Marcus Tullius Cicero→Titus Pomponius Atticus|c. 46 BC|Cicero|From Rome|To Rome/Athens|AI-assisted
I have read Brutus's letter and am sending it back to you. He certainly did not reply very intelligently to the points you had inquired about. But that is his own affair. One thing, though, he is disgracefully ignorant of. He thinks that Cato was the first to deliver an opinion about the punishment [of the Catilinarian conspirators] which everyone had stated before him except Caesar; and, although Caesar's own opinion was so severe (and he spoke at that time as a man of praetorian rank), Brutus thinks that the consulars were milder -- Catulus, Servilius, the Luculli, Curio, Torquatus, Lepidus, Gellius, Volcacius, Figulus, Cotta, Lucius Caesar, Gaius Piso, Manius Glabrio, and even Silanus and Murena, the consuls-designate. Why, then, did the vote go to Cato's motion? Because he had embraced the very same proposal in more brilliant and fuller language. Now this man praises me for having brought the matter before the Senate, not for having exposed [the conspiracy], not for having urged action, and finally not for having reached my own judgment before I consulted the Senate. All of which -- because Cato had extolled them to the skies and had moved that they be set down in the record -- it was on that account that the division was carried in favor of his motion. And this fellow even thinks he is paying me a great compliment when he writes 'an excellent consul.' Why, what enemy ever spoke more meanly? And as for his replies to your other points -- in what a manner he answered you! He only asks that you correct the decree of the Senate. This much he would have done even if he had been reminded of it by a copying-clerk. But here again that is his own affair.
[2] As for the gardens, since you approve, get something done. You know my financial situation. If indeed something also comes back to me from Faberius, there is no difficulty. But even without that I think I can manage to make the purchase. Drusus's gardens are certainly for sale, perhaps the Lamian and Cassian ones too. But we will speak of this in person.
About Terentia I cannot write more sensibly than you write yourself. Let our sense of duty be paramount with us. If I am in any way deceived, I would rather regret her conduct than my own.
[4] For Ovia, the wife of Gaius Lollius, 100,000 sesterces must be seen to. Eros says it cannot be done without me -- because, I suppose, some valuation has to be received and made. I wish he had told you. For if the matter is as he wrote to me, all ready, and he is not lying about that very point, it could have been settled through you. I should be glad if you would look into it and get it settled.
[5] As for your summoning me to the forum, you summon me to a place from which, even when my affairs were prosperous, I was already fleeing. For what is the forum to me without the law-courts, without the Senate-house, with those men running into my sight whom I cannot look upon with composure? As for your writing that people demand of me that I be in Rome, and do not grant me leave to be absent, or only grant it within certain limits -- know that for a long time now I have counted you alone as worth more than all of them. I do not even despise my own self, and I much prefer to stand by my own judgment than by that of all the rest. Yet I do not go further than the most learned men allow me; all their writings, whatever they are, on this subject I have not only read -- which in itself was the act of a brave invalid, to take his medicine -- but I have also transferred them into my own writings, which was surely not the act of a crushed and broken spirit. From these remedies do not summon me back into that crowd of yours, lest I relapse.
From the beginning of your letter "though I did not care what happened in Spain, still you would write," I thought you had some news from me: but I see you have answered my letter only as regards the forum and the Senate. But, you say, my house at Rome is a forum. What is the good of the house alone to me, if I have not the forum? I am dead and done for, Atticus, and have been this long while: but now I confess it, when I have lost the one link that bound me to life. So what I want is solitude. Still if in my despite anything drags me to Rome, I shall strive, if possible (and I will make it possible), to keep my grief from all eyes but yours, and, if it is anyhow possible, even from yours.
Besides there is this reason for not coming. You remember the questions Aledius asked you. They are annoying to me even now. What do you suppose they will be, if I come?
Arrange about Terentia as you say, and rid me of this addition—though not the weightiest—to my weighty griefs and sorrows. To show you that my sorrow is not prostration, you have entered in your Chronicle the date of the visit of Carneades and that famous embassy to Rome: I want to know now the cause of its coming. I think it was about Oropus: but I am not certain. And, if that is so, what was the point in question? Further, who was the most distinguished Epicurean of the time and the head of the Garden at Athens; also who were the famous politicians there? I think you can find all those things in Apollodorus' book.
It is annoying about Attica; but, as it is a mild attack, I expect it will be all right. About Gamala I had no doubt. For why was his father Ligus so fortunate? Need I mention my own case, when I am incapable of getting relief, though everything I wish were to happen.
The price you mention for Drusus' gardens I too had heard, and had written about it to you, yesterday I think. Whatever the price is, what is necessary is cheap. In my eyes, whatever you may think—for I know what I think of myself—it relieves my mind of a bounden duty, if not of sorrow.
I have written to Sicca, because he is intimate with L. Cotta. If nothing can be managed about gardens across the Tiber, Cotta has some at Ostia in
a very public place. They are cramped for room, but more than sufficient for this purpose. Please think of that. But don't be afraid of the price you mention for the gardens. I don't want plate or raiment or any pleasant places now: I want this. I see, too, who can help me. But speak to Silius; you can't do better. I have given Sicca a commission too. He answered that he has made an appointment with him. So he will write and tell me what he has done, and you will see to it.
legi Bruti epistulam eamque tibi remisi sane non prudenter rescriptum ad ea quae requisieras. sed ipse viderit. quamquam illud turpiter ignorat. Catonem primum sententiam putat de animadversione dixisse quam omnes ante dixerant praeter Caesarem et, cum ipsius Caesaris tam severa fuerit qui tum praetorio loco dixerit, consularium putat leniores fuisse, Catuli, Servili, Lucullorum, Curionis, Torquati, Lepidi, Gelli, Volcaci, Figuli, Cottae, L. Caesaris, C. Pisonis, M'. Glabrionis, etiam Silani, Murenae designatorum consulum. cur ego in sententiam Catonis? quia verbis luculentioribus et pluribus rem eandem comprehenderat. me autem hic laudat quod rettulerim, non quod patefecerim, quod <cohortatus> sim, quod denique ante quam consulerem ipse iudicaverim. quae omnia quia Cato laudibus extulerat in caelum perscribendaque censuerat, idcirco in eius sententiam est facta discessio. hic autem se etiam tribuere multum mi putat quod scripserit 'optimum consulem.' quis enim ieiunius dixit inimicus? ad cetera vero tibi quem ad modum rescripsit! tantum rogat de senatus consulto ut corrigas. hoc quidem fecisset, etiam si a librano admonitus esset. sed haec iterum ipse viderit. [2] de hortis quoniam probas, effice aliquid. rationes meas nosti. si vero etiam a Faberio aliquid recedit nihil negoti est. sed etiam sine eo posse videor contendere. venales certe sunt Drusi, fortasse etiam Lamiani et Cassiani. sed coram. de Terentia non possum commodius scribere quam tu scribis. officium sit nobis antiquissimum. si quid nos fefellerit, illius malo me quam mei paenitere. [4] Oviae C. Lolli curanda sunt HS c. negat Eros posse sine me, credo, quod accipienda aliqua sit et danda aestimatio. vellem tibi dixisset. si enim res est ut mihi scripsit parata nec in eo ipso mentitur, per te confici potuit. id cognoscas et conficias velim. [5] quod me in forum vocas, eo vocas unde etiam bonis meis rebus fugiebam. quid enim mihi foro sine iudiciis, sine curia, in oculos incurrentibus iis quos animo aequo videre non possum? quod autem a me homines postulare scribis <ut Romae sim neque mihi ut absim concedere> aut quatenus eos mihi concedere, iam pridem scito esse, cum unum te pluris quam omnis illos putem. ne me quidem contemno meoque iudicio multo stare malo quam omnium reliquorum. neque tamen progredior longius quam mihi doctissimi homines concedunt; quorum scripta omnia quaecumque sunt in eam sententiam non legi solum, quod ipsum erat fortis aegroti, accipere medicinam, sed in mea etiam scripta transtuli, quod certe adflicti et fracti animi non fuit. ab his me remediis noli in istam turbam vocare, ne recidam.
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I have read Brutus's letter and am sending it back to you. He certainly did not reply very intelligently to the points you had inquired about. But that is his own affair. One thing, though, he is disgracefully ignorant of. He thinks that Cato was the first to deliver an opinion about the punishment [of the Catilinarian conspirators] which everyone had stated before him except Caesar; and, although Caesar's own opinion was so severe (and he spoke at that time as a man of praetorian rank), Brutus thinks that the consulars were milder -- Catulus, Servilius, the Luculli, Curio, Torquatus, Lepidus, Gellius, Volcacius, Figulus, Cotta, Lucius Caesar, Gaius Piso, Manius Glabrio, and even Silanus and Murena, the consuls-designate. Why, then, did the vote go to Cato's motion? Because he had embraced the very same proposal in more brilliant and fuller language. Now this man praises me for having brought the matter before the Senate, not for having exposed [the conspiracy], not for having urged action, and finally not for having reached my own judgment before I consulted the Senate. All of which -- because Cato had extolled them to the skies and had moved that they be set down in the record -- it was on that account that the division was carried in favor of his motion. And this fellow even thinks he is paying me a great compliment when he writes 'an excellent consul.' Why, what enemy ever spoke more meanly? And as for his replies to your other points -- in what a manner he answered you! He only asks that you correct the decree of the Senate. This much he would have done even if he had been reminded of it by a copying-clerk. But here again that is his own affair.
[2] As for the gardens, since you approve, get something done. You know my financial situation. If indeed something also comes back to me from Faberius, there is no difficulty. But even without that I think I can manage to make the purchase. Drusus's gardens are certainly for sale, perhaps the Lamian and Cassian ones too. But we will speak of this in person.
About Terentia I cannot write more sensibly than you write yourself. Let our sense of duty be paramount with us. If I am in any way deceived, I would rather regret her conduct than my own.
[4] For Ovia, the wife of Gaius Lollius, 100,000 sesterces must be seen to. Eros says it cannot be done without me -- because, I suppose, some valuation has to be received and made. I wish he had told you. For if the matter is as he wrote to me, all ready, and he is not lying about that very point, it could have been settled through you. I should be glad if you would look into it and get it settled.
[5] As for your summoning me to the forum, you summon me to a place from which, even when my affairs were prosperous, I was already fleeing. For what is the forum to me without the law-courts, without the Senate-house, with those men running into my sight whom I cannot look upon with composure? As for your writing that people demand of me that I be in Rome, and do not grant me leave to be absent, or only grant it within certain limits -- know that for a long time now I have counted you alone as worth more than all of them. I do not even despise my own self, and I much prefer to stand by my own judgment than by that of all the rest. Yet I do not go further than the most learned men allow me; all their writings, whatever they are, on this subject I have not only read -- which in itself was the act of a brave invalid, to take his medicine -- but I have also transferred them into my own writings, which was surely not the act of a crushed and broken spirit. From these remedies do not summon me back into that crowd of yours, lest I relapse.
AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek below for scholarly use.
Latin / Greek Original
legi Bruti epistulam eamque tibi remisi sane non prudenter rescriptum ad ea quae requisieras. sed ipse viderit. quamquam illud turpiter ignorat. Catonem primum sententiam putat de animadversione dixisse quam omnes ante dixerant praeter Caesarem et, cum ipsius Caesaris tam severa fuerit qui tum praetorio loco dixerit, consularium putat leniores fuisse, Catuli, Servili, Lucullorum, Curionis, Torquati, Lepidi, Gelli, Volcaci, Figuli, Cottae, L. Caesaris, C. Pisonis, M'. Glabrionis, etiam Silani, Murenae designatorum consulum. cur ego in sententiam Catonis? quia verbis luculentioribus et pluribus rem eandem comprehenderat. me autem hic laudat quod rettulerim, non quod patefecerim, quod <cohortatus> sim, quod denique ante quam consulerem ipse iudicaverim. quae omnia quia Cato laudibus extulerat in caelum perscribendaque censuerat, idcirco in eius sententiam est facta discessio. hic autem se etiam tribuere multum mi putat quod scripserit 'optimum consulem.' quis enim ieiunius dixit inimicus? ad cetera vero tibi quem ad modum rescripsit! tantum rogat de senatus consulto ut corrigas. hoc quidem fecisset, etiam si a librano admonitus esset. sed haec iterum ipse viderit. [2] de hortis quoniam probas, effice aliquid. rationes meas nosti. si vero etiam a Faberio aliquid recedit nihil negoti est. sed etiam sine eo posse videor contendere. venales certe sunt Drusi, fortasse etiam Lamiani et Cassiani. sed coram. de Terentia non possum commodius scribere quam tu scribis. officium sit nobis antiquissimum. si quid nos fefellerit, illius malo me quam mei paenitere. [4] Oviae C. Lolli curanda sunt HS c. negat Eros posse sine me, credo, quod accipienda aliqua sit et danda aestimatio. vellem tibi dixisset. si enim res est ut mihi scripsit parata nec in eo ipso mentitur, per te confici potuit. id cognoscas et conficias velim. [5] quod me in forum vocas, eo vocas unde etiam bonis meis rebus fugiebam. quid enim mihi foro sine iudiciis, sine curia, in oculos incurrentibus iis quos animo aequo videre non possum? quod autem a me homines postulare scribis <ut Romae sim neque mihi ut absim concedere> aut quatenus eos mihi concedere, iam pridem scito esse, cum unum te pluris quam omnis illos putem. ne me quidem contemno meoque iudicio multo stare malo quam omnium reliquorum. neque tamen progredior longius quam mihi doctissimi homines concedunt; quorum scripta omnia quaecumque sunt in eam sententiam non legi solum, quod ipsum erat fortis aegroti, accipere medicinam, sed in mea etiam scripta transtuli, quod certe adflicti et fracti animi non fuit. ab his me remediis noli in istam turbam vocare, ne recidam.