Marcus Tullius Cicero→Titus Pomponius Atticus|c. 45 BC|Cicero|From Rome|To Rome/Athens|AI-assisted
Since I received a second letter from you today, I did not want you to make do with just one of mine. So do go ahead with what you write about Faberius. For on that the whole of what I am planning depends; and if this plan had not crossed my mind, believe me, I would not be troubling over that matter any more than over the rest. Therefore, as you are doing (for nothing can be added to that), press, insist, see it through.
[2] I should like you to send both of Dicaearchus' works, the one On the Soul [peri psyches] and the one On the Descent [katabaseos]. The Tripoliticus I cannot find, nor the letter of his which he sent to Aristoxenus. I would now particularly want those three books; they would be suited to what I have in mind.
[3] Torquatus is at Rome. I have arranged for it to be delivered to you. The Catulus and the Lucullus, I think, earlier. To these books new prefaces have been added in which each of those two men is praised. I want you to have those texts, and there are certain other things as well. And as for what I wrote to you about the ten commissioners, you understood too little, I believe, because I had written it in shorthand [dia semeion, by abbreviated signs]. For I was inquiring about Gaius Tuditanus, who I had heard from Hortensius was among the ten. I see that in Libo's [account] he was praetor in the consulship of Publius Popilius and Publius Rupilius. Could he have been a commissioner fourteen years before he was made praetor, unless he became quaestor extremely late? Which I do not suppose. For I see that he obtained the curule magistracies very easily in the proper years. Postumius, however, whose statue on the Isthmus you say you recall, I did not know had existed. But he is the one who was [consul] with Lucius Lucullus; the one you have added for me, a thoroughly suitable character for that assembly [syllogos]. So you will look, if you can, for the others, so that we may make a procession [pompeusai] with the personages [tois prosopois] as well.
I reached Astura on the evening of the 25th: for to avoid the heat of the day I rested three hours at Lanuvium. I should like you, if it is no trouble, to contrive that I need not come to Rome before the 5th of next month. You can manage it through Egnatius Maximus. The chief point is that you
should settle with Publilius in my absence: and about that you will let me know what people say. "Of course the world is all agog with that!" On my honour I don't think so; for the nine days' wonder is over. But I wanted to fill the page. What need of more: for I am almost with you, unless you put me off for a bit. For I have written to you about the gardens.
What a shame! A countryman of yours is enlarging the city, which he had never seen two years ago, and he thinks it too small to hold the great man alone. On that point then I am expecting a letter from you. You say you will present my book to Varro, as soon as he arrives. So they are already given and you have no choice left. Ah, if you but knew what a risk you are running! Or perhaps my letter stopped you, unless you had not read it, when you wrote your last letter. So I am eager to know how the matter stands.
As to Brutus' affection and your walk, though you give me no actual news, but only a repetition of what has often happened, yet the more often I hear it, the gladder I am; and I find it the more gratifying, because you enjoy it, and the more certain, because you tell me of it.
alteram a te epistulam cum hodie accepissem, nolui te una mea contentum. tu vero age, quod scribis, de Faberio. in eo enim totum est positum id quod cogitamus; quae cogitatio si non incidisset, mihi crede, istuc ut cetera non laborarem. quam ob rem, ut facis (istuc enim addi nihil potest), urge, insta, perfice. [2] Dicaearchi peri\ yuxh=j utrosque velim mittas et kataba/sewj . Tripolitikon non invenio et epistulam eius quam ad Aristoxenum misit. tris eos libros maxime nunc vellem; apti essent ad id quod cogito. [3] Torquatus Romae est. misi ut tibi daretur. Catulum et Lucullum, ut opinor, antea. his libris nova prohoemia sunt addita quibus eorum uterque laudatur. eas litteras volo habeas et sunt quaedam alia. et quod ad te <de> decem legatis scripsi parum intellexisti, credo, quia dia\ shmei/wn scripseram. de C. Tuditano enim quaerebam quem ex Hortensio audieram fuisse in decem. eum video in Libonis praetorem P. Popilio P. Rupilio <coss.> Annis xiiii ante quam praetor factus est legatus esse potuisset, nisi admodum sero quaestor est factus? quod non arbitror. video enim curulis magistratus eum legitimis annis perfacile cepisse. Postumium autem cuius statuam in Isthmo meminisse te dicis nesciebam fuisse. is autem est qui <cos.> cum <L.> Lucullo fuit; quem tu mihi addidisti sane ad illum su/llogon personam idoneam. videbis igitur, si poteris, ceteros, ut possimus pompeu=sai< kai\ toi=j prosw/poij .
◆
Since I received a second letter from you today, I did not want you to make do with just one of mine. So do go ahead with what you write about Faberius. For on that the whole of what I am planning depends; and if this plan had not crossed my mind, believe me, I would not be troubling over that matter any more than over the rest. Therefore, as you are doing (for nothing can be added to that), press, insist, see it through.
[2] I should like you to send both of Dicaearchus' works, the one On the Soul [peri psyches] and the one On the Descent [katabaseos]. The Tripoliticus I cannot find, nor the letter of his which he sent to Aristoxenus. I would now particularly want those three books; they would be suited to what I have in mind.
[3] Torquatus is at Rome. I have arranged for it to be delivered to you. The Catulus and the Lucullus, I think, earlier. To these books new prefaces have been added in which each of those two men is praised. I want you to have those texts, and there are certain other things as well. And as for what I wrote to you about the ten commissioners, you understood too little, I believe, because I had written it in shorthand [dia semeion, by abbreviated signs]. For I was inquiring about Gaius Tuditanus, who I had heard from Hortensius was among the ten. I see that in Libo's [account] he was praetor in the consulship of Publius Popilius and Publius Rupilius. Could he have been a commissioner fourteen years before he was made praetor, unless he became quaestor extremely late? Which I do not suppose. For I see that he obtained the curule magistracies very easily in the proper years. Postumius, however, whose statue on the Isthmus you say you recall, I did not know had existed. But he is the one who was [consul] with Lucius Lucullus; the one you have added for me, a thoroughly suitable character for that assembly [syllogos]. So you will look, if you can, for the others, so that we may make a procession [pompeusai] with the personages [tois prosopois] as well.
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
alteram a te epistulam cum hodie accepissem, nolui te una mea contentum. tu vero age, quod scribis, de Faberio. in eo enim totum est positum id quod cogitamus; quae cogitatio si non incidisset, mihi crede, istuc ut cetera non laborarem. quam ob rem, ut facis (istuc enim addi nihil potest), urge, insta, perfice. [2] Dicaearchi peri\ yuxh=j utrosque velim mittas et kataba/sewj . Tripolitikon non invenio et epistulam eius quam ad Aristoxenum misit. tris eos libros maxime nunc vellem; apti essent ad id quod cogito. [3] Torquatus Romae est. misi ut tibi daretur. Catulum et Lucullum, ut opinor, antea. his libris nova prohoemia sunt addita quibus eorum uterque laudatur. eas litteras volo habeas et sunt quaedam alia. et quod ad te <de> decem legatis scripsi parum intellexisti, credo, quia dia\ shmei/wn scripseram. de C. Tuditano enim quaerebam quem ex Hortensio audieram fuisse in decem. eum video in Libonis praetorem P. Popilio P. Rupilio <coss.> Annis xiiii ante quam praetor factus est legatus esse potuisset, nisi admodum sero quaestor est factus? quod non arbitror. video enim curulis magistratus eum legitimis annis perfacile cepisse. Postumium autem cuius statuam in Isthmo meminisse te dicis nesciebam fuisse. is autem est qui <cos.> cum <L.> Lucullo fuit; quem tu mihi addidisti sane ad illum su/llogon personam idoneam. videbis igitur, si poteris, ceteros, ut possimus pompeu=sai< kai\ toi=j prosw/poij .