A History of Roman Literature

by Harold North Fowler

What has been said of Cicero applies with at least equal force to Cæsar—the story of his life belongs to the history of Rome rather than to that of literature. We must therefore content ourselves with a brief sketch.

Gaius Julius Cæsar was born, according to the common account, in 100 B. C., but the real date is probably two years earlier. Cæsar’s early life. He was of patrician birth and his family claimed descent from Ascanius; or Iulus, the son of Æneas. Marius, his uncle by marriage, made him a priest of Jupiter at the age of not more than fifteen. While still little more than a boy he married Cornelia, the daughter of Cinna, and barely escaped the proscription of Sulla when he refused to divorce her. The young Cæsar was thus, in spite of his patrician birth, identified with the popular party. In 67 B. C. he was quæstor in Farther Spain, in 65 B. C. he became curule ædile, in which office he distinguished himself by the magnificence of his public games and exhibitions, and in 63 B. C. he was elected pontifex maximus, thereby becoming for life the official head of the Roman religion.

In 62 B. C. he was chosen prætor, and the next year was sent as proprætor to Farther Spain. His government in Spain. Up to this time he was known chiefly as a dissolute man and an unscrupulous demagogue. His extravagance had involved him in debts amounting to more than a million dollars. But in the government of his province he distinguished himself by military successes and excellent civil administration, besides amassing sufficient wealth to pay his debts.

The first triumvirate.In 60 B. C. he returned to Rome, and soon formed with Pompey and Crassus the agreement known as the first triumvirate, by which he was assured of the consulship in 59 B. C., and the government of Gaul for the following five years. To strengthen the alliance he married his young and beautiful daughter Julia to Pompey. In 56 B. C. he met Pompey and Crassus at Lucca, in the presence of a great concourse of senators and their followers, and an agreement was made that Cæsar should continue to hold the province of Gaul through 49 B. C., while Pompey and Crassus were to be consuls in 55 B. C., after which Syria and Spain were to be given to Crassus and Pompey respectively for five years. The agreement was duly carried out, and in 54 B. C. Crassus want to Syria, where he lost his life after the battle of Carrhæ, in 53 B. C. In the same year Pompey’s wife, Julia, died. Pompey had not gone to Spain to take possession of his province, but remained at Rome, and soon became openly hostile to Cæsar. When the Gallic war was ended, the senatorial party, with Pompey at its head, demanded that Cæsar disband his army. The civil war. This he refused to do unless Pompey also gave up his military command. Hereupon the civil war broke out, Cæsar crossed the Rubicon, the boundary of his province, and Pompey fled to Greece, where he was defeated in 48 B. C., at Pharsalus, then to Egypt, where he was murdered. In 46 B. C. the senatorial party was finally defeated in the battle of Thapsus, in Africa, and their leader, Cato, committed suicide at Utica.

Cæsar now returned to Rome, where he was made imperator and perpetual dictator, thus uniting in one person all the political power of the state. Henceforth the forms of republican government were but a thin mask disguising a real monarchy. Cæsar’s dictatorship and death. In the brief period of his power Cæsar accomplished the reform of the calendar, and carried through numerous important changes for the improvement of the government, but nothing could placate the hatred of those who wished to restore the rule of the senate, whatever its abuses had been. On the Ides of March (March 15), 44 B. C., he was murdered in the senate-house by a band of conspirators headed by Brutus.

Cæsar’s extant writings are seven books of Commentaries on the Gallic War, covering the years 58-52 B. C., and three books of Commentaries on the Civil War, covering the years 49-48 B. C. Cæsar’s writings. He also wrote some poems, a book On the Stars, two books Against Cato, and a few grammatical or rhetorical essays, all of which are lost, as are also his orations, which were greatly admired. Collections of his letters existed in antiquity, but these also have been lost, and the only extant letters of Cæsar are a few which are preserved in the correspondence of Cicero. Cæsar doubtless intended to publish commentaries on the years between 52 and 49 B. C., as well as on his wars in Egypt and elsewhere, but did not carry out his intention.

Cæsar’s Commentaries on the Gallic War were written apparently in the year 51 B. C., when he was still on good terms with Pompey. The energy of this pale, slender, delicate man sufficed not only to make him the conqueror of the warlike tribes of the north, and afterward of the trained armies of the republic, but also to gain him an eminent position among the great narrative and descriptive writers of the world. The Commentaries were written rapidly,[49] for the double purpose of showing what Cæsar had done to increase the glory and power of Rome, and to prove to his detractors that his conquest of Gaul had not been an act of unprovoked aggression, but had been forced upon him by circumstances. The facts narrated are drawn, in all probability, from the official army records, supplemented from Cæsar’s own recollections, and perhaps from his private journals. In striking contrast to the transparent vanity which led Cicero to extol his own merits on all possible occasions, Cæsar keeps his personality in the background, and writes of himself always in the third person, as if the deeds he narrates were those of another than the writer. This gives his narrative the appearance of great impartiality, but the careful reader can hardly fail to notice that Cæsar’s conduct is always put in the most favorable light, that his victories are made as important as possible, and his reverses are more lightly passed over. The Commentaries are not to be regarded as accurate history, but rather as a justification of Cæsar’s actions, presented in historical form.

Cæsar’s style.Cæsar’s style is clear, simple, and unaffected, and free from all obtrusive rhetorical adornment, but the narrative of his campaigns is varied and enlivened by the insertion of descriptions, speeches, dialogues, and all sorts of interesting details. He frequently takes occasion to signalize the brave deeds of his men. So in his account of the siege of Gergovia, he describes the heroic death of one of his centurions:

Marcus Petronius, a centurion of the same legion, in trying to break down the gate, was overwhelmed by numbers and despaired of his life. When he had already been wounded many times, he said to his comrades, who had followed him: “Since I can not save myself together with you, I will at least provide for your safety, since through my greed for glory I have led you into danger. When an opportunity is given you, do you look out for yourselves.” At once he rushed into the midst of the enemy, and after killing two, drove the rest a little away from the gate. When his comrades tried to succour him, “In vain,” he said, “do you try to save my life, since my blood and my strength are ebbing away. So go away, while you have the opportunity, and retreat to the legion.” Thus fighting he soon fell and saved his comrades.