CDLXXXV (F IV, 9)
TO M. CLAUDIUS MARCELLUS (AT
MITYLENE)
ROME (SEPTEMBER)
Though it is only a very few days ago that I
gave Quintus Mucius a letter for you written at
considerable length, in which I set forth in what
state of mind I thought you ought to be, and what
I thought you ought to do, yet, since your
freedman Theophilus was starting, of whose
fidelity and affection to you I had satisfied
myself, I was unwilling that he should reach you
without a letter from me. On the same
considerations, then, as I did in my previous
letter, I again and again exhort you, to make up
your mind to become a resident member of the
Republic, whatever its nature may be, at the
earliest possible time. You will perhaps see many
things disagreeable to your feelings, but not more
after all than you daily hear. Moreover, you are
not the man to be affected by the sense of sight
alone, and to be less afflicted when you learn the
same things by the ear, which indeed are usually
even magnified by imagination. 1 But—you
object—you will yourself be obliged to
say something you do not feel, or to do something
you do not approve. To begin with, to yield to
circumstances, that is to submit to necessity, has
ever been held the part of a wise man: in the next
place, things are not—as matters now
stand at least—quite so bad as that. You
may not be able, perhaps, to say what you think:
you may certainly hold your tongue. For authority
of every kind has been committed to one man. He
consults nobody but himself, not even his friends.
There would not have been much difference if he
whom we followed were master of the Republic. Can
we think that the man who in a time of war, when we were all united in the same
danger, consulted only himself and a certain
clique of wholly incompetent persons, was likely
to be more communicative in the hour of victory,
than he had been when the result was still
uncertain? And do you think that a man who in your
consulship would never be guided by your
consummate wisdom, nor, when your brother was
administering the consulship under your
inspiration, ever condescended to consult you two,
would now, if he were in sole power, be likely to
want suggestions from us? Everything in civil war is wretched; of which
our ancestors never even once had experience,
while our generation has now had it repeatedly:
2 but nothing, after all, is more
wretched than victory itself, which, even if it
fall to the better men, yet renders them more
savage and ruthless, so that, even if they are not
such by nature, they are compelled to become so by
the necessity of the case. For a conqueror is
forced, at the beck of those who won him his
victory, to do many things even against his
inclination. Were you not wont to foresee
simultaneously with myself how bloody that victory
was likely to be? Well, would you at that time
also have absented yourself from your country for
fear of seeing what you disapproved? "No," you
will say, "for then I should have been in
possession of wealth and my proper position." Ah,
but it had been consistent with a virtue such as
yours to regard your personal interests as among
the most insignificant concerns, and to be more
profoundly affected by those of the state. Again,
what is to be the end of your present policy? For
up to now your conduct is approved, and, as far as
such a business admits of it, your good fortune
also is commended: your conduct, because while you
engaged in the first part of the war under
compulsion, you shewed your wisdom by refusing to
follow it to the bitter end: your good fortune,
because by an honourable retirement you have
maintained both the dignity and the reputation of
your character. Now, however, it is not right that
you should feel any place more to your taste than
your native land; nor ought you to love it less
because it has lost some of its comeliness, but
rather to pity it, and not deprive
it of the light of your countenance also, when
already bereft of many illustrious sons. Finally,
if it was the sign of high spirit not to be a
supplicant to the victor, is it not perhaps a sign
of pride to spurn his kindness? If it was the act
of a wise man to absent himself from his country,
is it not perhaps a proof of insensibility not to
regret her? And, if you are debarred from enjoying
a public station, is it not perhaps folly to
refuse to enjoy a private one? The crowning
argument is this: even if your present mode of
life is more convenient, you must yet reflect
whether it is not less safe. The sword owns no
law: but in foreign lands there is even less
scruple as to committing a crime. I am personally
so anxious for your safety, that in this respect I
take rank with your brother Marcellus, or at any
rate come next to him. It is your business to take
measures for your own interests, civil rights,
life, and property.
ROME (SEPTEMBER)