“Tyranny!” shouted the people near the doors, and Marcus smiled at Julius.
Sulla said, “There is no censorship of what a man may read in Rome, for we believe in freedom of publication and there are no guards here who read over a man’s shoulder. Our law prohibits censorship.”
Marcus bowed almost to his knees. “I thank you, lord.”
The Senators stared in dismay at Sulla, who smiled enigmatically.
“However,” said Sulla, “we do prohibit treason.”
“You consider, lord,” said Marcus, “that Cincinnatus and Aristotle and the history of old Greece are treasonable?”
Sulla, for the first time, openly smiled. “Do not bait me, Cicero,” he said.
He looked at Julius. “What else?”
Julius, who had seen Sulla’s smile, was greatly relieved. He said, in a voice filled with affected irritability, “It appears that almost all of Servius’ book is composed of quotations from worthier men and from great patriots and philosophers, whom Rome reveres.”
A deep murmur ran through the Chamber. The Senators stared at Sulla, who was rubbing his cheek and faintly smiling again.
Marcus said, “Is it prohibited to a man to quote honored sources?
“Yes! For it is the Law that if he does so he must give credit to those sources! This Cato Servius has not done. He has written in a fashion that implies he is the author of these noble utterances. Therefore, he is guilty!”
He raised his arms in a gesture of anguish and mourning, then slowly dropped them and let his head decline, as if in remorse, on his breast.
He said, “I have come to denounce my client of a crime. Plagiarism. It is forbidden under the Law of Rome. I ask that he be adequately punished.”
Sulla leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, and all waited breathlessly for his words. But many moments passed and none could read his face.
Marcus spoke again, “Woe unto me, that I have a client who has broken the law concerning plagiarism! Had I known of this crime before I should not have defended him! What is the punishment? Let me read it to you, lords: ‘The offender shall be fined from one hundred to one thousand gold sesterces!’ I leave the judgment in your merciful hands.” He bowed humbly to the Senate, and then to Sulla, and then wiped his eyes with his kerchief. Sulla watched him, and his throat vibrated as if by withheld mirth. A signal was given at the doors, and the mighty mob laughed also with good nature.
Sulla sat forward in his chair and gazed at the Senate. “We have a serious infraction of the law here before us. Senators, what is your judgment?”
They stared at him, and saw his strange smile. Then they stared at each other.
Sulla then said to Julius, “What is your opinion, Caesar?”
The subtle Julius kept his face straight. “Cato Servius is guilty of plagiarism. Therefore, lord, I suggest that his book be seized until such time as he give credit to his sources. Moreover, he should be punished. Permit me, lord, to leave in your hands the extent of the legal punishment.”
Sulla said, “The law is not in my hands. It resides with the Senate. Lords, what is your judgment?”
The old Senator said, “Two hundred gold sesterces fine, noble Sulla.”
Sulla said, “It is done.”
“As Cato Servius is not guilty of treason, but only of unlawful plagiarism, I order that his lands and fortune be restored to him, and that he be set free.”
Marcus nudged his client. Servius started. He turned his blind sockets on his once-beloved general, and his face was torn with emotions. Marcus nudged him again.
Then Servius said in a bitter and despairing voice, “I yield not, unless Sulla, my old general, forgives my—crime! Otherwise, I shall fall on my sword.”
All waited, with held breath. Sulla gazed at Marcus, and Marcus returned that gaze blandly. Then Sulla rose from his chair and descended the steps with slow majesty. He reached Servius, and paused, while all watched and craned their necks. Like all Romans he loved drama. He extended his arms and embraced Servius. He kissed Servius’ cheek. And then he kissed it again and the terrible light eyes filled with tears.
“I command you, Servius, not to fall upon your sword for any crime you have committed! You are under my protection henceforth from yourself and from all others. I forgive you the crime of plagiarism. Go in peace.”
Marcus’ friends again gave the signal, and now the crowd screamed, “Hail, Sulla! Sulla! Sulla! Hail, Cicero! Hail! Hail!”
Servius leaned his head in prostration on Sulla’s shoulder, as if undone. He said in a voice only Sulla heard: “You are still a tyrant, and the enemy of my country.”
Sulla whispered back to him, “Blame me not, Servius, for the people willed it so. On them the curse and the imprecations, and not on me. I am but their creature.”
Servius lifted his head suddenly, and his face was moved. For the first time he returned Sulla’s embrace and kissed his cheek, in sadness, in understanding pity.
PART THREE
The Patriot and the Politician
Est quidem vera lex recta ratio naturae congruens, diffusa in omnes, constans, sempiterna, quae vocet ad officium iubendo, vetando a fraude deterreat; quae tamen neque probos frustra iubet aut vetat nec improbos iubendo aut vetando movet, huic Iegi nee obrogari fas est neque derogari ex hac aliquid licet neque tota abrogari potest, nee vera aut per senatum aut per populum—
—CICERO
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The summer was extremely hot, and the monolithic city sweltered and sweated under fierce bronze rays of light from the sky. Every sunset was a conflagration, as ominous as a distantly seen fire which inexorably approaches.
Marcus received a letter from his friend and dear enemy, Julius Caesar, in Asia, where Julius was serving his first military campaign under Minucius Thermos:
“Greetings to the noble Marcus Tullius Cicero from his friend, Julius Caesar.
“Carissime, I rejoiced to receive your letter and to hear that all is well with you and that you have triumphed in your last major pleadings before the law. What a man is our Cicero, what a patriot! He needs only to become a politician to be complete, and I am happy that he is considering this matter as a duty. But when shall I have the pleasure of hearing of your marriage? A man is not complete without a wife. Do I not know this? Did I not lovingly adhere to my Cornelia in face of Sulla’s threats, even when he deprived me of my priesthood? What is it that you often said to me: ‘It is better to obey God than man.’ I, therefore, must be virtuous in the sight of God for I honored the sacredness of marriage.”
(At this, Marcus made a grimace which reluctantly became a smile as he remembered the dissipations and adulteries of his friend.)
“Alas,” continued Julius’ letter, “I was grieved to hear of Sulla’s death in Puteoli, a year only since he resigned his dictatorship of Rome. But I expected it long before this time, for though his visage and his form did not indicate that he possessed any plethora which would lead to apoplexy he was a man of great passions and inner violences. He detested many, and hated many, but for reasons of state he repressed all expression of these emotions, and such repression has a dread effect upon the body and the soul. It was unfortunate for his memory that he died suddenly in the arms of his latest actress, for it has stained his true image of a spiritually austere and Stoic man. But let us be glad that he lived to complete his memoirs. I am impatient to read them.”
(I am certain of that, thought Marcus at this point.)
“In your last letter, Marcus, you wrote that you feared I am ambitious. Is it evil to be ambitious, to yearn with all your might and heart to serve your country justly and bravely? If that be ambition, let Romans again be endowed with such a priceless virtue! You, above all, should rejoice in ambitious men. But why should you accuse me of what you apparently consider an ominous thing? Who am I but a humble soldier, serving my general in this steaming and ungrateful and rebellious province? My ambition is to serve him well. In all modesty I declare
I did not seek nor desire the Civic Crown for saving a comrade’s life at Mytiline. Laugh if you will.”*
(Marcus laughed.)
“My general is sending me to serve under Servilius Isauricus against the Cillilian pirates. What a people are those pirates, a race composed of ancient Phoenicians, Hittites, Egyptians, Persians, Syrians, Arabs, and other maritime scourings of the Great Sea! Nevertheless, one must admire their effrontery and audaciousness, for do they not defy Rome? It is as if an ant would defy a tiger. They do not hesitate to seize even Roman ships and murder Roman sailors and seamen and to rob our cargoes. We shall put them down speedily.
“You prudently do not write your opinion of our present dictator, Lepidus, and I possess discretion also though you appeared to doubt it always.
“However,” continued Julius’ letter, “though a man of riches he does not possess the wealth that Sulla possessed. You were not then referring to him when you quoted Aristotle: ‘It is surely a bad thing that the greatest offices should be bought! The law which permits this abuse makes wealth of more account than nobility in a politician, and then the whole State becomes avaricious. For whenever the chiefs of the State deem anything honorable, the citizens are sure to follow their example, and where ability has not the first place there is no real aristocracy of mind and spirit.’ No, you were not referring to Lepidus.
“Or, is it possible that you were warning me? Incredible! It is true that I am not destitute, but it is also true that there is no office in Rome which I would attempt to buy, for I desire none.”
(Hah! thought Marcus.)
“I wish you were not always so ambiguous,” the letter went on. “But you possess the subtlety of a lawyer, which is beyond the comprehension of a humble soldier like myself.”
(“O Julius!” exclaimed Marcus aloud, in his office.)
“I had hoped,” wrote Julius, “that the paths of your brother, Quintus, and mine would cross, but it was not in our fate though we were less than two leagues apart at one time. I hear of the respect and honor in which he is held by his general. He is a noble Roman, for all his simplicity.”
(Which you do not admire, thought Marcus.)
“I feel a premonition, Carissime, that I shall soon look upon your amiable face, for have I not always loved you and held you to be a paragon of probity and all the virtues? I hope to return to Rome when the pirates are extinguished, which will be speedily. In the meantime, my sweetest thoughts are of my friend and the guide of my youth. Consider that I have just embraced you and kissed your cheek. I also kiss the hand of your dear mother and the cheek of your father, as though I were their son. May my patron, Jupiter, look upon you with favor, and my ancestress, Venus, grant you the sight of a desirable maiden for a wife, and may Cupid, the son of Venus, pierce your heart with his most delectable arrow.”
(And you consider that meaning me well! thought Marcus.)
He put down the letter, still smiling. Then the smile disappeared. He was filled with lassitude and weariness. He was but twenty-nine years old, but he felt aged and heavy. He could not forget Livia, the murdered wife of Catilina. Years had passed since her horrible death, but her face did not leave his inner eye. She remained passionately young to him, beautiful beyond all dreaming, eerie as a Sybil, elusive as a dryad, fleet of foot as a nymph, wild as a spring wind, a wraith from an unknown land.
As a man who analyzed everything, including himself, Marcus still did not know why he loved Livia, and why her face and her voice haunted him, why her whole person was as alive to him as no other was alive. He could recall the sound of her voice and her mystic singing at will, as sharp as if he had just heard it within the past hour. He could recall her smiles, the touch of her leaf-like hand, her faint laughter, the light of her blazing blue eyes. It was as if he had just left her side and then had looked back upon her over his shoulder and had seen her face again.
The fearful events which had shaken Rome, and himself, over these years were not so vivid to him as Livia Curius Catilina. When he visited the island near Arpinum he walked the little forest, and heard her voice echoing to him eagerly from shadows, and sometimes he believed he caught the flash of her hair, the floating of her palla, among the mysterious trees. When the wind ran through the branches he could hear Livia’s singing, the murmur of her unearthly song. His arms never ceased from aching to embrace her; he felt the sweetness of her kiss upon his lips. Her shade wandered over the bridge between the island and the town, and the stones whispered softly with her light step. It was on the island that he felt her presence most strongly, and not in Rome where she had lived and died.
He said to his mother, “No, I can never marry. I cannot forget Livia. I have nothing to offer another woman but the very shadow of myself, and that is not enough.”
Sometimes it seemed to him that his external life was a dream, and that the only reality he had ever known was Livia and the island, his endless studies, his poetry, and his thoughts. Years later he wrote to Atticus: “I served for a little space in the military service under Sulla (and was not considered the most able of soldiers). Nevertheless, the whole experience appears not to have any verity for me, but only a fantasy indulged in for an hour or more. I do not recall, now, even the name of my general, nor of my comrades—who never attempted any close approach to me. Nor I to them, I confess. They delighted in war, and thought it the noblest and most exciting of sports, even when the probability of death was always present. I found wars no pleasure to an intelligent man, and the short campaign in which I was engaged—Sulla, and my mother, believing I should miss no experience however arduous or dull—drowned me in yawning ennui. I do not decry armies and soldiers, for man, being what he is—a lover of war—can never be trusted especially if he is envious of your nation and lusts for your possessions, or yearns for power over you.”
Marcus was still receiving congratulations from many quarters because he had won the case of Cato Servius, and then, a little later, the case of one Sextus Roscius (who was no relative of the actor). Again, in the case of Sextus Roscius, he had had to oppose Sulla before a fearful jury, and he had had to accuse Chrysogonus, the friend of Sulla, and a former Greek slave, during the murder trial of Sextus, for whom he won an acquittal. In conclusion, and in referring to the sad state of law in Rome, Marcus said, “The daily spectacle of atrocious acts has stifled all feeling of pity in the hearts of men. When every hour we see or hear of an act of dreadful cruelty we lose all feeling of humanity. Crime no longer horrifies us. We smile at the enormities of our youth. We condone passion, when we should understand that the unrestrained emotions of man produce chaos. Once we were a nation of self-control and austerity and had a reverence for life and justice. This is true no longer. We prefer our politicians, particularly if they swagger with youth and are accomplished jesters and liars. We love entertainment, even in law, even in government. Unless we reform, our terrible fate is inevitable.”*
(In recalling that case Marcus was to write decades later, “It won such favorable comment that I was thought not incompetent to handle any sort of litigation. There followed in quick succession many other cases which I brought into court, carefully worked out and, as the saying is, smelling somewhat of the midnight oil.”)
In short, he became rich. He was not fool enough to despise riches, remembering his ascetic life in his youth, and he never believed that deprivation was nobler than money. “Poverty does not harden the soul, nor strengthen it. It creates slaves.”† Yet, with another part of his mind he regarded his new wealth with indifference. It was there; he could afford to forget it.
If Helvia, for all her plotting, had not yet been able to find a suitable and acceptable wife for her older son she manipulated the marriage of Quintus, her darling, to Pomponia, sister of Atticus, publisher to Marcus. Quintus, the secretly tenderhearted, had through long labor finally been able to acquire the reputation of being a blustering soldier. But Pomponia, a shrewd and intelligent young woman, had soon succeeded in conquering him, and it was a s
candal in the family that he had become a typical Roman husband of modern times—afraid of his wife, fearful of her tempers, and docile, and well governed. In this connection Marcus remembered the angry statement of old Porcius Cato, “Romans govern the world but are themselves governed by their wives.” He also recalled that Themistocles, the ancient Greek statesman, had complained that while Athenians governed the Greeks and he governed the Athenians, his wife governed him, and their son governed her. Marcus had no desire to be governed by a woman. He amiably visited the country home of Quintus, when his brother was on furlough, and amiably smiled upon Pomponia, but he shuddered at the awe and terror in which Quintus held his young wife. Quintus the fearless, the impulsive, Quintus whose own temper among men had gained a respectable reputation! As if to balance the oppression of his wife, Quintus often undertook to advise Marcus about politics, about which he was certain that Marcus knew nothing. “One must be a tactician, as in war, and you, dear Marcus, hate war.”
At twenty-nine his work, his endless labors, his growing fame, his lassitude and sadness, began to overcome Marcus. He discovered, to his alarm, that that fine instrument of his, his voice—so sedulously trained by Noë and Roscius—was showing signs of failing. There were mornings when he awoke that he said to himself, “It is impossible for me to face the day.” Never exceptionally strong, he was aware of weakness in his limbs. He struggled on against increasing pain and increasing disability, and would listen to no advice, not from his physician, not from his parents. “There is so little time,” he would say with an irritability foreign to his affable nature.
Then, one hot summer day, he collapsed in his office, and his students carried him to his couch in a fainting condition. His physician was called. The physician said, “I hold no hope for your life unless you leave Rome and your work and rest your mind and your spirit.” Marcus scoffed. But in the days that passed he found that he could rarely stir from his bed, that his joints ached and throbbed with anguish. His physician said, “You must go to Greece, to the shrine of the great physician, son of Apollo, Aesculapius, who is reputed, in dreams, to cure the afflicted. You have rheumatism; your body reflects the weariness and pain of your soul.”
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