Political Speeches (Oxford World's Classics) Read Online Free Page A

sister, Clodia Metelli, with whom Caelius had previously had an affair. Caelius had originally been a pupil of Cicero’s, before switching allegiance to the Clodii, and now that he had broken with the Clodii he was to become a friend of Cicero’s again. In taking on his defence, Cicero saw his chance to hurt Clodius by publicly humiliating his sister, whom he had reasons for hating: she had persecuted his family during his exile. In
Pro Caelio
(‘For Caelius’) the charges are largely ignored, and Cicero instead focuses on Caelius’ affair with Clodia, portraying her as a common prostitute (she was a high-ranking society lady) and holding her up to ridicule. Ingeniously, he manages to do this while exempting Caelius from moral blame. The speech is wonderfully funny, and very cruel: Cicero won his case by avoiding the issue and making the jury laugh at his enemy. After the trial, Clodia (who has a one-in-three chance of being the same person as Catullus’ ‘Lesbia’) disappears from history.
    Cicero owed his recall from exile to Pompey’s influence, and in return he had reluctantly undertaken to give the triumvirs his political support. But he soon detected an apparent rift between Pompey and Caesar (who was absent in Gaul from 58 to 49), and decided to drive the two men further apart by opposing Caesar. First he published an attack on Publius Vatinius which he had made at the time of Sestius’ trial (
In Vatinium
, ‘Against Vatinius’): Vatinus was a legate of Caesar’s who as tribune in 59 had procured for him his Gallic command. Secondly, he put a motion before the senate calling for discussion of Caesar’s controversial agrarian law of 59. This challenge to Caesar’s position did not split the triumvirate as Cicero had hoped: instead it drove the three men closer together. They reaffirmed their alliance, and Pompey and Crassus held a second joint consulship in 55 (they had held the consulship together in 70), withcommands for each of them to follow afterwards. Caesar’s command in Gaul was extended for a further five years.
    Cicero now realized that resistance to the triumvirs would be futile, and in any case he needed their protection against Clodius’ continuing attacks; he also felt that the conservatives in the senate, such as Hortensius, were failing to give him their full support. He therefore publicly declared his allegiance to the triumvirs: in
De provinciis consularibus
(‘On the consular provinces’, 56) he lavishes praise on Caesar and advocates the extension of his Gallic command.
    The later 50s were unhappy years for Cicero. In 54 he had to defend Vatinius; although he won, he apparently chose not to publish his defence. Soon afterwards (in 54 or 53) he was compelled to defend Gabinius, the consul of 58 who had allowed Clodius to exile him; at least this time he had the satisfaction of losing. In his private moments he consoled himself by starting to write a series of philosophical treatises in which he explained the various philosophical systems of the Greeks (he was the first person to do this in Latin; the work involved formulating a Latin philosophical vocabulary, which then became standard). At the same time he began a series of treatises on oratory and rhetoric; some of these works also explore, in theoretical terms, his own political philosophy. In 53 (or 52) he was gratified to receive, on Hortensius’ nomination, an important political honour: he was elected to a place in the College of Augurs, in succession to Crassus’ son, who had been killed with his father at Carrhae.
    Clodius during these years had become a powerful independent force in Rome with a large popular following. He had assembled a gang of thugs and used it to attack his enemies, most of all Cicero, and to terrorize the city. His chief opponent was Titus Annius Milo, who used similar tactics against him in return. The increasing willingness of politicians to resort to violence to achieve their ends was a symptom of