Latin Texts & Translations

CCCXXXI (A VIII, 2)

TO ATTICUS (AT ROME) FORMIAE, 17 FEBRUARY

THANK you all round-both for writing to tell me the remarks you had heard, and for not believing what reflected upon my energy, and, lastly, for letting me know your

opinion. I wrote only one letter to Caesar from Capua in answer to the remonstrance he addressed to me on the subject of his gladiators. ^[Note] My letter was short but expressed in friendly terms. So far from containing any attack upon Pompey, it mentioned him in the most complimentary terms. This exactly corresponded with my sentiment in favour of his making terms with Pompey. If he has sent that letter anywhere, let him placard it for everyone to read with all my heart. I am writing a second letter to him on the same day as I write this to you. I cannot do otherwise than write, since he has written to me both by his own hand and by that of Balbus. I am sending you a copy of it. I don't think there is anything for you to find fault with. If there is, suggest how I am to escape criticism. "Don't write at all," you will say; "how better elude those who want to make up a story?" Well, I will follow your advice as long as it is possible. You exhort me to remember my deeds, words, and even my writings: it is truly friendly on your part, and I thank you warmly for it; but you appear to me to take a different view from mine as to what is right and suitable to my character in this controversy. For in my opinion nothing more discreditable was ever done in any nation by anyone professing to be a statesman and leader, than the course taken by our friend. I am sorry for him. He abandoned the city, that is, his country, for which, and in which, it would have been a glorious thing to die. You don't seem to me to appreciate the magnitude of this disaster: for you are at this moment in your own town house. Yes, but you cannot remain there any longer except by the consent of the vilest of men. Can anything be more humiliating, more shameful than that? We are wandering about in distress with wives and children. All our hopes are dependent on the life of one man, who has a dangerous illness every year. We are not expelled, but summoned from our country, which we have left not to be safe-guarded till our return, but to be plundered and fired. There are not so very many with me, ^[Note] nor in suburban houses, nor

suburban parks, nor in the city itself—and if they are there now, they soon will not be. I meanwhile shall not stay even at Capua, but at Luceria, and shall, of course, abandon the care of the sea-coast at once. I shall wait to see what Afranius and Petreius do : ^[Note] for Labienus lacks distinction. Here you will hint that that is just what you find lacking in me. I say nothing about myself. I will leave that to others. In these circumstances, indeed, where is it to be found? All you loyalists are sticking to your houses, and will do so. In the old times didn't every loyalist come forward to support me? Who does so now in this war, for so it must now be called? As yet Vibullius has covered himself with glory. You will learn all about that from Pompey's letter: in which please notice the passage at which you will find a mark of attention (

some time have a talk with you. After writing this on the 17th, by the same lamp as that in which I burnt your letter, I am leaving Formiae to join Pompey, with some prospect of being of use if there is any question of peace, but if it is to be war—what good shall I be?