VII. TO ASINIUS POLLIO
(Fam., XXIV, 9)
Long ago the thought entered my mind of addressing letters of familiar intercourse to certain far-off masters of eloquence, embracing in the number those who had been the rare ornaments of the Latin tongue. I should not wish, therefore, to pass thy name over in silence, the more so that, according to the testimony of great writers, thy fame was second to none. Since, however, thy reputation has come down to us stripped almost bare of facts, it must be substantiated by the writings of others rather than of thyself, a fact which I deservedly number among the shameful losses of our age. I shall have, therefore, but little to say to thee.
I congratulate thee in that thou didst enjoy the honors of a consulship as well as those of a triumph;[79] I congratulate thee for the praises bestowed upon thy lofty intellect and polished eloquence, and for thy many other endowments of body and mind and fortune.[80] I give thee special congratulations, however, for having lived under the best of princes, who cherished most dearly both letters and virtues, and who was a competent judge of thy deeds. O happy thou, who didst fill the just measure of thy life while Augustus was still reigning, bringing an illustrious life to a peaceful close at thy Tusculan villa and in the eightieth year of thine age.[81] Thou didst escape the bloody hands of Tiberius, into which the orator Asinius Gallus fell, thy ill-fated offspring who, as we read, was killed by him with dreadful suffering.[82] Fortunate indeed was it that a timely death overtook thee, seeing toward what great misery thy destiny was already beginning to urge thee. Death saved thine eyes from witnessing such a sad spectacle at least. Only a few years more and, to thy great sorrow, thou wouldst have shared the fate of thy son, or wouldst have been compelled to look on.[83] His death must have diminished thy happiness in no slight degree—if it be true (as some thinkers claim) that the dead are affected by the lot of the living.
The laws of true friendship forbid me to conceal or pass over a certain thing in silence—for friendship binds me to the names and ashes of the illustrious dead of every age no less effectually than if they were alive. The thing, therefore, which greatly distressed me in thee was, that thou didst resolve to be such a very bitter and severe critic (not to say censurer) of Marcus Tullius.[84] In all justice thou shouldst have been the first to praise and exalt his name in thy writings. If thy defense is that thou hadst a right to freedom of thought, I shall answer that I do not deny thee such freedom, even though I do not agree with thy conclusions. I maintain, however, that thou shouldst have made more sparing use of thy freedom. Such counsel comes too late now, I know. Yet thou canst easily obtain indulgence from others[85] since thou didst so often exercise the same freedom against him who was then ruling the universe.[86]
It is rather difficult, I grant thee, for fortune’s favorite to curb the mind and the tongue. The seriousness of purpose consonant with thy great age and learning compels me to exact from thee careful consideration in all matters. Furthermore, it obliges me to censure thee for thy actions more severely than I should either thy son, who held the same opinions as thou because he followed in thy footsteps,[87] or Calvus and others of the same party.[88]
I am not so forgetful of myself as to deny thee the exercise of the same privilege in the case of a contemporary (whom thou couldst both see and know) that I have enjoyed, after so many centuries, in the case of a man of such reputation and so far removed from me in time. No one is perfect. Who, then, shall forbid thee, a man of such eminence, to call attention to anything reprehensible in the ways of thy neighbor, when even I who am so far removed have found things to criticise in his writings? But the moment thou dost attack his reputation for eloquence, the moment thou dost endeavor to wrest from him his supremacy in the field of oratory—a supremacy bestowed upon him from heaven and granted to him without dispute and by the common consent of nearly the entire world—that moment see to it that thou be not inflicting too palpable an injury.
Beware, and with thee let Calvus beware, that you do not enter upon an ill-matched struggle against Cicero for the palm in oratory. It is a very easy task for us to watch the contest as spectators. But the crown of victory has long since been awarded.[89] You have been conquered. Vain are your struggles and obstructions! The ruffling of your own pride prevents you from seeing the truth. In my opinion you would have been great men, had you been able to acknowledge a greater than yourselves. But man, in his pride, is raised by false opinions to higher levels than those to which he rightfully belongs; and from this high station truth then causes him to sink to a lower level than he might justly have deserved. Many have lost their own reward of glory in hungering after that of others.