In 75 B.C. Cicero was elected quaestor, and obtained the province of Sicily under the Praetor Sextus Peducaeus. While there he conciliated good will by his integrity and kindness, and on his departure was loaded with honours by the grateful provincials. But he saw the necessity of remaining in Rome for the future, if he wished to become known; consequently he took a house near the forum, and applied himself unremittingly to the calls of his profession. He was now placed on the list of senators, and in the year 70 appeared as a candidate for the aedileship. The only oration we know of during the intervening years is that for Tullius [7] (71 B.C.); but many cases of importance must have been pleaded by him, since in the preliminary speech by which he secured the conduct of the case against Verres, [8] he triumphantly brings himself forward as the only man whose tried capacity and unfailing success makes him a match for Hortensius, who is retained on the other side. This year is memorable for the impeachment of Verres, the only instance almost where Cicero acted as public prosecutor, his kindly nature being apter to defend than to accuse; but on this occasion he burned with righteous indignation, and spared no labour or expense to ransack Sicily for evidence of the infamous praetor's guilt.
Cicero was tied to the Sicilians, whom he called his clients, by acts of mutual kindness, and he now stood forth to avenge them with a good will. The friends of Verres tried to procure a Praevaricatio, or sham accusation, conducted by a friend of the defendant, but Cicero stopped this by his brilliant and withering invective on Caecilius, the unlucky candidate for this dishonourable office. The judges, who were all senators, could not but award the prosecution to Cicero, who, determined to obtain a conviction, conducted it with the utmost despatch. Waiving his right to speak, and bringing on the witnesses contrary to custom at the outset of the trial, he produced evidence so crushing that Verres absconded, and the splendid orations which remain [9] had no occasion to be, and never were, delivered. It was Cicero's justifiable boast that he obtained all the offices of state in the first year in which he could by law hold them. In 69 B.C. he was elected at the head of the poll as Curule Aedile, a post of no special dignity, something between that of a mayor and a commissioner of works, but admitting a liberal expenditure on the public shows, and so useful towards acquiring the popularity necessary for one who aspired to the consulship. To this year are to be referred the extant speeches for Fonteius [10] and Caecina, [11] and perhaps the lost ones for Matridius [12] and Oppius. [13] Cicero contrived without any great expenditure to make his aedileship a success. The people were well disposed to him, and regarded him as their most brilliant representative.
The next year (68 B.C.) is important for the historian as that in which begins Cicero's Correspondence—a mine of information more trustworthy than anything else in the whole range of antiquity, and of exquisite Latinity, and in style unsurpassed and unsurpassable. The wealth that had flowed in from various sources, such as bequests, presents from foreign potentates or grateful clients at home, loans probably from the same source, to which we must add his wife's considerable dowry, he proceeded to expend in erecting a villa at Tusculum. Such villas were the fairest ornaments of Italy, "ocelli Italiae," as Cicero calls them, and their splendour may be inferred from the descriptions of Varro and Pliny. Cicero's, however, though it contained choice works of art and many rare books, could not challenge comparison with those of great nobles such as Catulus, Lucullus, or Crassus, but it was tastefully laid out so as to resemble in miniature the Academy of Athens, where several of his happiest hours had been spent, and to which in thought he often returned. Later in life he purchased other country-seats at Antium, Asturia, Sinuessa, Arpinum, Formiae, Cumae, Puteoli, and Pompeii; but the Tusculan was always his favourite.
In the year 67 Cicero stood for the praetorship, the election to which was twice put off, owing to the disturbances connected with Gabinius' motion for giving the command of the Mediterranean to Pompey, and that of Otho for assigning separate seats in the theatre to the knights. But the third election ratified the results of the two previous ones, and brought in Cicero with a large majority as Praetor Urbanus over the heads of seven, some of them very distinguished, competitors. He entered on his office 66 B.C. and signalised himself by his high conduct as a judge; but this did not, however, prevent him from exercising his profession as an advocate, for in this year he defended Fundanius [14] in a speech now lost, and Cluentius [15] (who was accused of poisoning) in an extremely long and complicated argument, one of the most difficult, but from the light it throws on the depraved morals of the time one of the most important of all his speeches. Another oration belonging to this year, and the first political harangue which Cicero delivered, was that in favour of the Manilian law, [16] which conferred on Pompey the conduct of the war against Mithridates. The bill was highly popular; Caesar openly favoured it, and Cicero had no difficulty in carrying the entire assembly with him. It is a singularly happy effort of his eloquence, and contains a noble panegyric on Pompey, the more admirable because there was no personal motive behind it. At the expiration of his praetorian year he had the option of a province, which was a means of acquiring wealth eagerly coveted by the ambitious; but Cicero felt the necessity of remaining at Rome too strongly to be tempted by such a bribe. "Out of sight, out of mind," was nowhere so true as at Rome. If he remained away a year, who could tell whether his chance for the Consulship might not be irretrievably compromised?
In the following year (65 B.C.) he announced himself as a candidate for this, the great object of his ambition, and received from his brother some most valuable suggestions in the essay or letter known as De Petitione Consulatus. This manual (for so it might be called) of electioneering tactics, gives a curious insight into the customs of the time, and in union with many shrewd and pertinent remarks, contains independent testimony to the evil characters of Antony and Catiline. But Cicero relied more on his eloquence than on the arts of canvassing. It was at this juncture that he defended the ex-tribune Cornelius, [17] who had been accused of maiestas, with such surpassing skill as to draw forth from Quintilian a special tribute of praise. This speech is unfortunately lost. His speech in the white gown, [18] of which a few fragments are preserved by Asconius, was delivered the following year, only a few days before the election, to support the senatorial measure for checking corrupt canvassing. When the comitia were held, Cicero was elected by a unanimous vote, a fact which reflects credit upon those who gave it. For the candidate to whom they did honour had no claims of birth, or wealth, or military glory; he had never flattered them, never bribed them; his sole title to their favour was his splendid genius, his unsullied character, and his defence of their rights whenever right was on their side. The only trial at which Cicero pleaded during this year was that of Q. Gellius, [19] in which he was successful.
The beginning of his consulship (63 B.C.) was signalised by three great oratorical displays, viz. the speeches against the agrarian law of Rullus [20] and the extempore speech delivered on behalf of Roscius Otho. The populace on seeing Otho enter the theatre, rose in a body and greeted him with hisses: a tumult ensued; Cicero was sent for; he summoned the people into an adjoining temple, and rebuked them with such sparkling wit as to restore completely their good humour. It is to this triumph of eloquence that Virgil is thought to refer in the magnificent simile (Aen. i. 148):
"Ac veluti magno in populo cum saepe coorta est
Seditio, saevitque animis ignobile volgus;
Iamque faces et saxa volant, furor arma ministrat;
Tum pietate gravem ac meritis si forte virum quem
Aspexere silent arrectisque auribus adstant;
Ille regit dictis animos et pectora mulcet."
The next speech, which still remains to us, is a defence of the senator Rabirius; [21] that on behalf of Calpurnius Piso is lost. [22] But the efforts which make this year forever memorable are the four orations against Catiline. [23] These were almost extemporaneous, and in their trenchant vigour and terrible mastery of invective are unsurpassed except by the second Philippic. In the very heat of the crisis, however, Cicero found time to defend his friend Muraena [2] in a brilliant and jocose speech, which shows the marvellous versatility of the man. That warm Italian nature, open to every gust of feeling, over which impressions came and went like summer clouds, could turn at a moment's notice from the hand-to-hand grapple of a deadly duel to the lightest and most delicate rapier practice of the fencing school.
As soon as Cicero retired from office (62 B.C.) he found enemies ready to accuse him. Metellus the Tribune declared that he had violated the Constitution. Cicero replied to him in a spirited speech, which he alludes to under the name Oratio Metellina, but he felt himself on insecure ground. Catiline was indeed crushed, but the ramifications of the conspiracy extended far and wide. Autronius and Sulla were implicated in it; the former Cicero refused to aid, the latter he defended in a speech which is lost to us. [25] The only other speech of this year is that on behalf of the poet Archias, [26] who had been accused of usurping the rights of a Roman citizen. In the following year (61 B.C.) occurred the scandal about Clodius. This profligate demagogue would have been acquitted on an alibi, had it not been for Cicero's damaging evidence; he nevertheless contrived to procure a final acquittal by the most abominable means, but determined to wreak his vengeance by working Cicero's ruin. To this resolution the personal taunts of the great orator no doubt contributed. We have an account from Cicero's pen of the scenes that took place in the senate during the trial—the invectives poured forth by Clodius and the no less fiery retorts of his opponent. We must not imagine our orator's talent as always finding vent in the lofty strain which we are accustomed to associate with him. On the contrary, his attacks at times were pitched in another key, and he would frequently exchange sarcastic jests in a way that we should regard as incompatible with decency, and almost with self-respect. On one occasion, for instance, he had a skirmish of wit, which was vociferously applauded by an admiring senate: "You have bought a house," says Clodius. (We quote from Forsyth.) "One would think," rejoins Cicero, "that you said I had bought a jury." "They did not believe you on your oath!" exclaims Clodius. "Yes," retorted Cicero, "twenty-five of the jury did believe me, but thirty-one did not believe you, for they took care to get their money beforehand!" These and similar pleasantries, however they may have tickled the ears of the senate, awoke in Clodius an implacable hatred, which could only be satisfied with Cicero's fall; and the better to strike at him he made an attempt (unsuccessful at first, but carried out somewhat later) to be made a plebeian and elected tribune of the people (60 B.C.).
Meanwhile Cicero had returned to his profession, and defended Scipio Nasica; [27] he had also composed a history of his consulship in Greek, on which (to use his own expression) he had emptied all the scent-boxes of Isocrates, and touched it lightly with the brush of Aristotle; moreover, he collected into one volume the speeches he had delivered as consul under the title of Consular Orations. [28] At this time the coalition known as the First Triumvirate was formed, and Cicero, disgusted at its unscrupulous conduct, left Rome for his Tusculan villa, where he meditated writing a work on universal geography. Soon, however, impatient of retirement, he returned to Rome, defended A. Themius [29] twice, and both times successfully, and afterwards, aided by Hortensius (with whose party he had now allied himself), L. Valerius Flaccus (59 B.C.). [30]