[242]. To meet Brutus.

I return to your earlier letter, and I pass over the first part about the Buthrotians. For that is engraved on my heart of hearts, if only, as you say, there is an opening for action. You are very insistent about Brutus' speech, since you say so much about it again. Am I really to plead the same case as that he has written about? Am I to write without being asked by him? One could not put one's oar in more rudely. "But," you say, "write something in the style of Heracleides."[[243]] That I don't refuse, but I should have to settle on a line of argument, and I should have to wait for more time to write it. For think what you will of me—though of course I should like you to think as well as possible, and not be offended at what I say—if affairs drift on as they seem to be doing, I can take no pleasure in the Ides of March. Caesar would never have come back,[[244]] and fear would not have compelled us to ratify his acts; or, if I join Saufeius' school and desert the Tusculan Disputations, which you would press even on Vestorius, I was so high in his favour (heaven confound him, though he is dead!) that to a person of my age he was not a

[243]. Heracleides of Pontus, a pupil of Plato, who wrote on political subjects.

[244]. From the Parthian war, in all probability; though some take it to refer to Antony, as a reincarnation of Caesar.

308quoniam interfecto domino liberi non sumus, non fuerit dominus ille fugiendus. Rubeo, mihi crede, sed iam scripseram; delere nolui.

De Menedemo vellem verum fuisset, de regina velim verum sit. Cetera coram, et maxime quid nostris faciendum sit, quid etiam nobis, si Antonius militibus obsessurus est senatum. Hanc epistulam si illius tabellario dedissem, veritus sum, ne solveret. Itaque misi dedita. Erat enim rescribendum tuis.

IVa
CICERO ATTICO SAL.

Scr. In Tusculano VI K. Iun. a. 710

Quam vellem Bruto studium tuum navare potuisses! Ego igitur ad eum litteras. Ad Dolabellam Tironem misi cum mandatis et litteris. Eum ad te vocabis et, si quid habebis, quod placeat, scribes. Ecce autem de traverso L. Caesar ut veniam ad se rogat in Nemus aut scribam, quo se venire velim; Bruto enim placere se a me conveniri. O rem odiosam et inexplicabilem! Puto me ergo iturum et inde Romam, nisi quid mutaro. Summatim adhuc ad te; nihildum enim a Balbo. Tuas igitur exspecto nec actorum solum, sed etiam futurorum.

master to run away from, since the death of a master has not set us free. I blush, believe me; but I have written it, and I won't erase it.