoic seemed to him to have " the greater probability." 
 It was the great tenet of the school which he most 
 affected, that probability was the nearest approach 
 that man could make to speculative truth. " We are 
 not among those," he says, " to whom there seems to 
 be no such thing as truth ; but we say that all truths 
 have some falsehoods attached to them which have so 
 strong a resemblance to truth, that in such cases there 
 is no certain note of distinction which can determine 
 our judgment and assent. The consequence of which 
 is that there are many things probable ; and although 
 they are not subjects of actual perception to our 
 senses, yet they have so grand and glorious an 
 aspect that a wise man governs his life thereby." * 
 It remained for one of our ablest and most philoso- 
 phical Christian writers to prove that in such matters 
 probability was practically equivalent to demonstra- 
 tion.t Cicero's own form of scepticism in religious 
 
 * De Nat. Deor. i. 5. 
 
 t "To us, probability is the very guide of life." In trod 
 to Butler's Analogy.
 
 'ON THE NATURE OF THE GODS.' 193 
 
 matters is perhaps very nearly expressed in the strik- 
 ing anecdote which he puts, in this dialogue, into the 
 mouth of the Epicurean. 
 
 "If you ask me what the Deity is, or what his 
 nature and attributes are, I should follow the example 
 of Simonides, who, when the tyrant Hiero proposed 
 to him the same question, asked a day to consider of it. 
 When the king, on the next day, required from him 
 the answer, Simonides requested two days more ; and 
 when he went on continually asking double the time, 
 instead of giving any answer, Hiero in amazement 
 demanded of him the reason. ' Because,' replied he, 
 'the longer I meditate on the question, the more 
 obscure does it appear.'"* 
 
 The position of Cicero as a statesman, and also as a 
 member of the College of Augurs, no doubt checked 
 any strong expression of opinion on his part as to the 
 forms of popular worship and many particulars of 
 popular belief. In the treatise which he intended as 
 in some sort a sequel to this Dialogue on the ' Nature 
 of the Gods ' that upon ' Divination ' he states the 
 arguments for and against the national belief in omens, 
 auguries, dreams, and such intimations of the Divine 
 wilLt He puts the defence of the system in the 
 mouth of his brother Quintus, and takes himself the 
 destructive side of the argument: but whether this 
 was meant to give his own real views on the subject, 
 
 * De Nat Deor. L 22. 
 
 t There is a third treatise, ' De Fato,' apparently a continua- 
 tion of the series, of which only a portion has reached us. It 
 is a discussion of the difficiilt questions of Fate and Free-will. 
 
 A. C. vol. IX. N
 
 194 CICERO'S RELIGION. 
 
 we cannot be so certain. The course of argument 
 employed on both sides would rather lead to the 
 conclusion that the "writer's opinion was very much 
 that which Johnson delivered as to the reality of 
 ghosts " All argument is against it, but all belief is 
 for it." 
 
 With regard to the great questions of the soul's im- 
 mortality, and a state of future rewards and punish- 
 ments, it would be quite possible to gather from Cicero's 
 writings passages expressive of entirely contradictory 
 views. The bent of his mind, as has been sufficiently 
 shown, was towards doubt, and still more towards dis- 
 cussion ; and possibly his opinions were not so entirely 
 in a state of flux as the remains of his writings seem 
 to show. In a future state of some kind he must cer- 
 tainly have believed that is, with such belief as he 
 would have considered the subject-matter to admit of 
 as a strong probability. In a speculative fragment 
 which has come down to us, known as ' Scipio's Dream,' 
 we seem to have the creed of the man rather than the 
 speculations of the philosopher. Scipio Africanus the 
 elder appears in a dream to the younger who bore his 
 name (his grandson by adoption). He shows him a 
 vision of heaven ; bids him listen to the music of the 
 spheres, which, as they move in their order, " by a 
 modulation of high and low sounds," give forth that 
 harmony which men have in some poor sort reduced to 
 notation. He bids him look down upon the earth, 
 contracted to a mere speck in the distance, and draws 
 a lesson of the poverty of all mere earthly fame 
 and glory. "For all those who have preserved, or
 
 CICERO'S RELIGION. 195 
 
 aided, or benefited their country, there is a fixed and 
 definite place in heaven, where they shall be happy in 
 the enjoyment of everlasting life." But " the souls of 
 those who have given themselves up to the pleasures 
 of sense, and made themselves, as it were, the servants 
 of these, who at the bidding of the lusts which wait 
 upon pleasure have violated the laws of gods and men, 
 they, when they escape from the body, flit still 
 around the earth, and never attain to these abodes 
 but after many ages of wandering." We may gather 
 that his creed admitted a Valhalla for the hero and 
 the patriot, and a long process of expiation for the 
 wicked. 
 
 There is a curious passage preserved by St Augustin 
 from that one of Cicero's works which he most admired 
 the lost treatise on ' Glory ' * which seems to show 
 that so far from being a materialist, he held the body 
 to be a sort of purgatory for the soul. 
 
 " The mistakes and the sufferings of human life 
 make me think sometimes that those ancient seers, or 
 interpreters of the secrets of heaven and the counsels 
 of the Divine mind, had some glimpse of the truth, 
 when they said that men are born in order to suffer 
 the penalty for some sins committed in a former life ; 
 and that the idea is true which we find in Aristotle, 
 that we are suffering some such punishment as theirs of 
 old, who fell into the hands of those Etruscan bandits, 
 and were put to death with a studied cruelty ; their 
 living bodies being tied to dead bodies, face to face, 
 in closest possible conjunction : that so our souls are 
 * See p. 29.
 
 196 CICERO'S RELIGION. 
 
 coupled to our bodies, united like the living with the 
 dead." 
 
 But whatever might have been the theological side, 
 if one may so express it, of Cicero's religion, the moral 
 aphorisms which meet us here and there in his works 
 have often in them a teaching which comes near the 
 tone of Christian ethics. The words of Petrarch are 
 hardly too strong "You would fancy sometimes it 
 was not a Pagan philosopher but a Christian apostle 
 who was speaking " * These are but a few out of 
 many which might be quoted : " Strive ever for the 
 truth, and so reckon as that not thou art mortal, but 
 only this thy body ; for thou art not that which this 
 outward form of thine shows forth, but each man's 
 mind, that is the real man not the shape which can 
 be traced with the finger." t " Yea, rather, they live 
 who have escaped from the bonds of their flesh 
 as from a prison-house." " Follow after justice and 
 duty ; such a life is the path to heaven, and into yon 
 assembly of those who have once lived, and now, re- 
 leased from the body, dwell in that place." Where, 
 in any other heathen writer, shall we find such noble 
 words as those which close the apostrophe in the Tus- 
 culans ? " One single day well spent, and in accord- 
 ance with thy precepts, were better to be chosen than 
 an immortality of sin ! " J He is addressing himself, 
 it is true, to Philosophy ; but his Philosophy is here 
 little less than the "Wisdom of Scripture : and the 
 
 * " Interdum non Paganum philosophum, sed apostolum loqui 
 putes." 
 
 t ' The Dream of Scipio.' J Tusc., v. 2.
 
 CICERO'S RELIGION. 197 
 
 spiritual aspiration is the same only uttered under 
 greater difficulties as that of the Psalmist when he 
 exclaims, "One day in thy courts is better than a 
 thousand ! " We may or may not adopt Erasmus's view 
 of his inspiration or rather, inspiration is a word which 
 has more than one definition, and this would depend 
 upon which definition we take ; but we may well 
 sympathise with the old scholar when he says " I 
 feel a better man for reading Cicero." 
 
 END OP CICERO. 
 
 PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, EDINBURGH.
 
 PLINY'S LETTERS 
 
 BY THE 
 
 REV. \ALFRED CHURCH, M.A. 
 
 HEAD-MASTER OF THE ROYAL GRAMMAR-SCHOOL, 
 HENLEY-ON-THAMES 
 
 REV. W. J. BRODRIBB, M.A. 
 
 LATE FELLOW OF ST JOHN'S COLLEGE, 
 CAMBRIDGE 
 
 WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS 
 
 EDINBURGH AND LONDON 
 
 MDCCCLXXII
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 CHAP. i. PLINY'S EARLY DAYS SKETCH OP THE REIGNS 
 
 OF VESPASIAN AND TITUS PLINY THE 
 
 ELDER 1 
 
 it II. THE GREAT ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS, . . 12 
 ii III. REIGN OF TERROR DOMITIAN'S LAST DAYS 
 
 BANISHMENT OF THE PHILOSOPHERS, . 25 
 ii IV. THE NEW AGE VENGEANCE ON THE INFOR- 
 MERSTHE GREAT PROVINCIAL TRIALS, 30 
 ii V. THE ROMAN BAR PLINY'S PRACTICE IN THE 
 
 COURT OF THE HUNDRED, . . . 44 
 
 n VI. MEN OF LETTERS AT ROME, ... 61 
 
 ii VII. PUBLIC READINGS, 80 
 
 n vin. COMUM, PLINY'S BIRTHPLACE HIS LIVELY 
 
 INTEREST IN ITS WELFARE, ... 90 
 
 n ix. PLINY'S FAMILY AND FRIENDS, . . . 101 
 
 n X. COUNTRY LIFE PLINY'S VILLAS, . . 124 
 
 i XI. PLINY IN HIS PROVINCE, . . . . 141 
 
 n xii. PLINY'S OPINIONS AND HABITS, . . . 156
 
 ADYEETISEMENT. 
 
 MANY of the translations in this volume are our own. 
 Sometimes we have borrowed from the versions of 
 Lord Orrery and Melmoth. Occasionally we have 
 had the advantage, of which we "beg to express our 
 hearty appreciation, of the versions which Dean 
 Merivale gives in his ' History of the Romans under 
 the Empire.'
 
 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 
 
 As this work is not arranged in a regular biographical 
 form, it seems advisable to give a brief sketch of the 
 main events in the life of the Author of these Letters. 
 Most of these events the reader will find related at 
 greater length as he proceeds. 
 
 Pliny the younger was born A.D. 62. In A.D. 79 ho 
 witnessed the great eruption of Vesuvius. In the 
 following year he commenced practice as an advocate 
 in Rome. For a short time he served as a military 
 tribune in Syria. Eeturning to Eome, he was made 
 Quaestor; and in A.D. 93, Praetor. In A.D. 100, he 
 was Consul. He also filled at some time the office of 
 Prefect of the Treasury, and he was one of the Com- 
 missioners of the Tiber. He belonged to the College 
 of Augurs. In A.D. 103, he went as Propraetor to the 
 province of Pontus and Bithynia, an office which he 
 held for about two years. "We know nothing of him 
 later than the year 107. He was twice married, but 
 left no children.
 
 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 PLINY'S EARLY DAYS SKETCH OF THE REIGNS OP 
 VESPASIAN AND TITUS PLINY THE ELDER. 
 
 ~No reading can be pleasanter or more instructive than 
 the correspondence of a clever and accomplished man, 
 whose circumstances have brought him into continual 
 contact with the politics and literature of his day. 
 Cicero's letters are certainly among the most interest- 
 ing remains of antiquity. Those of the younger Pliny 
 are indeed the work of a man many degrees intellec- 
 tually inferior to Cicero, but they have deservedly 
 found many attentive readers in modern times. They 
 throw much light on that period of transition in the 
 history of mankind which began with the origin and 
 rise of the Christian Church ; and, as we read them, 
 we feel that there is something in their general tone 
 and character which makes them a sort of link between 
 the old and new worlds. 
 
 A. c. vol. xi. A
 
 2 PLINTS LETTERS. 
 
 Caius Plinius Csecilius Secundus such was his full 
 Roman name is familiarly known as " the younger 
 Pliny," to distinguish him from his uncle, and father 
 by adoption, the famous naturalist. His mother, 
 Plinia, was this uncle's sister. His father, Caius 
 CaecUius, was a man of no note, but of a good old 
 Eoman stock. The Caecilian family, though of plebeian 
 origin, had been for centuries an honourable house, 
 and could reckon consuls and great state officials 
 among its scions. The most illustrious name con- 
 nected with it was that of the Metelli. It was also 
 wealthy ; so that Pliny entered the world under good 
 auspices. We have to pick out from his own letters all 
 that can be known about him. He was, he tells us, 
 in his eighteenth year when that memorable eruption 
 of Vesuvius, A.D. 79, destroyed the cities of Pompeii 
 and Herculaneum. He was therefore born A.D. 62, a 
 year in which the wickedness and infamy of Nero were 
 rising to their utmost height. Comum, now Como, on 
 the lake of that name, was the place of his birth, as 
 maybe inferred with almost absolute certainty from vari- 
 ous passages in his letters. His family, it would seem, 
 had considerable estates in the neighbourhood ; and 
 their relations to the town and its inhabitants were 
 much the same as those of a great English landowner 
 to a borough closely connected with his property. 
 The early death of his father was possibly the cause 
 of his future distinction. His uncle, after the Eoman 
 fashion, adopted him as his son, and imbued him with 
 a love of letters, and an earnest desire of entering on 
 an honourable career. He had likewise the good
 
 HIS EARLY DATS. 3 
 
 fortune to have as his guardian a truly great man 
 Verginius Rufus to whom we shall have occasion to 
 refer more at length when we come to speak of Pliny's 
 friends. As a matter of course, the best education 
 which the age could furnish was provided for him. 
 He attended the lectures of the most famous teachers 
 of the day of Quintilian among the number. He 
 must have been a precocious lad, as he tells us that he 
 wrote a Greek tragedy in his fourteenth year, and that 
 he began to practise as an advocate at nineteen. His 
 early success was no doubt due to his remarkable in- 
 dustry as well as to his great social advantages. 
 
 The years of his childhood and youth were terrible 
 and eventful for the state. The latter period of Nero's 
 reign was an undisguised despotism, which indulged 
 itself without restraint in freaks of senseless and 
 capricious wickedness. The year A.D. 68 delivered the 
 world from the last * and worst of the Caesars. That 
 same year witnessed a great rising in the armies of 
 Gaul and of Lower Germany; and the empire was 
 actually offered by the troops on the Ehine to young 
 Pliny's guardian, Verginius Kufus. He declined it ; 
 and Servius Galba, who had been governor of one of 
 the provinces of Spain, and was a favourite with the 
 soldiers, became emperor. Thus was effected a complete 
 revolution. Men chosen by the soldiers were hence- 
 forth to rule the Eoman world. The secret of the 
 
 * So Suetonius terms him, as the last of the Julia gens that 
 is, of the family of Julius Csesar, whether connected with it by 
 blood or adoption. Commonly the first twelve emperors are 
 called " the twelve Caesars."
 
 4 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 empire, as Tacitus says in one of the opening chapters 
 of his History, was now divulged, that an emperor 
 might "be created elsewhere than at Eome. The follow- 
 ing year was one of continuous civil war. It comprises 
 the brief reigns of Galba, Otho, Vitellius, and is 
 minutely described by Tacitus. It was a time of 
 horrible bloodshed and confusion. " I am entering," 
 says the historian, " on a period rich in disasters, 
 frightful in its wars, torn by civil strife, and even in 
 peace full of horrors." With its close, which witnessed 
 the establishment of the Flavian dynasty, began a more 
 hopeful era. Vespasian, the first representative of that 
 dynasty, was called to the empire by the Eoman legions 
 in the east, to the command of which he had been 
 appointed at the commencement of the Jewish war. 
 A man of humble birth, he attained greatness by his 
 energy and perseverance. He was an able general, and 
 he retained through life the plain and straightforward 
 character of a good soldier. His good sense and firm- 
 ness enabled him to repress or mitigate some of the 
 worst evils of the time; and his reign was on the whole 
 a decided benefit to the Eoman world. 
 
 Vespasian was Emperor from A.D. 70 to 79. During 
 these years Pliny was diligently pursuing his studies 
 under the direction of the best of teachers. The 
 Emperor himself was a man of no culture or refinement, 
 but he was shrewd enough to see that it was for the 
 public good that men of letters should be encouraged. 
 He had the reputation of being parsimonious to a fault, 
 but he knew when to be munificent. He founded 
 a public library, and liberally pensioned poets and
 
 THE REIGN OF VESPASIAN. 5 
 
 artists, professors of grammar and rhetoric. Quintilian, 
 the most successful teacher of the day, rose, contrary 
 to all precedent, to the consulship. "We may well 
 imagine what a shock it must have been to an old- 
 fashioned Eoman nobleman to see a schoolmaster raised 
 to the highest dignity in the state. Vespasian no 
 doubt felt that the surest way to make his government 
 popular was to conciliate the goodwill of the men who 
 directed the education of the Eoman youth. He could 
 do nothing with the philosophers, whose political creed, 
 that especially of the Stoics, was a fanatical repub- 
 licanism, utterly impracticable, and at the same time 
 restless and aggressive. He was obliged to treat them 
 as enemies who were plotting the overthrow of his 
 government. Of the fate of Helvidius Priscus, the 
 most eminent, perhaps also the noblest and most con- 
 scientious, of the Stoics, we shall have occasion to 
 speak hereafter. He was banished, and soon after put 
 to death. Then followed a wholesale expulsion from 
 Rome of all the Stoics and Cynics ; and we may infer 
 from several allusions to them in Juvenal that the 
 popular sentiment, which regarded them as hypocrites 
 and impostors, heartily approved this seemingly harsh 
 measure. The quiet man of letters, who was content 
 to make the best of existing political arrangements, 
 had nothing to fear from Vespasian. Such a man 
 as the elder Pliny was perfectly safe, and, without 
 any loss of self-respect, could look upon the Emperor 
 as a friend. In the year A.D. 77, he dedicated his 
 great work on natural history to Vespasian's son and 
 successor.
 
 6 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 Vespasian encouraged architecture as well as letters. 
 He adorned both Rome and the provincial cities with 
 splendid structures. The Colosseum, the greatest 
 building of the ancient world, was begun by him. 
 The Temple of Peace was also his work. He spared 
 no expense in making the capital, and the empire 
 generally, more imposing and magnificent. His reign 
 was peaceful and prosperous ; there were none of those 
 commotions in Gaul, Germany, or the East which 
 before and after his time almost seemed to threaten the 
 Roman world with dissolution. As might have been 
 expected from a prudent and energetic soldier, he 
 maintained the armies of the state, which numbered 
 about 400,000 men, in thorough efficiency. In A.D. 
 78, the great Julius Agricola, Taqjtus's father-in-law, 
 whom Vespasian had raised to the patrician rank, was 
 sent to Britain, and strengthened the Roman hold 
 on the island by the conquest of North "Wales and 
 Anglesey. In the following year the Emperor died, 
 and was succeeded by his son Titus. 
 
 The chief event which we usually associate with the 
 name of Titus is the capture of Jerusalem,* and the 
 destruction of the Jewish nationality. His short reign 
 of two years was perfectly tranquil. He was so 
 popular an emperor that he was spoken of as "the 
 delight of the human race." Though he had seen and 
 himself taken part in peculiarly horrible scenes of war, 
 there was much less of the stern soldier in him than 
 in his father. He could win men's affections as well 
 as gain their respect. He was lavish of money, and 
 * Jerusalem was taken in the month of September, A.D. 70.
 
 THE REIGN OF TITUS. 7 
 
 was sincerely anxious to spread comfort and happiness 
 among his subjects. The hateful class of informers 
 who from the time of Tiberius had traded successfully 
 on false accusations of treason, were driven out of Rome 
 in disgrace. Like his father, he improved the capital 
 with great public works. He completed and dedicated 
 the Colosseum, and gave to Rome the famous baths 
 which are called by his name. His reign, however, 
 was not without serious disasters. The great eruption 
 of Vesuvius in A.D. 79, a fire which raged uninterrupt- 
 edly in Eome for three days, and was hardly less de- 
 structive than that in Nero's reign, and a pestilence 
 which for a while, according to Eusebius, daily de- 
 stroyed 10,000 of the population, followed in quick 
 succession. In the eruption of Vesuvius perished a 
 man who, both for his own merits and for the bene- 
 ficial influence which he exercised over the mind 
 of the young Pliny, deserves a detailed notice. To 
 the elder Pliny we must certainly give the first place 
 among the authors of his time. He did not, indeed, 
 escape the weaknesses and defects which marred all 
 the natural philosophy of the ancients, but he pursued 
 his studies with an ardour and enthusiasm which could 
 not fail to produce substantial results. 
 
 The nephew, we may be sure, owed much to such an 
 uncle. In one of his letters,* of which we subjoin a 
 translation, he describes, with evident admiration, his 
 uncle's marvellous devotion to study. From this letter 
 we derive our chief acquaintance with the elder Pliny's 
 manner of life. 
 
 * Epist. iii. 5.
 
 8 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 "It is a great pleasure to me," he writes to his 
 friend, Baebius Macer, " that you are so fond of reading 
 my uncle's books that you wish to possess them all, 
 and ask for a complete list of them. I will do the 
 part of an index, and also tell you the order in which 
 they were written, for the studious reader likes to 
 know this. First comes a work in one volume, on the 
 use of the dart by cavalry, a careful and ingenious 
 treatise, which he composed when he was in command 
 of one of the cavalry corps of our allied troops. Two 
 volumes of the life of Pomponius Secundus, a work 
 which he intended as a tribute to the memory of a 
 friend who was singularly attached to him. Wars with 
 Germany, in twenty books ; in these, he compiled a 
 nistory of all our wars with the German tribes. A 
 dream which he had when serving with the army in 
 Germany suggested the work. Drusus Nero, whose 
 victories in Germany were on the widest scale hitherto 
 known, and who perished in the country, seemed to 
 stand by him as he lay asleep, and to entreat him to 
 rescue his memory from oblivion. The Student, in 
 three parts, which from their length spread into six 
 volumes : a work in which is discussed the earliest 
 training and subsequent education of the orator. 
 Questions of Grammar and Style, in eight books, 
 written in the last years of Nero's reign, when every 
 sort of literary pursuit requiring freedom and elevation 
 of tone was dangerous in our enslaved condition. A 
 History of the State, in continuation of the work of 
 Aufidius Bassus, in thirty -one books. Last comes his 
 Natural History, in thirty-seven books; a work of vast
 
 THE ELDER PLINY. 9 
 
 extent, and as various as nature itself. You wonder at 
 a busy man having completed such a number of "books 
 books, too, containing much abstruse matter ; you will 
 wonder more when I tell you that for some time he 
 was a pleader, that he died at the age of 56, and that 
 meantime he was much hindered and distracted by 
 important state business, and by his intimacy with our 
 emperors. But his intellect was quick, his industry 
 perfectly marvellous, his power of remaining awake 
 remarkable. From the 23d of August he began to 
 study at midnight, and through the winter he con- 
 tinued to rise at one, or at the latest at two in the 
 morning, often at twelve. Sleep he could always com- 
 mand. Often it used to come upon him and leave 
 him in the midst of his books. Before daybreak he 
 would go to the Emperor, Yespasian, who also worked 
 at night, and thence to his official duties. On returning 
 home he gave what time remained to study. After 
 taking a light meal, as our forefathers used to do, he 
 would often in summer, if he had leisure, recline in the 
 sun, and have a book read to him, on which he wrote 
 notes, or from which he made extracts. He read no- 
 thing without making extracts, for he used to say that 
 you could get some good from the worst book. After 
 reading in the sun he generally had a cold bath, then 
 a light meal and a very short nap, after which, as if he 
 was beginning another day, he would study till dinner- 
 time. During dinner a book was read to him, and he 
 made notes upon it as it went on. I remember one of his 
 friends once stopping the reader, who had pronounced 
 a word incorrectly, and making him repeat it. My
 
 10 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 uncle said to him, 'Did you not understand the word?' 
 ' Yes,' he replied. ' Why then did you stop him ? We 
 have lost more than ten lines by this interruption.' So 
 parsimonious was he of his time. He rose from dinner 
 in the summer by daylight, in winter before seven, as 
 regularly as if constrained by law. Thus he lived in 
 the midst of his work and in the bustle of Rome. In 
 the country, he exempted only his bathing-time from 
 study ; I mean, the actual time of his immersion in 
 the water, for while he was being rubbed or dried, he 
 would hear something read or would dictate something. 
 While travelling, he threw aside every other care, and 
 gave himself up to study; he always had a scribe 
 at his side with a book and a writing-tablet, whose 
 hands in winter were protected by gloves, so that the 
 cold weather might not rob him of a single moment. 
 Even at Rome, he used to be carried in a litter with 
 this view. I remember his rebuking me for taking 
 a walk. 'You might have managed,' he said, 'not 
 to lose these hours.' In fact, he thought all tune 
 lost which was not given to study. It was by this 
 intense application that he completed so great a num- 
 ber of books, and left me, besides, a hundred and 
 sixty volumes of extracts, written on both sides of 
 the leaf, and in the minutest hand. He used to tell 
 me that when he was governor in Spain, he might 
 have sold these volumes to Largius Licinus for more 
 than 3000, and then there were fewer of them. 
 Would you not think, when you call to mind how 
 much he read and wrote, that he had never held office 
 or enjoyed an emperor's favour ? And again, on hear-
 
 THE ELDER PLINY. 11 
 
 ing of the intensity of his application, would you not 
 say that he had not read or written enough 1 It makes 
 me smile, when people call me a student; for, compared 
 with him, I am a mere idler. ' For myself, I am but a 
 man whose attention is divided between public business 
 and services rendered to friends. Yet of those who 
 devote their life to letters, who would not blush at 
 being compared with my uncle, and feel himself utterly 
 lazy and slothful ? I have written a long letter, though 
 you wished only to know what works he left behind 
 him ; but I am sure that this account of him will be 
 quite as acceptable to you as a list of the books them- 
 selves, and it may have the effect of urging you in a 
 spirit of emulation not merely to read them, but even 
 to accomplish some similar work," 
 
 The nephew, as we shall see, was a less close student 
 than the uncle, but a man whose range of interests was 
 wider and more diversified.
 
 CHAPTEE II. 
 
 THE GREAT ERUPTION OP VESUVIUS. 
 
 THE summer of A.D. 79 was made memorable by a 
 frightful catastrophe, of which Pliny was an eye- 
 witness, and of which he has left us a singularly 
 valuable account, in two letters written some years 
 afterwards to his friend the historian Tacitus. The 
 writer was, as usual, residing at the time with his 
 uncle and his mother near Misenum, where the elder 
 Pliny was in command of the fleet stationed at that 
 place a promontory which forms the northern ex- 
 tremity of the Bay of Naples. The Bay, then, as 
 now, one of the most beautiful spots in the world, 
 was crowded with the villas of the Roman nobility. 
 Baiae, the Brighton of Eome, with its splendid baths 
 and terraces built out into the sea ; Puteoli, with 
 its busy harbour; Neapolis, one of the largest and 
 wealthiest of the Italian cities ; with Herculaneum, 
 Pompeii, and Stabise, occupied the sea-coast in an 
 almost continuous line. Behind them, with its slopes 
 reaching almost to the sea, rose Vesuvius, clad to its 
 summit, which reached the height of about 4000 feet,
 
 ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS. 13 
 
 with olive and vine. A luxuriant vegetation concealed 
 all traces of the volcanic nature of the mountain, and 
 neither history nor tradition preserved any record which 
 might warn the populous cities at its base of the 
 danger which threatened them. Earthquakes, indeed, 
 were not unfrequent in the country ; and one of more 
 severity than usual had, sixteen years before, seriously 
 injured both Herculaneum and Pompeii. But of the 
 existence of a volcano no suspicion seems to have been 
 entertained. 
 
 * It was at one o'clock in the afternoon of the 24th of 
 August that the elder Pliny, always an eager observer 
 of natural phenomena, was summoned by his sister-in- 
 law from his study to witness a strange sight a cloud 
 of unusual size and shape, which was visible on the 
 opposite side of the Bay. It rose from one of the 
 hills, which the observers did not know at the time 
 to be Vesuvius, like a stone-pine with a lofty trunk 
 and a cluster of branches at the top, continually vary- 
 ing in height, and of a changing hue, sometimes fiery- 
 bright, sometimes streaked with black. It was the 
 beginning of that great shower of ashes and dust which 
 is said a not incredible assertion, when we compare it 
 with the records of other eruptions to have reached 
 as far as Africa and Egypt. The old philosopher, 
 anxious to get a nearer view of what was happening, 
 ordered one of the light vessels belonging to the fleet 
 to be manned. At the same time he invited his nephew 
 to accompany him; an offer which the young man, who 
 was more attached to literature than to natural science, 
 * This account gives the substance of Epist. vi. 16.
 
 14 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 declined, pleading in excuse a literary task which 
 his uncle had set him. The two did not meet again. 
 The uncle, whose fortunes our narrative will follow 
 for the present, changed his purpose on arriving at the 
 shore. A letter was put into his hands from Rectina, 
 the wife of Csesius Bassus, a poet of some eminence, 
 who had a villa on the shore of the Bay. This lady 
 was terrified at the danger in which she found her- 
 self not without reason, if it "be true, as we are told, 
 that her husband actually perished in the eruption. 
 The admiral's philosophical curiosity gave place to a 
 more serious purpose. Others besides Eectina were 
 imperilled, and he might give them help. The galleys 
 of the fleet were ordered to put to sea, and to steer for 
 the opposite side of the Bay, where the danger was 
 obviously most imminent. How serious this danger 
 was, became more evident as they approached the 
 scene. Showers of cinders and fragments of heated 
 stone fell around and upon the ships. At the same 
 time it was found that the soundings of the Bay were 
 altered an effect attributed to the falling masses, but 
 probably in a great measure owing to an elevation of the 
 sea-bed. The elder Pliny, who had continued calmly 
 to note down his observations, hesitated for a moment 
 whether or no he should proceed ; his sailing-master 
 strongly advised return. His resolve was soon taken. 
 Crying out, " Fortune helps the bold," he gave orders 
 that the fleet should make for the little town of Stabiae, 
 near the extreme southern point of the Bay, where his 
 friend, or, as some suppose, his second in command, 
 Pomponianus, was residing. While the ships were
 
 ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS. 15 
 
 busy in embarking the terrified inhabitants of the 
 coast, the admiral himself, who had landed at his 
 friend's villa, did his best to encourage the frightened 
 inmates, and proceeded, with what was anyhow an 
 admirable assumption of cheerfulness, to enjoy the 
 bath and dinner which formed the customary close of 
 a Eoman gentleman's day. Flames, which the ap- 
 proaching darkness had now made more visible, were 
 seen to break forth from the summit and sides of 
 Vesuvius, and the alarm at the villa increased. The 
 philosopher made light of these fears, and accounted 
 for the flames by the theory that some of the country 
 houses in the neighbourhood, which had been deserted 
 by their inhabitants, had caught fire. He then retired 
 to his bedchamber; the other inmates of the house 
 were in no humour for sleep, but as they passed his 
 door they heard the deep snoring (the philosopher 
 was of a corpulent habit) which indicated that his 
 slumbers were undisturbed. Before long, however, 
 it was found necessary to rouse him. His apartment 
 was approached from an open court, and this was fill- 
 ing up so rapidly with ashes and stones that egress 
 would soon have become impossible. He rose and 
 joined his friends, who were in doubt what course to 
 pursue. The house was trembling with frequent shocks 
 of earthquake, and threatened destruction to its in- 
 mates. Out of doors there was the peril of the falling 
 stones, which, though calcined with fire, and therefore 
 light in proportion to their size, seemed sufficiently 
 heavy to be dangerous.* To leave the house appeared, 
 * Some have been found at Pompeii, which was, however,
 
 16 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 on the whole, the preferable alternative. With pillows 
 and cushions fastened upon their heads by way of pro- 
 tection, the party sallied forth, first making their way 
 to the sea, by which they hoped to secure their escape. 
 They found it wild and stormy, with the wind blowing 
 strongly on shore, and were compelled for the pre- 
 sent to abandon the idea. The old man, fatigued with 
 his exertions, lay down upon a rug which the attend- 
 ants spread for him. Twice he asked for a draught of 
 cold water ; then, when the sudden approach of flames 
 and sulphurous vapour dispersed the party, in attempt- 
 ing, with the help of two of his servants, to rise from 
 the ground, he fell dead. The actual cause of his death 
 cannot be determined. His nephew says that he was 
 choked with sulphurous vapour, which acted the more 
 readily on him as his breathing was affected by chronic 
 weakness. But this account was collected from hear- 
 say, and was written many years after the occurrence ; 
 while it may well be doubted, according to a writer of 
 the first authority on such subjects,* whether flames and 
 sulphurous vapours could have been present at Stabiae, 
 ten miles from the centre of the eruption. We may 
 conjecture, as a more probable cause of death, a sudden 
 attack of illness. This supposition agrees with what we 
 are told was the appearance of the corpse when it was 
 found three days afterwards, "The attitude of the body 
 was more like that of a sleeper than that of a dead man." 
 
 considerably nearer to Vesuvius, weighing as much as eight 
 pounds. At Stabije, none have been found exceeding an ounce 
 in weight. 
 * Professor Phillips : ' Vesuvius,' p. 20.
 
 ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS. 17 
 
 "We must now return to the younger Pliny and his 
 mother. The narrative which he gives us of his own 
 adventures* is so characteristic of the man, and at times 
 so graphic in its descriptions, that we cannot do better 
 than present it to our readers in a form as closely 
 resembling the original as possible. 
 
 " When my uncle had started, I spent such time as 
 was left on my studies it was on their account, in- 
 deed, that I had stopped behind. Then followed the 
 bath, dinner, and sleep, this last disturbed and brief. 
 There had been noticed for many days before a trem- 
 bling of the earth, which had caused, however, but 
 little fear, because it is not unusual in Campania. But 
 that night it was so violent, that one thought that 
 everything was being not merely moved but absolutely 
 overturned. My mother rushed into my chamber ; I 
 was in the act of rising, with the same intention of 
 awaking her should she have been asleep. "We sat 
 down in the open court of the house, which occupied 
 a small space between the buildings and the sea. And 
 now I do not know whether to call it courage or 
 folly, for I was but in my eighteenth year I called for 
 a volume of Livy, read it, as if I were perfectly at 
 leisure, and even continued to make some extracts 
 which I had begun. Just then arrived a friend of my 
 uncle, who had lately come to him from Spain ;t when 
 he saw that we were sitting down that I was even 
 reading he rebuked my mother for her patience, and 
 me for my blindness to the danger. Still I bent my- 
 
 * Epist. vii. 20. 
 
 t The elder Pliny had been Procurator in Spain. 
 A. C. Vol. XL B
 
 18 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 self as industriously as ever over my "book. It was 
 now seven o'clock in the morning, but the daylight 
 was still faint and doubtful. The surrounding build- 
 ings were now so shattered, that in the place where we 
 were, which though open was small, the danger that 
 they might fall on us was imminent and unmistakable. 
 So we at last determined to quit the town. A panic- 
 stricken crowd followed us. They preferred the ideas 
 of others to their own in a moment of terror this has 
 a certain look of prudence and they pressed on us and 
 drove us on, as we departed, by their dense array. 
 When we had got away from the building, we stopped. 
 There we had to en'dure the sight of many marvellous, 
 many dreadful things. The carriages which we had 
 directed to be brought out moved about in opposite 
 directions, though the ground was perfectly level ; 
 even when scotched with stones they did not remain 
 steady in the same place. Besides this, we saw the 
 sea retire into itself, seeming, as it were, to be driven 
 back by the trembling movement of the earth. The 
 shore had distinctly advanced, and many marine 
 animals were left high and dry upon the sands. Be- 
 hind us was a dark and dreadful cloud, which, as it 
 was broken with rapid zigzag flashes, revealed behind 
 it variously-shaped masses of flame : these last were 
 like sheet-lightning, though on a larger scale. Then 
 our friend from Spain addressed us more energetically 
 and urgently than ever. 'If your brother,' he said, 
 ' if your uncle is alive, he wishes you to be saved ; if 
 he has perished, he certainly wished you to survive 
 him. If so, why do you hesitate to escape ? ' We
 
 ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS. 19 
 
 answered that we could not bear to think about our 
 own safety while we were doubtful of his. He lingered 
 no longer, but rushed off, making his way out of the 
 danger at the top of his speed. It was not long before 
 the cloud that we saw began to descend upon the 
 earth and cover the sea. It had already surrounded 
 and concealed the island of Capreae, and had made 
 invisible the promontory of Misenum. My mother 
 besought, urged, even commanded me to fly as best I 
 could ; ' I might do so,' she said, ' for I was young ; 
 she, from age and corpulence, could move but slowly, 
 but would be content to die, if she did not bring 
 death upon me.' I replied that I would not seek 
 safety except in her company; I clasped her hand, 
 and compelled her to go with me. She reluctantly 
 obeyed, but continually reproached herself for delaying 
 me. Ashes now began to fall still, however, in small 
 quantities. I looked behind me ; a dense dark mist 
 seemed to be following us, spreading itself over the 
 country like a cloud. ' Let us turn out of the way,' 
 I said, 'whilst we can still see, for fear that should 
 we fall in the road we should be trodden under foot in 
 the darkness by the throngs that accompany us.' "We 
 had scarcely sat down when night was upon us, not 
 such as we have when there is no moon, or when the 
 sky is cloudy, but such as there is in some closed room 
 when the lights are extinguished. You might hear 
 the shrieks of women, the monotonous wailing of 
 children, the shouts of men. Many were raising their 
 voices, and seeking to recognise by the voices that 
 replied, parents, children, husbands, or wives. Some
 
 20 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 were loudly lamenting their own fate, others the fate 
 of those dear to them. Some even prayed for death, in 
 their fear of what they prayed for. Many lifted their 
 hands in prayer to the gods ; more were convinced 
 that there were now no gods at all, and that the final 
 endless night of which we have heard had come upon 
 the world.* There were not wanting persons who 
 exaggerated our real perils with terrors imaginary or 
 wilfully invented. I remember some who declared 
 that one part of the promontory Misenum had fallen, 
 that another was on fire ; it was false, but they found 
 people to "believe them. It now grew somewhat light 
 again ; we felt sure that this was not the light of day, 
 but a proof that fire was approaching us. Fire there 
 was, but it stopped at a considerable distance from us ; 
 then came darkness again, and a thick heavy fall of 
 ashes. Again and again we stood up and shook them 
 off; otherwise we should have been covered by them, 
 and even crushed by the weight. I might boast that 
 not a sigh, not a word wanting in courage, escaped me, 
 even in the midst of peril so great, had I not been 
 convinced that I was perishing in company with the 
 universe, and the universe with me a miserable and 
 yet a mighty solace in death. At last the black mist I 
 had spoken of seemed to shade off into smoke or cloud, 
 and to roll away. Then came genuine daylight, and the 
 sun shone out with a lurid light, such as it is wont to 
 have in an eclipse. Our eyes, which had not yet re- 
 
 * This final annihilation of the universe, in which the gods 
 themselves would be included, was an idea common to the 
 classical and Scandinavian mythologies.
 
 ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS. 21 
 
 covered from the effects of fear, saw everything changed, 
 everything covered deep with ashes as if with snow. 
 We returned to Misenum, and, after refreshing ourselves 
 as best we could, spent a night of anxiety in mingled 
 hope and fear. Fear, however, was still the stronger 
 feeling ; for the trembling of the earth continued, while 
 many frenzied persons, with their terrific predictions, 
 gave an exaggeration that was even ludicrous to the 
 calamities of themselves and of their friends. Even 
 then, in spite of all the perils which we had experienced 
 and which we still expected, we had not a thought of 
 going away till we could hear news of my uncle." 
 
 This account, though sufficiently vivid in its descrip- 
 tion of the feelings and demeanour of the writer and 
 his companions, is scarcely satisfactory as a narrative 
 of facts. The writer does not tell us in what direction 
 the fugitives proceeded, though we may gather, from 
 what he says about the island of Capreae having become 
 invisible, that they advanced along the shore of the 
 Bay, and therefore towards the immediate neighbour- 
 hood of the eruption. Caprese (Capri) would have 
 been naturally hidden by the high land of the pro- 
 montory from persons travelling in a northerly direc- 
 tion. Again, he says nothing about the time covered 
 by his narrative. But as he would probably have 
 mentioned the circumstance, had he passed a night in 
 the open air, we may suppose that he returned to the 
 villa at Misenum on the afternoon of the same day on 
 which he had quitted it, this day being the 25th of 
 August. The promontory is about twenty miles dis- 
 tant from Vesuvius, and the strong north wind which
 
 22 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 was blowing during the day would have helped to clear 
 the atmosphere. At Stabise, on the opposite side of the 
 Bay, and much nearer to the mountain, the effects of the 
 eruption lasted longer. The body of the elder Pliny 
 was found, we are told, " on the morning of the third 
 day from that which he had last seen." This day 
 " which he had last seen " must have been the 24th,* 
 that on which he quitted his house ; for though he was 
 alive on the morning of the next, we are told that every- 
 thing was wrapt in darkness. If we follow the inclu- 
 sive reckoning by which the Romans, with other nations 
 of antiquity, commonly counted their days, we infer 
 that it was found possible to revisit Stabiae, and to 
 search for the corpse, on the morning of the 26th.t 
 It is natural to suppose that when the first violence of 
 the eruption had been spent, the lighter showers of 
 ashes might continue to fall on the southern side of 
 the Bay. That much, however, could not have fallen, 
 may be inferred from what is said about the finding 
 of the body. 
 
 A more remarkable omission, as at first sight it ap- 
 pears to be, is the absence of any allusion to the fearful 
 event which the mention of the first eruption at once 
 suggests to us the destruction of the cities of Hercu- 
 
 * Epist. vi. 16, 20. 
 
 t The most obvious illustration of this reckoning is to be 
 found in the narrative of the resurrection of our Lord. Accord- 
 ing to the accounts of the evangelists, He was buried in the 
 evening of Friday, and left the grave before dawn on Sunday, 
 being said " to rise again on the third day, " and even a much 
 stronger expression to have "been three days and three nights 
 in the earth."
 
 ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS. 23 
 
 laneum and Pompeii. They were both, it is true, 
 places of third-rate importance a fact which we are 
 apt to lose sight of in the singular interest which they 
 possess for us. Nevertheless the catastrophe would 
 have been certainly noticed by our author if it had 
 been his business, at the time of writing, to do so. 
 But both of the letters, of which we have been making 
 use in this chapter, were written in compliance with 
 definite requests on the part of his correspondent. 
 Tacitus, who was then collecting materials for his 
 History, a work which was to include the period from 
 the accession of Galba to the death of Domitian, first 
 asked his friend for an account of the last hours of his 
 uncle. A casual phrase in the letter which this 
 request called forth, suggested to the historian- that his 
 friend's personal experiences would be of interest and 
 value. With these, accordingly, a second letter sup- 
 plied him. The particulars of the most important inci- 
 dent in the eruption the destruction of the cities he 
 obtained elsewhere. In the prefatory chapters of the 
 History, he mentions, among the events which he 
 will have to record, "disasters," as he expresses it, 
 " either entirely novel or that recurred only after a long 
 succession of ages," that " cities in the richest plains of 
 Campania were swallowed up and overwhelmed." Un- 
 happily this portion of the work has been lost. The 
 consequence is, that we are left without any contempo- 
 rary account of the calamity. An epigram of Martial, 
 written about twelve years after the event, and the 
 words which have been quoted from Tacitus, are the 
 only allusions that we find till we come to Dion
 
 24 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 Cassius, a Greek rhetorician of the third century. He 
 tells us, amidst other particulars, real or fabulous, that 
 the matter sent forth from Vesuvius buried two cities, 
 Herculaneum and Pompeii, while the population was 
 sitting in the theatre. Modern research informs us 
 that Herculaneum was overwhelmed by a torrent of 
 liquid mud, which issued from the volcano,* and that 
 Pompeii was buried under showers of ashes and stones. 
 The destruction of Stabiae was not so complete, and it 
 appears to have been soon occupied again. 
 
 * According to Professor Phillips, there is no evidence to 
 prove that any lava-streams descended from the mountain in 
 the eruption of A.D. 79.
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 REIGN OP TERROR DOMITIAN's LAST DAYS BANISH- 
 MENT OP THE PHILOSOPHERS. 
 
 DOMITIAN succeeded his brother Titus in A.D. 81. 
 His reign of fifteen years is one of considerable interest, 
 and it is most unfortunate that the portion of the His- 
 tory of Tacitus which described it is lost to us. Its 
 early years were not without glory for the empire. 
 Agricola's campaigns in Britain ended in the complete 
 subjugation of the country to the Eoman sway. The 
 formidable German tribes were at least cowed by an 
 expedition undertaken by the Emperor in person ; and 
 though men secretly laughed at his assumption of the 
 surname Gennanicus, it appears on the whole probable 
 that the northern frontiers of the empire were effectu- 
 ally strengthened. A perilous war, accompanied by some 
 terrible reverses to the Eoman arms, was also waged 
 (A.D. 86-90) with the Dacians, a Thracian tribe on the 
 Lower Danube, whose settlements almost coincided with 
 Transylvania, and parts of Moldavia and Wallachia. 
 Home, from the time of Augustus, had found them 
 troublesome and dangerous neighbours. On this occa-
 
 26 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 sion a Roman legion and its commander were destroyed 
 by them. In A.D. 90 they were pressed hard by an 
 able Roman general, and peace was at length con- 
 cluded, without, however, any extension of the frontier, 
 and on terms which were by no means honourable to 
 Rome. Trajan subsequently, after two successful cam- 
 paigns, annexed the country to the empire. Pliny, as 
 we shall see, speaks of this second Dacian war in one 
 of his letters as full of picturesque incidents. He is 
 writing to one of his literary friends, who intended to 
 describe it in an epic poem. 
 
 There is, perhaps, hardly a more hateful name in 
 history than that of Domitian. Yet the first part of 
 his reign was not without promise. During this period 
 Pliny was assiduously practising at the bar, and rising 
 into fame as an advocate. He lived in the best liter- 
 ary society of Rome. After the conclusion of the 
 Dacian war in A.D. 90, the Emperor began to show in 
 his government the worst side of his character. He 
 had been a bad son and a bad brother; he seemed 
 now bent on making himself the most detestable of 
 rulers. There can be no doubt that there was a taint 
 of actual madness about both Caligula and Nero, which 
 must be taken into account in passing judgment on 
 them. Domitian was a man of considerable ability 
 and culture, and of perfectly sane, mind, and in all his 
 cruelty and wickedness there was an intelligible pur- 
 pose. With the year A.D. 93, when Pliny would be 
 in his 32d year, a reign of terror began, which lasted 
 to A.D. 96, the date of Domitian's death. These three 
 years were perhaps the most dreadful period in Roman
 
 A REIGN OF TERROR. 27 
 
 history. In A.D. 93 the great Agricola died, and it 
 was the popular belief that he had been poisoned by 
 the Emperor. At any rate his death was the begin- 
 ning of a series of the most horrible judicial murders. 
 In the opening of his History, Tacitus speaks of these 
 years as a period in which " even peace was full of 
 horrors." " The sea," he says, " was crowded with 
 exiles, and its rocks were polluted with bloody deeds. 
 In the capital were yet more dreadful cruelties. No- 
 bility, wealth, the refusal or the acceptance of office, 
 were grounds of accusation, and virtue insured destruc- 
 tion. The rewards of the informers were no less odious 
 than their crimes ; for while some seized on consulships 
 and priestly offices as their share of the spoil, others on 
 procuratorships and posts of more confidential autho- 
 rity, they robbed and plundered in every direction amid 
 universal hatred and terror. Slaves were bribed to 
 turn against their masters, and freedmen to betray their 
 patrons ; and those who had no personal enemy were 
 destroyed by friends." In his Life of Agricola, he con- 
 trasts Nero with Domitian, to the advantage of the for- 
 mer. "Nero," he says, "ordered cruelties to be commit- 
 ted, but did not himself witness them. UnderDomitian, 
 what crowned our misery was to see the tyrant, and 
 to be seen by him, and to have our very sighs noted 
 down against us as evidences of guilt." In that terri- 
 ble year, A.D. 93, Pliny was praetor, an office which 
 involved a seat in the senate. " I was," he says, 
 in his panegyric of Trajan, " promoted to office by 
 Domitian before he openly professed a hatred of all 
 good men ; when he had done so, I sought no further
 
 28 PLINY'S LETTERS, 
 
 advancement." Senators were proscribed, and, as we 
 have seen had been done before by Vespasian, the phi- 
 losophers were banished from Eome, " in order that," 
 as Tacitus says, in his introduction to the Life of 
 Agricola, " nothing noble and virtuous might anywhere 
 confront men's view." Pliny had many friends among 
 the philosophers, and their society was altogether to 
 his taste. He tells us in one of his letters, that at the 
 tune when the edict was issued which drove them into 
 exile, he was himself staying in the house of one of 
 their number, close to Eome. This intimacy with mem- 
 bers of a proscribed class seems to have been an occa- 
 sion of danger to him during this dreadful time. " I 
 was," he says, in the letter above referred to, " so to 
 speak, scorched by the thunderbolts which fell around 
 me, and which struck down so many of my friends ; 
 and I augured from certain indications the same ruin 
 for myself." He explains his meaning in another 
 letter. " I should," he says, " have been the victim of 
 an impeachment, had Domitian lived longer. In his 
 portfolio was found a paper containing an information 
 against me by Carus." Carus Metius was one of the 
 class technically known as " delatores." Of these we 
 shall hear more presently. The " delator " was a man 
 who lived, and often rose to wealth and fame, as an 
 informer and false accuser. As we should suppose, 
 his trade was one likely to be fostered and encouraged 
 by imperialism, and was sure to flourish under a bad 
 emperor. He had prospered under Nero. He became 
 yet more prosperous and formidable under Domitian, 
 and was often a man of intellectual power, and had
 
 DEATH OF DOMIT1AN. 29 
 
 access to even the best society. Without such a 
 weapon the emperor's jealousy and malice would have 
 been almost powerless to do harm. Domitian used it 
 more systematically and mercilessly than any of his 
 predecessors. The result is described by Tacitus in 
 one of the opening chapters of his Life of Agricola. 
 " As a former age," he says, " witnessed the extreme 
 of freedom, so has ours witnessed the extreme of 
 slavery, for we were robbed of the very privilege of 
 interchanging our thoughts. Wo should have lost 
 memory as well as speech, had it been as possible for 
 us to forget as it was to keep silence." * 
 
 The reign of terror ended in A.D. 96. As Juvenal 
 tells us, the tyrant who was red with the blood of the 
 noblest families of Rome fell by the assassin's hand 
 when he became an object of dread to the artisan. A 
 promising future now opened on Pliny. 
 
 * Agricola, c. 45.
 
 CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 THE NEW AGE VENGEANCE ON THE INFORMERS 
 
 THE GREAT PROVINCIAL TRIALS. 
 
 THOUGH Pliny, as we have seen, had, lite his illus- 
 trious friend Tacitus, continued to take some part in 
 public life even during the last and worst part of the 
 reign of terror, he must have felt profoundly the relief 
 when the sword of Stephanus rid the civilised world 
 of the most dangerous tyrant it had ever known. He 
 had been on an intimate footing with some of the 
 most illustrious of Domitian's victims, and his own 
 name, as we have seen, would probably have been 
 added to the list. The strongest motives, therefore, 
 combined to induce him to share in the movement, 
 which was naturally the first impulse of the liberated 
 states, to exact from the informers, who had been the 
 most odious and deadly instruments of the fallen 
 despot, the just penalty for their crimes. One of the 
 earliest acts of the new reign had been formally to 
 suppress the whole class, though the gentleness, or per- 
 haps it should rather be said, the weakness, of Nerva, 
 induced him to shield from punishment some of the
 
 PMTUS AND ARR1A. 31 
 
 worst offenders. The first few days of recovered lib- 
 erty were spent in hunting down inferior criminals whom 
 no one cared to defend. Pliny took no part in these 
 hasty proceedings, hut reserved himself for a greater 
 effort. One of the most atrocious acts of Domitian's 
 reign had been the judicial murder of Priscus Hel- 
 vidius, with whom, as with many members of his 
 family, Pliny had been on terms of intimate friend- 
 ship. It was indeed a family of martyrs to liberty, 
 whose story well deserves to be told. To matron in 
 the best days of Rome had been more illustrious for 
 resolute courage than the first Arria. Pliny tells a 
 pathetic story of the fortitude with which she bore 
 and concealed from her husband, whose precarious 
 health demanded the effort, the death of her son, a 
 boy of singular beauty and promise how she brought 
 into the sick-chamber a face of unfailing cheerfulness, 
 and left, as he forcibly puts it, her bereavement out- 
 side the doors. This husband, Caecina Paetus by 
 name, afterwards took part in an unsuccessful insur- 
 rection in Ulyricum against the Emperor Claudius, and 
 was taken a prisoner to Eome. Arria, forbidden to 
 embark in the ship which carried him, followed in a 
 fishing-boat across a stormy and perilous sea. When 
 he was brought before Claudius, and found an adverse 
 witness in the wife of Scribonianus, the leader of the 
 movement, she broke forth in the scornful reproach, 
 " Shall I listen to you, you in whose lap Scribonianus 
 was killed, and who still endure to live?" Psetus, know- 
 ing that escape was hopeless, resolved to anticipate 
 his fate by suicide. In this noble resolution (for
 
 32 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 such, it seemed to a Eoman moralist) his wife sustained 
 him, taking the dagger in her hands, and teaching 
 him fortitude by stabbing herself, while she uttered 
 the words which the epigram of Martial has made 
 immortal, " P^ETE NON DOLET." * The constancy with 
 which, after her husband's death, she resolved to 
 put an end to her own life, seemed equally worthy 
 of praise : " I will find," she cried to the relatives 
 who sought to restrain her, " some road to death, 
 however : painful, if you thwart me in that which is 
 easy." The tradition of this courage was well pre- 
 served in the next generation by the second Arria, 
 daughter of the first, and by her husband Psetus Thrasea, 
 one of the most distinguished of the few men who ven- 
 tured to keep something of the old Eoman freedom 
 under the tyranny of Nero. When that bad prince, 
 after the murder of his mother Agrippina, wrote a letter 
 to the senate, informing it that the deceased had con- 
 spired against him and had been justly punished, 
 Psetus, unable to bear the shame of condoning such 
 a crime, rose from his place, and left the house. In 
 the next year he contrived to baffle the vengeance of the 
 tyrant upon one whom he accused of having libelled 
 him ; and he gave the final offence by refusing to 
 concur in the divine honours which were paid to 
 Poppaea, the Emperor's wife. The story of his last 
 hours is told in one of the most masterly passages, un- 
 happily imperfect in the existing copies, of the 'Annals ' 
 of Tacitus. His wife, Arria, who had wished to follow 
 the example of her mother, was persuaded, for the 
 * " Psetus, it does not hurt."
 
 PKISCUS HELVIDIUS. 33 
 
 sake of her daughter, to remain alive. This daughter, 
 Fannia by name, Thrasea had given to a man in whom 
 he had found a spirit singularly akin to his own, 
 Priscus Helvidius. The younger man shared to the 
 full his father-in-law's dangerous passion for liberty, 
 and was his companion at the feasts, at which he 
 quaffed, as Juvenal tells us, chaplet on head, his oldest 
 wine to the memories of great reptiblican heroes the 
 Brutus who had driven out the kings, his namesake 
 who had stabbed the dictator Caesar, and Cassius. 
 When Thrasea was dead, Nero seems to have been 
 satisfied with the banishment of Helvidius. From 
 this exile he returned when, with the accession of 
 Galba, a better day seemed to dawn. His first act was 
 to attack the accuser of his father-in-law, Eprius Mar- 
 cellus an attack which he repeated when Vespasian 
 came to the throne. He made enemies right and left 
 among the powerful class to which Marcellus belonged; 
 and his demeanour to the Emperor was so bold, we 
 may almost say so reckless, that these enemies were 
 not long in bringing about his ruin. He was banished 
 to one of the provincial towns of Italy, and an or- 
 der for his death which was, however, recalled when 
 it was too late soon followed him. Fannia, who 
 had accompanied him in his first and in his second 
 exile, returned to the capital, probably after the death 
 of Vespasian. In the evil days of Domitian she was 
 accused of having incited Senecio to write a pane- 
 gyric on her husband, and was banished for the third 
 time. By a former wife, whose name we do not 
 know, Helvidius had a son who bore the same name, 
 A. c. vol. xi.
 
 34 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 and who was among Pliny's most intimate friends. 
 He was a man of great ability, and he cherished the 
 principles which were dear to his father, but, warned 
 by his fate, he sought safety in avoiding public life. 
 The precaution was of no avail. The informers 
 found in a drama which had for its subject the loves 
 of Paris and CEnone an attack on the private life of 
 Domitian. No more atrocious crime was committed 
 even in these terrible days. Not only was the man 
 absolutely blameless, but the circumstances that at- 
 tended his death were peculiarly revolting. A scene of 
 violence to which Tacitus, who must have been pre- 
 sent on the occasion, alludes, not without shame, dis- 
 graced the senate - house. Helvidius was actually 
 dragged off to prison by some of the senators, among 
 whom one Publicius Certus was conspicuous. 
 
 It was on Certus that Pliny resolved to avenge the 
 death of his friend, and, we may say, the wrongs of a 
 whole family. He was bowed down at the time by a 
 severe domestic affliction, having lost his wife so re- 
 cently, that etiquette did not permit him to leave the 
 house. He sent, however, for Anteia, the widow of 
 Helvidius, and bade her communicate his purpose to 
 the two distinguished ladies, Arria and Fannia, who, 
 next to the widow, were the nearest relatives of the 
 murdered man. They had just returned from exile, 
 and they immediately signified their approval. At 
 the next meeting of the senate, Pliny commenced the 
 attack. Hia first sentences were heard with applause, 
 but as his purpose unfolded itself, a vigorous opposition 
 sprang up. Why was he raking up these old troubles ?
 
 PROSECUTION OF CERTUS. 35 
 
 Whom was he accusing in this irregular fashion ? Even 
 his friends sought to change his purpose, using especi- 
 ally the ominous threat that he was making himself a 
 marked man, whom future emperors would be sure to 
 distrust; and pointing to the powerful friends on whom 
 Certus relied to one especially who was then com- 
 manding a large army in the East, and who might, it 
 was thought, "be not indisposed to play the part of 
 another Vespasian. "When the opinion of the House 
 was called for, senator after senator, some of them 
 friends and connections of Pliny, expressed disapproval 
 of the proceeding. But two speakers supported him. 
 Avidius Quietus, who had been a close friend of Thrasea, 
 declared that the senate could not refuse to hear the 
 complaints of Arria and Eannia, and must regard not 
 the position but the conduct of the accused. Cornutus 
 Tertullus told the assembly that he had been appointed 
 guardian of the daughters of Helvidius, and pointed 
 out to it how moderate was the request of the com- 
 plainants, demanding as they did nothing more than 
 a public censure on the guilty man. Pliny, when it 
 came to his turn to reply, carried the senate with 
 him. Veiento, who indeed was deeply implicated in 
 the guilt of the informers, attempted to defend his 
 friend, but could barely make himself heard. The 
 presiding consul called for a division while he was 
 still attempting to speak, and he turned away mutter- 
 ing a line from Homer 
 
 " Old man, those younger warriors press thee sore." 
 It is true that the Emperor, when the resolution of the
 
 36 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 senate was sent up to him, took no action upon it. 
 The champion of Certus was among his intimate friends, 
 and while Veiento was in favour, Certus could scarcely 
 be punished. It is satisfactory to know that there was 
 not wanting a Roman of the old type to tell the truth 
 even to an emperor. " I wonder," said Nerva to his 
 guests at the dinner-table, when the conversation hap- 
 pened to turn on one of the informers, Catullus Messa- 
 linus " I wonder what would have happened to him 
 were he alive now." Catullus, who was blind, had 
 distinguished himself even in these days by a cruelty 
 peculiarly revolting and pitiless. "He would be dining 
 with us," said Junius Mauricus, one of the guests, with a 
 reference which could not be mistaken to Veiento, who 
 was reclining on the same couch with the Emperor. Cer- 
 tus, however, did not escape with entire impunity. The 
 consulship, to which he had been named, was bestowed 
 upon another man ; and he was superseded in his own 
 office of Prefect of the Treasury. Nor did he long 
 survive his disgrace. Pliny published a report of all 
 the speeches delivered upon the occasion. Very soon 
 after the appearance of the book Certus died. Pliny 
 was told and he hoped, for the sake of justice, that 
 the report was true that the guilty man fancied that 
 he saw the image of his accuser, sword in hand, per- 
 petually threatening him. 
 
 Arria seems to have died not long after her return 
 from exile, and a letter * of Pliny's leaves it in doubt 
 whether her daughter Fannia did not soon follow her. 
 At least he mentions her severe and dangerous illness, 
 
 * Epist. vii. 19.
 
 F ANN I A. 37 
 
 and deplores by anticipation the loss which it seemed 
 too likely the country was about to suffer. It is pleas- 
 ing to learn incidentally from this, the last notice that 
 we have of her, that her high courage was not 
 inconsistent with a very tender and womanly nature. 
 Her illness was the result of the ceaseless care with 
 which she had watched by the sick-bed of a kins- 
 woman of her husband, one of the Yestal Virgins. 
 The Virgins, when attacked by illness, were sent 
 away from the temple, and committed to the care of 
 some matron of high character. Fannia had at first 
 voluntarily undertaken, and afterwards been regularly 
 intrusted by the Pontiff with, the care of her relative. 
 " What purity is in thee," cries Pliny, " what holiness, 
 what dignity, what courage ! And, at the same time, 
 how pleasing she is, and how courteous ! one who can 
 be loved a rare excellence this as kind as she is 
 respected. ... I reverenced, I loved both mother 
 and daughter ; I know not which I put first ; they had 
 no thought of any difference. They had my services in 
 prosperity, they had them in adversity. I was able 
 to console them in their exile, and I sought them when 
 they came back. Still I never made them an equal 
 return ; therefore I am the more desirous that the one 
 still left may be preserved to me, to give some more 
 opportunity of fulfilling my obligations. This is my 
 anxiety, as I write. If only some god will turn it into 
 joy, I shall not complain at having felt these fears." 
 With these wishes, of which we would gladly know the 
 issue, Fannia vanishes from our sight. It completes 
 the history of an unfortunate family when we learn
 
 38 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 that the two daughters of Helvidius died in child- 
 bed. 
 
 The early years of Trajan were signalised by the 
 punishment which overtook another class of offenders, 
 the rapacious governors of the provinces. One of the 
 most notorious of these was Marius Priscus,* to whose 
 name Juvenal has given an evil immortality in one of 
 his most pregnant lines, in which he ironically warns 
 his friend that he must not expect much plunder when 
 the provinces had already been squeezed to the utmost, 
 " when Marius has just stripped his slender Africans 
 to the skin." The Africa which Priscus had robbed was 
 a fertile province, including the northern shore of the 
 continent for a length of about 300 miles, now known 
 as Tunis and part of Algiers, and important to the 
 capital as supplying it with a great part of the wheat 
 which Italy could no longer produce. But Marius 
 had been something more than an ordinary robber. 
 He had received bribes so at least his accusers alleged 
 for bringing about the condemnation and death of 
 innocent men. One Yitellius Honoratus had bought 
 from him, for a sum of 2500 in our money, the 
 banishment of a Roman knight and the execution of 
 seven of his associates. Another man, Flavius Marti- 
 anus by name, had paid 6000 for a similar equiva- 
 lent. Here again the victim was a Roman knight. 
 He had been beaten with clubs, then condemned to 
 the mine, and finally strangled in prison. Marius, 
 anxious to avoid exposure, did not attempt to defend 
 himself against the charges of rapacity and extortion, 
 
 * See Epist. ii. 11, 12.
 
 A STATE TRIAL AT ROME. 39 
 
 but, so far confessing his guilt, begged the senate to 
 appoint arbitrators who should estimate the amount to 
 be refunded. The province had employed as its coun- 
 sel the two friends, Pliny and Tacitus. They opposed 
 the request. The crimes of the accused had, they said, 
 been too atrocious to admit of such a settlement. The 
 senate decided that the arbitrators should be appointed, 
 but that the accusers should have liberty to substan- 
 tiate, if they could, the other charge. The accomplices 
 of Priscus were summoned to attend. Honoratus died 
 before he could be brought before the senate, but 
 Martianus was produced. After one adjournment, 
 made for the purpose of bringing the two accused to- 
 gether, the cause was heard. It was the time the 
 month of January when the capital was especially 
 crowded, and the senators attended in unusual numbers. 
 The Emperor himself presided in his capacity of con- 
 sul. Pliny, though he had had much experience as 
 an advocate, felt nervous and anxious. Priscus had 
 been consul, and had belonged to one of the sacred 
 colleges; he had been already found guilty of extor- 
 tion, and it might seem to be pressing hard on a fallen 
 man to bring against him further charges. The speech, 
 however, was a great success. It lasted for nearly 
 five hours. The Emperor showed his personal interest 
 in the orator by more than once suggesting to the 
 freedman who stood behind him, that he should warn 
 his master against an over-exertion to which his some- 
 what feeble frame was not equal. Pliny was followed 
 by other advocates on both sides, and the senate was 
 twice adjourned. A great part of the third day was
 
 40 PLINTS LETTERS. 
 
 occupied by reading over the evidence. Then came 
 the voting. Two propositions had been made. One 
 was, that Marius should pay into the treasury the 
 money received from Martianus, and should be ban- 
 ished from Rome and Italy, while the exile of Mar- 
 tianus was to extend also to Africa. The other was 
 identical as far as the money was concerned, but 
 limited the banishment of Martianus to five years, and 
 proposed to subject the principal offender to no further 
 penalties than he had incurred under the charge of 
 extortion. The severer sentence was ultimately adopted. 
 It seems to us monstrously inadequate to the offence 
 of the guilty man ; but such was the character of the 
 Eoman law, so stern against the slave and the foreigner, 
 so strangely mild in its dealings with citizens, even 
 when it had to avenge a citizen's wrongs. Marius 
 certainly suffered little from his sentence. He found 
 some pleasant retreat out of Italy, where, as Juvenal 
 tells us, exile though he was, he lived at ease* and 
 "basked in the wrath of heaven." Pliny, however, 
 seemed perfectly satisfied with the result of the trial, 
 though he complains of the action of the senate in one 
 which grew out of it, when the deputy of Marius had 
 to answer for his share in his principal's crimes. This 
 man, Hostilius Firminus by name, had managed the 
 disgraceful affair of Martianus, receiving a private 
 bribe of about 80 " perfume money " it had been 
 called ; not an inappropriate name, says Pliny, for a 
 
 * Literally, "he drank from two o'clock." To dine early 
 was the mark of wealth and luxury, as no business was trans- 
 acted after dinner. Juv. Sat. L 49.
 
 A PROVINCIAL TYRANT. 41 
 
 notorious fop. A proposition that lie should he de- 
 graded from the senate was rejected for the milder 
 alternative of passing over his name in allotting the 
 provincial governments. " What can he more ahsurd," 
 asks Pliny, " than that one whom the senate has cen- 
 sured should still sit in the senate 1 should have heen 
 excluded from the proconsulship for had hehaviour 
 while he was deputy, and yet sit in judgment on pro- 
 consuls 1 should have heen found guilty of peculation, 
 and yet have to condemn or acquit other men 1 Such 
 was the pleasure of the majority. Opinions, you know, 
 are numbered, not weighed : so it must always he in 
 a puhlic assemhly, where there is nothing so unequal 
 as equality." The sensible Eomansaw clearly through 
 the specious fallacy of " universal suffrage." 
 
 It would be tedious to relate at length the course of 
 another trial, or rather series of trials, of a similar kind, 
 in which Pliny was engaged about this time. During 
 the year in which Africa had heen suffering under the 
 exactions of Priscus, Baetica, one of the divisions of 
 Further Spain, had found a worse tyrant in Caecilius 
 Classicus.* Curiously enough, Priscus was a native of 
 Spain, Classicus of Africa ; and the unlucky Spaniards 
 consoled themselves by a melancholy jest upon the 
 coincidence, " we have got as good as we gave." 
 Classicus was an open and notorious offender. He had 
 had the impudence regularly to enter in his books how 
 much every disgraceful affair had brought him in. 
 This interesting volume had been seized, as also had 
 been a letter to his mistress at Eome. " Hurrah ! " it 
 
 * Epist. iii. 9.
 
 42 . PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 said, "Hurrah! I am coining to you a free man; I have 
 sold up half these fellows in the province, and have 
 cleared two-and-thirty thousand pounds." Classicus, 
 however, was beyond the reach of justice. He was 
 dead it was more than suspected by his own hand. 
 But other criminals were left, and the province deter- 
 mined to press the charge against them. They were 
 tried, not before the senate, but before juries appointed 
 by that body, and in batches. The prosecution, for 
 which Pliny appeared, had no difficulty in proving 
 agency the facts themselves were notorious. The de- 
 fence was, that the agency had been under compulsion. 
 Pliny was successful ; and though the immediate rela- 
 tives of Classicus his wife, daughter, and son-in-law 
 had been included in the indictment were acquitted, 
 many of his accomplices were condemned, and visited 
 with punishment, utterly inadequate, as it seems to 
 us, but yet considered at the time sufficiently severe. 
 An incident of the trial deserves mention, for its bear- 
 ing on the subject of the earlier part of the chapter. 
 One of the witnesses turned upon Norbanus Licinianus, 
 an official whom the province had employed to assist 
 in the case against his late superior, and accused him 
 of what we should call " compounding a felony," by 
 entering into a corrupt understanding with the wife of 
 Classicus. The wrath of the senate blazed up in a 
 moment. The man had plied the trade of an informer 
 in the days of Domitian. Old charges, not relevant, 
 as far as can be seen, to the matter in hand, were 
 brought against him among them, one that he had cor- 
 rupted one of the jurymen on a former trial. Licini-
 
 NORBANUS LICINIANUS. 43 
 
 anus was visited with a severer sentence than any that 
 we hear of elsewhere. He was banished to an island. 
 There must have been some solid stuff in the man, if, 
 as Pliny tells us without knowing whether to call such 
 conduct courage or impudence, he continued to perform 
 his part in the great cause of which his own trial had 
 been an interlude, without flinching, to the end.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE ROMAN BAR PLINY's PRACTICE IN THE COURT 
 OP THE HUNDRED REQULUS. 
 
 PLINY, as we have said, gained early distinction by 
 practice as an advocate. The bar had long been an 
 honourable profession at Rome, and the way to wealth 
 and high office. In theory, the Roman counsel gave 
 his services gratuitously; his remuneration consisted 
 in presents from his clients, which, however, in pro- 
 cess of time, came to be commuted into regular fees. 
 A law' was passed in 204 B.C., forbidding such fees 
 to be received, and it was confirmed during the reign 
 of Augustus by a decree of the senate. Under the 
 reigns of his successors it seems to have been syste- 
 matically evaded, and occasional attempts to revive 
 it proved failures. The law, in fact, must have be- 
 come a dead letter ; and all that was done to check 
 the supposed evils of hired advocacy was to limit the 
 amount which a counsel might receive. This, as we 
 have it from Tacitus and from Pliny, was fixed at 
 about 80, and it was understood to be illegal for an 
 advocate to receive this fee till he had actually rendered 
 his services. It seems, however, hardly likely that such
 
 PRACTICE AT THE ROMAN BAR. 45 
 
 a regulation could have been strictly enforced. The 
 lawyers, we may be sure, were too useful and influential 
 a class to be tied down by any such artificial arrange- 
 ment. Tacitus mentions an instance of a fee of some- 
 thing like 3500 having been once paid by a Eoman 
 knight. Senators of moderate fortune had always been 
 in the habit of increasing their means by practice at the 
 bar; and though, from time to time, they might grossly 
 abuse their opportunities by shameless rapacity, it was 
 on the whole felt to be expedient to put as little legal 
 restraint on them as possible. Pliny very clearly 
 implies in one of his letters that it must be left to 
 public opinion to adjust the relations between advo- 
 cates and their clients. 
 
 It was, as we have seen, at the end of Vespasian's 
 reign that Pliny entered on the profession of the bar, 
 and it would seem that he continued it during the 
 reigns of Titus and Domitian. He was well off", but 
 by no means so rich as many men of his time ; and 
 he, no doubt, found in the pursuit of the law the 
 surest road to wealth and official rank. The court in 
 which he began to practise, and with which indeed he 
 seems chiefly to have been connected, was distinguished 
 as the Court of the Hundred. Its precise functions are 
 not clearly known to us ; it is, however, certain that 
 it had to decide a great number of important civil 
 matters, and that various questions concerning owner- 
 ship and the devolution of property were brought 
 before it. Pliny frequently alludes to it, and in the 
 following letter describes some peculiar and amusing 
 practices to which young aspirants to legal fame were
 
 46 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 not ashamed to stoop. The letter is addressed to his 
 friend Maximus : * 
 
 " Your conjecture is correct ; I am at present quite 
 overworked with cases in the Hundred Court, which 
 give me more occupation than pleasure. Most of 
 them are paltry and insignificant, for we seldom get a 
 case in which a distinguished person or an important 
 matter is involved. Besides, only a few of the coun- 
 sel are men with whom it is any satisfaction to hold a 
 brief ; the rest are an impudent set, and many of them 
 are unknown young men, who come into the court to 
 make a speech by way of practice ; and they do it with 
 so little respect for their profession, and so recklessly, 
 that I think my friend Atilius has very correctly said, 
 that boys make a beginning at the bar with cases in 
 the Hundred Court, just as they begin their school 
 studies with Homer. At the bar, as at school, the 
 most important study is the first entered on. Before 
 my time, so my seniors tell me, even the noblest 
 youths could find no place in court unless they were 
 introduced by a man of consular rank ; so great was 
 the respect with which the most honourable of all 
 professions was regarded. Now all the barriers of 
 modesty and reverence are broken down, and instead 
 of being introduced, they thrust themselves into the 
 court. They have an audience like themselves, reg- 
 ularly hired for the occasion ; a speculator contracts 
 to supply them; presents are passed to them quite 
 openly in the court, and they go for the same hire from 
 court to court. Yesterday two young slaves of mine 
 * Epist. ii. 14.
 
 THE ROMAN BAR. 47 
 
 were dragged off to applaud somebody, at half-a-crown 
 apiece. Such is the price of the highest eloquence. 
 For this you may fill a number of benches, collect a 
 crowd, and have a burst of cheering as soon as ever 
 the leader of the chorus has given his signal. Those 
 who don't understand, and who are not even listening, 
 must have a signal given them. Most of them pay no 
 attention, and these very persons cheer the most loudly. 
 If you ever have occasion to go through the colonnade 
 in which the court is held, and wish to know how the 
 different speakers acquit themselves, you need not go 
 on to the raised platform where the judges sit you 
 need not listen to the speeches ; it is easy enough to 
 give a right guess, for you may be sure that the man 
 who is most loudly cheered is the worst speaker. 
 Largius Licinus was the first to introduce this fashion, 
 but he only went round to people, and begged them to 
 come to the court and hear the speeches. This, at 
 any rate, is what I remember to have been told by my 
 tutor, Quintilian. ' I used,' he said, ' to attend on the 
 famous pleader Domitius Afer, and to go with him into 
 court. Once, when he was speaking in his usual slow 
 and impressive manner before the Hundred, he heard 
 close to him a great and strange noise. He paused in 
 astonishment. As soon as it ceased, he resumed the 
 thread of his argument, when the noise was repeated. 
 He again paused, and, when silence was restored, for 
 the third time continued his speech. At last he 
 asked, who was speaking ] The reply was, Licinus. 
 Upon this he broke off the case, and addressing the 
 judges, said, " My profession, gentlemen, is at an end."'
 
 48 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 Indeed, for many other reasons, the profession of the 
 bar was on its way to ruin at the time when Afer 
 thought it was wholly ruined. Now, it is certain that 
 it is all over with it. I am ashamed to tell you of 
 the mincing and affected pronunciation of the speakers, 
 and of the shrill - voiced applause with which their 
 speeches are received. All that is wanted to complete 
 the performance is the clapping of hands, and the 
 noise of drums and cymbals ; even the wildest shout- 
 ing (for there is no other phrase to describe a style 
 of cheering which would be unseemly in a theatre) is 
 a frequent accompaniment. For myself, a regard for 
 the benefit of my friends, and my comparative youth, 
 still keep me to my professional work ; for I am afraid 
 that people would think that I had given up a labori- 
 ous occupation rather than simply avoided such dis- 
 graceful scenes. However, I go into court less fre- 
 quently than was my wont, and this is a beginning of 
 gradual retirement from practice." 
 
 Pliny's practice in this court had brought him into 
 contact with one of the worst and most notorious speci- 
 mens of the informer class. This was Regulus, who 
 is the subject of frequent allusions in these letters. 
 He had laid the foundations of a successful career in 
 Nero's reign, and had continued to struggle out of ob- 
 scure poverty into immense wealth and high social 
 position. Under Vespasian and Titus he must have 
 been obliged to content himself with simply living on 
 his ill-gotten gains; but the last years of Domitian 
 raised him to the very highest pinnacle of prosperity. 
 He became a prince among millionaires, and a terror
 
 THE INFORMER REGULUS. 49 
 
 to all good men. It is painful to find such a man 
 the object of the grossest flatteries from the poet Mar- 
 tial, and it shows how a man of real genius could 
 become morally debased under the sinister influences 
 of that bad time. To the infamous trade of a false 
 accuser Eegulus added the practice of the arts of the for- 
 tune-hunter, which he plied with the most shameless 
 assiduity. Pliny's stories about him illustrate a curi- 
 ous phase of Roman life. The following letters (of 
 which we give the substance) show us the manner of 
 man that he was, and may be supposed to indicate the 
 general character of his class. 
 
 PLINY TO VOCONIUS BOMANUS.* 
 
 " Did you ever see a man more cowed, more down 
 in the mouth, than Eegulus since Domitian's death ? 
 His crimes under Domitian were quite as bad as those 
 under Nero, but they were less easy of detection. He 
 began to fear I was angry with him, and so indeed I 
 was. He had done his best to imperil Rusticus Aru- 
 lenus ; he openly rejoiced at his death, and even 
 published a book in which he abused him, and called 
 him ' an ape of Stoic philosophers.' He made such 
 a savage attack on Herennius Senecio that Metius 
 Car us said to him, ' What have you to do with my 
 victims ? Did I ever attack Crassus or Camerinus 1 ' 
 These were men whom Regulus had accused and ruined 
 in Nero's reign. He thought I was indignant at all 
 this ; and so, when he gave a reading to a select circle 
 out of the book he had published, he did not invite me. 
 
 * Epist. i. 5. 
 A. C. Vol. xi. D
 
 50 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 He remembered, too, what a savage attack he had 
 once made on me in the Court of the Hundred. I 
 was counsel for Arrionilla, a case which I had under- 
 taken at the request of Arulenus. I had Regulus 
 against me. In one part of the case I laid much stress 
 on an opinion given by Modestus, an excellent man, 
 who was then by Domitian's order in banishment. 
 Up jumps Regulus, and says to me, ' Pray, what view 
 do you take of the character of Modestus ? ' It would, 
 you see, have been very dangerous to me to have 
 replied, ' I think well of him ; ' it would have been 
 an infamous thing to have said the contrary. Well, I 
 really believe that Providence helped me out of the 
 scrape. ' I will answer your question,' I replied, ' if 
 this is the matter on which the court is about to 
 pronounce judgment.' He could say nothing. I was 
 praised and congratulated for having avoided com- 
 promising my credit by a safe but discreditable answer, 
 and for having escaped the snare of such an invidious 
 question. He was thoroughly frightened, and rushes 
 up to Csecilius Celer and Fabius Justus, and begs them 
 to reconcile us. This was not enough for him; he 
 goes off to Spurinna, and, with that cringing manner 
 which he always has when he is frightened, he says to 
 him, ' Pray, go and call on Pliny the very first thing 
 in the morning (be sure you do this, for I can't endure 
 my anxiety any longer), and do your best to prevail 
 on him not to be angry with me.' I had risen early ; 
 there comes a message from Spurinna to this effect, 
 ' I am coming to see you.' I sent back word, ' I am 
 myself coming to you.' Well, we meet on the way in
 
 THE INFORMER REQULUS. , 51 
 
 Livia's portico ; Spurinna explains the wishes of Eegu- 
 lus, and adds his own entreaties, as you would expect 
 from a very good man on behalf of one wholly unlike 
 himself. I replied to him, ' You will yourself clearly 
 perceive what message you think had best be sent 
 back to Eegulus ; you ought not to be misled by me. 
 I am waiting the return of Mauricus (he had not yet 
 come back from exile); I can't give you an answer 
 either way, because I mean to do whatever he decides 
 on, for he ought to be my leader in this matter, and I 
 ought to be simply his follower.' A few days after- 
 wards, Eegulus met me at one of the prsetor's levees ; 
 he kept close to me, and begged me to give him a 
 private interview. He then told me he was afraid 
 that a remark he had once made in the Court of the 
 Hundred still rankled in my mind. The remark, he 
 said, was made when he was replying as counsel to 
 myself and to Satrius Eufus, and was this ' Satrius 
 Eufus, who does not attempt to rival Cicero, and who 
 is content with the eloquence of our own day.' My 
 answer to him was ' I see now that you meant it ill- 
 naturedly, because you admit it yourself; but your 
 remark might have been taken as intended to be 
 complimentary. I do try to rival Cicero, and I am 
 not content with the eloquence of our own day. It is, 
 I think, the height of folly not to propose to one's self 
 the best pattern for imitation. But how comes it that 
 you remember this circumstance so distinctly, and 
 have forgotten the occasion in court when you asked 
 me what was my opinion of the loyalty of Modestus 1 ' 
 Pale as he always looks, he then turned as pale as
 
 52 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 death, and stammered out that he asked the question, not 
 to hurt me, but to hurt Modestus. Note the fellow's 
 vindictive cruelty; he actually confessed to himself 
 that he wished to do an injury to one in exile. He 
 added an admirable reason for his conduct. ' Modes- 
 tus,' he said, ' in a letter written by him which was 
 read out before Domitian, used the following expression 
 Regulus, of all two-footed creatures the wickedest.' 
 And Modestus was perfectly right. This ended our 
 conversation. I did not wish to go further in the 
 matter, or to tie my hands in any way, till Mauricus 
 had returned. I am very well aware that Regulus is 
 a formidable person. He is rich, influential, courted 
 by many, feared by many, and to be feared often does 
 more for a man than to be loved." 
 
 The following letter, written after the death of 
 Regulus, describes some of the eccentric devices by 
 which he endeavoured to render his pleading in court 
 more effective. 
 
 PLINY TO ARRIANUS.* 
 
 " Sometimes I miss Regulus in our courts. I cannot 
 say I deplore his loss. My reason for missing him is, 
 that he really respected his profession, that he bestowed 
 infinite labour on it, made himself pale with study 
 and anxiety, wrote out his speeches, though he could 
 not get them by heart. He had a queer practice of 
 painting round his right eye if he was counsel for the 
 plaintiff, his left if he was for the defendant ; of wear- 
 ing a white patch on his forehead; of asking the 
 * Epist. vL 1.
 
 DECLINE OF THE BAR. 53 
 
 soothsayers what the issue of the action would be, and 
 so forth. Yet all this eccentricity was really due to 
 his extreme earnestness in his profession. There was 
 another thing which was very acceptable to the counsel 
 who were engaged with him. He asked for unlimited 
 time in speaking, and he got together an audience. 
 What could be pleasanter than to be able to speak as 
 long as you liked before a full court, when the odium 
 of the whole arrangement rested with another 1 Still, 
 at any rate, Regulus has done well in ridding the 
 world of his presence ; and he would have done better 
 had he done it sooner. As things are now, he really 
 might have lived without hurt to the state under an 
 emperor in whose time he could not possibly do 
 mischief. And so one may very properly feel that 
 one sometimes misses him. Since his death it has 
 become an established practice for the court to give, 
 and for the counsel to ask, a limited time for the 
 pleadings. For both those who plead wish to have 
 done with it rather than to go on speaking, and the 
 judges who hfear the- case are anxious to decide it 
 rather than to continue sitting on the bench. Such 
 neglect, such apathy in a word, such utter indifference 
 as to our professional duties has come over us. Are 
 we wiser than our ancestors, or is our practice more 
 just and reasonable than the law itself, which liberally 
 grants ever so many hours, and days, and adjourn- 
 ments? Are we to consider them dull and beyond 
 measure tedious, and to fancy that we speak more 
 clearly, understand more readily, decide matters with 
 more scrupulous care, because we get through cases in
 
 54 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 fewer hours than they took days ? Begulus ! it 
 was by zeal in your profession that you secured an 
 advantage which is but rarely given to the highest 
 integrity. For my own part, whenever I have to hear 
 a case (and this I do oftener than I plead), I give 
 the greatest amount of time which any counsel asks. 
 It is, I think, rash to try to conjecture to what length a 
 cause yet to be tried is likely to run, and to set a limit 
 to an affair the extent of which is unknown to you. 
 The very first duty which a judge owes to his position 
 is to have that patience which constitutes an important 
 part of justice. Even superfluous matter had better 
 be brought forward than any really necessary point 
 be omitted. Besides, it is impossible to say whether 
 it is superfluous till you have heard it." 
 
 The following letter shows up Regulus in his char- 
 acter of a fortune-hunter : 
 
 PLINY TO CALVISIUS.* 
 
 " I have a first-rate story for you, or rather two 
 stories for the one, which is quite fresh, reminded me 
 of the other. It makes no difference with which I 
 begin. Verania, Piso's wife (I mean the Piso adopted 
 by the Emperor Galba), was seriously ill. Eegulus 
 pays her a visit. Think of the man's brazen impu- 
 dence in calling on her in her illness, when he had 
 been her husband's bitterest enemy, and was utterly 
 hated by the lady herself ! It would have been bad 
 enough if he had confined himself to a mere call. He 
 * Epist. iL 20.
 
 A ROMAN FORTUNE-HUNTER, 55 
 
 actually sat down by her bedside, and asked her the 
 day and the hour of her birth. When she had told 
 him, he looks very grave, fixes his eyes on her, moves 
 his lips, makes passes with his fingers, and goes through 
 a calculation. After keeping the unhappy woman for 
 a long while in suspense, he says, ' You are at a perilous 
 crisis of your life, but you will recover. To convince 
 you of this, I will consult an augur whose art I have 
 often tested.' Without a moment's delay, he had a 
 sacrifice offered up, and he declares that the victim's 
 entrails present signs exactly agreeing with what may be 
 inferred from the stars. The lady, whose danger made 
 her credulous, asks for some writing-paper, and puts 
 down in her will a legacy for Regulus. Very soon she 
 becomes worse ; and, as she is dying, she calls the man 
 a rogue, a treacherous and worse than perjured villain, 
 because he had actually sworn falsely to her by his 
 son's life. It is a practice of Eegulus, as wicked as it 
 is frequent, to call down the wrath of heaven, which he 
 so often invokes to witness a lie, on the head of his 
 unhappy son. 
 
 " Velleius Bleesus the wealthy man, I mean, who 
 rose to the consulship was in his last illness, and 
 wished to alter his will. Eegulus, who hoped to get 
 something out of the alteration, because he had of late 
 paid court to him, begged and implored the physicians 
 to lengthen his life by all possible means. When the 
 will had been signed and sealed, he changed his char- 
 acter and reversed his tone, and said to these same 
 physicians, ' How long do you mean to keep the un- 
 happy man in misery; why do you grudge one to
 
 56 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 whom you cannot give life, the happy release of death 1 ?' 
 Blaesus dies, and as if he had heard everything, leaves 
 Eegulus not a farthing. Are two stories enough for 
 you, or would you like to have a third, after the man- 
 ner of school exercises ? Well, I have got one for you. 
 Aurelia, an extremely elegant lady, when about to set 
 the seal to her will, had put on a remarkably hand- 
 some dress. Eegulus came to witness the signature, 
 and on his arrival he said to the lady, ' Pray, leave me 
 by your will the dress you have on.' Aurelia thought 
 the man was joking. Eegulus pressed the matter in 
 earnest, and, to cut my story short, he actually made 
 the lady open her desk, and add a clause to her will, 
 leaving him the dress. All the time she was writing 
 it, he kept his eye on her, and looked to see whether 
 she had really written it. The man gets bequests and 
 legacies just as if he deserved them. Why do I dwell 
 on such matters, when we are living in a country in 
 which wickedness and roguery have long been able to 
 command as great, nay, greater rewards than virtue and 
 honour 1 Look at Eegulus ; from abject poverty he 
 has made his way, by all sorts of rascality, to such 
 prodigious wealth that he himself told me that when 
 he asked an auguj how soon he should be able to 
 amass a fortune of half a million, he found that twice 
 that amount was promised him by the signs exhibited 
 by the victim's entrails. And he will get it, if he only 
 pursues his present course of making persons, when 
 they prepare their wills, add to them clauses which 
 they never intended to insert." 
 
 It would appear, from the two following letters
 
 REGULUS MOURNING FOR HIS SON. 57 
 
 \vhich describe his strange demeanour on the death 
 of his son, that Eegulus had all the extravagant 
 affectation which is sometimes found in the nouveaux 
 riches. 
 
 PLINY TO ATTIUS CLEMENS.* 
 
 " Eegulus has lost his son ; the only misfortune he 
 did not deserve, and I am not sure whether he thinks 
 it a misfortune. The hoy had quick parts, but one 
 could not be at all sure how he would turn out ; still, 
 he seemed to have a capacity for virtue, were he not 
 to grow up like his father. Eegulus gave him the legal 
 release from parental control, so that the lad might 
 become heir to his mother's property, and having done 
 this (I speak of the current rumours, based on the 
 man's character), he fawned on the lad with a disgust- 
 ing show of fond affection, which in a parent was 
 utterly out of place. Incredible, you will say, but 
 only consider the man. At any rate he deplores his 
 death in a most insane fashion. The boy had a num- 
 ber of ponies for riding and driving, of big and little 
 dogs, and a host of pet nightingales, parrots, and 
 blackbirds. All these Eegulus had slaughtered on 
 the funeral pile. It was not grief, but an ostentatious 
 parade of grief. A crowd of visitors throng to his 
 house. All hate and detest the man, and as if they 
 loved and esteemed him, they hurry to his doors and 
 hang round them, and, to tell you in a word what 
 I really think, in seeking to do Eegulus a kindness 
 they make themselves exactly like him. He keeps 
 * Epist. iv. 2.
 
 58 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 himself in his park on the other side the Tiber, where 
 he has built huge colonnades over a vast extent of 
 ground, and set up a number of his own statues on the 
 river-side ; for with all his intense avarice he is extra- 
 vagant, and in the midst of his infamy he loves fame. 
 At this very unhealthy time of year he is boring 
 society, and he feels pleasure and consolation in being 
 a bore. He says he wishes to marry a piece of per- 
 versity, like all his other conduct. You will soon hear 
 of the marriage of one who is in mourning, the mar- 
 riage of an old man. In the first case, it is too soon, 
 in the second, too late. You ask me the grounds of 
 my conjecture ; it is not because he says it himself, for 
 he is as false as false can be ; it is only because one 
 may be sure that Eegulus will do whatever is highly 
 improper." 
 
 PLINY TO CATIUS LEPIDUS.* 
 
 " I often tell you that Regulus has a certain force of 
 character. It is wonderful to see how he gets through 
 a thing to which he has applied himself. He made up 
 his mind to mourn the death of his son ; he is abso- 
 lutely unequalled as a mourner. It was his fancy to 
 get together an immense number of statues and pictures 
 of his son ; so he sends orders to all the sculptors and 
 painters, and has the boy represented on canvas, in 
 wax, bronze, silver, gold, ivory, marble, &c. &c. He 
 himself actually invited to his house a numerous 
 audience to hear him read his son's memoir the 
 * Epist. iv. 7.
 
 THE ENERGY OF REGULUS. 59 
 
 memoir of a mere boy. However, he read it ; he even 
 had a thousand copies made of it, and distributed 
 throughout Italy and the provinces. He had a public 
 notice put up, that the town-councils were to choose 
 out of their number the man with the best voice, to 
 read the book to the people. It was really done. Only 
 suppose he had used this force of character, or what- 
 ever you call this earnestness, in trying to get what one 
 wants, for better ends, and what good would he have 
 been able to accomplish ! There is, however, less of 
 this quality about the good than the bad, and as (to 
 quote Thucydides) ' folly genders confidence, while 
 thoughtfulness produces hesitation,' so modesty often 
 cripples the action of virtue, as effrontery strengthens 
 vice. Eegulus is an example. He has weak lungs, a 
 confused look, a stammering tongue, a slow and dull 
 imagination, no memory nothing in short but a sort 
 of frantic energy ; and yet by his impudence and mad 
 vehemence he has won the reputation of an orator. 
 Cato has a famous definition of an orator, which Her- 
 ennius Senecio has curiously reversed about Eegulus, 
 thus : ' An orator is a bad man who has no skill in 
 speaking.' Cato certainly has not more correctly 
 described the true orator than Senecio has hit off 
 Eegulus." 
 
 We now take leave of Eegulus. The tone of this 
 last letter looks as if Pliny's dislike of the man led 
 him to speak more contemptuously of him than facts 
 could have warranted him in doing. If Eegulus
 
 60 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 laboured under so many natural disadvantages, his 
 success in his profession must have implied a force of 
 character of a remarkably high order. He and many 
 of his class were no doubt morally as bad as it was 
 possible to be, but they were by no means intellec- 
 tually contemptible.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 MEN OF LETTERS AT ROME. 
 
 CIRCUMSTANCES combined to produce at Eome in the 
 days of the Empire a very considerable amount of 
 literary activity. For more than two centuries the 
 wealth of the whole civilised world had been pouring 
 into the capital. This influx had promoted the growth 
 of two things, which to the men of the old regime to 
 such Conservatives, for instance, asCato seemed equal- 
 ly odious, luxury and culture. The first impulse of the 
 monied class a class whose riches equalled, if they 
 did not surpass, even the largest fortunes of modern 
 times was to surround itself with the means of mate- 
 rial enjoyment and display. But it was not long before 
 more refined tastes began to be developed. Among 
 the spoils of the world with which a long series of 
 conquests had crowded the palaces of Eome, were to 
 be found the treasures of Hellenic civilisation manu- 
 scripts, pictures, and statues, the contents of the libra- 
 ries and museums which the Greek, almost invariably 
 a scholar as well as a soldier, had founded so plenti- 
 fully in Eastern Europe and Western Asia. "With
 
 62 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 these had come, in throngs which excited the wrath 
 and scorn of satirists like Juvenal, the teachers of 
 literature and art. From the decaying and impoverished 
 cities of the East they crowded to the place where a 
 nation of wealthy pupils was waiting to welcome and 
 to remunerate their services. At the same time, the 
 class which was thus so abundantly furnished with all 
 the appliances of culture, was profoundly affected in 
 its habits of life by the revolution which substituted an 
 empire for a republic. One great resource in which men 
 of wealth find occupation, which to our own monied 
 class, for instance, is so fascinating the devotion to 
 public affairs ceased to be available at Rome. Men 
 were still selected, indeed, from the highest nobility 
 to fill the offices of proconsul and praetor in the pro- 
 vinces; and at Rome the old magistracies of the republic 
 and the senate still remained, though they had but 
 the shadow of their former dignity. But politics had 
 ceased to furnish a profession. Tacitus complains of the 
 men of his time, that they were as ignorant about their 
 country as if it were not their own. Under such emper- 
 ors as Nero, men of average character, who on the one 
 hand would not stoop to the vile art of the sycophant 
 and the informer, and, on the other, did not choose to 
 venture their lives in impossible attempts at reform, 
 clung to the safe retirement of private life, while a 
 vigorous ruler like Trajan kept all power in his own 
 hands, and left nothing for his subjects to do. At the 
 same time, the bar had greatly degenerated from that 
 which Hortensius and Cicero had adorned. It was 
 no longer the avenue to power, though it was still the
 
 ITALICUS. 63 
 
 road to office, and might be made the means of ac- 
 cumulating riches. When we consider these circum- 
 stances, it does not surprise us to find that literature 
 furnished occupation not only to a numerous class of 
 professional writers, but to many men of rank and wealth. 
 Among these must be ranked C. SILIUS ITALICUS. 
 He was by many years Pliny's senior, having been 
 born A.D. 25. He followed with success the profes- 
 sion of an advocate, and had b'een a member of the 
 Hundred Court. Unfortunately for his character, he 
 became a prominent person in the state when it was 
 passing through its most evil day. A sinister rumour 
 which our author mentions, and evidently does not 
 disbelieve, had attributed to him a share in the infamous 
 practices and gains of the informers. In reward, pos- 
 sibly, for these services, he was raised in the last year 
 of Nero's reign to the consulship. The " Lists of the 
 consuls " record that he, with his colleagues, abdicated 
 office, and that the Emperor, then in his last parox- 
 ysm of suspicion, succeeded to the vacancy " without 
 colleague." In the terrible year that followed, "the 
 year of the three emperors," and while enjoying the 
 dangerous honour of an intimate friendship with Vitel- 
 lius, he behaved with wisdom and courtesy. When 
 that Emperor, pressed hard by the troops of Vespasian, 
 sought to secure his safety by resigning his throne, 
 and held for this purpose an interview with the elder 
 brother of his successful rival, Silius was one of the 
 two witnesses who were present. The government of 
 the province of Asia, a province which may be roughly 
 described as comprising the western half of the penin-
 
 64 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 sula of Asia Minor, followed in due course. It was one 
 of the chief commands in the empire, and Silius exer- 
 cised it with great distinction and credit. After this 
 he took no active part in political life, though he was 
 still a prominent personage at Rome "prominent," 
 says Pliny, " but exercising no power and exciting no 
 hostility." In this position his conduct was so blame- 
 less, that the errors of his earlier life were willingly 
 forgotten. No house in the capital was more thronged, 
 or by more sincere admirers. At some time in the 
 short reign of Nerva, warned by his increasing infirmities, 
 he retired from the capital, which, as Pliny mentions 
 with admiring surprise, he did not even revisit to pay 
 his respects to a new emperor, when Nerva was suc- 
 ceeded by Trajan. He was in his seventy-fifth year 
 when the pain of some incurable disease, probably a 
 cancer, made him resolve to put an end to his life. 
 Abstaining from food was then the fashionable method 
 of suicide, and the old man resolutely starved himself 
 to death. The name of Silius is known to students 
 of Latin literature by the accident which has preserved 
 his tedious poem on the Punic war. Of the poetical 
 merits of that work little need be said. The author 
 was wholly without genius an imitator, not surpass- 
 ingly skilful, of VirgiL And he offends at least modern 
 taste by the mythological machinery which he intro- 
 duces into the narrative of historical events. What- 
 ever interest attaches to his verses belongs to the anti- 
 quarian or geographical information which they convey. 
 As a poet, he seems indeed to have been little esteemed 
 by his contemporaries. Pliny disposes of him with a
 
 TACITUS. 65 
 
 very brief criticism. " He used to write verses with 
 more diligence than force." He has more to say of him 
 as a connoisseur and collector. These tastes were de- 
 veloped in him till they grew to a positive frenzy for 
 buying. " He became the possessor of several country 
 houses in the same localities, was passionately fond of 
 the last acquisition, and left the others to neglect. All 
 of them were crowded with books, with statues, with 
 busts. These last he not only kept about him, he 
 absolutely worshipped." Among them was one which 
 connected together his literary and his artistic tastes. 
 It was the likeness of Virgil, and he held it in especial 
 reverence. He was accustomed to keep the birthday 
 of his master with more solemnity than he kept his 
 own, and to visit the tomb where the great poet lay on 
 the shore of the Bay of Naples with such respect as 
 worshippers pay to a temple. 
 
 Much nearer to Pliny, and bound to him by the ties of 
 intimate friendship, was C. CORNELIUS TACITUS. When, 
 after his uncle's death, Pliny came, still a mere youth, 
 to Eome, and began to practise in the law courts, he 
 found Tacitus at the head of his profession. A splen- 
 did alliance (he had married the daughter of the great 
 soldier Agricola) had assured his position, and he 
 seemed likely to rise to the highest eminence in the 
 state. Some reason unknown it may have been a 
 command in the provinces, it may have been the now 
 precarious position of his father-in-law took him for 
 several years from the capital, to which he returned 
 only to become an unwilling witness of the horrors of 
 the last years of Domitian. In the early days of the 
 
 A. c. voL xi. E
 
 66 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 better time that followed he took an active part in 
 public affairs. We have seen him associated with 
 Pliny in one of the great provincial trials. In A.D. 
 100 we find him appointed consul to supply the va- 
 cancy caused by the death of Verginius Eufus. The 
 funeral oration over the old man, the "Wellington of 
 his day, who almost seemed to rise above the throne 
 which he had once refused, was pronounced by his 
 successor. " It was the crown of his good fortune," 
 cried the enthusiastic friend of the orator, " that he 
 found in Cornelius Tacitus the most eloquent of pane- 
 gyrists." With his consulate, however, his public life 
 seems to have closed. Affairs of state must always 
 be unattractive to men of genius under an absolute 
 ruler, whether he be an enlightened prince like Trajan, 
 or a suspicious tyrant like Domitian. How wholly 
 Tacitus had withdrawn himself from them is evident, 
 when we find him recommending to the good offices 
 of Pliny a certain Naso, who was a candidate for one 
 of the magistracies, wholly ignorant of the fact that it 
 was under the auspices of Pliny that Naso had origi- 
 nally started. 
 
 Tacitus had probably made his first essay in liter- 
 ature if the 'Dialogue about Famous Orators' be 
 really his at a time when Pliny was still a boy. 
 His ' Life of Agricola * was published in the reign of 
 Nerva, his 'Treatise on Germany' shortly after the 
 accession of Trajan. Meanwhile he was living on 
 terms of close friendship with Pliny. The two con- 
 stantly interchanged works for mutual criticism. On 
 the side of Pliny these seem to have been, for the
 
 TACITUS. 67 
 
 most part, revisions of speeches which he had delivered. 
 Among the works which Tacitus submitted to the 
 judgment of his friend may have been the ' Treatise 
 on Germany.' About the others we cannot even form 
 a conjecture. He was busy, however, with prepara- 
 tions for a greater work, his History, which had for 
 its subject the period beginning with the accession of 
 Galba and ending with the death of Domitian. We 
 have seen how, in his search for materials, he applied 
 to Pliny for such information as he could give about 
 the great eruption of Vesuvius. In another letter we 
 find his friend volunteering particulars of an incident 
 out of which he believed himself to have come with 
 considerable credit, and begging that it might find a 
 place in the forthcoming work. The intimacy that 
 grew up out of this community of literary interests 
 became very close, and the Letters repeatedly express 
 the joy and pride which it gave to the younger and 
 less distinguished of the two friends. In one place 
 he remarks with pleasure how frequently both were 
 named in the wills of friends and acquaintances for 
 legacies of the same amount. In another he relates 
 to a correspondent, with great glee, a story which he 
 had heard from Tacitus himself. The historian, it 
 seems, was sitting with a stranger, looking on at the 
 games in the circus. After much learned talk his 
 new acquaintance asked him, "Are you of Italy or 
 from the provinces ? " " You know me," replied the 
 historian, " and that from your reading." " Then," re- 
 joined the other, " you must be either Tacitus or Pliny." 
 To a third man of letters, M. VALERIUS MARTIALIS,
 
 68 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 Pliny stood in the relation of a patron rather than a 
 friend. Martial was a native of Bilbilis in Spain, 
 who had come towards the end of the reign of Nero 
 to seek his fortune in Borne. He soon attracted 
 the notice of the Emperor Titus ; and Domitian, who 
 had at least one redeeming quality in a genuine love 
 of letters, even admitted him to his intimacy a favour 
 which he repaid by flattery so gross as not to admit of 
 any defence. It is possible that one whose adulation 
 of the tyrant stood on record against him, did not feel 
 himself at ease under the new regime. Anyhow he 
 left Rome early in Trajan's reign to return to his 
 native country. There about four years afterwards he 
 died, and Pliny records his decease in a letter,* a part 
 of which it will be worth while to quote : "I hear 
 that Valerius Martialis is dead, and I am sorry for it. 
 He was a clever man, of a pointed wit, and of much 
 spirit. In his writing there was plenty of flavour, 
 plenty of bitterness, and not less of straightforward 
 honesty. I presented him, when he was leaving 
 Rome, with some money for his travelling expenses. 
 So much was due to our friendship, so much to the 
 verses he wrote about me.t It was an old custom to 
 
 * Epist. iii. 23. 
 
 f In these verses (Epig. x. 19) Martial addresses his Muse, and 
 bids her carry his book to Pliny at his house on the Esquiline 
 Hill. (The Esquiline had become the fashionable quarter of 
 Rome since Maecenas had built his great mansion there.) The 
 latter part of the Epigram, which Pliny quotes in his letter, 
 may be roughly Englished as follows : 
 
 " Only take care, my tipsy Muse, 
 That a fit and proper time you choose
 
 MARTIAL. 69 
 
 compliment with distinction or money those who had 
 written the praise either of persons or of states. With- 
 in our days it has, like other good and honourable 
 practices, grown obsolete, and sooner perhaps than 
 any. When we cease to do what deserves praise, 
 we soon begin to think that praise is a silly thing." 
 The transaction such a praise paid for in money 
 bears a curious resemblance to what was a recognised 
 practice among ourselves, till, happily both for the 
 purse and for the honour of our men of letters, the 
 public superseded the patron. 
 
 Of the merits of Silius Italicus, of Tacitus, and of 
 Martial, we are able to form a judgment for ourselves. 
 Of the other literary contemporaries of whom Pliny 
 speaks, nothing has been preserved, nor are their names 
 even mentioned elsewhere. PASSENNUS PAULLUS, of 
 whom we shall have an anecdote to relate hereafter, 
 was a fellow-townsman and descendant of Propertius, 
 and had inherited a talent for writing elegiac verse. 
 He also appears to have done what Eoman poets 
 seldom did, to have imitated Horace. Another friend, 
 
 To knock at my Pliny's eloquent gates. 
 To the stern Minerva he devotes 
 All his days, and elaborates 
 What may win the Hundred Judges' votes, 
 Speeches which this and the coming age 
 May venture to match with Tully's page. 
 When may you safely go ? when the light 
 Of the lamps is burning late, and the night 
 Grows wild with the wine-cup, and the rose 
 Is Queen of the feast, and the perfume flows 
 From dripping locks. In that hour of thine 
 Stern Catos may read this book of mine."
 
 70 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 CANINIUS RUFUS, Pliny encourages in his design of 
 celebrating in verse Trajan's campaigns in Dacia. 
 " What subject," he says, " could you find so fresh, so 
 full of matter, so wide in a word, so poetical, and, 
 though it deals with the most absolute truth, so ro- 
 mantic? New rivers made to flow, new bridges 
 thrown over rivers, mountain precipices occupied with 
 camps, a king driven from his palace, driven even 
 from life, yet never despairing these are the things 
 of which you will sing." But there would be a vast 
 difficulty, he tells his friend, in raising even his 
 genius to the height of so vast an undertaking ; and 
 another, not to be despised, in the task of getting the 
 barbarous names of Dacian chiefs and towns to suit 
 the measure of his verse, which was, apparently, the 
 Greek hexameter. There was the name of the king, 
 for instance, Diurpaneus. All that could be said was, 
 that he must take Homeric licence, and Homer was 
 accustomed to alter much more tractable words. 
 
 YERGILIUS ROMANUS, a clever writer of burlesques and 
 of comedies, which Pliny, a kindly, or perhaps it should 
 be said, even a flattering critic, thought equal to those 
 of Plautus and Terence, was another member of the same 
 literary circle. In his praise of Pompeius Saturninus, 
 an advocate like himself, our author is still more enthu- 
 siastic. He was great as a writer ; hear or read his 
 speeches, you liked them equally well. History he 
 wrote with the same eloquence, only in a more concise 
 and compressed style. And verses he could write like 
 Calvus or Catullus, even to the skilful insertion of a 
 certain archaic roughness. His last work had been a
 
 C. FANNIUS. 71 
 
 volume of letters. It was true that he declared them 
 to be written by his wife. In any case the whole credit 
 of them was his ; for, says Pliny, his wife, whom he 
 had taken unmarried from her father's house, must 
 have received from him any learning or culture that 
 she had a significant remark, and perfectly consistent 
 with what we learn from other sources, as showing 
 that whatever education a Roman woman could boast 
 was for the most part acquired not in the home but in 
 the world. Another lawyer of literary tastes, whose 
 premature death Pliny laments, was C. FANNIUS. He 
 had snatched some time from the toils of his profession 
 to write the ' Lives of the Victims of Nero.' Nine 
 books only had been written ; a singular dream had 
 warned him that he would not be permitted to add 
 any more. He had dreamt that he was lying on his 
 bed with his writing-desk before him, that Nero entered 
 the chamber, sat down upon the couch, opened the first 
 volume (this had been already published), and read it 
 to the end, did the same with the second and the 
 third, and then departed. Fannius, in his terror, 
 believed that he should write no more than the dead 
 tyrant had read, and the dream possibly did some- 
 thing to accomplish itself. 
 
 "We must now make distinct mention of a group of 
 accomplished foreigners, whom Pliny seems to have 
 regarded with the same respect and affection that he 
 showed to his Roman friends. 
 
 EUPHRATES was a Stoic philosopher, of Greek race, 
 born (for the accounts vary) in Egypt or Syria. It was 
 in the latter country that Pliny, then a young soldier,
 
 72 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 had made his acquaintance, and had been admitted to 
 his intimacy. The two met again in Borne, whither 
 the philosopher had removed, probably attracted by 
 the liberal patronage which the capital extended to 
 learning. His tall stature, his handsome countenance, 
 his long hair, and huge white beard, and an appearance 
 wholly free from that affectation of squalor in which 
 some of his brethren delighted, attracted favour before 
 he spoke, and his speech was singularly winning. He 
 discourses, says Pliny, with subtlety, with dignity, 
 with elegance; frequently he even gives to his lan- 
 guage all the fulness and richness of Plato. His 
 style is copious and varied, and remarkably winning, 
 so as to move and carry on with it even reluctant 
 hearers. The philosopher's position was strengthened 
 by his marriage with one of the most distinguished of 
 the Roman families settled in his native province. 
 Pliny mentions with praise the special care with 
 which he educated his children, and seems indeed 
 to have regarded him generally with the utmost affec- 
 tion and respect. " Why," he cries, " should I say 
 more of a man whose company I cannot enjoy ? Only, 
 surely, to vex myself the more because I cannot. I 
 am occupied by the duties of my office, a most im- 
 portant and a most troublesome one. I sit in front of 
 the tribunal ; I countersign documents ; I settle ac- 
 counts ; I write a vast amount of the most illiterate 
 literature." This " illiterate literature" reminds us of 
 Charles Lamb's allusion to the volumes which he had 
 left behind him in the India House. Euphrates 
 consoled his friend in a very sensible fashion. " It was
 
 EUPHRATES ARTEMIDORUS. 73 
 
 a part," lie said, " nay, the most honourable part, of 
 philosophy, this discharge of public affairs, this hear- 
 ing and deciding of causes, this discovering and prac- 
 tising of justice, this actual using of what they, the 
 philosophers, taught." Euphrates is mentioned by 
 others of his contemporaries. Both Arrian, a pupil of 
 Epictetus, and author of the ' Expedition of Alexander,' 
 and the Emperor Aurelius Antoninus, speak in high 
 praise of his eloquence. Philostratus gives an account of 
 him in his ' Lives of the Sophists,' where he accuses him 
 of servility. He is said to have reached an advanced 
 age, and to have begged and obtained permission from 
 the Emperor Hadrian to put an end to his life. 
 
 ARTEMIDORUS was another Greek philosopher with 
 whom Pliny made acquaintance when he was serving 
 in Syria. He seems to have followed his friend to 
 Rome. Certainly he was in the capital when, in A.D. 
 93, Domitian banished the philosophers. Pliny was 
 one of the praetors for the year, and, though the reign 
 of terror had begun, though the storm had fallen with 
 especial violence on his circle of friends, and was 
 threatening himself, he stood manfully by his friend, 
 even venturing to visit him at the house which he occu- 
 pied in the suburbs. At the same time he rendered 
 him substantial service by the present of a large sum 
 of money. The philosopher had made himself liable 
 for a debt of considerable amount; and Pliny, who 
 had, he tells us, himself to borrow the money, fur- 
 nished him with the means of discharging it. When 
 the accession of Nerva brought happier times, Artemi- 
 dorus returned to Rome, and Pliny renewed his ac-
 
 74 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 quaintance with him. " Of all who call themselves 
 philosophers, you will scarcely," he says, " find more 
 than one or two so single-hearted and so true. I put 
 aside his marvellous endurance both of cold and of heat, 
 his industry, which no labours can tire, his indifference 
 to all the pleasures of eating and drinking, the control 
 which he exercises over his eyes and his thoughts. 
 These are great things, or might be in another man. In 
 him these are but of very little weight, compared with 
 those other virtues which made C. Musonius choose 
 him for his son-in-law out of suitors of all ranks." 
 Artemidorus, like Euphrates, had married into a 
 Roman family. His father-in-law, Musonius Rufus, 
 was an enthusiastic adherent of the Stoic philosophy 
 so enthusiastic, indeed, that he nearly met his end by 
 delivering an unseasonable lecture on his favourite 
 tenets to the combatants, when the troops of Vespasian, 
 under the command of Antonius Pronus, were forcing 
 their way into Rome against the desperate resistance 
 of the adherents of Vitellius. It perfectly suits his 
 character that he should have bestowed his daughter 
 on a man whom many would probably have despised 
 as a penniless scholar. 
 
 A third distinguished Greek, Is^ius, seems to have 
 been a visitor rather than a resident at Rome. " More 
 fluent than Isaeus" is Juvenal's description of the ready 
 speech which he mentions among the qualities of the 
 Greek adventurers who were thronging to the capital. 
 He seems to have been something of an improvisatore, 
 and Pliny gives a very admiring account * of his per- 
 * Epist. ii. 3.
 
 75 
 
 formances. " I had heard a wonderful report of 
 Isseus before his coining ; "but it was not equal to the 
 reality. He possesses the utmost readiness, copious- 
 ness, and abundance of language ; speaks always ex- 
 tempore, yet always as if he had written his speech 
 long before. His style is genuinely Greek I may say, 
 Attic. His introductions are terse, elegant, attractive, 
 sometimes weighty in matter, and loftily conceived. 
 He suggests several themes, and permits his audience 
 to choose, doing this often without preparation. He 
 rises, arranges his cloak, and begins. At once he has 
 everything almost equally ready at hand. Meanings 
 that you never saw are suggested to you, and words 
 what words they are ! exquisitely chosen and polished. 
 The wideness of his reading, his great practice in 
 writing, are clearly shown in these unprepared displays. 
 His preface is to the point, his narrative is lucid, his 
 attack spirited, his summing up forcible, his rhetorical 
 ornament noble. In a word, he teaches, delights, and 
 affects you ; and you cannot decide which of the three 
 he does best. His reflections are frequent ; frequent, 
 too, his syllogisms, as well as condensed and carefully 
 finished no small merit to attain even in a written 
 style. His memory is beyond belief; he repeats from 
 far back what he has spoken extempore, and does not 
 miss a single word. Such is the habit of excellence 
 to which he has reached by study and practice, for 
 night and day he does nothing, hears nothing, says 
 nothing else. He has passed his sixtieth year, and is 
 still a scholar, and nothing more. Than this class of 
 men, indeed, I know nothing more single-hearted, more
 
 76 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 genuine, or more excellent. For we who have to go 
 through the rough work of the forum and of real dis- 
 putes contract something, however unwilling we may 
 be, of evil cleverness. The school, the lecture-room, the 
 imaginary case, the whole affair, in short, is innocent and 
 harmless, and quite as full of enjoyment, especially to 
 the old. For my part I think Isseus not only the most 
 eloquent but the happiest of men ; and you," he adds 
 to his correspondent, " unless you are anxious to make 
 his acquaintance, must be made of stone or iron." 
 
 In this literary and learned society Pliny found, it 
 is evident, a very keen and genuine enjoyment. We 
 must perhaps take with a certain reservation his 
 lamentations over the distraction of business, public 
 and private, which kept him from the learned leisure 
 in which he delighted. He was fond, it is evident, of 
 the distinction which was given by office ; he rejoiced 
 in the triumphs which he won, and which he does not 
 fail to describe to his correspondents, in the courts 
 of law. Nevertheless he really loved literature. He 
 combined indeed, with no little success, the character 
 of a man of letters, a patron, and a critic. Of his 
 authorship we speak elsewhere. His patronage was 
 shown, as we have seen, in substantial help to authors. 
 Such help was, of course, but a small matter to a man 
 of wealth so large. There was more of real value in 
 the genuine sympathy which he felt with their produc- 
 tions a sympathy the want of which has often made 
 offensive the liberality of the most munificent patron. 
 He was always ready with advice and encouragement, 
 and made it a special duty to be present at the public
 
 PLINY AS PATRON AND CRITIC. 77 
 
 readings, to be described in the next chapter. This 
 help was of a kind which no mere man of wealth 
 could give. Pliny's countenance and approval, as 
 a man of wide culture and genuine taste, must 
 have been highly valued. His criticism, indeed, 
 we can hardly help thinking, as we read the high 
 compliments which he pays to the authors whom he 
 mentions, must have been of a very kindly character. 
 Yet in the cases where we are able to compare his 
 literary opinion of contemporary writers the true 
 test, it is almost needless to say, of critical sagacity 
 with the verdict of succeeding tune, we find him to 
 have been right. He dismisses with a very few words 
 of modified praise the tedious heroics of Silius Italicus, 
 while he recognises the wit and brilliance which have 
 given Martial the first place among epigrammatists, 
 and fully appreciated in Tacitus the solid qualities of tho 
 greatest of Eoman historians. And in more than one of 
 his letters, where he deals with general literary topics, 
 the soundness of his judgment is evident. Nothing, for 
 instance, could be more judicious than the literary ad- 
 vice which he gives in the following letter:* "You 
 ask me what I think should be your method of study 
 in the retirement which you have been now for some 
 time enjoying. As useful as anything, as it is fre- 
 quently recommended, is the practice of translating 
 either your Greek into Latin, or your Latin into Greek. 
 By practising this you acquire propriety and dignity of 
 expression, an abundant choice of the beauties of style, 
 power in description, and in the imitation of the best 
 * Epist. vii. 9.
 
 78 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 models a facility of creating such models for yourself. 
 Besides, what may escape you when you read, cannot 
 escape you when you translate. From this follows a 
 quick appreciation of beauty and sound taste. There 
 is no reason why you should not write about the sub- 
 jects which you have been already reading, keeping to 
 the same matter and line of argument, as if you were a 
 rival; should then compare it with what you have read, 
 and carefully consider whether the author has been the 
 happier of the two, and wherefore. You may congratu- 
 late yourself much if sometimes you have done better, 
 but should be much ashamed if he is always superior. 
 Sometimes you may select even very famous passages, 
 and compete with what you select. The competition 
 is daring enough, but, as it is private, cannot be called 
 impudent. Sometimes you can go over a speech again, 
 when it has passed from your memory, retaining much, 
 omitting more, inserting some things, and rewriting 
 others. This is, I know, a laborious and tedious task, 
 but its very difficulties make it useful ; so hard is it 
 to work one's self up again into the old heat, to recover 
 the energy which has once suffered break or interrup- 
 tion, and, worse than all, to put new limbs into a body 
 already complete without disturbing the old. 
 Sometimes you should take a subject from history, and 
 you might give more care to the composition of your 
 letters. In speaking, you will often find a necessity 
 for passages of description in the style of history nay, 
 even in that of poetry. From letters you acquire a 
 simple and terse style. You will do quite right again 
 in refreshing yourself with poetry ; I do not say with
 
 THE PLEASURES OF LITERATURE. 79 
 
 any long and continuous work, but with, something 
 neat and short a most appropriate variety in occupa- 
 tion and business of whatever kind. . . . Perhaps I 
 have given you more than you wanted. Yet I have 
 left out one point. I have not told you what I think 
 you should read ; though, indeed, I did tell you 
 when I told you what you should write. Remember 
 to be careful in your choice of authors of every kind. 
 They say that one ought to read much, but not many 
 books." 
 
 There is sound sense in all this ; and in the follow- 
 ing letter, with which this chapter may be concluded, 
 we have a genuine expression of feeling : 
 
 " I find my joy and my solace in literature. There 
 is no gladness that this cannot increase, no sorrow that 
 it cannot lessen. Troubled as I am by the ill-health of 
 my wife, by the dangerous condition sometimes, alas ! 
 by the death of my friends, I fly to my studies as the 
 one alleviation of my fears. They do me this service 
 they make me understand my troubles better, and bear 
 them more patiently. It is my custom, whatever I 
 purpose to publish, previously to try by the judgment 
 of my friends, of whom you stand among the first. 
 Pray give your best attention to the book which you 
 will receive with this letter, for I fear that I, in my 
 sorrow, have scarcely given mine to it. I eould so 
 far command my grief as to write ; not so far as to 
 write with an unoccupied and cheerful mind. Cer- 
 tainly there is a pleasure in these pursuits, but they 
 themselves prosper best when the heart is light." 
 * Epist. viii. 19.
 
 CHAPTEE VII. 
 
 PUBLIC READINGS. 
 
 WE shall be much mistaken if we form our ideas of 
 the supply of books in Eome from what we know of 
 the scarcity and costliness of this article in the age 
 that intervened between the fall of the Empire and the 
 invention of printing, or perhaps it should rather be 
 said, the revival of learning. In medieval Europe, and 
 more particularly among the Northern nations, manu- 
 scripts were among the rarest of the possessions of the 
 wealthy. The sale of them was negotiated with as 
 much solemnity as was the sale of an estate ; the most 
 solid security was exacted when they were lent. A 
 score of them constituted a library such as individuals 
 or even corporations were proud to possess. But in 
 this, as in other matters, European civilisation had 
 greatly retrograded from what it was during the first 
 centuries of the Christian era. In the days of Pliny, 
 at least, as we know from the express testimony of a 
 contemporary,* copies of popular books were produced 
 
 * Martial tells a friend that a book which he had lately pub- 
 lished ("a slender book," he calls it ; it might be printed in
 
 PUBLIC READINGS. 81 
 
 in great numbers, and at a very cheap rate. But while 
 this proves both that there existed a considerable class 
 of readers, and that the mechanical means of satisfying 
 their demand were to be found in much completeness, 
 it is easy enough to see that there was nothing like 
 the thoroughly - organised system of communication 
 between the writer and the public that has been 
 created in modern times. It is not to be forgotten 
 though this, of course, is not the chief thing to be 
 considered that the manuscript was less attractive, 
 less handy, and, in short, less readable, than the 
 printed book. An ordinary Roman could, of course, 
 peruse with ease what it now takes a practised scholar 
 to decipher ; but it is impossible not to believe that 
 something was wanting to the pleasure of the reader 
 when there was no distinction in the size of letters, no 
 separation between words, and none of the perpetual 
 help of punctuation. More important, however, was 
 the question of publishing. 
 
 This now is a process sufficiently simple and easy. 
 There is a large class of men whose business it is to 
 introduce an author to his readers. The competi- 
 tion between them is so keen that probably no book 
 of merit, a few exceptional cases allowed for, fails to 
 obtain an introduction to the world. Such facilities, 
 if they were not altogether wanting to the literary men 
 
 about thirty -two pages of the volume which the reader has in 
 his hands) could be purchased for four sesterces (about equivalent 
 to tenpence in our money); and that if this price seemed too high, 
 a cheaper copy might be procured for half that price, "and 
 yet," he adds, " the bookseller will get a profit." 
 
 A. C. VOL XI. F
 
 82 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 of Rome, were certainly not so fully developed. There 
 were, indeed, booksellers both there and in the chief 
 provincial cities. The poet Horace has preserved the 
 name of a firm " Sosii Brothers," as we should put it 
 who were the most eminent of their class in his time ; 
 and one of the passages in which he speaks of them 
 may possibly be understood as meaning that they were 
 accustomed to purchase works from authors as pub- 
 lishers now purchase a copyright. " Such a book," 
 he says, speaking of one which possesses certain ex- 
 cellences, "earns money from the Sosii," a phrase, 
 however, which might be used if these Sosii were 
 merely booksellers, and paid over to the author the 
 money which they had received. " Booksellers " 
 (bibliopolce) they are certainly called ; and though they 
 may have sometimes acted the part of publishers, and 
 probably did so in arranging for the copying of books, 
 and the ornamentation of the copies, it is quite clear 
 that an intending author did not find matters made so 
 simple and easy as, by the organisation of the trade in 
 books, they now are. To put the matter shortly, there 
 was no market in which the value of his wares might 
 be readily appraised. The want of this compelled 
 him to appeal directly to the public which he wished 
 to address. He had to learn from the opinion of a 
 larger circle than that of his immediate friends, whether 
 his book was worth publishing a process which, we 
 must remember, was difficult and costly ; and, in the 
 event of a favourable judgment, he wished to make 
 the intended publication known as widely as possible. 
 To gain these objects, he would " recite " or read his
 
 PUBLIC READINGS. 83 
 
 compositions in public. "We do not hear of the prac- 
 tice in the days of the Republic, when men were, we 
 may suppose, too busy for such things ; but both 
 Horace and Ovid speak of it, and the allusions become 
 more frequent when we come to the time of Pliny 
 and his contemporaries. The method of proceeding 
 may be described in a few words. The first care was to 
 provide some place capable of holding a large audience. 
 Sometimes, in the case, we may suppose, of writers 
 who had already acquired a reputation, the temple of 
 Apollo, the public library of Eome, was obtained for 
 the purpose. Sometimes a convenient room had to be 
 hired. But an author, if his own house did not con- 
 tain the necessary accommodation, was generally able 
 to find a wealthy friend or patron who would supply 
 what was wanted. Pliny mentions with praise one of 
 his friends, Titinius Capito, as always ready to lend 
 his house for this purpose. " If you want to recite," 
 cries Juvenal, u Maculonus will lend you his house, will 
 range his freedmen on the furthest benches, and will 
 put in the proper places his strong-lunged friends ; 
 but he will not give what it costs to hire the benches, 
 and to set up the galleries, and to fill the stage with 
 chairs." The author's next care, we thus learn, after 
 finding his room, was to fit it with seats for his 
 audience; the chairs, we may presume, being meant, 
 like those which fill the platform at our own public 
 meetings, for distinguished personages or private 
 friends, while the benches accommodated the general 
 public. For himself, the reader provided a high chair 
 and desk ; sometimes he sought to commend himself
 
 84 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 to his listeners by adorning his person with unusual 
 splendour. It is not uncommon among ourselves to 
 see a lecturer, a reader, or even a preacher, seeking to 
 attract his hearers by the brilliancy of a diamond ring, 
 or setting himself off to the best advantage by carefully- 
 combed hair and a new coat ; but we are taken at once 
 into a totally different sphere of manners when we read 
 that the reciter would sometimes put a gay-coloured 
 hood on his head, bandages on his ears, and a woollen 
 comforter round his neck. It still remained to secure 
 an audience. The author, if he was a man of wealth 
 and position, might reckon with certainty on a consid- 
 erable number of hearers, of whose presence, and even 
 of whose applause, he might be sure. The freedmen, 
 whose obligation to their patrons was, notwithstanding 
 their manumission, of no slight kind, and the whole 
 crowd of clients, some of them men whom we are sur- 
 prised to find in a position seemingly so humiliating, 
 who were accustomed to pay him their court, and to 
 receive from his hands the dole which acknowledged 
 their service, would be sure to attend, and would 
 scarcely fail to be unanimous in their judgment of 
 the performance. If he was indebted to a patron for 
 a room, the loan would include, as we have seen, the 
 use of the accustomed body of claqueurs. A city like 
 Rome would be sure to furnish a number of listeners, 
 some of them, of course, mere idlers, who were willing 
 to kill the time by listening to a poem, a play, or 
 a history, if there was no chariot -race or show of 
 gladiators to be seen ; some doubtless in the case of 
 a man of note, many who were attracted by a genuine
 
 PUBLIC READINGS. 85 
 
 interest in literature. Around the reader was the 
 array of his personal friends, whose attendance, indeed, 
 on these occasions was one of the chief, and some- 
 times, it may he "believed, one of the most laborious 
 duties which society demanded from men of good posi- 
 tion at Rome. " I must beg you to excuse me this 
 particular day," writes Pliny to a friend. " Titinius 
 Capito means to give a reading, and I cannot say 
 whether I am more bound or more desirous to hear 
 him. ... He lends his house to readers; and, 
 whether the reading be at his own home or elsewhere, 
 he shows a remarkable kindness in making himself 
 one of the audience : me certainly he has never failed, 
 whenever he has happened to be in town." We 
 have here a hint of what indeed must on reflection 
 be sufficiently obvious, that the demand made by 
 these readings on the time of a busy man, or a man 
 of many friends, and made in many cases by writers 
 of very moderate talent, was felt to be exceedingly 
 onerous. Horace complains of the " troublesome 
 reader," from whom learned and unlearned alike fled in 
 terror, and who bored to death the luckless listeners 
 who could not escape from him; and Juvenal, in his 
 first Satire, apologetically introduces himself to the 
 public by declaring that he could not always be a lis- 
 tener, " wearied as he had so often been by the ' The- 
 seid' of the hoarse Codrus;" the epithet "hoarse" 
 suggesting with significant force the length of the poem 
 which the audience had to endure. We must remem- 
 ber, indeed, that a man of education at Rome had not 
 his literary appetite satiated with the abundance of
 
 86 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 reading which constitutes one of the most serious bur- 
 dens of modern life. Books, if not positively scarce, 
 did not crowd upon him in overwhelming numbers ; 
 and the " light troops " of literature magazines and 
 pamphlets and newspapers were altogether unknown. 
 .Still we cannot entirely withhold our sympathy from 
 the offender of whose conduct Pliny complains in an 
 amusing letter to his friend Senecio. " This year," he 
 says, " has brought us a great crop of poets. During 
 the whole month of April, there was scarcely a day on 
 which some one did not give a reading. I am de- 
 lighted to see that literature nourishes, that the powers 
 of our writers have the opportunity of displaying 
 themselves : yet audiences come but slowly to listen. 
 Many persons sit in the lounging-places, and waste in 
 gossip the time that they should spend in listening. 
 They even have news brought to them whether the 
 reader has entered, whether he has spoken his preface, 
 whether he has got through a considerable part of his 
 manuscript. Then at last they come, but come slowly 
 and reluctantly : even then they do not stop, but go 
 away before the end ; some, indeed, in secret and by 
 stealth, others with perfect openness and freedom. 
 Good heavens ! our fathers can remember how the 
 Emperor Claudius, walking one day in the palace, and 
 hearing a great shouting, inquired the cause. They 
 told him that Nonianus was reading ; whereupon he 
 entered the room, wholly unexpected by the reader. 
 Now, the idlest of men, after having been invited 
 long before to attend, and reminded over and over again 
 of the engagement, either do not come at all, or, if
 
 PUBLIC READINGS. 87 
 
 they come, complain of having ' lost a day ! ' the fact 
 being that they have not lost it. I," continues Pliny, 
 " have failed scarcely a single reader. True, most of them 
 were my friends : and, indeed, there are scarcely any 
 who love literature who are not also on friendly terms 
 with me. This is the reason why I have stayed longer 
 in town than I had intended to do. At last I am at 
 liberty to seek my country retirement, and to write 
 something something which I shall not read ; for I do 
 not wish to seem to have been obliging rather than 
 listening to my friends." 
 
 Sometimes it happened that one or other of the 
 unwilling auditors, whom a friendly compulsion had 
 brought to assist in proceedings which did not interest 
 him, would avenge himself by an unwelcome interrup- 
 tion. We have spoken of Passennus Paullus, a writer 
 of elegiac verses, modelled after the compositions of 
 his townsman and relative, Propertius. Passennus had 
 collected a number of friends to hear him read a new 
 volume ', among them a lawyer, Javolenus Priscus by 
 name, with whom he was on very intimate terms. The 
 poet began, " Priscus, you bid me ;" but was astounded 
 by a sudden interruption from his friend, " / do not 
 bid you." We may illustrate this incident by suppos- 
 ing that Pope is reading in public his " Essay on Man," 
 and has got as far as the opening words, " Come now, 
 my St John," when St John (Bolingbroke), who is 
 one of his audience, interrupts him with " Come, 
 indeed ! not I." " Javolenus," says Pliny, " is a 
 man of doubtful sanity, though he takes a share in 
 public business, is summoned to consultations, and
 
 88 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 even gives opinions on civil law." The fact is, that he 
 was a very distinguished lawyer, some of whose legal 
 wisdom is still preserved in the Pandects of Justinian. 
 Possibly, in a fit of absence, while his mind was wan- 
 dering to scenes more congenial and familiar, he was 
 startled by hearing his name, and made the ludicrous 
 reply which Pliny has preserved. Or if Passennus 
 was one of the poets who had occupied with their 
 readings nearly every day in April, one of the 
 busiest months, it must be remembered, for lawyers, 
 and Javolenus had been dragged from court to attend 
 them, his " J don't bid you" may have been the 
 expression of a pent-up annoyance, which no feelings 
 of friendship could restrain. However this may 
 be, we can very well imagine that, as Pliny says, 
 the interruption threw something of a damp on the 
 proceedings; and we can appreciate the wisdom of 
 his advice, that " those who mean to read in public 
 should not only be sane themselves, but also bring 
 sane friends to hear them." Pliny's own practice 
 in this matter he himself describes in a letter which 
 shows both good sense and good feeling.* He had 
 been writing, it seems, some poems of a lighter kind. 
 " I chose," he continues, " for producing these, the 
 most seasonable time and place. To accustom them 
 in good time to be heard by listeners that are taking 
 their ease, and at the dinner-table, I collected my 
 friends in the month of July, when the law courts 
 have least to do, and put writing-desks before their 
 chairs. It so happened that on the morning of the 
 day I was called away to an unexpected case in court. 
 * Epist. viii. 21.
 
 PUBLIC READINGS. 89 
 
 This gave me opportunity for some words of preface. 
 I begged my friends not to think that it showed me 
 wanting in respect to what I had in hand if, when 
 meaning to read, though it was only to friends and to 
 a small audience (another word for friends), I did not 
 abstain from the business of the forum. I added, that 
 even in writing I followed this order put my friend- 
 ship before my pleasures, my business before my amuse- 
 ments, and wrote firstly for my friends, secondly for 
 myself. My book contained a variety of compositions 
 and metres. Tis thus that I am accustomed, trusting 
 but little to my talent, to avoid the risk of being 
 wearisome. My reading lasted two days. The ap- 
 proval of my audience made this necessary ; and yet, 
 while some readers pass over part of their volume, and 
 make a merit of passing it over, I pass over nothing, 
 and tell my hearers as much. I read everything, be- 
 cause I want to correct everything, a thing which 
 those who read extracts only cannot do. The other 
 plan, you may say, is more modest, and possibly more 
 respectful. "Well, but this is more honest and more 
 affectionate. Genuine affection is so confident of affec- 
 tion in return, as not to be afraid of wearying a friend. 
 Besides, what benefit do one's companions confer if 
 they assemble only for the sake of pleasing themselves 1 
 It is very like indolence, when a man would sooner 
 hear his friend read a book already good, than help to 
 make it good. Doubtless, in your general affection for 
 me, you will want to read as soon as possible this book, 
 which is still ' fermenting.' You shall read it, but 
 after it has passed through my hands again. This was 
 my reason for reading it aloud."
 
 CHAPTEE VIII. 
 
 COMUM, PLINY'S BIRTHPLACE HIS LIVELY INTEREST 
 IN ITS WELFARE. 
 
 COMUM, as has been said, was in all probability the 
 birthplace of both the elder and the younger Pliny. 
 There is much of direct and indirect evidence to con- 
 nect them with the place. Tradition is distinctly in 
 favour of it. The numerous allusions which are made 
 to it in the letters, and the fact that our friend had 
 several little villas on the margin of the Lake of Como, 
 seem to point to the same conclusion. 
 
 Comum was in that northern part of Italy which 
 was known to the Eomans as Cisalpine Gaul. It was 
 at the extremity of one of the two southern branches 
 of the Lake of Como, about 28 miles to the north of 
 Milan. It passed out of the hands of the Gauls into 
 the possession of the Romans in B.C. 196, when a great 
 victory, won by the famous Marcellus, the conqueror 
 of Syracuse, over the united strength of the Gauls, 
 carried the Roman territory as far as the foot of the 
 Alps, and made Como and Milan Roman towns. Julius 
 Caesar added five thousand new colonists to the pop-
 
 COMUM AND ITS LAKE. 91 
 
 ulation of the place, and from that time it became one 
 of the most prosperous towns of the north of Italy. 
 It had several natural advantages. Its beautiful and 
 attractive situation at the foot of the Alps, and on the 
 shores of a lovely lake, was greatly in its favour : it 
 also lay very conveniently in the way of a much-fre- 
 quented route across the Rhaetian Alps. The elder 
 Pliny speaks of its iron-foundries as being the most 
 famous in Italy. Thus it happily combined the vari- 
 ous elements which make up the prosperity of a pro- 
 vincial town. 
 
 Pliny often in his letters alludes to the picturesque 
 Lake of Como, and seems to have taken peculiar 
 delight in its scenery. He calls it once or twice 
 " our Larius," the name by which Virgil mentions it. 
 One may fairly infer that he would hardly have 
 spoken of it in this manner, had not he and his 
 family been long and closely connected with the neigh- 
 bourhood. Many a rich Roman had his villa on its 
 banks, which, as they rose in a somewhat steep ascent 
 from the water, were clothed with olive-woods, vine- 
 yards, and chestnut-groves. The lower slopes pre- 
 sented to the eye an abundance of rural wealth, and 
 the quiet beauty which is always its accompaniment ; 
 above, at no great distance, were all the wildness and 
 grandeur of mountain scenery. 
 
 There are some pleasing touches in the following 
 letter, written, as it would appear, to a fellow-towns- 
 man of Pliny, who is encouraged to use so delight- 
 ful a retreat as Comum as a stimulus to literary 
 work :
 
 92 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 PLINY TO CANINIUS BUFUS.* 
 
 " How is our dear darling Comum looking ? Tell 
 me about that lovely villa, about the colonnade where 
 it is always spring, about the shady plane-tree walk, 
 about the green and flowery banks of that little stream, 
 and of the charming lake below, which serves at once 
 the purpose of use and beauty. What have you to 
 tell me about the carriage-drive, as firm as it is soft, 
 and the sunny bath-room, and your dining-rooms, both 
 for a large and a select circle of friends, and your 
 various chambers of rest and repose by day or night ? 
 Do these delightful attractions share you by turns, or 
 are you, as usual, called away from them by the pres- 
 sure of important business engagements connected with 
 your property? If all these delights have you to 
 themselves, you are indeed most fortunate ; if not, you 
 are like most other people. Why not leave (for it is 
 high time) these wretched degrading cares to others, 
 and give yourself up in the deep repose of such a snug 
 retreat to reading and study ? Make these your busi- 
 ness and your recreation, your labour and your rest, 
 the subjects of your waking and even of your sleeping 
 thoughts. Work at something and produce some- 
 thing which will be yours for ever. All your other 
 possessions will pass from one master to another ; this 
 alone, when once yours, will be yours for ever. I 
 know the temper and the genius which I am seeking 
 to stimulate. Only strive to think yourself what the 
 
 * Epist. i. 3.
 
 HIS INTEREST IN COMUM. 93 
 
 world will think you, if you do yourself justice. 
 Farewell" 
 
 The lively interest which Pliny took in his native 
 place is pleasantly attested by the following letter : 
 
 PLINY TO ANNIUS SEVERUS.* 
 
 "Out of a legacy that was left me I have just 
 bought a statue of Corinthian "bronze. It is small, but 
 thoroughly clever and done to the life at least, in my 
 judgment, which, in matters of this sort, and perhaps 
 of every sort, is not worth much. However, I really 
 do see the merits of this statue. It is a nude figure, 
 and its faults, if it has any, are as clearly observable 
 as its beauties. It represents an old man standing up. 
 The bones, the muscles, the veins, and the very 
 wrinkles, all look like life. The hair is thin, the fore- 
 head broad, the face shrunken, the throat lank, the 
 arms hang down feebly, the chest is fallen in, and the 
 belly sunk. Looked at from behind, the figure is just 
 as expressive of old age. The bronze, to judge from 
 its colour, has the marks of great antiquity. In short, 
 it is in all respects a work which would strike the eye 
 of a connoisseur, and which cannot fail to charm an 
 ordinary observer. This induced me, novice as I am 
 in such matters, to buy it. However, I bought it not 
 to put in my own house (for I have never had there a 
 Corinthian bronze), but with the intention of placing 
 it in some conspicuous situation in the place of my 
 birth, perhaps in the temple of Jupiter, which has the 
 best claim to it. It is a gift well worthy of a temple 
 * Epist. iii. 6.
 
 94 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 and of a god. Do you, with that kind attention 
 which you always give to my requests, undertake this 
 matter, and order a pedestal to be made for it out of 
 any marble you please, and let my name, and, if you 
 think fit, my various titles, be engraven upon it. I 
 will send you the statue by the first person who will 
 not object to the trouble ; or, what I am sure you will 
 like better, I will bring it myself, for I intend, if I 
 can get away from business, to take a run into your 
 parts. I see joy in your looks when I promise to 
 come ; but your joy will soon go when I tell you that 
 my visit will be only for a few days, for the work 
 which keeps me here will prevent my making a longer 
 stay. Farewell. " 
 
 The two following letters will show that Pliny's 
 anxiety for the welfare of his native town took a much 
 higher range than that of a simply graceful act of 
 liberality. He did his best to make provision for the 
 enlightenment of the inhabitants, by presenting them 
 with a library and helping them to establish a school 
 It appears that on the first occasion he made a speech 
 to the burgesses of Comum, in which he no doubt 
 dwelt on the pleasure and advantages of intellectual 
 culture ; and in the following letter he explains the 
 motives which prompted him to this particular act of 
 munificence. He mentions in it an interesting cir- 
 cumstance, which has about it a singularly modern 
 character. In the spirit of the benevolent patron, he 
 has established a fund for the maintenance and educa- 
 tion of the children of distressed gentlefolks :
 
 HIS INTEREST IN COMUM. 95 
 
 PLI^Y TO POMPEIUS SATUBNINUS.* 
 
 "Nothing could have been more seasonable than 
 the letter in which you begged me to send you some 
 of my literary efforts, as at the time I had intended to 
 do so. You have, in fact, put spurs into the willing 
 horse, and saved yourself the excuse of refusing the 
 trouble, and me the awkwardness of asking the favour. 
 Without any hesitation, then, I avail myself of your 
 offer, and you must now take the consequences of it 
 without reluctance. But don't expect anything new 
 from such a lazy man as myself. I am going to ask 
 you to revise once more the speech I made to my fel- 
 low-townsmen when I dedicated the public library to 
 their use. I remember that you have already given me 
 a few general criticisms, but I now beg of you not only 
 to take a general view of the whole speech, but to criti- 
 cise it in detail. When you have done this, I shall 
 still be at liberty to publish or to keep it back. And 
 perhaps my doubtfulness in the matter will be deter- 
 mined one way or the other as the process of correction 
 goes on ; for careful revision will either show it to be 
 not worth publishing, or will make it fit to be pub- 
 lished. Yet my chief difficulty in deciding arises not 
 so much from the character of the composition as from 
 its subject-matter. The style may be ever so plain and 
 unpretentious, yet it is embarrassing to modesty to have 
 to speak not only of my ancestors' munificence, but also 
 of my own. It is a dangerous and slippery situation, 
 though necessity draws one into it. People do not 
 * Epist. i. 7.
 
 9G PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 listen very patiently to the praise which we bestow on 
 others ; how difficult, then, must it be to get a favour- 
 able hearing when we have to talk about ourselves or 
 our ancestors ! Virtue by itself is apt to be disliked 
 especially so, when glory and distinction attend it ; 
 and the world is never so little likely to misrepresent 
 or to carp at good actions, as when they pass unobserved 
 and without applause. Hence I have often asked my- 
 self, Is this composition, whatever its merits, due to 
 my own vanity or to regard for others ? I see that 
 many things which may be quite proper and necessary 
 at a particular time, lose all their usefulness and grace 
 when the occasion is past. In the case before us, what 
 could have been more useful than to explain at length 
 the grounds and motives of my liberality 1 First, it 
 engaged my mind in good and ennobling thoughts ; it 
 made me take a lengthened survey of the nobleness of 
 such thoughts ; then, it effectually guarded me from 
 that repentance which is sure to follow on an impulsive 
 act of generosity. All this trained me to the habit of 
 despising mere wealth. I find that all men naturally 
 like to keep what they have got ; for myself, a love of 
 liberality has been the result of long and matured 
 reflection, and has set me free from that slavery to 
 avarice which is so common in the world. My bounty, 
 I thought, would be the more praiseworthy, as it would 
 be recognised as the result of deliberate purpose and 
 not of sudden impulse. Add to all this, that what I 
 engaged to do was not to exhibit games or a gladiatorial 
 show, but to establish an annual fund for the mainten- 
 ance and education of poor people of respectable family.
 
 HIS INTEREST IN COMUM. 97 
 
 Pleasures -which merely appeal to the eye and the ear, 
 so far from wanting a speech to recommend them, often 
 need to be discouraged by eloquent argument ; whereas, 
 if you can induce a man to undertake the tiresome work 
 of education, you must attract him not only by pay, 
 but also by the most seductive allurements of a per- 
 suasive rhetoric. If physicians find that they must 
 coax their patients into adopting a wholesome though 
 perhaps unpleasant regimen, how much more ought a 
 man who, out of regard to the public welfare, has to 
 recommend a highly useful but not very popular bene- 
 faction, to win the people over by persuasiveness of 
 argument, especially when, like myself, he has to plead 
 for an institution solely for the benefit of those who 
 are parents, and to do his best to persuade a large 
 number who are yet childless to wait patiently for a 
 privilege in which only a few can immediately share 1 
 As, however, at the time I thought of the public good 
 more than of my own personal reputation, and with 
 that view explained my motives, so now I am afraid 
 that if I publish my speech, people will say that I do 
 it for my own credit rather than for the good of others. 
 Persons who confer public benefits, and then afterwards 
 set them off in speeches, seem to have conferred them 
 simply in order to talk about them. In my own case, 
 a special circumstance weighs much with me. My 
 speech was not delivered before an assembly of all the 
 people of the town, but only before the corporation in 
 the town-hall. I fear it would hardly be consistent in 
 me, after having avoided popular applause when I made 
 the speech, to appear now to covet the same applause by 
 A. c. vol. xi. G
 
 98 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 publishing it, and, though I thus kept out of the town- 
 hall the mass of the people for whose benefit the li- 
 brary was given, to be afterwards thrusting a parade 
 of my liberality on those to whom it can do no good 
 except by way of example. Such are my reasons for 
 hesitating in this matter. Your judgment, which I 
 shall esteem a sufficient sanction for my conduct, will 
 decide me. Farewell" 
 
 Still more interesting, because simpler and less self- 
 conscious, is the following letter, in which he describes 
 his offer to his townspeople to contribute largely to the 
 establishment of a -school for their youth : 
 
 PLINY TO TACITUS.* 
 
 " I am glad to hear of your safe arrival at Rome. I 
 am always anxious to see you, and especially just now. 
 I shall stay a few more days at Tusculum, that I may 
 finish a little work I have in hand ; for I am afraid 
 that if I break it off when I have all but completed it, 
 I shall find it difficult to take it up again. Meanwhile, 
 that I may lose no time, I send off this letter, so to 
 speak, in advance of me, to ask a favour of you which 
 I shall soon ask in person. First, let me tell you the 
 occasion of it. Being lately at my native town, a 
 young lad, son of one of my neighbours, came to pay 
 me a complimentary call. ' Do you go to school 1 ' I 
 asked him. ' Yes,' he replied. ' Where ? ' 'At Medio- 
 lanum.' t ' Why not here 1 ' ' Because,' said his father, 
 who had come with him, ' we have no professors here.' 
 * Epist iv. 17. t Milan.
 
 ENDOWMENT OF A SCHOOL. 99 
 
 ' No professors ! Why, surely,' I replied, ' it would be 
 very much to the interest of all you fathers ' (and, for- 
 tunately, several fathers heard what I said) ' to have 
 your sons educated here rather than anywhere else. 
 Wher e can they live more pleasantly than in their own 
 town ? or be bred up more virtuously than under their 
 parents' eyes, or at less expense than at home ? What 
 an easy matter it would be, by a general contribution, 
 to hire teachers, and to apply to their salaries the 
 money which you now spend on lodging, journeys, 
 and all you have to purchase for your sons at a dis- 
 tance from home. I have no children myself; I look 
 on my native town in the light of a child or a parent, 
 and I am ready to advance a third part of any sum 
 which you think fit to raise for the purpose. I would 
 even promise the whole amount, were I not afraid that 
 my benefaction might be spoilt by jobbery, as I see 
 happens in many towns where teachers are engaged at 
 the public expense. There is only one way of meeting 
 this evil. If the choice of professors is left solely to 
 the parents, the obligation to choose rightly will be 
 enforced by the necessity of having to pay towards the 
 professors' salaries. Those who would perhaps be 
 careless in administering another's bounty, will cer- 
 tainly be careful about their own expenses, and will 
 see that none but those who deserve it receive any 
 money, when they must at the same time receive theirs 
 as welL So take counsel together, and be encouraged 
 by my example, and be assured that the greater my 
 proportion of the expense shall be, the better shall I 
 be pleased. You can do nothing more for the good of
 
 100 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 your children, or more acceptable to your native town. 
 Your sons will thus receive their education in the place 
 of their birth, and be accustomed from their infancy to 
 love and to cling to their native soil. I trust that you 
 may secure such eminent teachers that the neighbour- 
 ing towns will be glad to draw their learning from 
 hence ; so that, as you now send your children else- 
 where to be educated, other people's children may 
 hereafter flock hither for instruction.' 
 
 " I thought it advisable to explain the whole affair 
 to you circumstantially, that you may see more clearly 
 how much obliged I should be if you will undertake 
 what I request. 1 entreat you, in consideration of the 
 importance of the matter, to look out among the mul- 
 titude of men of letters whom the reputation of your 
 genius draws round you, some teachers to whom we 
 may apply, but without as yet tying ourselves down to 
 any particular man. I leave everything to the parents ; 
 I wish them to judge, and select as they think fit j I 
 take on myself nothing but the trouble and expense. 
 If any one shall be found who has confidence in his 
 own ability, let him go there ; but he must understand 
 that he goes with no assurance but that derived from 
 his own merit." 
 
 There is an inscription at Como in honour of a gram- 
 marian named Septicianus, which seems to imply that 
 Pliny's proposal to the townspeople was accepted, and 
 bore fruit.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 PLINY'S FAMILY AND FRIENDS. 
 
 IT is not too much to say that the glimpses which we 
 get of Pliny's domestic life of the man as he lived 
 among his family and friends make as pleasant a 
 picture as anything of the kind that is to be found 
 in classical literature. There are letters, indeed, of 
 Cicero which are full of the same kind of interest ; hut, 
 unhappily, we know too much about Cicero. It is 
 impossible, for instance, as we read the affectionate 
 language which he addresses to his wife Terentia, to 
 help recollecting that in later life he divorced this 
 same Terentia, and married a ward of his own ; and 
 the recollection, though it need not make us doubt the 
 sincerity of his language, cannot but diminish the 
 pleasure with which we regard the writer in this aspect 
 of his life. It might, of course, be objected, that it is 
 well for Pliny's character, and for our own satisfaction, 
 that we know far less about him ; but it is a fact that 
 all that we do know is of the pleasantest kind. There 
 is not a syllable in what he says about his wife, his 
 kindred, his friends, that we could wish to be changed ;
 
 102 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 not a syllable that hints at his being other than an 
 affectionate, just, blameless man. Nor is there from 
 other sources a breath of scandal against his name. 
 One is apt to think, after reading such terrible books 
 as Suetonius's 'Lives of the Caesars' and Juvenal's 
 Satires, that there could not have been such a thing 
 as pure and happy family -life in Eome; and it is 
 refreshing to correct such an impression by turning to 
 the picture that we get in these letters, and to feel 
 assured that, in the darkest and worst times, there 
 were homes such as we know our English homes to be, 
 kind masters whose hearts the curse of slavery had 
 not hardened, single-minded friends, pure women, and 
 faithful husbands. Of Pliny's father we know abso- 
 lutely nothing. His mother appears once only in the 
 letters describing the eruption of Vesuvius though she 
 is not unfrequently alluded to. "What we read there 
 is enough to satisfy us that there was a strong affection 
 between the mother and the son. We also learn that 
 she was somewhat infirm, and we may gather from his 
 language here and elsewhere that she was not alive at 
 the time (97-107) to which the Letters are to be as- 
 cribed. That Pliny had married some time previous 
 to the year A.D. 96, we learn from the fact that he 
 then held a sacred office which involved marriage, and 
 from his own statement, that that year the year, it 
 will be remembered, of the accession of Nerva found 
 him suffering from a recent bereavement in the loss 
 of his wife. He makes no other mention of this lady. 
 "We do not even know her name. His second wife, 
 Calpurnia, is comparatively well known to us. We
 
 HIS WIFE. 103 
 
 cannot do better than let the reader see the letter,* 
 written, it would seem, not long after marriage, in 
 which he describes her good qualities to her aunt, 
 Calpurnia Hispulla, herself an old friend of the Pliny 
 family, who had had the charge of her education : 
 
 " It is because you are a model of family affections, 
 because you loved, as well as he loved you, that most 
 excellent and affectionate brother of yours, and still 
 love his daughter, showing to her the affection not only 
 of an aunt, but also of her dead father, I am sure that 
 you will feel the greatest joy in knowing that she is 
 proving herself worthy of her father, worthy of you, 
 worthy of her grandfather. Her intelligence is very 
 great, very great her frugality ; in loving me she shows 
 how good a heart she has. And she has now a fond- 
 ness for letters which springs from her affection for 
 me. She keeps my books by her, loves to read them, 
 even learns them by heart. How anxious she is when 
 she sees that I am going to speak, how delighted when 
 I have spoken ! She takes care to have messengers to 
 let her know how far I have convinced, how often 
 moved my audience to applaud, and what has been the 
 result of the trial. If ever I give a reading, she sits 
 close by, separated from the audience by a curtain, 
 and drinks in my praises with the greediest ears. She 
 sings and sets to the harp my verses ; and it is not 
 any professor who teaches her, but love, who is the 
 best of masters. These things make me feel a most 
 certain hope that there will be a perpetual and ever- 
 growing harmony between us. For it is not youth or 
 * Epist. iv. 19.
 
 104 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 personal beauty that she loves in me things that by 
 degrees decline with old age but my fame. This is 
 exactly what becomes one brought up by your hands, 
 and instructed by your teaching one who can never 
 have seen anything in your companionship but what 
 was pure and honourable, and who learnt to love me 
 from your descriptions. It was you, you who used to 
 look upon my mother as upon a parent, you who 
 trained me from early boyhood, you who praised me, 
 you who predicted that I should be the man that now 
 I appear to be. So we vie with each other in thanking 
 you I for your having given her to me, she for your 
 having given me to her; for we seem each to have 
 chosen the other." 
 
 To Calpurnia herself we find addressed three charm- 
 ing love-letters* from her husband, which we shall not 
 apologise for giving entire : 
 
 " I have never complained more than now of my 
 occupations, which did not allow me to accompany you 
 when you were going into Campania to recruit your 
 health, or even to be quick in following you. I am at 
 this time especially anxious to be with you, to learn 
 from my own eyes whether you are growing stronger 
 and stouter, and whether you make your way through 
 these luxurious and pleasure-seeking regions without 
 meeting anything to annoy you. Were you quite well, I 
 could not have you away from me without some appre- 
 hension. There is a certain fear and anxiety in know- 
 ing nothing for a time about her whom one loves most 
 ardently. As it is, when I consider both my own absence 
 * Epist. vi. 4 ; vi. 7 ; vii. 5$
 
 HIS WIFE. 105 
 
 and your feeble health, I am grievously troubled by 
 vague and various anxieties. I dread everything, fancy 
 everything, and, as is natural to those who fear, con- 
 jure up the very things that I most dread. I entreat 
 you, therefore, the more earnestly, to do what you can 
 for my fears, by writing once, nay, even twice, a-day. 
 I shall be more at ease while I am reading your 
 letters, though when I have read them, I shall imme- 
 diately feel my fears again." 
 
 " You write that you are no little troubled by my 
 absence, and find your only solace in making my 
 books take my place, and setting them where I ought 
 to be. I am glad that you miss me ; I am glad that 
 you find some rest in these alleviations. For my part, 
 I read and re-read your letters, taking them up in my 
 hands many times, as though they were newly come ; 
 but this only stirs in me a keener longing for you. 
 What sweetness must there be in the talk of one 
 whose letters contain so much that pleases ! Write, 
 nevertheless, as often as you can, though this, while it 
 delights, still tortures me." 
 
 " You will not believe what a longing for you pos- 
 sesses me. The chief cause of this is my love ; and 
 then we have not grown used to be apart. So it 
 comes to pass that I spend a great part of the night in 
 a wakefulness that dwells on your image; and that by 
 day, when the hours return at which I was wont to 
 visit you, my feet take me, as is so truly said, to your 
 chamber ; and that at last, sick and sad at heart, like a
 
 106 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 lover whom his mistress shuts out, I depart from the 
 empty threshold. The only time that is free from 
 these torments is when I am being worn out by the 
 business of the courts and the suits of my friends. 
 Judge you what must be my life when I find my re- 
 pose in toil, my solace in wretchedness and anxiety." 
 
 This wife Pliny nearly lost by a dangerous illness, 
 brought on by a miscarriage. She seems, however, to 
 have recovered her health, for she was with him dur- 
 ing his two years' stay in his provincial government. 
 It was apparently about the end of that period when 
 she was summoned to Italy by the death of her 
 grandfather. Pliny, in one of his letters to the Em- 
 peror, excuses himself for having given his wife a 
 diploma (a sort of free pass, entitling the bearer to use 
 horses and carriages belonging to the state). He had 
 never before, he says, given one except on the Em- 
 peror's affairs ; but his wife had heard of the death of 
 her grandfather, and wished to make all haste she 
 could to join her aunt (the Calpurnia Hispulla before 
 mentioned), and he had given her the document with- 
 out waiting for the Emperor's sanction, which, indeed, 
 could not have been given till it was too late to be of 
 use. Trajan's answer is, as we should expect, kind and 
 approving. 
 
 It would seem that Pliny had no children that is, 
 if we may argue from the absence of any allusion of 
 the kind in the Letters, except, indeed, when he writes 
 to Calpurnia's aunt and to her grandfather about the 
 disappointment which he and his wife had experi- 
 enced. " You cannot desire " (he writes to the old
 
 CALPURNIUS FABATUS. 107 
 
 man, his father-in-law's father, or prosocer, as the 
 Latin conveniently expresses it) "great-grandchildren 
 more eagerly than I desire children children to whom. 
 I seem likely to leave an easy road to honour, both 
 on your side and on mine a name that is widely 
 known, and a nobility of no new origin. The gods 
 grant that they may be born, and change this sorrow 
 of ours into joy." We should hardly have failed to 
 hear if their hopes had been fulfilled. Childlessness 
 was common, as we may gather from many indications, 
 among the upper class of Romans. 
 
 Calpurnia's father had died many years before her 
 marriage. Her grandfather, Calpurnius Fabatus, sur- 
 vived, as we have seen, to the year 105. He must 
 have been then a very old man, as more than forty 
 years before, in the days of Nero, he had had a narrow 
 escape from a charge brought against him by one of 
 the informers of the time. He was, it appears, a 
 native, or, at all events, an inhabitant of Comum, 
 and therefore a fellow-townsman of Pliny. We also 
 find that he was a man of wealth. We have a let- 
 ter congratulating him on having dedicated, in the 
 name of himself and of his son (who was then dead), 
 a very handsome chapel in Comum,- and in having 
 promised a further sum of money for the ornamentation 
 of the gates. In another letter Pliny sends his com- 
 pliments to the old man on the occasion of his birth- 
 day, and takes the opportunity of telling him that he 
 had inspected a villa of his in Campania. A third 
 letter, written, like the others, in a very affectionate 
 tone, promises an early visit on the part of Pliny and
 
 108 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 his wife. This letter will be found at the close of 
 the next chapter. 
 
 The subject of Pliny's family must not be dismissed 
 without a brief mention of the humbler members of it, 
 the freedmen and slaves, for whom he seems to have 
 entertained a kindly feeling which was not always 
 found in Eoman masters, and which he does not de- 
 scribe without something of apology in his tone. " I 
 know," he says, writing to a friend, " how mildly you 
 rule your household, and so will more frankly confess 
 to you how indulgently I treat my own people." These 
 words are the introduction to a letter which he writes 
 on behalf of his freedman, Zosimus. Zosimus, who 
 was of Greek extraction descended, one may guess, 
 through more than one generation of slaves, from the 
 inhabitant of some luckless Greek city which had 
 taken the wrong side in the civil wars was an accom- 
 plished man, with a special gift for comic acting. He 
 had suffered from hemorrhage, brought on by the 
 exercise of his art, and had been sent by his master, 
 or, we should rather say, patron, into Egypt. From 
 this country he had returned apparently restored in 
 health, but exertion had brought on a partial relapse. 
 Pliny writes to his friend Paullinus to request that the 
 invalid might be allowed to take up his abode for a 
 time on an estate which the latter possessed at Forum 
 Julii (now Frejus, in the Eiviera). It is interesting 
 to see the Eoman using the same sanatoria as are now 
 in request among consumptive patients. Another 
 noteworthy point is an arrangement which the letter 
 suggests, almost as a matter of course, by which Zosi-
 
 HIS FREEDMEN AND SLAVES. 109 
 
 mus was to be quartered at the expense of Paullinus or 
 his tenants. " Will you," it runs, " give direction 
 to your people to let him have the use of your house 
 and buildings, and to furnish him with supplies if he 
 wants anything. A physician he certainly will want. 
 I will give him, when he sets out, a sum for travelling 
 expenses sufficient to carry him to your place." 
 
 Another letter speaks so well for the writer's kind- 
 ness of heart, that we shall give it entire.* 
 
 " I am much troubled by illnesses, and, alas ! by 
 deaths, among my own people, some of them quite 
 young men. I have two consolations, not equal indeed 
 to so great a sorrow, yet consolations still. One is my 
 willingness to give them their freedom. I count myself 
 to have lost, not altogether before their tune, those who 
 were free when I lost them. The other is, that I allow 
 even my slaves to make what may be called wills, and 
 that I treat them as valid. They leave such injunctions 
 and requests as they think fit ; I obey as one who fol- 
 lows command. They share, they give, they leave what 
 they possess, so long as they do it within the family, t 
 To the slave, indeed, the family is a sort of common- 
 wealth, so to speak, or country. Though I seek to be 
 satisfied with these consolations, still I am overcome ; 
 I am overpowered by the same human feeling which 
 has led me to grant this indulgence, yet I would not 
 wish to become harder. I know, indeed, that others 
 speak of misfortunes of this kind as being nothing 
 
 * Epist. viii. 16. 
 
 fThe "family," in Eoman parlance, included the whole 
 household, bond or free.
 
 110 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 more than a loss of property, and think themselves, on 
 the strength of it, great and wise men. Great and wise 
 they may be I cannot tell; but men they are not. To 
 be touched by grief to feel it, but fight against it ; 
 to make use of consolations, not to be above the need 
 of them this is what becomes a man." 
 
 Pliny's FRIENDS were a numerous company, and it 
 must suffice to notice a few of the most prominent. Of 
 the men of letters we have already spoken. Among 
 the rest, VERGINIUS EUPUS, who had acted as joint 
 guardian with his uncle, stands foremost. 
 
 His name occurs several times in the History of 
 Tacitus. His life was long and eventful. During the 
 last year of Nero's reign he commanded the Eoman 
 army in Lower Germany, and in the confusion which 
 followed on the revolt of Vindex, the soldiers wished 
 to make him emperor. He refused, on the ground that 
 it was for the senate and not for the army to name 
 Nero's successor. Soon after, on Otho's death, the 
 same offer was pressed on him by the soldiers, and a 
 second time declined. This brought him into peril ; 
 the capricious soldiery, in their disappointment, accused 
 him of a conspiracy against Vitellius, and insisted on his 
 being put to death. The danger was happily escaped, 
 and this great man lived to A.D. 97, the second year of 
 Nerva's reign, and died as consul for the third time at 
 the age of eighty-three. We have in the following 
 letter* an account of the circumstances of his death 
 and of his funeral : 
 
 * Epist. ii. 1.
 
 VERGINIUS RUFUS. HI 
 
 FLINT TO VOCONIUS ROMANUS. 
 
 " Rome lias not for many years beheld a grander and 
 more memorable sight than the public funeral of Ver- 
 ginius Rufus, a most illustrious man, and as fortunate 
 as he was illustrious. He lived thirty years after he had 
 reached the zenith of his fame. He read poems about 
 himself, and histories of his achievements ; he, in fact, 
 lived to see his fame with an after-generation. He 
 was three times consul, thus rising to be the highest of 
 subjects, after having refused to be an emperor. The 
 Caesars, who suspected and hated his virtues, he outlived, 
 and has left behind him this best of emperors, this friend 
 of all mankind. One would think Providence had 
 spared him that he might receive the honour of a pub- 
 lic funeral He died in his eighty-fourth year, in the 
 most perfect calm, reverenced by all. He had enjoyed 
 strong health, with the exception of a trembling in his 
 hands, which, however, gave him no pain. His last ill- 
 ness, indeed, was severe and tedious, but its circum- 
 stances added to his reputation. He was one day prac- 
 tising his voice with the view of delivering a speech of 
 thanks to the Emperor for having promoted him to tho 
 consulship, and had taken in his hand a large volume, 
 which was rather too heavy for an old man to hold as 
 he stood up. It slipped from his grasp, and in hastily 
 trying to recover it, his foot slipped on the smooth 
 pavement; he fell and broke his thigh-bone, which, 
 being badly set (his age being against him), did not 
 properly unite. His funeral obsequies have done 
 honour to the Emperor, to the age, and to the bar.
 
 112 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 Cornelius Tacitus, as consul, pronounced over him the 
 funeral oration. His good fortune was crowned by 
 having so eloquent a speaker to celebrate his praises. 
 He died, indeed, full of years and of glory, famous even 
 from honours which he had refused. Still our world 
 must always sadly miss him, as an example of a past 
 age ; and for myself, I must peculiarly feel his loss, for 
 I not only admired him. as a patriot, but loved him as 
 a friend. We came from the same part, and from 
 neighbouring towns, and our estates joined each other. 
 Besides all this, he was left my guardian, and treated 
 me with a parent's affection. Whenever I was a can- 
 didate for office he supported me with his interest, and 
 though he had long since given up all such services to 
 friends, he would leave his retirement and give me his 
 vote in person. On the day on which the priests no- 
 minate such as they think most worthy of the sacred 
 office, he always proposed me. Even in his last illness, 
 when he thought he might possibly be appointed by 
 the senate one of the five commissioners for reducing 
 the public expenses, he fixed upon me, young as I was, 
 to make his excuses, in preference to many other friends 
 of superior age and rank. He even said to me, ' Had 
 I a son of my own I would intrust you with this 
 matter.' 
 
 " And so I must lament his death, as though it were 
 premature, and pour out my grief into your bosom, if 
 indeed it is right to lament over him, or to use the 
 word death of an event which to such a man termin- 
 ates his mortality rather than ends his life. He lives, 
 and will live for ever, and his name will be more
 
 VESTR1CIUS SPURINNA. 113 
 
 widely celebrated in the recollection of posterity now 
 that he is taken from our sight. I had much else to 
 write to you, but my mind is wholly absorbed in these 
 thoughts. Verginius is ever present to my imagina- 
 tion, and even to my eyes. I am ever fondly imagin- 
 ing that I hear him, converse with him, embrace him. 
 "We have perhaps, and still shall have, citizens equal 
 to him in virtue ; none, I feel sure, in renown. Fare- 
 well" 
 
 ]S"ext to Verginius Rufus comes another soldier, VES- 
 TRICIUS SPURINNA. Spurinna had made his reputation 
 in the wars of a former generation, when he distinguished 
 himself by his brilliant defence of Placentia, which he 
 held in the interest of Otho against the ViteUianist 
 general Caecina. It was nearly thirty years after this 
 that Trajan, a prince not likely to choose for such ser- 
 vice a commander who had lost anything of his vigour, 
 put him in command of an army that was intended to 
 operate against the Bructeri, a German tribe. The 
 object of the campaign, which was to restore a native 
 prince, was effected without recourse to actual hostilities. 
 A statue, habited in the robe of triumph, was voted to 
 Spurinna by the senate, and a similar honour was 
 paid to his son, whom he had lost while absent from 
 Eome. Of this son Pliny wrote a memoir, which we 
 find him sending, with a graceful letter of condolence, 
 to the father and mother. There is another letter 
 addressed by Pliny to Spurinna, in which he tells 
 him how Calpurnius Piso, grandson probably of the 
 luckless man whom Galba adopted three days before 
 
 A. c. vol. xi. H
 
 114 PLINY'S LETTJERS. 
 
 his death, had acquitted himself in writing some poem. 
 " I write the more speedily," he says, " because I 
 know how well disposed you are to all honourable 
 pursuits, and how it delights you to find young men 
 of noble race doing something worthy of their ances- 
 tors." The aged general was indeed an accomplished 
 and cultivated man ; nor would it be easy to find in 
 literature a more pleasant picture than Pliny, who had 
 just returned from a visit to his old friend, gives of his 
 life in retirement.* 
 
 [We take the translation of Dean Merivale, in his 
 ' History of the Romans under the Empire,' vol. vii. 
 p. 326, 327.] 
 
 " I know not that I ever passed a pleasanter time 
 than lately with Spurinna. There is indeed no man 
 I should so much wish to resemble in my own old age, 
 if I am permitted to grow old. Nothing can be finer 
 than such a mode of life. For my part I like a well- 
 ordered course of life, particularly in old men, just as 
 I admire the regular order of the stars. Some amount 
 of irregularity, and even of confusion, is not unbecom- 
 ing in youth ; but everything should be regular and 
 methodical with old men, who are too late for labour, 
 and in whom ambition would be indecent. This regu- 
 larity Spurinna strictly observes, and his occupations, 
 trifling as they are (trifling, that is, were they not per- 
 formed day by day continually), he repeats as it were 
 in a circle. At dawn he keeps his bed, at seven he 
 asks for his slippers ; he then walks just three miles, 
 exercising his mind at the same time with his limbs. 
 * Epist. iiL L
 
 VESTRIC1US SPURINNA. 115 
 
 If friends are by, he discourses seriously with, them if 
 not, he hears a book read ; and so he sometimes does 
 even when friends are present, if it be not disagreeable 
 to them. He then seats himself, and more reading 
 follows, or more conversation, which he likes better. 
 By-and-by he mounts his carriage, taking with him 
 his wife, a most admirable woman, or some friends as 
 myself, for instance, the other day. What a noble, 
 what a charming tete-a-tete! how much talk of an- 
 cient things ! what deeds, what men you hear of ! 
 what noble precepts you imbibe, though indeed he 
 refrains from all appearance of teaching ! Returning 
 from a seven-mile drive, he walks again one mile ; 
 then sits down or reclines with a pen in his hand, 
 for he composes lyrical pieces with elegance both 
 in Greek and Latin. Very soft, sweet, and merry 
 they are, and their charm is enhanced by the decorum 
 of the author's, own habits. When the hour of the 
 bath is announced that is, at two in summer, at three 
 in winter he strips and takes a turn in the sun, 
 if there is no wind. Then he uses strong exercise for 
 a considerable space at tennis, for this is the discipline 
 with which he struggles against old age. After the 
 bath he takes his place at table, but puts off eating for 
 a time, listening in the meanwhile to a little light and 
 pleasant reading. All this time his friends are free to 
 do as he does, or anything else they please. Dinner 
 is then served, elegant and moderate, on plain but 
 ancient silver. He uses Corinthian bronzes, too, and 
 admires without being foolishly addicted to them. 
 Players are often introduced between the courses, that
 
 116 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 the pleasures of the mind may give a relish to those 
 of the palate. He trenches a little on the night even 
 in summer ; but no one finds the time tire, such are 
 his kindness and urbanity throughout. Hence now, 
 at the age of seventy-seven, he both hears and sees per- 
 fectly ; hence his frame is active and vigorous ; he has 
 nothing but old age to remind him to take care of him- 
 self. Such is the mode of life to which I look forward for 
 myself, and on which I will enter with delight as soon 
 as advancing years allow me to effect a retreat. Mean- 
 while I am harassed by a thousand troubles, in which 
 Spurinna is my consolation, as he has ever been my 
 example. For he, too, as long as it became him, dis- 
 charged duties, bore offices, governed provinces j and 
 great was the labour by which he earned his relaxation." 
 Another among the older friends of Pliny was 
 CORELLIUS EUFUS. One of the earliest of the letters 
 describes his death; others speak in affectionate terms 
 of the intimate friendship which, in spite of the dis- 
 parity of age, had always existed between the two, and 
 of the great services which the elder had rendered to 
 the younger friend. " Our age," says Pliny, writing 
 to a friend who had asked him to plead the cause of 
 Corellius's daughter, " has seen no nobler man, none 
 of purer life, none of keener intellect. He was one 
 whom, when my admiration for him grew into affection, 
 I admired the more, the more thoroughly I knew him 
 scarcely, you know, what usually happens." Through- 
 out his public life, in seeking office and in discharging 
 its duties, Corellius had always been at his side. 
 " The conversation," he writes, " once happened to
 
 CORELLIUS RUFUS. 117 
 
 turn in Nerva's presence on young men of worth. 
 Many were speaking in high praise of me ; for a while 
 he kept the silence which helped to give such weight 
 to his words. At last, with that serious air which you 
 know, he said, ' I must be moderate in praising 
 Secundus, for he never acts hut by my advice.' " The 
 circumstances of his death were peculiarly painful. 
 We quote the letter * in which Pliny describes them, 
 and again avail ourselves of Dean Merivale's trans- 
 lation of the passage : 
 
 " I have just suffered a great loss. My friend 
 Corellius Rufus is dead, and by his own act, which 
 imbitters my sorrow. No death is so much to be 
 lamented as one that comes not in the course of fate 
 or nature. Corellius indeed was led to this resolve 
 by the force of reason, which holds with philoso- 
 phers the place of necessity, although he had many 
 motives for living a good conscience, a high repu- 
 tation and influence, not to mention a daughter, a 
 wife, a grandson, sisters, and true friends besides. 
 Eut he was tortured by so protracted a malady that 
 his reasons for death outweighed all these advantages. 
 In his thirty-third year, as I have heard him declare, 
 he was attacked by gout in his feet.t The disease 
 was hereditary with him. In the vigour of life he had 
 checked it by sobriety and restraint ; when it grew 
 worse with increasing years, he had borne it with 
 fortitude and patience. I visited him one day, in 
 
 * Epist 1 12. 
 
 t We have here taken the liberty of altering Dean Merivale's 
 rendering.
 
 118 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 Domitian's time, and found him in the greatest suffer- 
 ing, for the disease had spread from the feet all through 
 his limbs. His slaves quitted the room, for such was 
 their habit whenever an intimate friend came to see 
 him ; and such was also his wife's practice, though 
 she could have kept any secret. After casting his 
 eyes around, he said, ' Why do you suppose it is I con- 
 tinue so long to endure these torments? I would 
 survive the ruffian (meaning Domitian) just one day.' 
 Had his body been as strong as his mind, this wish 
 he would have effected with his own hand. God 
 granted it, however ; and when he felt that he should 
 die a free man, he burst through all the lesser ties 
 which bound him to life. The malady which he had 
 tried so long to relieve by temperance still increased. 
 At last his firmness gave way. Two, three, four days 
 passed, and he had refused all food. His wife, His- 
 pulla, sent our friend Geminius to me, with the mel- 
 ancholy news that her husband had resolved to die, 
 and would not be dissuaded by her prayers or her 
 daughter's ; I alone could prevail upon him. I flew 
 to him. I had almost reached the spot, when Atticus 
 met me from Hispulla to say that even I could not 
 now prevail, so fixed had become his determination. 
 To his physician, indeed, on food being offered him, 
 he had said, ' I have decided ; ' an expression which 
 makes me the more regret him, as I the more admire 
 him. I think to myself, What a friend, what a man 
 I have lost ! He had completed, indeed, his sixty- 
 seventh year, an advanced age even for the strongest. 
 Yes, I know it. He has escaped from his long-
 
 JUNIUS MAURICUS. 119 
 
 protracted illness. I know it. He has died, leaving 
 his dearest friends behind him, and the state, which 
 was still dearer to him, in prosperity. This, too, I know. 
 Nevertheless I lament his death, no less than if he 
 were young and vigorous. I lament it do not think 
 me weak in saying so on my own account. For I 
 have lost yes, I have lost a witness of my own life, 
 a guide, a master. In short, I will say to you, as I 
 said to my friend Calvisius, I fear I shall myself live 
 more carelessly for the future." 
 
 Another of his friends was JUNIUS MAURICUS, the 
 brother of Arulenus Busticus, who, as Tacitus tells us 
 at the beginning of his Life of Agricola, had been put 
 to death under Domitian for writing a panegyric on 
 Psetus Thrasea. "We," says the historian, speaking 
 of his brother senators in one of the closing chapters, 
 in which he briefly and powerfully sketches the last 
 three terrible years of Domitian's reign, " we parted 
 the two brothers;" the one being murdered, the other 
 driven into exile. The banishment of Mauricus is 
 alluded to in a letter already given about the informer 
 Eegulus.* He returned from exile in the year of Nerva's 
 accession; and though only three of Pliny's extant 
 letters are addressed to him, he was, it is clear, one of 
 his intimate and valued friends. From one of these 
 letters it appears that he had asked Pliny to look out 
 for a husband for his brother's daughter ; another is a 
 reply to the request that he would choose a tutor for 
 his brother's children. In these letters Pliny implies 
 that he himself owed much to the brother, who was 
 P. 52.
 
 120 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 one of the many victims of the reign of terror, and that 
 he was prepared to undertake the somewhat invidious 
 task of making a selection. Pliny says he never knew 
 a firmer or a more outspoken man than Mauricus. The 
 praise would seem to have been well deserved. Tacitus 
 tells us that he put a singularly bold question to 
 Domitian on the occasion of his father's accession to 
 the throne. It was Domitian's first appearance in the 
 senate, and Mauricus then and there publicly asked him 
 to submit to the House the papers of the late emperors, 
 so that they might see for themselves who had laid in- 
 formations, and who were the subjects of those informa- 
 tions. The Emperor, Domitian replied, must be con- 
 sulted in so importanta matter; and the motion was thus 
 evaded. We have already had occasion to allude to an 
 instance of the truthfulness and candour of Mauricus 
 when he was once dining with the Emperor !Nerva. 
 Pliny mentions another. There was a celebration of 
 games, with the usual gymnastic contests, at Vienna, in 
 Gaul, which one of Pliny's friends, who held an im- 
 portant office in the town, contrived -to get abolished. 
 It was said that he had done this without the authority 
 of the townspeople ; and when brought to trial, as it 
 would appear, before the senate, he pleaded his cause 
 himself, and carried with him the sympathies of the 
 audience. When the verdict had to she pronounced, 
 and it came to the turn of Mauricus to pronounce 
 judgment, he gave it as his opinion that the games in 
 question ought not to be repeated at Vienna ; and he 
 added the audacious and unpopular sentiment that he 
 wished they could be abolished at Rome.
 
 VOCON1US ROM ANUS. 121 
 
 Several of Pliny's letters are addressed to VOCONIUS 
 ROMANUS. "We know nothing of him but what Pliny 
 tells us. He was evidently one of his best and dearest 
 friends. His father was a Eoman knight, and his 
 mother came from one of the provinces of Spain. 
 Pliny and he had been fellow-students ; they had, no 
 doubt, heard the same lectures at Eome, and had ac- 
 quired similar tastes. Voconius was preparing hims.elf 
 for the bar, and became, according to Pliny, an admir- 
 able pleader. He is spoken of in the highest terms 
 in a letter in which Pliny recommends him to the 
 notice of Priscus, who was, it appears, in the command 
 of a large army, and would have plenty of patronage 
 at his disposal. Pliny says of him, " My friend is a 
 charming talker, and has, besides, a particularly sweet 
 expression of countenance. He has, too, ability of the 
 highest order ; he has a piercing and refined intellect, 
 ready for its work at a moment's notice ; he is a learned 
 lawyer; he writes such admirable letters that you 
 would think the Muses themselves must speak in 
 Latin. I love him as much as it is possible for one 
 friend to love another, and his love for me is the same." 
 Pliny asks for his friend a great favour of the Emperor 
 Trajan, which we may presume was granted. He begs 
 that he may be raised to the highest rank in the state, 
 and be made a senator. 
 
 A singularly pathetic letter it happens, naturally 
 enough, that we hear most of the friends whom Pliny 
 lost describes the character of a younger man, Junius 
 Avitus, to whom Pliny had rendered much the same ser- 
 vice that he had himself received from Corellius Rufus;
 
 122 PL f NY'S LETTERS. 
 
 and who, after having won golden opinions both in a 
 short military career and as praetor under more than one 
 provincial governor, had died suddenly, immediately 
 after completing his canvass for the sedileship. But of 
 all the letters of the kind, there is nothing more touch- 
 ing than the following : * 
 
 " I have the saddest news to tell you. Our friend 
 Fundanus has lost his younger daughter. I never saw 
 a girl more cheerful, more lovable, more worthy of long 
 life nay, of immortality. She had not yet completed 
 her fourteenth year, and she had already the prudence 
 of an old woman, the gravity of a matron, and still, with 
 all maidenly modesty, the sweetness of a girl. How she 
 would cling to her father's neck ! how affectionately and 
 discreetly she would greet us, her father's friends ! how 
 she loved her nurses, her attendants, her teachers, 
 every one according to his service ! How earnestly, 
 how intelligently, she used to read ! How modest was 
 she and restrained in her sports ! And with what 
 self-restraint, what patience nay, what courage she 
 bore her last illness ! She obeyed the physicians, en- 
 couraged her father and sister, and when all strength 
 of body had left her, kept herself alive by the vigour 
 of her mind. This vigour lasted to the very end, and 
 was not broken by the length of her illness or by the 
 fear of death ; so leaving, alas ! to us yet more and 
 weightier reasons for our grief and our regret. Oh 
 the sadness, the bitterness of that death ! Oh the 
 cruelty of the time when we lost her, worse even than 
 * Epist. v. 16.
 
 THE DAUGHTER OF FUNDANUS. 123 
 
 the loss itself ! She had been betrothed to a noble 
 youth ; the marriage-day had been fixed, and we had 
 been invited. How great a joy changed into how great 
 a sorrow ! I cannot express in words how it went to 
 my heart when I heard Fundanus himself (this is one 
 of the grievous experiences of sorrow) giving orders 
 that what he had meant to lay out on dresses, and 
 pearls, and jewels, should be spent on incense, 
 unguents, and spices."
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 COUNTRY LIFE PLINY*S VILLAS. 
 
 PUNY, like all the rich men of his time, lived much in 
 the country. He thoroughly enjoyed and appreciated 
 the charms of rural scenery, and his descriptions of it 
 have a"bout them the tone of modern sentiment. As 
 we read them, we seem to be on the threshold of our 
 own times. There is, we feel, a distinct link between 
 our own tastes and those of a Eoman who could dwell 
 with pleasure on the beauties of a landscape. The 
 Eoman of the upper class, no doubt, had always been 
 fond of country life, and was in many respects not 
 unlike an English squire ; but it would seem that the 
 sort of sentimental, and, so to speak, artistic feeling 
 about the country which is so familiar to us, was spe- 
 cially developed under the Empire, and exhibited itself 
 in the literature of the Silver age. 
 
 In the following letter Pliny contrasts life in Eome 
 with life in the country : 
 
 PLINY TO MINUTIUS FUNDANUS.* 
 
 " When one considers how the time passes at Eome, 
 * Epist. i. 9.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 125 
 
 one cannot but be surprised that, take any single day, 
 and it either is or seems to be spent reasonably enough; 
 and yet, upon casting up the whole sum, the amount 
 will appear quite otherwise. Ask any of your friends 
 what he has been doing to-day 1 he will tell you, per- 
 haps, ' I have been paying a visit to a friend on the 
 occasion of his son's coming of age ; I have had an 
 invitation to a wedding ; I have had to witness the 
 signature of a will ; I was asked to attend the hearing 
 of a cause; I was called in to a consultation.' All 
 these duties seem very important while you are en- 
 gaged in them ; yet, when you reflect at your leisure 
 that every day has been thus employed, you feel them 
 to be mere trifles. Then you think to yourself how 
 many of your days have been spent in a dull dreary 
 routine. This is my own case when I retire to my 
 house at Laurentum for a little quiet reading and 
 writing, and for; the bodily rest which freshens up the 
 mind. Then I hear nothing and say nothing for 
 which I have reason to be sorry ; no one talks scandal 
 to me, and I find fault with nobody, except myself, 
 when I cannot compose to my satisfaction. There 
 I am free from the anxieties of hope and fear; no 
 rumours worry me ; my books and my thoughts are 
 my only companions. True and genuine life, sweet 
 and honourable repose, nobler than any sort of occu- 
 pation ! sea and shore, true scene for study and 
 contemplation, with how many thoughts do you in- 
 spire me ! My friend, do you too take the first oppor- 
 tunity of leaving the bustle of Eome, with its idle 
 pursuits and laborious trifles, and give yourself up to
 
 126 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 study or to repose. ' It is better,' as my friend Atilius 
 has said, with as much wit as wisdom, ' to have noth- 
 ing to do than to be doing nothing.' Farewell." 
 
 Horace complains in very much the same way of a city 
 life, and of the infinite boredom which so often attends 
 it. "As soon as I came," he says, " to the gardens of 
 Maecenas at Rome, a hundred suitors leap out and 
 pounce upon me, and annoy me with endless solicita- 
 tions." Some of the very same particular troubles are 
 mentioned by the poet as are alluded to by Pliny. 
 
 In the following letter we see the delight which 
 Pliny took in beautiful scenery. It is a description 
 of the source of the Clitumnus and the surrounding 
 country. The Clitumnus was a little river in Umbria, 
 and a tributary of the Tiber. It was known as the 
 Timia or Tinia during the last nine or ten miles of its 
 course. Virgil speaks of the singularly white cattle 
 which were pastured on its banks. It flowed through 
 a rich valley bounded on either side by the Apen- 
 nines. It would appear that the picturesqueness of 
 the scenery about its source attracted a number of 
 visitors. Clitunno is its modern name; Spoleto and 
 Foligno are in its immediate neighbourhood. 
 
 PLINY TO ROMANUS.* 
 
 " Have you ever seen the source of the Clitumnus ? 
 I suppose not, as I never heard you mention it. Let 
 me advise you to go there at once. I have just seen 
 it, and am sorry I put off my visit so long. 
 * Epist. iii. 8.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 127 
 
 " At the foot of a little hill, covered with old and 
 shady cypress-trees, gushes out a spring, which bursts 
 out into a number of streamlets, all of different sizes. 
 Having struggled, so to speak, out of its confinement, 
 it opens out into a broad basin, so clear and trans- 
 parent that you may count the pebbles and little 
 pieces of money which are thrown into it. From this 
 point the force and weight of the water, rather than 
 the slope of the ground, hurries it onward. What was 
 a mere fountain becomes a noble river, wide enough to 
 allow vessels to pass each other, as they sail with or 
 against the stream. The current is so strong, though 
 the ground is level, that large barges, as they go down 
 the river, do not require the assistance of oars ; while 
 to go up it is as much as can possibly be done with 
 oars and long poles. When you sail up and down for 
 amusement, the ease of going down the stream and the 
 labour of returning make a pleasant variety. The 
 banks are clothed with an abundance of ash and poplar, 
 which are so distinctly reflected in the clear water that 
 they seem to be growing at the bottom of the river, 
 and can be easily counted. The water is as cold as 
 snow, and its colour the same. Near it stands an 
 ancient and venerable temple, in which is a statue of 
 the river-god Clitumnus, clothed in the usual robe of 
 state. The oracles here delivered attest the presence 
 of the deity. In the immediate neighbourhood are 
 several little chapels, dedicated to particular gods, each 
 of whom has his distinctive name and special worship, 
 and is the tutelary deity of a fountain. For, besides 
 the principal spring, which is, as it were, the parent of
 
 128 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 all the rest, there are several smaller springs which have 
 a distinct source, but which unite their waters with the 
 Clitumnus, over which a bridge is thrown, separating 
 the sacred part of the river from that which is open to 
 general use. Above the bridge you may only go in a 
 boat ; below it, you may swim. The people of the 
 town of Hispellum, to whom Augustus gave this place, 
 furnish baths and lodgings at the public expense. 
 There are several little houses on the banks, in the 
 specially picturesque situations, and they are quite close 
 to the water. In short, everything in the neighbour- 
 hood will give you pleasure. You may also amuse 
 yourself with numberless inscriptions on the pillars and 
 walls, celebrating the praises of the stream and of its 
 tutelary divinity. Many of these you will admire, and 
 some will make you laugh. But no ; you are too 
 cultivated a person to laugh on such an occasion. 
 Farewell" 
 
 Lord Orrery, who published a translation of the 
 Letters early in the last century, in some observations on 
 this letter, says that it reminds us of St "Winifred's Well 
 in Wales. The old temple of Clitumnus may be com- 
 pared with the chapel of St Winifred, and the honours 
 paid to the Italian god bear a resemblance to the mir- 
 aculous powers popularly attributed to the old British 
 saint. 
 
 When in the country, Pliny used to indulge in the 
 fashionable country sports, though we should think 
 they were not quite to his taste. Possibly his phy- 
 sical strength was hardly equal to the exertion which
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 129 
 
 they required. There is a decided touch of affectation 
 in the following letter to his friend Tacitus, in which 
 he tells him how he contrived to do literary work in 
 the hunting-field. As Lord Orrery remarks, a thorough- 
 bred fox-hunter would at once conclude that Pliny 
 had no real heart for field-sports. 
 
 PLINY TO TACITUS.* 
 
 " You will laugh, and laugh you may. Your old 
 friend, whom you know so well, has captured three 
 magnificent boars. What ! Pliny ? you will say. Yes, 
 Pliny; without, however, abandoning my indolent 
 habits and love of repose. The nets were spread, and 
 I sat close to them, but instead of a boar-spear or 
 javelin, I was armed with my pen and my note-book. 
 I mused, and put down my thoughts on paper, for 
 T had made up my mind that if I had to return with 
 my hands empty, my note-book should be full. There 
 is no reason why you should despise this way of study- 
 ing. You cannot conceive how much bodily exercise 
 contributes to enliven the imagination. Besides, the 
 solitude of the woods around you, and the perfect 
 silence which is observed in hunting, strongly in- 
 clines the mind to thought. For the future, when 
 you go hunting, let me advise you to take with 
 you your papers, as well as a basket of provisions 
 and a bottle of wine. You will then find that Min- 
 erva haunts the mountains quite as much as Diana. 
 Farewell." 
 
 * Epist. i. 6. 
 
 A. C. vol. xi. I
 
 130 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 But perhaps the most interesting and important of 
 Pliny's letters in connection with country life are those 
 in which he describes his country houses, of which he 
 had several. Of the two principal he gives us a very 
 elaborate account, to which we are indebted for most 
 of our knowledge about the character of a Roman villa. 
 One of these was close to Ostia, about seventeen miles 
 from Rome, facing the Tyrrhenian Sea. This Pliny calls 
 his Laurentine, Laurentum having been the old legen- 
 dary capital of Latium, and having given its name to 
 a considerable strip of the western coast of Italy, in 
 the neighbourhood of the mouth of the Tiber. It is 
 not possible to identify the site of Pliny's villa, as 
 might be expected from a circumstance which he him- 
 self tells us, that his own was only one of a great num- 
 ber of villas on this part of the coast. Its moderate 
 distance from Rome made it just the place which a 
 rich and hard-working man would select for a country 
 seat. Pliny tells us he could transact his business in 
 Rome, and arrive comfortably at his villa on the even- 
 ing of the same day. His other principal country 
 mansion was on a larger scale, and at a much greater 
 distance from Rome. He always calls it his Tuscan 
 villa. It was under the Apennine range, and the Tiber 
 flowed through the adjacent meadows. The great Ro- 
 man houses, at all events in the country, seem to have 
 consisted of but one storey. We subjoin considerable 
 portions of the letters in which Pliny describes his 
 Laurentine and Tuscan villas. They are too long to 
 be inserted in full.
 
 HIS LAURENTINE VILLA. 131 
 
 PUNY TO GALLUS.* 
 
 " You wonder why I am so extremely fond of my 
 house at Laurentum. You will wonder no longer when 
 I make you acquainted with its attractiveness, the 
 advantages of its situation, and the extent of shore on 
 which it stands." 
 
 ***** 
 
 " It is but seventeen miles from Eome, so that I can 
 pass my evening here without breaking in upon the 
 business of the day. There are two roads to it; if 
 you go by that of Laurentum you must turn off at 
 the fourteenth milestone if by that of Ostia, at the 
 eleventh. Both are rather sandy, which makes them 
 heavy for a carriage, but easy and pleasant if you go 
 on horseback. You have a variety of landscape; some- 
 times your view is shut in by woods, then again it 
 opens out into broad meadows, where numberless flocks 
 of sheep and herds of cattle, which the inclemency of 
 winter has driven from the mountains, grow fat and 
 sleek during the warmth of spring in the rich pasturage, 
 
 " My house is for use, not for show. You first 
 enter a courtyard, plain and simple without being 
 mean, and then pass into a colonnade in the shape of 
 the letter D, the space enclosed by which looks bright 
 and cheerful. Here one has a capital place of retreat 
 in bad weather, for there are windows all round it, 
 and it is sheltered by a projection on the roof. Oppo- 
 site the middle of the colonnade is a very pleasant 
 inner court, which leads into a handsome dining-room 
 * Epist. ii. 17.
 
 132 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 running out to the sea-shore. When the wind is in 
 the south-west, its walls are gently washed by the 
 waves which break at its foot. The room has fold- 
 ing-doors, or windows as large as doors, and from these 
 you might imagine you see three different seas. From 
 another point you look through the colonnade into the 
 court, and see the mountains in the distance. To the 
 left of the dining-room, a little further from the sea, is 
 a spacious sitting-room, within that a smaller room, 
 one side of which gets the morning and the other the 
 afternoon sun. This I make my winter snuggery. 
 Then comes a room, the windows of which are so 
 arranged that they secure the sun for us during the 
 whole day. In its walls is a bookcase for such works 
 as can never be read too often." 
 
 Then follows a description of the bed -rooms, 
 dressing-rooms, bath-rooms, &c., which were all on an 
 elaborate scale. There were both hot and cold baths, 
 and a warming-apparatus. There was also a tennis-- 
 court, warmed by the afternoon sun, at the end of 
 which was a sort of tower. This, unlike the rest of 
 the house, appears to have been built in storeys, and 
 the highest storey was for the express purpose of 
 enjoying an extensive prospect. 
 
 " The garden is chiefly planted with fig and mul- 
 berry trees, to which this soil is peculiarly favourable. 
 Here is a dining-room, which, though it is at a dis- 
 tance from the sea, commands a prospect no less plea- 
 sant. Behind this room are two apartments, the
 
 SIS LAURENTINE VILLA. 133 
 
 windows of which look out on the entrance to the 
 house, and to a well-stocked kitchen-garden. You 
 then enter a sort of cloister, which you might suppose 
 built for public use. It has a range of windows on 
 each side ; in fair weather we open all of them ; if it 
 blows, we shut those on the exposed side, and are 
 perfectly sheltered. In front of this colonnade is a 
 terrace, fragrant with the scent of violets, and warmed 
 by the reflection of the sun from the portico. We 
 find this a very pleasant place in winter, and still more 
 so in summer, for then it throws a shade on the terrace 
 during the forenoon, while in the afternoon we can 
 walk under its shade in the place of exercise, or in 
 the adjoining part of the garden. The portico is 
 coolest when the sun's rays strike perpendicularly on 
 its roof. By setting open the windows, the soft west- 
 ern breezes have a free draught, and so the air is never 
 close and oppressive." 
 
 One of the rooms was so contrived, that Pliny 
 says, when he was in it, he seemed to be at a distance 
 from his own house ; and on the occasion of the feast 
 of the Saturnalia, which gave his domestics and ser- 
 vants full licence to make as much noise as they liked, 
 he found this a particularly convenient retreat. 
 
 The letter concludes with a brief description of the 
 neighbourhood. 
 
 "Amid the conveniences and attractions of the 
 place, there is one drawback ; we want running water. 
 However, we have wells, or rather springs, at our com- 
 mand. Such is the extraordinary nature of the ground, 
 that in whatever part you dig, as soon as you have
 
 134 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 turned up the surface of the soil, you meet with a 
 spring of perfectly pure water, altogether free from 
 any salt taste. The neighbouring woods supply us 
 with fuel in abundance, and all kinds of provisions 
 may be had from Ostia, A man with few and simple 
 wants might get all he required from the next village. 
 In that little place there are three public baths, a very 
 great convenience, in case my friends come in unex- 
 pectedly, and my bath is not ready heated and pre- 
 pared. The whole coast is prettily studded with 
 detached villas or rows of villas, which, whether you 
 view them from the sea or the shore, look like a collec- 
 tion of towns. The strand is sometimes, after a long 
 calm, perfectly smooth, though in general, by the 
 storms driving the waves upon it, it is rough and 
 uneven. I cannot say that we have any very fine fish, 
 but we get excellent soles and prawns. As to other 
 kinds of provisions, my house is better off than those 
 which are inland, especially as to milk, for the cattle 
 come here in great numbers to seek water and shade." 
 
 Pliny had no estate or park of any extent round his 
 Laurentine house. In this respect his Tuscan villa 
 contrasts advantageously with it. It was here that he 
 liked to spend the summer months, as he did a great 
 part of the winter at Laurentum. 
 
 His description of his Tuscan seat is equally minute 
 as the preceding. We give portions of it. 
 
 PLINY TO DOMITIUS APOLLINAEIS.* 
 
 " I sincerely thank you for your kind concern in 
 * Epist. v. 6.
 
 HIS TUSCAN VILLA 135 
 
 trying to dissuade me from passing the summer on my 
 Tuscan property, under the impression that it is an 
 unhealthy part. It is quite true that the air of the 
 coast is unwholesome, hut my house is at a distance 
 from the sea, under one of the Apennines which are 
 singularly healthy. But, to relieve you from all 
 anxiety on my account, I will describe to you the 
 climate and character of the country, and the lovely 
 situation of my house. I am sure you will read the 
 description with as much pleasure as I shall give it. 
 
 " The air in winter is sharp and frosty, so that 
 myrtles and olives, and trees which delight in warmth, 
 will not grow there. The laurel thrives, and is 
 remarkably beautiful, though now and then it is killed 
 by the cold not, however, oftener than at Eome. 
 The summers are very temperate, and there is always 
 a refreshing breeze, seldom high winds. To this I 
 attribute the number of old men. If you were to see 
 the grandfathers and great-grandfathers, and hear 
 their stories about their ancestors, you would fancy 
 yourself born in some former age. 
 
 " The character of the country is very beautiful. 
 Picture to yourself an immense amphitheatre, such as 
 only nature could create. Before you lies a broad 
 plain, bounded by a range of mountains whose sum- 
 mits are covered with tall and ancient woods, which 
 are stocked with all kinds of game for hunting. The 
 lower slopes of the mountains are planted with un- 
 derwood, among which are a number of little risings 
 with a rich soil, on which hardly a stone is to be 
 found. In fruitfulness they are quite equal to a
 
 136 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 valley, and produce as good crops, though not so early 
 in the year. Below these, on the mountain-side, is a 
 continuous stretch of vineyards, terminated by a belt 
 of shrubs. Then you have meadows and the open 
 plain. The arable land is so stiff that it is necessary 
 to go over it nine times with the biggest oxen and 
 the strongest ploughs. The meadows are bright with 
 flowers, and produce trefoil and other kinds of herbage 
 as fine and tender as if it were but just sprung up. 
 All the soil is refreshed with never- failing streams, 
 but though there is plenty of water, there are no 
 marshes ; for as the ground is on a slope, all the water 
 which is not absorbed runs off into the Tiber. 
 
 " This river winds through the midst of the meadows. 
 It is navigable only in winter and in spring, and then 
 conveys the produce of the neighbourhood to Eome. 
 In summer it shrinks to nothing, and leaves the name 
 of a great river to an almost empty channel. In 
 autumn it again claims its title. 
 
 " You would be charmed by taking a view of the 
 country from one of the neighbouring mountains. 
 You would fancy that you were looking on the ima- 
 ginary landscape of a first-rate artist ; such a harmo- 
 nious variety of beautiful objects meets the eye wher- 
 ever it turns. 
 
 " My house commands as good a view as if it stood 
 on the brow of the hill. You approach it by so grad- 
 ual a rise that you find yourself on high ground with- 
 out perceiving that you have been making an ascent. 
 Behind, but at a considerable distance, is the Apen- 
 nine range, from which, on the calmest days, we get
 
 THE GARDENS AND GROUNDS. 137 
 
 cool breezes. There is nothing sharp or cutting about 
 them, as the distance is sufficient to break their 
 violence. The greater part of the house has a south- 
 ern aspect, and enjoys the afternoon sun in summer, 
 and gets it rather earlier in winter. It is fronted by 
 a broad and proportionately long colonnade, which has 
 a porch of antique fashion, and in front of this colon- 
 nade is a terrace edged with box and shrubs cut into 
 different shapes. From the terrace you descend by an 
 easy slope to a lawn, and on each side of the descent 
 are figures of animals in box facing each other. You 
 then come to a shrubbery formed of the soft, I had 
 almost said, the liquid acanthus. Eound this runs a 
 walk, shut in by evergreens shaped into every variety 
 of form. Beyond this is a riding-ring, like a circus, 
 which goes round the box-hedge and the dwarf-trees 
 which are cut close." 
 
 The remainder of the letter is occupied with a very 
 detailed description of the plan and arrangement of 
 the house. Pliny, as he says, had made up his mind 
 to take his friend into every nook and corner of it. 
 "We find that everything was on a splendid and luxuri- 
 ous scale. There are summer and winter rooms, bath 
 and dining rooms, a tennis-court, a carriage-drive, and 
 a hippodrome or place for horse exercise, alcoves of 
 marble in the gardens, shaded with vines, and foun- 
 tains and little rills in all directions. The garden 
 seems to have been laid out in a somewhat stiff and 
 formal manner; there was, however, it seems, an 
 attempt to introduce into it an imitation of the wild
 
 138 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 beauty of nature. It appears that the practice of 
 cutting trees into regular shapes came into fashion 
 among the Romans in the time of Augustus. In this 
 garden of Pliny's Tuscan villa we find it to be a very 
 prominent feature. We find, too, the plane-tree fre- 
 quently mentioned, as well as the cypress and the box. 
 Pliny says he had a special affection for this villa and 
 its surroundings, as they were designed by himself. 
 It was natural that he should take great pleasure in 
 describing it at length. " You will hardly," he says 
 to his friend, " think it a trouble to read the descrip- 
 tion of a place which I am persuaded would charm you 
 were you to see it." Towards the close of this long 
 letter he hints that he had villas at Tusculum, Tibur, 
 Praeneste, all names familiar to persons acquainted 
 with Latin literature. Of these villas he tells us no- 
 thing, except that he did not like them so much as his 
 Tuscan seat. He had also, as we have mentioned, 
 some villas on the margin of the Lake of Como. Two 
 of these, which were his especial favourites, he play- 
 fully called " Tragedy" and " Comedy." In the follow- 
 ing letter the names are explained. 
 
 PLINY TO ROMANUS.* 
 
 " I am glad to find by your letter that you have 
 begun to build. I may now shelter myself under your 
 example. I am myself building, and as I have you 
 on my side, I have reason too. We are also alike in 
 another respect : you are building by the sea, I am 
 
 * Epist. ix. 7.
 
 VILLAS AT COMUM. 139 
 
 building by Lake Larius. I have several villas on the 
 border of this lake, but there are two in which I take 
 most delight, and which chiefly occupy my attention. 
 They are situated like the houses at Baiae ; one of 
 them stands on a rock, and commands a view of the 
 lake; the other is close to the water. I call one 
 * Tragedy,' because it is supported, as it were, by the 
 high buskin ; the other ' Comedy,' as resting on the 
 humble sock. Each has its own peculiar beauties, 
 which, from their very difference, are all the more 
 pleasing to their owner. One has a nearer view of the 
 lake ; the other commands a wider prospect over it. 
 The first is built along the bend of a little bay ; the 
 latter is on a cliff which runs out so as to form two 
 bays. Here you have a straight walk, extending along 
 the banks of the lake ; there a spacious terrace, that 
 falls towards it by a gentle descent. The former does 
 not feel the force of the waves, the latter breaks them; 
 from one you see people fishing below, from the other 
 you may fish yourself, and almost throw your line 
 from your chamber, as you lie in bed, as well as if you 
 were in a boat. It is the beauties these villas possess 
 which tempt me to add to them those which are want- 
 ing. But why should I give you a reason when I 
 know that you will think it a sufficient one that I am 
 following your example? Farewell." 
 
 The following letter tells us how Pliny occasionally 
 played the part of the benevolent patron in a thoroughly 
 modern fashion. It reminds us of a church-opening, 
 and of the luncheon which commonly succeeds it :
 
 140 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 PLINY TO FABATUS, HIS WIFE'S GRANDFATHER.* 
 
 " You have long been wishing to see your grand- 
 daughter and myself. We are equally anxious to see 
 you, and are determined to delay the pleasure no 
 longer ; indeed we are actually packing up, and mean 
 to set off as soon as the state of the roads will permit. 
 "We shall stop only once, and that for a short time. 
 We must turn a little out of the way to go to my 
 Tuscan property not to look after the estate (for that 
 might be postponed), but to perform an indispensable 
 duty. Near my property is a town called Tifernum- 
 on-Tiber, which put itself under my patronage when I 
 was a mere boy, thus showing an affection for me as 
 strong as it was undeserved. The people always cele- 
 brate my arrival with public rejoicings, express sorrow 
 when I leave them, and are delighted whenever they 
 hear of my preferment to office. To show my gratitude 
 to them (for it is a shame to be outdone in friendly 
 feeling) I built them a temple at my own expense, and 
 as it is finished, it would be a sort of impiety to delay 
 its consecration any longer. We shall be there on the 
 day fixed for the ceremony, and I intend to celebrate 
 it with a public banquet. Perhaps we may stay there 
 the next day, but in that case we shall make all the 
 more haste in our journey. May we have the hap- 
 piness to find you and your daughter in good health, 
 for I am sure we shall find you in good spirits if we 
 arrive safely. Farewell." 
 
 * Epist. iv. 1.
 
 CHAPTEE XL 
 
 PLINY IN HIS PROVINCE. 
 
 IN.A.D. 103, the sixth year of Trajan's reign, Pliny was 
 appointed governor of the provinces known as Bithynia 
 and Pontus, or Pontica, as it was also called. He bore 
 the title of Legatus and Propraetor, and he had the 
 consular power. He had, in short, the highest rank 
 and position with which a Roman governor could be 
 invested. It would seem that he did not actually 
 arrive in his province till the middle of the September 
 of the year. He landed after a pleasant voyage at 
 Ephesus, and thence had a rather tiresome and dis- 
 agreeable journey during excessive heat to Pergamos, 
 where he stopped a while. His health, never very 
 strong, had been shaken by a serious illness in the 
 preceding year. His life, he tells the Emperor in one 
 of his letters, had been in danger, and he availed him- 
 self of a mode of treatment which we may presume was 
 much in fashion at the time. He procured the services 
 of a medical practitioner who cured many of his patients 
 by the simple process of rubbing and anointing. So 
 much good did he derive from the remedy prescribed,
 
 142 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 that, with the gratitude which he always felt for a 
 kindness, he asked the Emperor to grant to the physi- 
 cian, who was probably either a Jew or a Greek, the 
 freedom of the city of Alexandria, and also the privi- 
 leges of Eoman citizenship. His province was an 
 important one. Its administration at this particular 
 time required tact and ability. It contained several 
 considerable towns, to the prosperity of which, it would 
 appear, the imperial government had greatly contri- 
 buted. Some of them, as Neocaesareia, or Mcasa, where 
 the famous ecclesiastical council was held in A.D. 314, 
 were of comparatively recent origin. There were also 
 the free cities of Chalcedon, Nicomedeia, Amisus, and 
 Trapezus, and the colonies of Heracleia and Sinope. 
 The district had the elements of wealth ; parts of it, 
 especially towards the coast, were extremely produc- 
 tive ; and it had iron mines. Its population must 
 have been of a very mixed character, with Greek ideas 
 and civilisation diffused throughout it. And in Pliny's 
 time, as we shall see, Christianity had gained a strong 
 hold on the people, and was a fact of the highest 
 importance. 
 
 Pliny had unquestionably many both of the moral 
 and intellectual qualities which go to make a good and 
 wise ruler. He had carefully cultivated a habit of 
 sympathy, and his tendency was to be as gentle and 
 merciful as possible. He was, as we should say, thor- 
 oughly tolerant and liberal. He was particularly fond 
 of everything* Greek ; and, as we have seen, he especi- 
 ally delighted in the society of Greek rhetoricians and 
 philosophers. In the following letter his love and
 
 PLINY IN HIS PROVINCE. 143 
 
 admiration of Greece and its culture are strikingly 
 displayed. Like a well-known letter of Cicero to his 
 brother Quintus, it is a letter of advice to a friend 
 who was about to enter on the government of Achaia, 
 and had already earned credit as the governor of 
 Bithynia. 
 
 PLINY TO MAXIMUS.* 
 
 " My friendship for you constrains me, I will not 
 say to give you directions (for you do not require 
 them), but to remind you of what you already know, 
 so that you may put it in practice, and even know it 
 more thoroughly. Consider that you are sent to the 
 province of Achaia, that true and genuine Greece, 
 whence civilisation, literature, even agriculture, are 
 believed to have taken their origin, sent to regulate 
 the condition of free cities, whose inhabitants are men 
 in the best sense of the word free men of the noblest 
 kind, inasmuch as they have maintained the freedom 
 which nature gives as a right, by their virtues, by 
 their good actions, and by the securities of alliance 
 and solemn obligation. Eevere the gods who founded 
 their state ; revere the glory of their ancient days, even 
 that old age itself, which, as in men it claims respect, 
 is in cities altogether sacred. Honour their old tradi- 
 tions, their great deeds, even their legends. Grant 
 to every one his full dignity, freedom yes, and the 
 indulgence of his vanity. Keep ever before you the 
 fact that it was this land which gave us our laws gave 
 them to us, not as a conquered people, but at our own 
 * Epist. viii. 24.
 
 144 FLINT 'S LETTERS. 
 
 request. It is Athens, remember, to which you go, 
 it is Lacedaemon you will have to govern ; and to take 
 from such states the shadow and the surviving name 
 of liberty would be a cruel and barbarous act. You 
 see that physicians treat the free with more tenderness 
 than slaves, though their disorder may be the same. 
 Eemember what each of these states has been, but so 
 remember as not to despise them for being no longer 
 what they were. Show no pride or arrogance; and 
 yet do not be afraid that you will fall into contempt. 
 Can he who is invested with power, and has the 
 insignia of authority, be despised, unless he first shows 
 that he despises himself by being mean and avaricious? 
 Power is ill proved by insult ; ill can terror command 
 respect ; far more efficacious is love in procuring sub- 
 mission than fear. Terror vanishes with your absence, 
 while love remains ; the former turns to hatred, the 
 latter to reverence. You must therefore again and 
 again call to mind the meaning of your title, and make 
 yourself fully understand what a great work is the 
 government of free cities. For what can be better for 
 society than such government; what can be more 
 precious than freedom? Again, what could be more 
 shameful than to turn the first into anarchy, the last 
 into slavery ? " 
 
 "We may be pretty sure that Pliny tried to govern 
 his province on the principles here laid down. From 
 his correspondence with Trajan, he would seem to have 
 combined kindness with energy. A Eoman governor 
 had very great powers, and a very wide latitude given
 
 MUNICIPAL MISMANAGEMENT. 145 
 
 him. He commanded the army, and he had to hear 
 and decide causes. He had to impose the taxes, and 
 take care that they were collected. Much, one would 
 suppose, must have been left to the governor's dis- 
 cretion. Pliny's letters to Trajan, however, do not 
 bear out this impression. He would appear to have 
 thought that he was not justified in dealing with the 
 most ordinary matters without appealing to the Em- 
 peror. Very possibly this may have been the general 
 tone of a Eoman governor at this time. Pliny, how- 
 ever, carried it so far that we think he must have been 
 wanting in that self-reliance without which a man 
 cannot be even a subordinate of the highest order. 
 Trajan, no doubt, liked and esteemed Pliny ; yet on 
 one occasion he gives him a gentle reproof. The 
 people of Mcaea had undertaken to build a theatre ; 
 and when 80,000 had been spent, it was found that 
 the walls were cracked from top to bottom, either from 
 the foundation being laid on marshy ground, or from 
 the bad quality of the stones. Pliny asks the Em- 
 peror whether in his opinion the work should be 
 finished, or entirely abandoned. This seems to imply 
 a very strict system of imperialism, or such a question 
 would have been utterly absurd. The Emperor hints 
 very plainly that Pliny must decide for himself. 
 " You are on the spot," he says in his answer, " and 
 are the best person to consider and determine what 
 had better be done in the matter." The town of 
 Mcaea, it would appear, did not manage its affairs very 
 well. Pliny tells us in the same letter that it was 
 rebuilding, on an enlarged plan, a gymnasium which 
 A. c. vol. xi. K
 
 146 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 had been burnt down before his arrival in the province. 
 They had already incurred a considerable, and, as it 
 turned out, a useless expense. The structure was not 
 only very irregular and ill arranged, but a second 
 architect who had been called in, and who was a rival 
 of the original architect, declared that the walls, though 
 they were twenty -two feet thick, were not strong 
 enough to support the fabric, not having been properly 
 cemented. It seems strange that Pliny should write 
 to the Emperor about such details. The explanation 
 is to be sought in the fact, that a grant from the 
 imperial treasury was occasionally made to supplement 
 the deficiencies of local resources. Trajan in his reply 
 shows the contempt of a soldier for the trifling amuse- 
 ments of the Greeks. " These paltry Greeks, I know, 
 are extravagantly fond of gymnastic diversions ; and 
 therefore, perhaps, the citizens of Nicsea have planned 
 a more magnificent building for this purpose than is 
 necessary. However, they must be contented with such 
 as will be sufficient to answer the use for which it is 
 intended." 
 
 Only a very few of Pliny's letters to Trajan refer to 
 matters of great interest or importance. In one he 
 recommends a friend with a testimonial to the Emperor; 
 in another he explains some slight deviation from ordi- 
 nary routine ; in by far the larger number he writes 
 about purely local matters, which, with our ideas, it 
 would seem almost an impertinence to refer to a ruler 
 who was many hundred miles distant. One of them 
 is interesting as an illustration of the extreme jealousy 
 of Roman imperialism, and its dread of anything like
 
 MUNICIPAL MISMANAGEMENT. 147 
 
 secret societies. It reminds us of our trades-unions 
 and working men's associations. A destructive fire 
 had broken out in the city of Mcomedeia, and the 
 people, instead of trying to extinguish it, looked on as 
 idle and indifferent spectators. There were no engines 
 or buckets at hand no means, in short, of putting a 
 stop to the fire. It occurred to Pliny that it would 
 be advisable to form an association of firemen, limited 
 however to 150 members. This very moderate pro- 
 posal does not commend itself to the Emperor. In his 
 reply he tells Pliny that it is to be remembered that 
 such societies have greatly disturbed the peace of the 
 province. " Whatever name we give them," he says, 
 " and for whatever purpose they may be established, 
 they are sure to become factious combinations, however 
 short their meetings may be." 
 
 From another of Pliny's letters it appears that the 
 people of this same town were as careless in their 
 management of public money as those of Mcaea. They 
 had spent a great sum on an aqueduct, and left it so 
 unfinished that it actually fell to pieces. The same 
 fate attended a second attempt, so that the town after 
 a vast expenditure was still without water. Pliny 
 tells the Emperor that he has himself visited a spring 
 from which the water can be brought, and that the 
 work can be constructed with the old materials, but 
 that it is really of the first importance that they should 
 have an architect from Rome to superintend the affair, 
 and guarantee them against a recurrence of failure. 
 " The usefulness and greatness of the work," he adds, 
 "is fully worthy of your reign." Trajan's reply is
 
 148 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 short and to the point. He tells Pliny that he ought 
 to find out whose fault it is that so much money has 
 been thrown away; and he plainly hints that the 
 jobbery of the townspeople among themselves has been 
 the cause of the disaster. 
 
 Trajan's reign, as we know, was a great time for the 
 construction of aqueducts, and several of Pliny's letters 
 concern this subject The inhabitants of the colony 
 of Sinope were badly off for water, and it could only 
 be conveyed into the town from a distance of sixteen 
 miles. Pliny consults the Emperor, and tells him that 
 he believes the money can be raised on the spot, if he, 
 the Emperor, is willing to concede such an indulgence 
 to the thirsty townspeople. Trajan's reply is favour- 
 able ; the work, he says, will conduce to the health 
 and beauty of the place. Public baths, too, were much 
 in request at this time, and no town was thought to be 
 complete without them. This was a matter which 
 Pliny referred to the Emperor. The people of Prusa 
 wanted new baths, and Pliny found that there was a 
 very eligible site in a spot now occupied by the ruins 
 of what had been a noble mansion. Part of it, it 
 seemed, had been designed by the owner to be a temple 
 in honour of the Emperor Claudius ; the remainder was 
 to be leased out for the benefit of the town- Pliny 
 suggests that the entire site had better be given or sold 
 to the town, and public baths constructed on it. Tra- 
 jan's answer shows that he was not without religious 
 scruples. " You have not," he says, " distinctly told 
 me whether a temple to Claudius was actually erected 
 on the spot ; if so, though it has fallen down, the soil
 
 ROMAN TOLERATION. 149 
 
 on which it stood is still sacred." We have an amus- 
 ing instance of a sanitary matter being brought by 
 Pliny under the Emperor's notice. A town, by name 
 Amastria, had, among many other beauties, a remark- 
 ably fine street of great length, by the side of which 
 there ran what was dignified with the name of a river, 
 but what was in reality a nasty sewer, as foul to the 
 sight as it was to the smell. Pliny thought it neces- 
 sary to tell Trajan that it ought to be covered up, and 
 that this should be done if the Emperor would sanc- 
 tion the necessary expenditure. If all Eoman gover- 
 nors referred such matters to the Emperor, centralisa- 
 tion must have been carried to a preposterous extent. 
 Trajan's objection to so simple a thing as the forma- 
 tion of a kind of fire brigade, gives us a clue to the gene- 
 ral attitude of imperialism towards the most important 
 phenomenon of the age. Christianity, indeed, had 
 now become a fact which could not escape the notice 
 of an observant ruler, and towards which no one pene- 
 trated with the true spirit of Roman policy could pre- 
 serve a friendly or even an indifferent attitude. For 
 Roman tolerance, though in one sense very wide, was 
 yet restricted by well-defined limits. To every con- 
 quered country it accorded the right of worshipping, 
 without molestation, its: own gods. In legal language, 
 each national faith became " a lawful religion " (religio 
 lidta). But this religion might, strictly speaking, be 
 practised only within its natural limits. To this rule 
 there were, of course, large exceptions. It would have 
 been a great hardship on a Roman subject, pursuing 
 some lawful occupation elsewhere than in his native
 
 150 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 country, if he had "been forbidden to worship after his 
 own manner. In Eome especially, where strangers 
 from all the world were assembled, the rule was re- 
 laxed, even to a degree which sometimes as when, 
 for instance, the worship of the Egyptian Isis was for- 
 bidden called forth the interference of the state. Of 
 all recognised religions, none was more commonly to 
 be seen flourishing in foreign countries than that of 
 the Jews. And it was with this religion of the Jews 
 that Christianity was, for the early years of its exist- 
 ence, confounded by all but the best-informed observer. 
 It shared the reverses of what may be called the mother 
 faith, as we may see in the banishment of Aquila 
 and Priscilla ; but it also shared its immunities. It 
 was not long, however, before the distinction between 
 the two began to be noticed. Christianity was the 
 more active, and therefore the more offensive, of the 
 kindred faiths. This unpopularity must have become 
 sufficiently marked when Nero selected the Christians 
 to bear the weight of the popular rage, which had been 
 roused by the destruction of Eome. Titus, if we may 
 trust the speech which Sulpicius Severus borrowing 
 probably from Tacitus puts into his mouth, recog- 
 nised the difference, though he thought the two reli- 
 gions to be so intimately connected that the overthrow 
 of the headquarters of the one would lead to the ruin 
 of the other.* The language quoted below displays the 
 
 * The occasion of the speech was the council held, after the 
 capture of Jerusalem, to determine the fate of the Temple. It 
 runs thus : " On the other hand, some, Titus himself among 
 them, were of opinion that the Temple, more than anything
 
 POSITION OF THE CHRISTIANS. 151 
 
 growth of that feeling of suspicion and hostility which 
 was about to bear fruit in more than two centuries of 
 persecution. Titus does not seem in his short reign to 
 have taken any steps for giving effect to his feelings 
 about the new faith. Possibly he believed that what 
 he had done in the destruction of Jerusalem would 
 suffice. Domitian's capricious tyranny was not likely 
 to be peculiarly formidable to the Christians, though it 
 seems probable the informers of whom we have heard 
 as being peculiarly active in his reign took occasion 
 to bring against some of them the accusation of athe- 
 ism. Trajan was a vigorous ruler, full of the tradi- 
 tions of Eoman policy ; and it was inevitable that he 
 should come into collision with the great Society which 
 had now extended into all the provinces of the empire. 
 To him it seemed a secret society of the most dangerous 
 character. It had no home of its own to which it 
 could point as its national seat. It claimed to embrace 
 all nations in a strange brotherhood, which seemed to 
 be, as indeed it really was, the rival of that empire 
 which also claimed to be coextensive with the world. 
 With Pliny's famous letter on the subject, and Trajan's 
 reply, we conclude this chapter. 
 
 else, must be destroyed, that so the Jewish and the Christian 
 superstition might be thoroughly eradicated. These supersti- 
 tions, though mutually opposed, had had their origin in the 
 same people. The Christians had risen up from among the 
 Jews ; if the root was removed, the stem would soon perish." 
 The contradiction between this and the account given by Jose- 
 phus, who attributes the conflagration of the Temple to his own 
 countrymen, is remarkable.
 
 152 FLINT S LETTERS. 
 
 PLINY TO THE EMPEROH.* 
 
 "It is my invariable rule to refer to you in all mat- 
 ters about which I feel doubtful. Who can better 
 remove my doubts or inform my ignorance ? I have 
 never been present at any trials of Christians, so that 
 I do not know what is the nature of the charge against 
 them, or what is the usual punishment. Whether any 
 difference or distinction is made between the young 
 and persons of mature years whether repentance of 
 their fault entitles them to pardon whether the very 
 profession of Christianity, unaccompanied by any 
 criminal act, or whether only the crime itself involved 
 in the profession, is a subject of punishment ; on all 
 these points I am in great doubt. Meanwhile, as to 
 those persons who have been charged before me with 
 being Christians, I have observed the following me- 
 thod. I asked them whether they were Christians; 
 if they admitted it, I repeated the question twice, and 
 threatened them with punishment ; if they persisted, 
 I ordered them to be at once punished. I could not 
 doubt that whatever might be the nature of their 
 opinions, such inflexible obstinacy deserved punish- 
 ment. Some were brought before me, possessed with 
 the same infatuation, who were Eoman citizens ; these 
 I took care should be sent to Home. As often happens, 
 the accusation spread, from being followed, and various 
 phases of it came under my notice. An anonymous 
 information was laid before me, containing a great 
 number of names. Some said they neither were and 
 * Epist. x. 97, 98.
 
 LETTER ON THE CHRISTIANS. 153 
 
 never had been Christians ; they repeated after me 
 an invocation of the gods, and offered wine and 
 incense before your statue (which I had ordered 
 to be brought for that purpose, together with those 
 of the gods), and even reviled the name of Christ; 
 whereas there is no forcing, it is said, those who 
 are really Christians into any of these acts. These 
 I thought ought to be discharged. Some among them, 
 who were accused by a witness in person, at first 
 confessed themselves Christians, but immediately after 
 denied it; the rest owned that they had once been 
 Christians, but had now (some above three years, 
 others more, and a few above twenty years ago) re- 
 nounced the profession. They all worshipped your 
 statue and those of the gods, and uttered imprecations 
 against the name of Christ. They declared that their 
 offence or crime was summed up in this, that they met 
 on a stated day before daybreak, and addressed a form 
 of prayer to Christ, as to a divinity, binding them- 
 selves by a solemn oath, not for any wicked purpose, 
 but never to commit fraud, theft, or adultery, never to 
 break their word, or to deny a trust when called on 
 to deliver it up : after which it was their custom to 
 separate, and then reassemble, and to eat together a 
 harmless meal. From this custom, however, they de- 
 sisted after the proclamation of my edict, by which, 
 according to your command, I forbade the meeting of 
 any assemblies. In consequence of their declaration, 
 I judged it necessary to try to get at the real truth by 
 putting to the torture two female slaves, who were 
 said to officiate in their religious rites ; but all I could
 
 154 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 discover was evidence of an absurd and extravagant 
 superstition. And so I adjourned all further proceed- 
 ings in order to consult you. It seems to me a matter 
 deserving your consideration, more especially as great 
 numbers must be involved in the danger of these pro- 
 secutions, which have already extended, and are still 
 likely to extend, to persons of all ranks, ages, and of 
 both sexes. The contagion of the superstition is not 
 confined to. the cities, it has spread into the villages 
 and the country. Still I think it may be checked. 
 At any rate, the temples which were almost abandoned 
 again begin to be frequented, and the sacred rites, so 
 long neglected, are revived, and there is also a general 
 demand for victims for sacrifice, which till lately found 
 very few purchasers. From all this it is easy to con- 
 jecture what numbers might be reclaimed, if a general 
 pardon were granted to those who repent of their 
 error." 
 
 The following is the Emperor's reply : 
 
 TRAJAN TO PLINY. 
 
 " You have adopted the right course in investigating 
 the charges made against the Christians who were 
 brought before you. It is not possible to lay down 
 any general rule for all such cases. Do not go out of 
 your way to look for them. If they are brought before 
 you, and the offence is proved, you must punish them, 
 but with this restriction, that when the person denies 
 that he is a Christian, and shall make it evident that 
 he is not by invoking the gods, he is to be pardoned,
 
 ANSWER OF TRAJAN. 155 
 
 notwithstanding any former suspicion against him. 
 Anonymous informations ought not to be received 
 in any sort of prosecution. It is introducing a very 
 dangerous precedent, and is quite foreign to the spirit 
 of our age." 
 
 Pliny remained in his province two years, and then 
 returned to Borne. 

 
 CHAPTEE XII. 
 PLINY'S OPINIONS AND HABITS. 
 
 PLINY'S time, as we have seen, was divided between 
 Borne and the country. At Borne he was a busy man. 
 He was an advocate in considerable practice ; he was a 
 member of the senate, and took a lively interest in all 
 its proceedings; and he was evidently much in request 
 in fashionable and literary society. Often would he 
 have to hurry away from the court in which he had 
 been pleading, to hear and criticise the composition of 
 one of his many friends. He was, too, we should sup- 
 pose, a man of genial and social temper, and was never 
 unwilling to accept an invitation to dinner, provided he 
 thought the conversation and the general character of 
 the entertainment was likely to have about it a refined 
 and elegant tone. The banquets of the vulgar rich, 
 though occasionally he may have found it advisable to 
 attend them, he despised and detested. 
 
 Country life, with its quiet and repose, he really 
 enjoyed perhaps all the more from the weakness of 
 his constitution, which no doubt sometimes succumbed 
 to the fatigues of city life. He had an eye for the
 
 FLINT'S OPINIONS AND HABITS. 157 
 
 beautiful scenery of Italy ; and it would seem, to judge 
 from his minute descriptions, that he felt a genuine 
 pride and pleasure in the arrangement of his gardens. 
 He is continually telling us in his letters how pecu- 
 liarly favourable he found the country to meditation 
 and to literary work ; and it was in the retirement of 
 one or other of his numerous villas that he used to 
 revise his various compositions. If we may judge 
 from one or two allusions, he was partial to the quiet 
 amusement of fishing. Hunting he regarded as good 
 for the refreshment of the mind rather than as a 
 pleasure in itself. A gentle ride or stroll were much 
 more to his taste than any such violent exercise. In 
 the following letter he gives us a pleasant picture of the 
 way in which he passed his time at his Tuscan villa : 
 
 PLINY TO FUSCUS.* 
 
 " You wish to know how I dispose of my time in the 
 summer at my Tuscan villa. I wake without being 
 called, generally about six o'clock, sometimes earlier, 
 but seldom later. My windows remain shut, as I find 
 the darkness and quiet have a very happy effect on the 
 mind. Being thus withdrawn from all objects which 
 call off the attention, I am left to my own thoughts, 
 and instead of suffering my mind to wander with my 
 eyes, I keep my eyes in subjection to my mind. If I 
 have any literary work on hand, I think over it, and 
 revise the style and expression, just as if I had my pen 
 in my hand. Thus I get through more or less work, 
 according as the subject is more or less difficult, and I 
 * Epist. vii. 9.
 
 158 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 find my memory able to retain it. Then I call for my 
 amanuensis, and having opened the windows, I dictate 
 to him what I have composed ; then I dismiss him for 
 a while, and call him in again. About ten or eleven 
 (for I do not observe any fixed hour), according to the 
 weather, I walk on the terrace or in the colonnade, and 
 then I think over or dictate what I had left unfinished. 
 Then I have a drive, and employ myself as before, and 
 find this change of scene refreshing to my mind, and 
 it enables me to apply it with more vigour. On my 
 return I take a short nap ; then I stroll out, and re- 
 peat aloud a Greek or Latin speech, not so much to 
 strengthen my voice as my digestion, though my voice 
 is improved at the same time. I then have another 
 stroll, take my usual exercise, and bathe. At dinner, 
 if I have only my wife or a few friends with me, 
 a book is read to us, and after dinner we have 
 some music or a little play acted. Then I walk out 
 with my friends, among whom are some men of learn- 
 ing. Thus we pass the evening in various conversation, 
 and the day, even when it is at the longest, soon comes 
 to an end. Sometimes I make a little change in this 
 order. If I have remained in bed, or taken a longer 
 walk than usual, I have a ride instead of a drive, after 
 having read aloud one or two speeches. Thus I get 
 more exercise in less time. My friends now and then 
 look in upon me from the neighbouring villages, and 
 occasionally, when I am tired, their visits are a pleasant 
 relief. Sometimes I hunt, but I always take my note- 
 book with me, so that if I get no sport, I may at any 
 rate bring something back with me. Part of my time
 
 PLINY'S OPINIONS AND HABITS. 159 
 
 is given to my tenants, though not so much as they 
 would like. Their rustic squabbles make me return 
 with fresh zest to my studies and more cultivated 
 occupations." 
 
 There is an amusing letter, creditable to the writer's 
 good taste and feeling, in which Pliny tells us how he 
 treated his guests when he gave a dinner-party. It 
 was common enough among the rich men of the time 
 those, of course, especially who had suddenly acquired 
 wealth by disreputable means to draw very marked 
 distinctions in the company when they entertained. 
 Readers of Juvenal will remember his laughable de- 
 scription of Virro's party, how the great man treated 
 his poorer and less important guests with conspicuous 
 contempt. The dishes set before them contained the 
 coarsest and most indigestible fare, the wine was like 
 vinegar, and a slave stood over them to see that they did 
 not attempt to pocket some of the jewels with which 
 the drinking-cups were adorned. It was once Pliny's 
 misfortune to have to dine, as a comparative stranger, 
 with a man like Virro, who thought himself (so Pliny 
 says) an exceedingly elegant and attentive host, but 
 who really combined expense with stinginess. There 
 were three kinds of wine ; the best he reserved for him- 
 self and Pliny, the next best for his inferior friends, 
 while the worst was given to his freedmen and to 
 those of Pliny, who, it appears, were present. One of 
 the guests who sat by Pliny observed the arrange- 
 ment, and turning round asked him what he thought 
 of it, and whether he approved of it. Pliny shook
 
 160 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 his head. " Well, then, what do you do on such occa- 
 sions ?" " I give all my guests the same wine," said 
 Pliny, " for when I ask them to dinner, I look on my 
 freedmen as my guests, and forget that they were once 
 slaves." The letter in which this anecdote occurs is 
 addressed to Junius Avitus, who, it seems, was a young 
 man at the time, just entering into fashionable society. 
 " Take care," says Pliny, " that you avoid above every- 
 thing this new-fangled idea of combining a show of 
 splendour with actual meanness : either, by itself, is 
 bad enough; when combined, they are simply dis- 
 gusting." 
 
 In a letter, in which he accepts an invitation to 
 dinner, he says to his friend : " I must have a clear un- 
 derstanding with you that your dinner is not to be 
 very long and elaborate ; only let there be plenty of 
 the sort of conversation in which Socrates and his 
 friends indulged themselves, and even that must be 
 limited as to time, since I have official engagements early 
 in the morning." Once one of Pliny's friends, who 
 had promised to dine with him, disappointed him. 
 " I will bring an action against you," Pliny replies, 
 " and I will lay my damages at a high amount." He 
 then describes the menu, which seems to have been 
 singularly light, fruits and vegetables largely pre- 
 ponderating in it. Still, Pliny says there were attrac- 
 tions of no mean kind. There was to have been a 
 reading, or some acting, or some music, perhaps all in 
 succession. He playfully hints that his friend would 
 have preferred a less refined entertainment. From 
 what we know of him we can thoroughly believe what
 
 Tim PUBLIC GAMES. 161 
 
 he says to his friend in conclusion : " You may have a 
 more splendid and expensive dinner in many houses ; 
 there is not one in which you can dine with more cheer- 
 ful accompaniments, and feel yourself more at ease, 
 than in mine." 
 
 - Pliny's tastes were altogether those of a cultivated 
 man. Many men of the time, no doubt, resembled him, 
 and thoroughly hated the vulgarity which they so often 
 saw associated with enormous wealth. One of the chief, 
 and in popular estimation one of the most attractive, 
 features of life in Rome was the annual celebration of 
 the great games the games of the circus, as they were 
 called during the first days of September. In one of 
 Pliny's letters we have his general opinion about them, 
 which was substantially the same as that of the man 
 he admired so much Cicero. He is writing to a 
 friend who had very possibly wondered how Pliny, 
 whom he knew to be in Rome, came to be absent from 
 the seats allotted to the senators for the grand spec- 
 tacle. He had passed, he says, all the tune amid his 
 books and papers, and had thoroughly enjoyed the 
 quiet. The games, he says, have really nothing in 
 them which one would care to see more than once. 
 Even the spectators, he hints, are not so much drawn 
 by the attractions of the sight itself as by a spirit of 
 gambling, to which a wide scope had been given in 
 Domitian's reign by the chariot -races, and the six 
 companies which engaged in them, and divided the 
 popular sympathies. Yet it is certain that many of the 
 best men of the time frequently witnessed these spec- 
 tacles. Very possibly a senator who was never seen 
 A. c. vol. xi. L
 
 162 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 in his place would have been a marked man, and in- 
 curred actual peril. Even in the better times of im- 
 perialism it may have been unadvisable for a man of 
 rank and position to have seemed to protest by his 
 habitual absence against so popular an amusement. 
 The letter from which we have been quoting may, and 
 we think, probably did, reflect Pliny's genuine senti- 
 ments ; but, at the same time, we must admit that it 
 looks a little as if he was anxious to impress his friend 
 with the delicacy and refinement of his tastes. He is 
 certainly inconsistent with himself when we find him 
 in another letter praising a friend who had exhibited 
 a magnificent spectacle of gladiators at Verona, and 
 expressing his regret that the African leopards which 
 had been purchased for the show were detained by 
 stress of weather, and arrived too late. 
 
 It does not appear that Pliny had any definite 
 philosophical opinions. He liked the society of 
 philosophers as agreeable and intellectual men, but he 
 never shows any trace of having adopted the dogmas 
 of either Stoicism or Epicureanism. Had he done so, 
 we may feel sure that his communicative disposition 
 would not have allowed him to conceal his preference. 
 He was of too gentle and sympathising a temper to 
 attach himself decidedly to any one set of opinions. It 
 would be interesting to know what he thought about 
 Providence, about the direction of human affairs, and 
 about such questions as a future state and the immor- 
 tality of the soul. All these subjects he must have 
 heard discussed from the most various points of view. 
 It seems very unlikely that he had any matured
 
 A GHOST-STORY. 163 
 
 opinions about them. Sometimes in his letters we 
 come across passages which look as if he believed in 
 the unseen world, and in the possibility of occasional 
 revelations from it. His mind appears to have had 
 what we may call a religious basis. There is a very 
 remarkable letter which strikingly reminds us of a 
 modern ghost -story. It is an anecdote about a 
 haunted house. There was a house at Athens which 
 had long been deserted because frightful noises were 
 heard in it during the stillness of night, and the appa- 
 rition of a grisly old man, with a long and unkempt 
 beard, who had chains on his hands and feet, and 
 rattled them in a horrible manner, was to be seen in 
 one of its desolate chambers. It remained, as may be- 
 supposed, unlet,till a philosopher, by name Athenodorus, 
 came to Athens, and professed his willingness to take 
 the house ; all the more, says Pliny, because of its evil 
 repute. He at once became the tenant, and as he sat 
 the first evening in one of the outer rooms, he concen- 
 trated his whole attention on his philosophical studies. 
 Surrounded with his books and papers, he felt sure 
 that his imagination would not be distracted by any 
 idle and unreal terrors. In the silence of midnight 
 he hears the clanking of chains, and though he fixes 
 his mind yet more steadily on his work, the noise in- 
 creases, and seems to be on the threshold of his chamber. 
 He looks behind him and sees the apparition, which 
 makes signs to him, and on his again returning to 
 his paper, stands over him as he writes, shaking and 
 rattling its fetters. Again he looks behind him, takes 
 a light, and follows the figure. The spectre moves
 
 164 PLINY'S LETTERS, 
 
 slowly, as though encumbered by the weight of the 
 chains ; then it turns aside into the courtyard and 
 vanishes. The philosopher marks the place of its dis- 
 appearance with some leaves. The next day he goes 
 to the magistrates and asks them to have the spot dug 
 up. Some bones are found belonging to a corpse 
 which had long since rotted in the earth, with chains 
 attached to them. These are carefully collected, and 
 are then publicly interred, after which the house is 
 perfectly free from the apparition. Pliny's comment 
 on this strange story is as follows : " I believe the 
 word of those who affirm all this." The tone of this 
 letter would certainly suggest to us that Pliny would 
 have been inclined to accept the alleged marvels of 
 modern spiritualism. At the close of it he relates two 
 singular incidents which had come within his own 
 knowledge, and to which he attributed great signifi- 
 cance. One of his freedmen was sleeping in the same 
 bed with his younger brother. The latter dreamt that 
 he saw some one sitting on the couch, who with a pair 
 of scissors approached his head and cut off some locks 
 of hair. In the morning he found that the top of his 
 head was shorn, and he saw the hair on the ground. 
 On another occasion one of Pliny's slaves was sleeping 
 with several of his companions in the slaves' dormitory. 
 Two men clothed in white appeared to him to enter 
 the room by the window, and to clip his locks as he 
 lay in bed. They then disappeared. The morning 
 showed that the dream was a reality ; the scattered 
 locks of hair were to be seen round the boy. Pliny 
 half looked on these two incidents as omens which
 
 PREVALENCE OF SUICIDE. 165 
 
 pointed to his fortunate escape of the fate of many of 
 his friends under Domitian. " Nothing particularly 
 noteworthy," he says, "followed, except perhaps the 
 circumstance that in Domitian's time I was never the 
 subject of an accusation, though I should have been 
 had Domitian, during whose reign these incidents oc- 
 curred, lived longer. A paper was found in his desk 
 in which was written an accusation against me by 
 Cams Metius." " Hence one may conjecture," he 
 adds, "that, since accused persons usually let their hair 
 grow long, the cutting off of my two slaves' hair was 
 an intimation of the averting of a peril which was 
 hanging over me." Pliny had no doubt much good 
 sense, yet one would infer from all this that he was by 
 no means without a taint of superstition. The age, it 
 must be remembered, while sceptical and unbelieving 
 in one sense, was also addicted to marvels and pro- 
 digies ; and the best and wisest men, having no distinct 
 and definite assurance about the mysteries of the un- 
 seen world, could not rise above some of the lower and 
 weaker tendencies of the period. 
 
 "We see from Pliny's Letters that suicide was very 
 frequent among the Eomans of his time. His friend 
 Corellius Eufus, and the rich and luxurious Silius 
 Italicus, had both died a voluntary death with the most 
 cool and deliberate purpose. He also tells, with mani- 
 fest approval, the story of a most determined act of 
 suicide which had happened in the neighbourhood of 
 his own native town. He had been sailing with an 
 elderly friend on the Lake of Como, and had had pointed 
 out to him a house with a chamber projecting over the
 
 166 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 water, from which a lady, a native of Comum, had 
 thrown herself together with her husband. The man 
 was afflicted with a painful and incurable disease, and 
 his wife, convinced of the hopelessness of his recovery, 
 urged him to die, and was, in Pliny's words, " his com- 
 panion in death, nay, more, his guide, his example, and 
 the constraining cause of the deed." She bound herself 
 to him, and both perished together. Pliny wonders 
 that he never before heard of the incident. The 
 action, he says, was equal to the splendid self-devotion 
 of Arria, but the actor was less famous. We can under- 
 stand how much there was in the circumstances of the 
 imperial period, even in its brighter days, to render the 
 interest in life less vivid than with ourselves. The very 
 luxury with which a wealthy Roman was as a matter 
 of course surrounded may well have become tiresome 
 and oppressive, and a comparatively slight cause may 
 have been enough to prevail on him to escape from its 
 ennui. On the whole, the teachings of the Stoic phi- 
 losophy encouraged a healthier view of life, and no 
 doubt braced up many who were wavering to bear with 
 patience present ills and troubles. Pliny seems to 
 have generally approved this aspect of Stoicism. One 
 of his friends was suffering from a tedious and severe 
 illness, and had made up his mind that, if the physicians 
 should pronounce it incurable, he would put an end to 
 his life. Should, however, there be a prospect of ultimate 
 recovery, he was determined to bear with it, though it 
 might be long and painful ; this, he thought, he owed 
 to his wife, to his daughter, to his friends, and, among 
 others, to Pliny. His resolution is heartily commended
 
 HIS POLITICAL VIEWS. 167 
 
 by Pliny as in the highest degree noble and praise- 
 worthy. " To rush on death," he says, " in a rash and 
 headlong fashion, is a vulgar and commonplace act ; to 
 weigh and anxiously consider the various motives 
 which urge one to it, and to choose between life and 
 death according to the guidance of reason, is the mark 
 of a great mind." He thus satisfies himself with a 
 sort of compromise, leaning, however, to the better 
 view, from which the Stoics in theory allowed no 
 exception. 
 
 Imperialism is necessarily unfavourable to the 
 development of political opinions. Those of Pliny 
 were perhaps somewhat colourless. It would have 
 been absurd affectation in him to have professed 
 attachment to the old republican ideas, which he 
 as well as Tacitus knew could not possibly be 
 revived. 
 
 In the senate, indeed, which still preserved some- 
 thing of its old state, if not of its power, he always 
 felt the liveliest interest. He frequently speaks of its 
 proceedings, and expresses no little delight and pride 
 when these really possessed something of the importance 
 which accorded with the nominal dignity of the as- 
 sembly. More than once he mentions measures which 
 were being taken, either by its own or by the Emperor's 
 action, to increase its efficiency. One of these passages 
 bears so closely on a subject which is just now on the 
 surface in our own political life, that, though it has 
 recently been quoted more than once, we must not 
 omit it. Open voting in the election to offices of state 
 had caused, it seems, in the senate, proceedings so un-
 
 168 PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 dignified, and even disgraceful, that recourse was had 
 to the ballot. " I fear," says Pliny, " lest, as time 
 goes on, abuses spring up from this very remedy of 
 ours. There is a danger lest, when our votes are 
 silent, a want of honourable feeling come upon us. 
 For how few are equally careful of honour in secret 
 and in public ! Many stand in awe of public opinion, 
 few of conscience." 
 
 But it was to the Emperor, as the real power in 
 the state, that he was compelled to look. Under 
 a ruler like Trajan he may well have sincerely be- 
 lieved that freedom and order were so united as to 
 make the prospects of the Eoman world really hope- 
 ful. His Panegyric of Trajan has unquestionably an 
 unpleasant tone of flattery running through its artifi- 
 cial and elaborate sentences ; and it is, we feel, the 
 last of his compositions from which we should wish 
 to form an estimate of him. Still, there can be no 
 reason for doubting that it reflected Pliny's genuine 
 political sentiments. There is a perpetual contrast 
 between Trajan's beneficent rule and Domitian's hide- 
 ous tyranny. Thought and speech were now free, fear 
 unknown ; it was easy and pleasant to obey. The 
 world was happy and contented, and every stranger 
 was anxious to obtain the safeguard and privileges of 
 Eoman citizenship. The comfort and prosperity of 
 the provinces were anxiously studied. " How must 
 every province," says Pliny, " rejoice in being tinder 
 our protection, now that a prince is on the throne 
 able and willing to transfer from one region to another
 
 fflS LAST DAYS. 169 
 
 the produce of the earth a prince who purveys for 
 lands separated from Rome by seas and continents, 
 as he provides for the capital itself. Nowhere is the 
 climate so constant as to insure universal fertility, but 
 Caesar has it in his power to correct the season's 
 caprice ; and although he cannot make a blighted or 
 barren tract immediately fruitful, he can arrest the 
 hand of famine. That we should have one master 
 over us is infinitely better for us than a freedom full 
 of strife and discord." Pliny's good-nature, and wish 
 to see people happy and comfortable, naturally inclined 
 him to think well of a government which secured for 
 the world at large so many material advantages, while 
 it allowed the men of cultivation and of letters to 
 express their thoughts as freely as his friend Tacitus 
 was able to do in his Annals and History. 
 
 Of Pliny's last days, of even the date of his death, 
 we know nothing. We gather that he was alive A.D. 
 107 from one of the Letters, in which he complains that 
 ten years after the death of Verginius Eufus (who 
 died A.D. 97) the monument which ought to have been 
 erected over his grave was still unfinished. Pliny was 
 then in his forty-seventh year. The Letters were pub- 
 lished in his lifetime, and as no later allusion to con- 
 temporary events occurs in them, their appearance may 
 be conjecturally attributed to that or the following 
 year. From that time he disappears entirely from OUT 
 sight. It is not without pain that we take so abrupt 
 a leave of one of the most interesting characters of an- 
 tiquity. We cannot, indeed, call him a man of genius ; 
 
 A. c. vol. xi M
 
 170 PLINY'S LETTE&S. 
 
 and we may trace some weak lines in the portrait 
 which he has painted for us of himself. But it would 
 not be easy to find in ancient literature, or indeed in 
 modern, one who approaches more closely to the best 
 modern ideal of a well-bred, cultivated, blameless 
 gentleman. 
 
 END OP PLINY'S LETTERS. 
 
 PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AMD SONS, EDINBURGH.
 
 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY