Latin Texts & Translations

DXXXVII (F VI, I)

TO AULUS MANLIUS TORQUATUS (AT ATHENS)

ROME (JANUARY) Though ^[Note] the universal upset is such that each man thinks his position the worst possible, and that there is no one who does not wish to be anywhere but where he is, yet I feel no doubt that at the present moment the most miserable place for a good man to be in is Rome. For though wherever any man is, he must have the same feeling and the same pang from the ruin that has overtaken the fortunes both of himself and of the state, yet, after all, one's eyes add to the pain, which force us to see what others only hear, ^[Note] and do not allow us to turn our thoughts from our miseries. Therefore, though you must necessarily be pained by the absence of many objects, yet from that particular sorrow, with which I am told that you are specially overpowered—that you are not at Rome—pray free your mind. For though you must feel great uneasiness at being without your family and your surroundings, yet, after all, the objects of your regret are maintaining all their rights. They could not maintain them better, if you were here, nor are they in any special danger. Nor ought you, when thinking of your family, to demand any special favour of fortune for yourself, or to refuse to bear what is common to all. In regard to

yourself personally, Torquatus, your duty is to think over everything, but not to take counsel with despair or fear. For it is not the case that the man, who has as yet been harsher to you than your character deserved, has given no signs of softened feeling towards you. But, after all, that person himself, of whom your safety is being asked, is far from having the way to secure his own clear and plain before him. And while the results of all wars are uncertain, I perceive that from the victory of the one side there is no danger for you, seeing that such danger has nothing to do with the general overthrow, while from the victory of the other I feel sure that you yourself have never had any fear. I must therefore conclude that the very thing which I count as a consolation—the common danger to the state—is what is chiefly torturing you. That is an evil so great that, however philosophers may talk, I fear it admits of no real consolation being found, except that which is exactly proportioned to the strength and mettle of each man's mind. For if right thinking and right doing are sufficient to secure a good and happy life, I fear that it is impious to call a man miserable who can support himself by the consciousness of having acted on the best motives. For neither do I consider that we abandoned country and children and property at that time from the hope of the rewards of victory on the contrary, I think we were following a just and sacred duty, due at once to the Republic and our own honour-neither, at the time we did so, were we so mad as to feel certain of victory. Wherefore, if that has happened, of which, when we were entering upon the cause, the possibility was fully before us, we ought not to be crushed in spirit, as though something had happened which we never contemplated as possible. Let us then take the view, which reason and truth alike enjoin, that in this life we should not feel ourselves bound to guarantee anything except to do nothing wrong: and that, since we are free from that imputation, we should bear every misfortune incident to humanity with calmness and good temper. And so my discourse amounts to this, that, though all be lost, virtue should shew that she can after all support herself. But if there is some hope of a public recovery, you certainly ought not to be without your share in it, whatever the constitution of the future is to be.

And yet, as I write this, it occurs to me that I am the man whose despair you were wont to blame, and whom you used your influence to rouse from a state of hesitation and anxiety. It was at a time, indeed, when it was not the goodness of our cause, but the wisdom of our policy with which I was dissatisfied. For I saw that, when too late, we were opposing arms which had long before been rendered formidable by ourselves, and I grieved that a constitutional question should be settled by spears and swords, not by consultation and the weight of our influence. Nor, when I said that those things would occur, which actually did do so, was I divining the future. I was only expressing a fear lest what I saw to be possible and likely to be ruinous, if it did occur, should happen; especially as, if I had to promise one way or the other about the result and end of the campaign, what did actually occur would have been the more obvious promise for me to make. For the points in which we had the advantage were not those which appear on the field of battle, while in the use of arms and the vigour of our soldiers we were at a disadvantage. But pray shew the spirit now which you thought that I ought to have shewn then. I write this because on my making all sorts of inquiries about you from your freedman Philargyrus, he told me with feelings, as I thought, of the utmost devotion to you, that at times you were apt to be excessively anxious. You ought not to be so, nor to doubt either that, if any form of constitution is restored, you will have your due place in it, or that, if it is gone for ever, you will be in no worse position than the rest. The present position, indeed, which is one of alarm and suspense for us all, you ought to bear with the greater calm-ness of spirit from the fact that you are living in a city which gave birth to and fostered a systematic rule of life, and that you have with you in Servius Sulpicius one for whom you have always had a singular affection: one who no doubt consoles you by his kindness and wisdom; whose example and advice, if we had followed, we should have remained at peace under Caesar's supremacy, rather than have taken up arms and submitted to a conqueror.

But perhaps I have treated these points at too great a length: the following, which are more important, I will express more briefly. There is no one to whom I owe more

than to yourself. Those, to whom I was indebted to an extent of which you are aware, the result of this war has snatched from me. My position at the present moment I fully understand. But since there is no one so utterly prostrate as not to be able, if he gives his whole attention to what he is doing, to accomplish and carry out something, I should wish you to consider as deservedly at the service of yourself and your children, of course all my zeal, but also all my powers of counsel and action.