History of Roman Literature from its Earliest Period to the Augustan Volume II Part 8

Great part of the harangue appears to be but collaterally connected with the direct subject of the prosecution. Oppianicus, it seems, had been formerly accused by Cluentius, and found guilty of a similar attempt against his life; but after his condemnation, a report became current that Cluentius had prevailed in the cause by corrupting the judges, and, to remove the unfavourable impression thus created against his client, Cicero recurs to the circ.u.mstances of that case. In the second part of the oration, which refers to the accusation of poisoning Oppianicus, he finds it necessary to clear his client from two previous charges of attempts to poison. In treating of the proper subject of the criminal proceedings, which does not occupy above a sixth part of the whole oration, he shows that Cluentius could have had no access or opportunity to administer poison to his father, who was in exile; that there was nothing unusual or suspicious in the circ.u.mstances of his death; and that the charge originated in the machinations of Cluentius' unnatural mother, against whom he inveighs with much force, as one hurried along blindfold by guilt-who acts with such folly that no one can account her a rational creature-with such violence that none can imagine her to be a woman-with such cruelty, that none can call her a mother. The whole oration discloses such a scene of enormous villainy-of murders, by poison and a.s.sa.s.sination-of incest, and subornation of witnesses, that the family history of Cluentius may be regarded as the counterpart in domestic society, of what the government of Verres was in public life. Though very long, and complicated too, in the subject, it is one of the most correct and forcible of all Cicero's judicial orations; and, under the impression that it comes nearer to the strain of a modern pleading than any of the others, it has been selected by Dr Blair as the subject of a minute a.n.a.lysis and criticism(321).

_De Lege Agraria contra Rullum_. In his discourse _Pro Lege Manilia_, the first of the deliberative kind addressed to the a.s.sembly of the people, Cicero had the advantage of speaking for a favourite of the mult.i.tude, and against the chiefs of the Senate; but he was placed in a very different situation when he came to oppose the Agrarian law. This had been for 300 years the darling object of the Roman tribes-the daily attraction and rallying word of the populace-the signal of discord, and most powerful engine of the seditious tribunate. The first of the series of orations against the Agrarian law, now proposed by Rullus, was delivered by Cicero in the Senate-house, shortly after his election to the consuls.h.i.+p: The second and third were addressed to the people from the rostrum. The scope of the present Agrarian law was, to appoint Decemvirs for the purpose of selling the public domains in the provinces, and to recover from the generals the spoils acquired in foreign wars, by which a fund might be formed for the purchase of lands in Italy, particularly Campania-to be equally divided among the people. Cicero, in his first oration, of which the commencement is now wanting, quieted the alarms of the Senate, by a.s.suring them of his resolution to oppose the law with his utmost power.

When the question came before the people, he did not fear to encounter the Tribunes on their own territory, and most popular subject; he did not hesitate to make the rabble judges in their own cause, though one in which their pa.s.sions, interests, and prejudices, and those of their fathers, had been engaged for so many centuries. Conscious of his superiority, he invited the Tribunes to ascend the rostrum, and argue the point with him before the a.s.sembled mult.i.tude; but the field was left clear to his argument and eloquence, and by alternately flattering the people, and ridiculing the proposer of the law, he gave such a turn to their inclinations, that they rejected the proposition as eagerly as they had before received it.

But although the Tribunes were unable to cope with Cicero in the Forum, they subsequently contrived to instil suspicions into the minds of the populace, with regard to his motives in opposing the Agrarian law. These imputations made such an impression on the city, that he found it necessary to defend himself against them, in a short speech to the people.

It has been disputed, whether this third oration was the last which Cicero p.r.o.nounced on occasion of this Agrarian law. In the letters to Atticus, while speaking of his consular orations, he says, "that among those sent, was that p.r.o.nounced in the Senate, and that addressed to the people, on the Agrarian law(322)." These are the first and second of the speeches, which we now have against Rullus; but he also mentions, that there were two _apospasmatia_, as he calls them, concerning the Agrarian law. Now, what is at present called the third, was probably the first of these two, and the last must have perished.

_Pro Rabirio_. About the year 654, Saturninus, a seditious Tribune, had been slain by a party attached to the interests of the Senate. Thirty-six years afterwards, Rabirius was accused of accession to this murder, by Labienus, subsequently well known as Caesar's lieutenant in Gaul.

Hortensius had pleaded the cause before the Duumvirs, Caius and Lucius Caesar, by whom Rabirius being condemned, appealed to the people, and was defended by Cicero in the Comitia. The Tribune, it seems, had been slain in a tumult during a season of such danger, that a decree had been pa.s.sed by the Senate, requiring the Consuls to be careful that the republic received no detriment. This was supposed to sanction every proceeding which followed in consequence; and the design of the popular party, in the impeachment of Rabirius, was to attack this prerogative of the Senate.

Cicero's oration on this contention between the Senatorial and Tribunitial power, gives us more the impression of prompt and unstudied eloquence than most of his other harangues. It is, however, a little obscure, partly from the circ.u.mstance that the accuser would not permit him to exceed half an hour in the defence. The argument seems to have been, that Rabirius did not kill Saturninus; but that even if he had slain him, the action was not merely legal, but praiseworthy, since all citizens had been required to arm in aid of the Consuls.

It was believed, that in spite of the exertions of Cicero, Rabirius would have been condemned, had not the Praetor Metellus devised an expedient for dissolving the Comitia, before sentence could be pa.s.sed. The cause was neither farther prosecuted at this time, nor subsequently revived; the public attention being now completely engrossed by the imminent dangers of the Catilinarian Conspiracy, which was discovered during the Consuls.h.i.+p of Cicero.

_Contra Catilinam_. The detection and suppression of that nefarious plot, form the most glorious part of the political life of Cicero; and the orations he p.r.o.nounced against the chief conspirator, are still regarded as the most splendid monuments of his eloquence. It was no longer to defend the rights and prerogatives of a munic.i.p.al town or province, nor to move and persuade a judge in favour of an unfortunate client, but to save his country and the republic, that Cicero ascended the Rostrum. The conspiracy of Catiline tended to the utter extinction of the city and government. Cicero, having discovered his design, (which was to leave Rome and join his army, a.s.sembled in different parts of Italy, while the other conspirators remained within the walls, to butcher the Senators and fire the capital,) summoned the Senate to meet in the Temple of Jupiter Stator, with the intention of laying before it the whole circ.u.mstances of the plot. But Catiline having unexpectedly appeared in the midst of the a.s.sembly, his audacity impelled the consular orator into an abrupt invective, which is directly addressed to the traitor, and commences without the preamble by which most of his other harangues are introduced.

In point of effect, this oration must have been perfectly electric. The disclosure to the criminal himself of his most secret purposes-their flagitious nature, threatening the life of every one present-the whole course of his villainies and treasons, blazoned forth with the fire of incensed eloquence-and the adjuration to him, by flying from Rome, to free his country from such a pestilence, were all wonderfully calculated to excite astonishment, admiration, and horror. The great object of the whole oration, was to drive Catiline into banishment; and it appears somewhat singular, that so dangerous a personage, and who might have been so easily convicted, should thus have been forced, or even allowed, to withdraw to his army, instead of being seized and punished. Catiline having escaped unmolested to his camp, the conduct of the Consul in not apprehending, but sending away this formidable enemy, had probably excited some censure and discontent; and the second Catilinarian oration was in consequence delivered by Cicero, in an a.s.sembly of the people, in order to justify his driving the chief conspirator from Rome. A capital punishment, he admits, ought long since to have overtaken Catiline, but such was the spirit of the times, that the existence of the conspiracy would not have been believed, and he had therefore resolved to place his guilt in a point of view so conspicuous, that vigorous measures might without hesitation be adopted, both against Catiline and his accomplices. He also takes this opportunity to warn his audience against those bands of conspirators who still lurked within the city, and whom he divides into various cla.s.ses, describing, in the strongest language, the different degrees of guilt and profligacy by which they were severally characterized.

Manifest proofs of the whole plot having been at length obtained, by the arrest of the amba.s.sadors from the Allobroges, with whom the conspirators had tampered, and who were bearing written credentials from them to their own country, Cicero, in his third oration, laid before the people all the particulars of the discovery, and invited them to join in celebrating a thanksgiving, which had been decreed by the Senate to his honour, for the preservation of his country.

The last Catilinarian oration was p.r.o.nounced in the Senate, on the debate concerning the punishment to be inflicted on the conspirators. Sila.n.u.s had proposed the infliction of instant death, while Caesar had spoken in favour of the more lenient sentence of perpetual imprisonment. Cicero does not precisely declare for any particular punishment; but he shows that his mind evidently inclined to the severest, by dwelling on the enormity of the conspirators' guilt, and aggravating all their crimes with much acrimony and art. His sentiments finally prevailed; and those conspirators, who had remained in Rome, were strangled under his immediate superintendence.

In these four orations, the tone and style of each of them, particularly of the first and last, is very different, and accommodated with a great deal of judgment to the occasion, and to the circ.u.mstances under which they were delivered. Through the whole series of the Catilinarian orations, the language of Cicero is well calculated to overawe the wicked, to confirm the good, and encourage the timid. It is of that description which renders the mind of one man the mind of a whole a.s.sembly, or a whole people(323).

_Pro Muraena_.-The Comitia being now held in order to choose Consuls for the ensuing year, Junius Sila.n.u.s and Muraena were elected. The latter candidate had for his compet.i.tor the celebrated jurisconsult Sulpicius Rufus; who, being a.s.sisted by Cato, charged Muraena with having prevailed by bribery and corruption. This impeachment was founded on the Calpurnian law, which had lately been rendered more strict, on the suggestion of Sulpicius, by a _Senatusconsultum_. Along with this accusation, the profligacy of Muraena's character was objected to, and also the meanness of his rank, as he was but a knight and soldier, whereas Sulpicius was a patrician and lawyer. Cicero therefore shows, in the first place, that he amply merited the consuls.h.i.+p, from his services in the war with Mithridates, which introduces a comparison between a military and forensic life. While he pays his usual tribute of applause to cultivated eloquence, he derides the forms and phraseology of the jurisconsults, by whom the civil law was studied and practised. As to the proper subject of the accusation, bribery in his election, it seems probable that Muraena had been guilty of some practices which, strictly speaking, were illegal, yet were warranted by custom. They seem to have consisted in encouraging a crowd to attend him on the streets, and in providing shows for the entertainment of the mult.i.tude; which, though expected by the people, and usually overlooked by the magistrates, appeared heinous offences in the eye of the rigid and stoical Cato. Aware of the weight added to the accusation by his authority, Cicero, in order to obviate this influence, treats his stoical principles in the same tone which he had already used concerning the profession of Sulpicius. In concluding, he avails himself of the difficulties of the times, and the yet unsuppressed conspiracy of Catiline, which rendered it unwise to deprive the city of a Consul well qualified to defend it in so dangerous a crisis.

This case was one of great expectation, from the dignity of the prosecutors, and eloquence of the advocates for the accused. Before Cicero spoke, it had been pleaded by Hortensius, and Cra.s.sus the triumvir; and Cicero, in engaging in the cause, felt the utmost desire to surpa.s.s these rivals of his eloquence. Such was his anxiety, that he slept none during the whole night which preceded the hearing of the cause; and being thus exhausted with care, his eloquence on this occasion fell short of that of Hortensius(324). He shows, however, much delicacy and art in the manner in which he manages the attack on the philosophy of Cato, and profession of Sulpicius, both of whom were his particular friends, and high in the estimation of the judges he addressed(325).

_Pro Valerio Flacco_.-Flaccus had aided Cicero in his discovery of the conspiracy of Catiline, and, in return, was defended by him against a charge of extortion and peculation, brought by various states of Asia Minor, which he had governed as Pro-praetor.

_Pro Cornelio Sylla_.-Sylla, who was afterwards a great partizan of Caesar's, was prosecuted for having been engaged in Catiline's conspiracy; but his accuser, Torquatus, digressing from the charge against Sylla, turned his raillery on Cicero; alleging, that he had usurped the authority of a king; and a.s.serting, that he was the third foreign sovereign who had reigned at Rome after Numa and Tarquin. Cicero, therefore, in his reply, had not only to defend his client, but to answer the petulant raillery by which his antagonist attempted to excite envy and odium against himself.

He admits that he was a foreigner in one sense of the word, having been born in a munic.i.p.al town of Italy, in common with many others who had rendered the highest services to the city; but he repels the insinuation that he usurped any kingly authority; and being instigated by this unmerited attack, he is led on to the eulogy of his own conduct and consuls.h.i.+p,-a favourite subject, from which he cannot altogether depart, even when he enters more closely into the grounds of the prosecution.

For this defence of Cornelius Sylla, Cicero privately received from his client the sum of 20,000 sesterces, which chiefly enabled him to purchase his magnificent house on the Palatine Hill.

_Pro Archia_.-This is one of the orations of Cicero on which he has succeeded in bestowing the finest polish, and it is perhaps the most _pleasing_ of all his harangues. Archias had been his preceptor, and, after having obtained much reputation by his Greek poems, on the triumphs of Lucullus over Mithridates, and of Marius over the Cimbri, was now attempting to celebrate the consuls.h.i.+p of Cicero; so that the orator, in pleading his cause, expected to be requited by the praises of his muse.

This poet was a native of Antioch, and, having come to Italy in early youth, was rewarded for his learning and genius with the friends.h.i.+p of the first men in the state, and with the citizens.h.i.+p of Heraclea, a confederate and enfranchised town of Magna Graecia. A few years afterwards, a law was enacted, conferring the rights of Roman citizens on all who had been admitted to the freedom of federate states, provided they had a settlement in Italy at the time when the law was pa.s.sed, and had a.s.serted the privilege before the Praetor within sixty days from the period at which it was promulgated. After Archias had enjoyed the benefit of this law for more than twenty years, his claims were called in question by one Gracchus, who now attempted to drive him from the city, under the enactment expelling all foreigners who usurped, without due t.i.tle, the name and attributes of Roman citizens. The loss of records, and some other circ.u.mstances, having thrown doubts on the legal right of his client, Cicero chiefly enlarged on the dignity of literature and poetry, and the various accomplishments of Archias, which gave him so just a claim to the privileges he enjoyed. He beautifully describes the influence which study and a love of letters had exercised on his own character and conduct. He had thence imbibed the principle, that glory and virtue should be the darling objects of life, and that to attain these, all difficulties, or even dangers, were to be despised. But, of all names dear to literature and genius, that of poet was the most sacred: hence it would be an extreme of disgrace and profanation, to reject a bard who had employed the utmost efforts of his art to make Rome immortal by his muse, and had possessed such prevailing power as to touch with pleasure even the stubborn and intractable soul of Marius.

The whole oration is interspersed with beautiful maxims and sentences, which have been quoted with delight in all ages. There appears in it, however, perhaps too much, and certainly more than in the other orations, of what Lord Monboddo calls _concinnity_. "We have in it," observes he, speaking of this oration, "strings of ant.i.theses, the figure of like endings, and a perfect similarity of the structure, both as to the grammatical form of the words, and even the number of them(326)." The whole, too, is written in a style of exaggeration and immoderate praise.

The orator talks of the poet Archias, as if the whole glory of Rome, and salvation of the commonwealth, depended on his poetical productions, and as if the smallest injury offered to him would render the name of Rome execrable and infamous in all succeeding generations.

_Pro Cn. Plancio_.-The defence of Plancius was one of the first orations p.r.o.nounced by Cicero after his return from banishment. Plancius had been Quaestor of Macedon when Cicero came to that country during his exile, and had received him with honours proportioned to his high character, rather than his fallen fortunes. In return for this kindness, Cicero undertook his defence against a charge, preferred by a disappointed compet.i.tor, of bribery and corruption in suing for the aediles.h.i.+p.

_Pro s.e.xtio_.-This is another oration produced by the grat.i.tude of Cicero, and the circ.u.mstances of his banishment. s.e.xtius, while Tribune of the people, had been instrumental in procuring his recall, and Cicero requited this good office by one of the longest and most elaborate of his harangues. The accusation, indeed, was a consequence of his interposition in favour of the ill.u.s.trious exile; for when about to propose his recall to the people, he was violently attacked by the Clodian faction, and left for dead on the street. His enemies, however, though obviously the aggressors, accused him of violence, and exciting a tumult. This was the charge against which Cicero defended him. The speech is valuable for the history of the times; as it enters into all the recent political events in which Cicero had borne so distinguished a part. The orator inveighs against his enemies, the Tribune Clodius, and the Consuls Gabinius and Piso, and details all the circ.u.mstances connected with his own banishment and return, occasionally throwing in a word or two about his client s.e.xtius.

_Contra Vatinium_.-Vatinius, who belonged to the Clodian faction, appeared, at the trial of s.e.xtius, as a witness against him. This gave Cicero an opportunity of interrogating him; and the whole oration being a continued invective on the conduct of Vatinius, poured forth in a series of questions, without waiting for an answer to any of them, has been ent.i.tled, _Interrogatio_.

_Pro Caelio_.-Middleton has p.r.o.nounced this to be the most entertaining of the orations which Cicero has left us, from the vivacity of wit and humour with which he treats the gallantries of Clodia, her commerce with Caelius, and in general the gaieties and licentiousness of youth.

Caelius was a young man of considerable talents and accomplishments, who had been intrusted to the care of Cicero on his first introduction to the Forum; but having imprudently engaged in an intrigue with Clodia, the well-known sister of Clodius, and having afterwards deserted her, she accused him of an attempt to poison her, and of having borrowed money from her in order to procure the a.s.sa.s.sination of Dio, the Alexandrian amba.s.sador. In this, as in most other prosecutions of the period, a number of charges, unconnected with the main one, seem to have been acc.u.mulated, in order to give the chief accusation additional force and credibility.

Cicero had thus to defend his client against the suspicions arising from the general libertinism of his conduct. He justifies that part of it which related to his intercourse with Clodia, by enlarging on the loose character of this woman, whom he treats with very little ceremony; and, in order to place her dissolute life in a more striking point of view, he conjures up in fancy one of her grim and austere ancestors of the Clodian family reproaching her with her shameful degeneracy. All this the orator was aware would not be sufficient for the complete vindication of his client; and it is curious to remark the ingenuity with which the strenuous advocate of virtue and regularity of conduct palliates, on this occasion, the levities of youth,-not, indeed, by lessening the merits of strict morality, but by representing those who withstand the seductions of pleasure as supernaturally endued.

This oration was a particular favourite of one who was long a distinguished speaker in the British Senate. "By the way," says Mr Fox, in a letter to Wakefield, "I know no speech of Cicero more full of beautiful pa.s.sages than this is, nor where he is more in his element. Argumentative contention is what he by no means excels in; and he is never, I think, so happy as when he has an opportunity of exhibiting a mixture of philosophy and pleasantry; and especially when he can interpose anecdotes and references to the authority of the eminent characters in the history of his country. No man appears, indeed, to have had such real respect for authority as he; and therefore, when he speaks upon that subject, he is always natural and in earnest; and not like those among _us_, who are so often declaiming about the wisdom of our ancestors, without knowing what they mean, or hardly ever citing any particulars of their conduct, or of their _dicta_(327)."

_De Provinciis Consularibus_. The government of Gaul was continued to Caesar, in consequence of this oration, so that it may be considered as one of the immediate causes of the ruin of the Roman Republic, which it was incontestibly the great wish of Cicero to protect and maintain inviolate.

But Cicero had evidently been duped by Caesar, as he formerly had nearly been by Catiline, and as he subsequently was by Octavius, Pollio, and every one who found it his interest to cajole him, by proclaiming his praises, and professing ardent zeal for the safety of the state. So little had he penetrated the real views of Caesar, that we find him asking the Senate, in his oration, what possible motive or inducement Caesar could have to remain in the province of Gaul, except the public good. "For would the amenity of the regions, the beauty of the cities, or civilization of the inhabitants, detain him there-or can a return to one's native country be so distasteful?"

_Pro Cornelio Balbo_.-Balbus was a native of Cadiz, who having been of considerable service to Pompey, during his war in Spain, against Sertorius, had, in return, received the freedom of Rome from that commander, in virtue of a special law, by which he had obtained the power of granting this benefit to whom he chose. The validity of Pompey's act, however, was now questioned, on the ground that Cadiz was not within the terms of that relation and alliance to Rome, which could, under any circ.u.mstances, ent.i.tle its citizens to such a privilege. The question, therefore, was, whether the inhabitants of a federate state, which had not adopted the inst.i.tutions and civil jurisprudence of Rome, could receive the rights of citizens.h.i.+p. This point was of great importance to the munic.i.p.al towns of the Republic, and the oration throws considerable light on the relations which existed between the provinces and the capital.

_In Pisonem_.-Piso having been recalled from his government of Macedon, in consequence of Cicero's oration, _De Provinciis Consularibus_, he complained, in one of his first appearances in the Senate, of the treatment he had received, and attacked the orator, particularly on the score of his poetry, ridiculing the well known line,

"Cedant arma togae-concedat laurea linguae."

Cicero replied in a bitter invective, in which he exposed the whole life and conduct of his enemy to public contempt and detestation. The most singular feature of this harangue is the personal abuse and coa.r.s.eness of expression it contains, which appear the more extraordinary when we consider that it was delivered in the Senate-house, and directed against an individual of such distinction and consequence as Piso. Cicero applies to him the opprobrious epithets of _bellua_, _furia_, _carnifex_, _furcifer_, &c.; he banters him on his personal deformities, and upbraids him with his ignominious descent on one side of the family, while, on the other, he had no resemblance to his ancestors, except to the sooty complexion of their images.

_Pro Milone_.-When Milo was candidate for the Consuls.h.i.+p, the notorious demagogue Clodius supported his compet.i.tors, and during the canva.s.s, party spirit grew so violent, that the two factions often came to blows within the walls of the city. While these dissensions were at their height, Clodius and Milo met on the Appian Way-the former returning from the country towards Rome, and the latter setting out for Lanuvium, both attended by a great retinue. A quarrel arose among their followers, in which Clodius was wounded and carried into a house in the vicinity. By order of Milo, the doors were broken open, his enemy dragged out, and a.s.sa.s.sinated on the highway. The death of Clodius excited much confusion and tumult at Rome, in the course of which the courts of justice were burned by a mob. Milo having returned from the banishment into which he had at first withdrawn, was impeached for the crime by the Tribunes of the people; and Pompey, in virtue of the authority conferred on him by a decree of the Senate, nominated a special commission to inquire into the murder committed on the Appian Way. In order to preserve the tranquillity of the city, he placed guards in the Forum, and occupied all its avenues with troops. This unusual appearance, and the shouts of the Clodian faction, which the military could not restrain, so discomposed the orator, that he fell short of his usual excellence. The speech which he actually delivered, was taken down in writing, and is mentioned by Asconius Pedia.n.u.s as still extant in his time. But that beautiful harangue which we now possess, is one which was retouched and polished, as a gift for Milo, after he had retired in exile to Ma.r.s.eilles.

In the oration, as we now have it, Cicero takes his exordium from the circ.u.mstances by which he was so much, though, as he admits, so causelessly disconcerted; since he knew that the troops were not placed in the Forum to overawe, but to protect. In entering on the defence, he grants that Clodius was killed, and by Milo; but he maintains that homicide is, on many occasions, justifiable, and on none more so than when force can only be repelled by force, and when the slaughter of the aggressor is necessary for self-preservation. These principles are beautifully ill.u.s.trated, and having been, as the orator conceives, sufficiently established, are applied to the case under consideration. He shows, from the circ.u.mstantial evidence of time and place-the character of the deceased-the retinue by which he was accompanied-his hatred to Milo-the advantages which would have resulted to him from the death of his enemy, and the expressions proved to have been used by him, that Clodius had laid an ambush for Milo. Cicero, it is evident, had here the worst of the cause. The encounter appears, in fact, to have been accidental; and though the servants of Clodius may, perhaps, have been the a.s.sailants, Milo had obviously exceeded the legitimate bounds of self defence. The orator accordingly enforces the argument, that the a.s.sa.s.sination of Clodius was an act of public benefit, which, in a consultation of Milo's friends, was the only one intended to have been advanced, and was the sole defence adopted in the oration which Brutus is said to have prepared for the occasion. Cicero, while he does not forego the advantage of this plea, maintains it hypothetically, contending that _even if_ Milo had openly pursued and slain Clodius as a common enemy, he might well boast of having freed the state from so pernicious and desperate a citizen. To add force to this argument, he takes a rapid view of the various acts of atrocity committed by Clodius, and the probable situation of the Republic, were he to revive. When the minds of the judges were thus sufficiently prepared, he ascribes his tragical end to the immediate interposition of the providential powers, specially manifested by his fall near the temple of Bona Dea, whose mysteries he had formerly profaned. Having excited sufficient indignation against Clodius, he concludes with moving commiseration for Milo, representing his love for his country and fellow-citizens,-the sad calamity of exile from Rome,-and his manly resignation to whatever punishment might be inflicted on him.

The argument in this oration was perhaps as good as the circ.u.mstances admitted; but we miss through the whole that reference to doc.u.ments and laws, which gives the stamp of truth to the orations of Demosthenes. Each ground of defence, taken by itself, is deficient in argumentative force.

Thus, in maintaining that the death of Clodius was of no benefit to Milo, he has taken too little into consideration the hatred and rancour mutually felt by the heads of political factions: but he supplies his weakness of argument by ill.u.s.trative digressions, flashes of wit, bursts of eloquence, and appeals to the compa.s.sion of the judges, on which he appears to have placed much reliance(328). On the whole, this oration was accounted, both by Cicero himself and by his contemporaries, as the finest effort of his genius; which confirms what indeed is evinced by the whole history of Roman eloquence, that the judges were easily satisfied on the score of reasoning, and attached more importance to pathos, and wit, and sonorous periods, than to fact or law.

_Pro Rabirio Postumo_.-This is the defence of Rabirius, who was prosecuted for repayment of a sum which he was supposed to have received, in conjunction with the Proconsul Gabinius, from King Ptolemy, for having placed him on the throne of Egypt, contrary to the injunctions of the Senate.

_Pro Ligario_.-This oration was p.r.o.nounced after Caesar, having vanquished Pompey in Thessaly, and destroyed the remains of the Republican party in Africa, a.s.sumed the supreme administration of affairs at Rome. Merciful as the conqueror appeared, he was understood to be much exasperated against those who, after the rout at Pharsalia, had renewed the war in Africa.

Ligarius, when on the point of obtaining a pardon, was formally accused by his old enemy Tubero, of having borne arms in that contest. The Dictator himself presided at the trial of the case, much prejudiced against Ligarius, as was known from his having previously declared, that his resolution was fixed, and was not to be altered by the charms of eloquence. Cicero, however, overcame his prepossessions, and extorted from him a pardon. The countenance of Caesar, it is said, changed, as the orator proceeded in his speech; but when he touched on the battle of Pharsalia, and described Tubero as seeking his life, amid the ranks of the army, the Dictator became so agitated, that his body trembled, and the papers which he held dropped from his hand(329).

This oration is remarkable for the free spirit which it breathes, even in the face of that power to which it was addressed for mercy. But Cicero, at the same time, shows much art in not overstepping those limits, within which he knew he might speak without offence, and in seasoning his freedom with appropriate compliments to Caesar, of which, perhaps, the most elegant is, that he forgot nothing but the injuries done to himself. This was the person whom, in the time of Pompey, he characterized as _monstrum et portentum tyrannum_, and whose death he soon afterwards celebrated as _divinum in rempublicam beneficium_!

The oration of Tubero against Ligarius, was extant in Quintilian's time, and probably explained the circ.u.mstances which induced a man, who had fought so keenly against Caesar at Pharsalia, to undertake the prosecution of Ligarius.

_Pro Rege Dejotaro_.-Dejotarus was a Tetrarch of Galatia, who obtained from Pompey the realm of Armenia, and from the Senate the t.i.tle of King.

In the civil war he had espoused the cause of his benefactors. Caesar, in consequence, deprived him of Armenia, but was subsequently reconciled to him, and, while prosecuting the war against Pharnaces, visited him in his original states of Galatia. Some time afterwards, Phidippus, the physician of the king, and his grandson Castor, accused him of an attempt to poison Caesar, during the stay which the Dictator had made at his court. Cicero defended him in the private apartments of Caesar, and adopted the same happy union of freedom and flattery, which he had so successfully employed in the case of Ligarius. Caesar, however, p.r.o.nounced no decision on the one side or other.

_Philippica_.-The remaining orations of Cicero are those directed against Antony, of whose private life and political conduct they present us with a full and glaring picture. The character of Antony, next to that of Sylla, was the most singular in the Annals of Rome, and in some of its features bore a striking resemblance to that of the fortunate Dictator. Both were possessed of uncommon military talents-both were imbued with cruelty which makes human nature shudder-both were inordinately addicted to luxury and pleasure-and both, for men of their powers of mind and habits, had apparently, at least, a strange superst.i.tious reliance on destiny, portents, and omens. Yet there were strong shades of distinction even in those parts of their characters in which we trace the closest resemblance: The cruelty of Sylla was more deliberate and remorseless-that of Antony, more regardless and unthinking-and amid all the atrocities of the latter, there burst forth occasional gleams of generosity and feeling. But then Sylla was a man of much greater discernment and penetration-a much more profound and successful dissembler-and he was possessed of many refined and elegant accomplishments, of which the coa.r.s.er Antony was dest.i.tute.

Sylla gratified his voluptuousness, but Antony was ruled by it. The former indulged in pleasure when within his grasp, but ease, power, and revenge, were his great and ultimate objects: The chief aim of the latter, was the sensual pleasure to which he was subservient. Sylla would never have been the slave of Cleopatra, or the dupe of Octavius. Hence the wide difference between the destiny of the triumphant Dictator, whose chariot rolled on the wheels of Fortune to the close of his career, and the sad fate of Antony. Yet that very fate has mitigated the abhorrence of posterity, and weakness having been added to wickedness, has unaccountably palliated, in our eyes, the faults of the soft Triumvir, now more remembered as the devoted lover of Cleopatra, than as the chief promoter of the Proscriptions.

The Philippics against Antony, like those of Demosthenes, derive their chief beauty from the n.o.ble expression of just indignation, which indeed composes many of the most splendid and admired pa.s.sages of ancient eloquence. They were all p.r.o.nounced during the period which elapsed between the a.s.sa.s.sination of Caesar, and the defeat of Antony at Modena.

Soon after Caesar's death, Cicero, fearing danger from Antony, who held a sort of military possession of the city, resolved on a voyage to Greece.

Being detained, however, by contrary winds, after he had set out, and having received favourable intelligence from his friends at Rome, he determined to return to the capital. The Senate a.s.sembled the day after his arrival, in order, at the suggestion of Antony, to consider of some new and extraordinary honours to the memory of Caesar. To this meeting Cicero was specially summoned by Antony, but he excused himself on pretence of indisposition, and the fatigue of his journey. He appeared, however, in his place, when the Senate met on the following day, in absence of Antony, and delivered the first of the orations, afterwards termed Philippics, from the resemblance they bore to those invectives which Demosthenes poured forth against the great foe of the independence of Greece. Cicero opens his speech by explaining the motives of his recent departure from Rome-his sudden return, and his absence on the preceding day-declaring, that if present, he would have opposed the posthumous honours decreed to the usurper. His next object, after vindicating himself, being to warn the Senate of the designs of Antony, he complains that he had violated the most solemn and authentic even of Caesar's laws; and at the same time enforced, as ordinances, what were mere jottings, found, or pretended to have been found, among the Dictator's _Memoranda_, after his death.

Antony was highly incensed at this speech, and summoned another meeting of the Senate, at which he again required the presence of Cicero. These two rivals seem to have been destined never to meet in the Senate-house.

Cicero, being apprehensive of some design against his life, did not attend; so that the Oration of Antony, in his own justification, which he had carefully prepared in intervals of leisure at his villa, near Tibur, was unanswered in the Senate. The second Philippic was penned by Cicero in his closet, as a reply to this speech of Antony, in which he had been particularly charged with having been not merely accessary to the murder of Caesar, but the chief contriver of the plot against him. Some part of Cicero's oration was thus necessarily defensive, but the larger portion, which is accusatory, is one of the severest and most bitter invectives ever composed, the whole being expressed in terms of the most thorough contempt and strongest detestation of Antony. By laying open his whole criminal excesses from his earliest youth, he exhibits one continued scene of debauchery, faction, rapine, and violence; but he dwells with peculiar horror on his offer of the diadem to Caesar, at the festival of the Lupercalia-his drunken debauch at the once cla.s.sic villa of Terentius Varro-and his purchase of the effects that belonged to the great Pompey-on which last subject he pathetically contrasts the modesty and decorum of that renowned warrior, once the Favourite of Fortune, and darling of the Roman people, with the licentiousness of the military adventurer who now rioted in the spoils of his country. In concluding, he declares, on his own part, that in his youth he had defended the republic, and, in his old age, he would not abandon its cause.-"The sword of Catiline I despised; and never shall I dread that of Antony." This oration is adorned with all the charms of eloquence, and proves, that in the decline of life Cicero had not lost one spark of the fire and spirit which animated his earlier productions. Although not delivered in the Senate, nor intended to be published till things were actually come to an extremity, and the affairs of the republic made it necessary to render Antony's conduct and designs manifest to the people, copies of the oration were sent to Brutus, Ca.s.sius, and other friends of the commonwealth: hence it soon got into extensive circulation, and, by exciting the vengeance of Antony, was a chief cause of the tragical death of its author.

The situation of Antony having now become precarious, from the union of Octavius with the party of the Senate, and the defection of two legions, he abruptly quitted the city, and placing himself at the head of his army, marched into Cisalpine Gaul, which, since the death of Caesar, had been occupied by Decimus Brutus, one of the conspirators. The field being thus left clear for Cicero, and the Senate being a.s.sembled, he p.r.o.nounced the third Philippic, of which the great object was to induce it to support Brutus, by placing an army at the disposal of Octavius, along with the two Consuls elect, Hirtius and Pansa. He exhorts the Senate to this measure, by enlarging on the merits of Octavius and Brutus, and concludes with proposing public thanks to these leaders, and to the legions which had deserted the standard of Antony.

From the Senate, Cicero proceeded directly to the Forum, where, in his fourth Philippic, he gave an account to the people of what had occurred, and explained to them, that Antony, though not nominally, had now been actually declared the enemy of his country. This harangue was so well received by an audience the most numerous that had ever listened to his orations, that, speaking of it afterwards, he declares he would have reaped sufficient fruit from the exertions of his whole life, had he died on the day it was p.r.o.nounced, when the whole people, with one voice and mind, called out that he had twice saved the republic(330).

Brutus being as yet unable to defend himself in the field, withdrew into Modena, where he was besieged by Antony. Intelligence of this having been brought to Rome, Cicero, in his fifth Philippic, endeavoured to persuade the Senate to proclaim Antony an enemy of his country, in opposition to Calenus, who proposed, that before proceeding to acts of hostility, an emba.s.sy should be sent for the purpose of admonis.h.i.+ng Antony to desist from his attempt on Gaul, and submit himself to the authority of the Senate. After three days' successive debate, Cicero's proposal would have prevailed, had not one of the Tribunes interposed his negative, in consequence of which the measure of the emba.s.sy was resorted to. Cicero, nevertheless, before any answer could be received, persisted, in his sixth and seventh Philippics, in a.s.serting that any accommodation with a rebel such as Antony, would be equally disgraceful and dangerous to the republic. The deputies having returned, and reported that Antony would consent to nothing which was required of him, the Senate declared war against him-employing, however, in their decree, the term tumult, instead of war or rebellion. Cicero, in his eighth Philippic, expostulated with them on their timorous and impolitic lenity of expression. In the ninth Philippic, p.r.o.nounced on the following day, he called on the Senate to erect a statue to one of the deputies, Servius Sulpicius, who, while labouring under a severe distemper, had, at the risk of his life, undertaken the emba.s.sy, but had died before he could acquit himself of the commission with which he was charged. The proposal met with considerable opposition, but it was at length agreed that a brazen statue should be erected to him in the Forum, and that an inscription should be placed on the base, importing that he had died in the service of the republic.