Part 19

This poet was a native of Antioch, and, having come to Italy in early youth, was rewarded for his learning and genius with the friendship of the first men in the state, and with the citizenship of Heraclea, a confederate and enfranchised town of Magna Græcia. 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 passed, and had asserted the privilege before the Prætor 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 title, the name and attributes of Roman citizens. The loss of records, and some other circumstances, 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 antitheses, 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 pronounced by Cicero after his return from banishment. Plancius had been Quæstor 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 competitor, of bribery and corruption in suing for the ædileship.

_Pro Sextio_.—This is another oration produced by the gratitude of Cicero, and the circumstances of his banishment. Sextius, 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 illustrious 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 circumstances connected with his own banishment and return, occasionally throwing in a word or two about his client Sextius.

_Contra Vatinium_.—Vatinius, who belonged to the Clodian faction, appeared, at the trial of Sextius, 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 entitled, _Interrogatio_.

_Pro Cælio_.—Middleton has pronounced 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 Cælius, and in general the gaieties and licentiousness of youth.

Cælius 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 assassination of Dio, the Alexandrian ambassador. In this, as in most other prosecutions of the period, a number of charges, unconnected with the main one, seem to have been accumulated, 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 passages 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 Cæsar, 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 Cæsar, 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 Cæsar, that we find him asking the Senate, in his oration, what possible motive or inducement Cæsar 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 circumstances, entitle its citizens to such a privilege. The question, therefore, was, whether the inhabitants of a federate state, which had not adopted the institutions and civil jurisprudence of Rome, could receive the rights of citizenship. This point was of great importance to the municipal 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 togæ—concedat laurea linguæ.”

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 coarseness 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 Consulship, the notorious demagogue Clodius supported his competitors, and during the canvass, 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 assassinated 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 Pedianus 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 Marseilles.

In the oration, as we now have it, Cicero takes his exordium from the circumstances 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 illustrated, and having been, as the orator conceives, sufficiently established, are applied to the case under consideration. He shows, from the circumstantial 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 assailants, Milo had obviously exceeded the legitimate bounds of self defence. The orator accordingly enforces the argument, that the assassination 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 circumstances admitted; but we miss through the whole that reference to documents 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 illustrative digressions, flashes of wit, bursts of eloquence, and appeals to the compassion 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 pronounced after Cæsar, having vanquished Pompey in Thessaly, and destroyed the remains of the Republican party in Africa, assumed 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 Cæsar, 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 Cæsar, 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 circumstances which induced a man, who had fought so keenly against Cæsar 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 title of King. In the civil war he had espoused the cause of his benefactors. Cæsar, 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 Cæsar, during the stay which the Dictator had made at his court. Cicero defended him in the private apartments of Cæsar, and adopted the same happy union of freedom and flattery, which he had so successfully employed in the case of Ligarius. Cæsar, however, pronounced 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 superstitious 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 coarser Antony was destitute. 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 noble expression of just indignation, which indeed composes many of the most splendid and admired passages of ancient eloquence. They were all pronounced during the period which elapsed between the assassination of Cæsar, and the defeat of Antony at Modena. Soon after Cæsar’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 assembled the day after his arrival, in order, at the suggestion of Antony, to consider of some new and extraordinary honours to the memory of Cæsar. 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 Cæsar’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.