Quantam tu mihi moves exspectationem de sermone Bibuli, quantam de colloquio βοώπιδος, quantam etiam de illo delicato convivio! Proinde ita fac venias ut ad sitientes aures. Quamquam nihil est iam, quod magis timendum nobis putem, quam ne ille noster Sampsiceramus, cum se omnium sermonibus sentiet vapulare, et cum has actiones εὐανατρέπτους videbit, ruere incipiat. Ego autem usque eo sum enervatus, ut hoc otio, quo nunc tabescimus, malim ἐντυραννεῖσθαι quam cum optima spe dimicare.
De pangendo quod me crebro adhortaris, fieri nihil potest. Basilicam habeo, non villam, frequentia Formianorum
Your news that the uproar has died down in Rome does not surprise me: but I can assure you it has not died down in the country, and the very country cannot endure that despotism you endure. If you come to this “Laestrygonia of the far gates,”—Formiae Odyssey x. 81| I mean—you will find the people raging with indignation, and our friend Magnus—a name which is now growing as obsolete as Crassus’ surname Dives—held in the deepest abhorrence. You may not believe me, but I have not met anyone here who takes the matter as coolly as myself. So follow my advice and let us stick to philosophy. I can take my oath there is nothing like it. If you have a letter to send to the Sicyonians, hasten to Formiae. I am thinking of leaving on the 6th of May.
XIV
CICERO TO ATTICUS, GREETING.
Formiae, between April 20 and 28, B.C. 59
You have aroused the liveliest curiosity in me as to your talk with Bibulus and your conversation with Juno, and about that “fast” dinner too. So remember my ears are thirsting for news, and come quickly. However, the thing I am most afraid of at the present moment is that our friend the Pasha may run amuck as soon as he realizes that every one is railing at him and laying it on to him, and that these new measures are quite easy to upset. For myself, however, I have grown so slack that I should prefer to waste my life in my present ease under a despotism than to take part in the struggle however bright the prospect of success. As for the writing, for which you so incessantly clamour, it is impossible. My house is so crowded with the townsfolk that it is a
atque imparem basilica tribui Aemiliae.[[74]] Sed omitto vulgus; post horam quartam molesti ceteri non sunt. C. Arrius proximus est vicinus, immo ille quidem iam contubernalis, qui etiam se idcirco Romam ire negat, ut hic mecum totos dies philosophetur. Ecce ex altera parte Sebosus, ille Catuli familiaris. Quo me vertam? Statim mehercule Arpinum irem, ni te in Formiano commodissime exspectari viderem dumtaxat ad pr. Nonas Maias; vides enim, quibus hominibus aures sint deditae meae. O occasionem mirificam, si qui nunc, dum hi apud me sunt, emere de me fundum Formianum velit! Et tamen illud probem: “Magnum quid aggrediamur et multae cogitationis atque otii”? Sed tamen satis fiet a nobis, neque parcetur labori.
XV
CICERO ATTICO SAL.
Scr. in Formiano inter XI et III K. Mai a. 695
Ut scribis, ita video non minus incerta in re publica quam in epistula tua, sed tamen ista ipsa me varietas sermonum opinionumque delectat. Romae enim videor esse, cum tuas litteras lego, et, ut fit in tantis rebus, modo hoc, modo illud audire. Illud tamen explicare non possum, quidnam invenire possit nullo recusante ad facultatem agrariam. Bibuli autem ista magnitudo animi in comitiorum dilatione quid habet nisi ipsius iudicium sine ulla correctione rei