[sect. VII] Under Caesar's Government.
(Aet. 60-62. B.C. 47-45. Epist. LIV.-LXXXIV.)
32. After the battle of Pharsalus Cicero remained for a time at Corcyra117
and Patrae,118
and then decided to return to Italy. He reached Brundisium119
in Oct., 48 B.C., and stayed there until Sept, 47 B.C., passing one of the
most miserable years of his life. He was distressed by both political and
domestic anxieties. He had returned contrary to the express orders of Caesar,
who had forbidden the Pompeians to enter Italy.120
He was therefore a political fugitive in a city filled
[p. xxxv]
with hostile soldiers. At the same time Caesar's critical position in Egypt
121
made it quite possible that the Pompeian cause might succeed after all, in
which case Cicero's standing would be still more precarious. His family
affairs were equally distressing: Tullia, his daughter, was most unhappy with
her husband Dolabella; Terentia's management of his property122
during his absence had caused him a deal of vexation; an unfortunate misunderstanding had
sprung up with his brother Quintus.123
33. Cicero's anxiety in regard to his own position was somewhat relieved in
Sept., 47 B.C., by the arrival of Caesar, who generously gave him permission to
remain in Italy.124
He went almost directly to Rome, and his letters in the main,
up to the close of 46 B.C., were written either in that city or at his villas
at Tusculum and Cumae. The battle of Thapsus was fought Apr. 6, 46 B.C., and
by it Caesar's supremacy in Africa was established; but the tidings of this
important battle and even of the violent deaths125
of the Pompeian leaders, Scipio, Petreius, Afranius, and Juba,126
do not seem to have stirred Rome so deeply as the news that Cato had taken his own life at Utica,127
feeling that the cause of the Republic was beyond hope. The little memoir which Cicero wrote of
his personal and political friend128
called forth opposition pamphlets from the Caesarians, Hirtius129
and Brutus,130
and even Caesar found time on the eve of the battle of Munda to write an 'Anticato.'131
34. Cicero gave much of his time to literature during this period. The
Orator was written and the Brutus finished in
[p. xxxvi]
46 B.C.132
Although he attended the meetings of the senate, he took little active
part in politics, save in working to secure the recall of some Pompeians who
were still in exile. At one time Cicero hoped that Caesar would follow a
conservative course and would at least restore the senate to its old position
and influence, and it was with this hope in his mind that he spoke so warmly of
him in his oration pro Marcello; but he soon saw clearly that it was
Caesar's purpose to retain the supreme power in his own hands, especially when,
at the close of the year 46, Caesar, on departing for Spain, left the city in
charge of eight praefecti, who were directly responsible to his personal
representatives, Cornelius Balbus and C. Oppius.133
35. Caesar defeated the last of the Pompeians, who had rallied under the
leadership of Labienus and the two sons of Pompey, at Munda,134
Mar. 17, 45 B.C., and returned to Rome in September to continue the reforms which he had already
begun, and to make preparations for his great campaign against the Parthians in
the following year. In the meantime a conspiracy was forming against him, led
by a few disappointed office-seekers and fanatics, and fostered by the
traditional Roman prejudice against the title of rex and the regal
insignia. The indiscreet act of Antony and of some other personal friend (or
enemy?), in offering a diadem to Caesar,135
and in crowning his statue with a laurel wreath,136
strengthened the conspiracy, while Caesar's own course in
openly assuming supreme power, a course far removed from the more diplomatic
policy of his successor Augustus, must have offended the more conservative
element. The meeting of the senate on Mar. 15, 44 B.C., furnished a suitable
occasion, the presentation of a petition by L. Tillius
[p. xxxvii]
Cimber a convenient opportunity, and the conspirators accomplished their purpose of assassinating Caesar.137
