Against Cicero

[Ed Cryer]

I've managed to find a contemporary speech against Cicero (attributed to
Sallust, the historian, and it certainly has his literary
idiosyncracies), probably delivered in the senate. A great many of the
attacks are born out by known history: especially the political
shiftiness, the blowing-his-own-trumpet because he came from nowhere,
the sometimes extremely fascist heavy-handedness, and the money-grabbing.


C. SALLVSTI CRISPI INVECTIVA IN CICERONEM

I 1. Graviter et iniquo animo maledicta tua paterer, M. Tulli, si te
scirem iudicio magis quam morbo animi petulantia ista uti. sed cum in te
neque modum neque modestiam ullam animadverto, respondebo tibi, ut, si
quam male dicendo voluptatem cepisti, eam male audiendo amittas.

2. Ubi querar, quos implorem, patres conscripti, diripi rem publicam
atque audacissimo cuique esse praedae? apud populum Romanum? qui ita
largitionibus corruptus est, ut se ipse ac fortunas suas venales habeat.
an apud vos, patres conscripti? quorum auctoritas turpissimo cuique et
sceleratissimo ludibrio est. ubiubi M. Tullius leges iudicia rem
publicam defendit atque in hoc ordine ita moderatur, quasi unus reliquus
e familia viri clarissimi, Scipionis Africani, ac non reperticius,
accitus ac paulo ante insitus huic urbi civis.

II 1. An vero, M. Tulli, facta tua ac dicta obscura sunt? an non ita a
pueritia vixisti, ut nihil flagitiosum corpori tuo putares, quod alicui
collibuisset? aut scilicet istam immoderatam eloquentiam apud M. Pisonem
non pudicitiae iactura perdidicisti? itaque minime mirandum est, quod
eam flagitiose venditas, quam turpissime parasti.

2. Verum, ut opinor, splendor domesticus tibi animos tollit: uxor
sacrilega ac periuriis delibuta, filia matris paelex, tibi iucundior
atque obsequentior quam parenti par est. domum ipsam tuam vi et rapinis
funestam tibi ac tuis comparasti, videlicet, ut nos commonefacias, quam
conversa res sit, cum in ea domo habitares, homo flagitiosissime, quae
P. Crassi, viri clarissimi, fuit.

III 1. Atque haec cum ita sint, tamen se Cicero dicit in concilio deorum
immortalium fuisse, inde missum huic urbi civibusque custodem absque
carnificis nomine, qui civitatis incommodum in gloriam suam ponit. quasi
vero non illius coniurationis causa fuerit consulatus tuus et idcirco
res publica disiecta eo tempore, quo te custodem habebat. sed ut opinor,
illa te magis extollunt, quae post consulatum cum Terentia uxore de re
publica consuluisti, cum legis Plautiae iudicia domo faciebatis, ex
coniuratis aliquos pecunia condemnabas, cum tibi alius Tusculanam, alius
Pompeianam villam exaedificabat, alius domum emebat. qui vero nihil
poterat, is erat calumniae proximus, is aut domum tuam oppugnatum
venerat aut insidias senatui fecerat, denique de eo tibi compertum erat.

IV 1. Quae si tibi falsa obicio, redde rationem, quantum patrimonii
acceperis, quid tibi litibus accreverit, qua ex pecunia domum paraveris,
Tusculanum et Pompeianum infinito sumptu aedificaveris, aut si retices,
cui dubium potest esse: opulentiam istam ex sanguine et miseriis civium
parasti?

2. Verum, ut opinor, homo novus Arpinas, ex M. Crassi familia, illius
virtutem imitatur, contemnit simultatem hominum nobilium, rem publicam
caram habet, neque terrore neque gratia removetur a vero, amicitia
tantum ac virtus est animi.

V 1. Immo vero homo levissimus, supplex inimicis, amicis contumeliosus,
modo harum, modo illarum partium, fidus nemini, levissimus senator,
mercennarius patronus, cuius nulla pars corporis a turpitudine vacat,
lingua vana, manus rapacissimae, gula immensa, pedes fugaces: quae
honeste nominari non possunt, inhonestissima. atque is cum eius modi
sit, tamen audet dicere: laquo;o fortunatam natam me consule Romam!
raquo; te consule fortunatam, Cicero? immo vero infelicem et miseram,
quae crudelissimam proscriptionem eam perpessa est, cum tu perturbata re
publica metu perculsos omnes bonos parere crudelitati tuae cogebas, cum
omnia iudicia, omnes leges in tua libidine erant, cum tu sublata lege
Porcia, erepta libertate omnium nostrum vitae necisque potestatem ad te
unum revocaveras.

VI 1. Atque parum quod impune fecisti, verum etiam commemorando
exprobras neque licet oblivisci his servitutis suae. egeris, oro te,
Cicero, profeceris quidlibet, satis est perpessos esse. etiamne aures
nostras odio tuo onerabis, etiamne molestissimis verbis insectabere?
laquo;cedant arma togae, concedat laurea linguae. raquo; quasi vero
togatus et non armatus ea, quae gloriaris, confeceris, atque inter te
Sullamque dictatorem praeter nomen imperii quicquam interfuerit.

VII 1. Sed quid ego plura de tua insolentia commemorem? quem Minerva
omnis artis edocuit, Iuppiter Optimus Maximus in concilio deorum
admisit, Italia exulem humeris suis reportavit. oro te, Romule Arpinas,
qui egregia tua virtute omnis Paulos, Fabios, Scipiones superasti, quem
tandem locum in hac civitate obtines? quae tibi partes rei publicae
placent? quem amicum, quem inimicum habes? cui in civitate insidias
fecisti, ancillaris; cuius ope de exsilio tuo Dyrrhachio redisti, eum
insequeris. quos tyrannos appellabas, eorum potentiae faves; qui tibi
ante optimates videbantur, eosdem dementes ac furiosos vocas. Vatini
causam agis, de Sestio male existimas. Bibulum petulantissimis verbis
laedis, laudas Caesarem. quem maxime odisti, ei maxime obsequeris. aliud
stans, aliud sedens sentis de re publica. his male dicis, illos odisti,
levissime transfuga, neque in hac neque in illa parte fidem habens.

***************

An Invective against Marcus Tullius
(attributed to Sallust)

1 I should be troubled and angered by your abuse, Marcus Tullius, if I
were sure that your impudence was the result of intention rather than of
a disordered mind. But since I perceive in you neither moderation nor
any modesty, I shall answer you; so that if you have derived any
pleasure from reviling, you may lose it by listening to censure.

Where shall I make complaint, Fathers of the Senate, that our country
is being rent asunder and is the victim of all the most reckless of men;
to whom shall I appeal? Shall I turn to the Roman people, who are so
corrupted by largess that they offer themselves and all their fortunes
for sale? Shall I appeal to you, Fathers of the Senate, whose authority
is the plaything of all the basest and most criminal of men? Wherever
Marcus Tullius is, is he the defender of the laws, the courts and the
state, and does he lord it in this assembly as if he were the sole
survivor of the family of the illustrious Scipio Africanus and not a
parvenu citizen but recently grafted upon this city? Or pray, Marcus
Tullius, are your deeds and words unknown to us? Have you not lived such
a life from childhood, that you thought nothing a disgrace to your body
which any other's desire prompted? Did you not in fact learn all your
unchecked torrent of language under Marcus Piso at the expense of your
chastity? It is, therefore, not at all surprising that you trade upon it
shamefully, when you acquired it most shamefully.

2 But, I suppose, your spirits are raised by the brilliance of your
home, by a wife guilty of sacrilege and dishonoured by perjury, by a
daughter who is her mother's rival and is more compliant and submissive
to you than a daughter should be to a parent. Even your house, fatal to
yourself and your family, you obtained by violence and robbery;
doubtless in order to remind us how our country has changed, when you,
vilest of men that you are, live in the house which was once the
property of that most distinguished man Publius Crassus. And in spite of
all this, Cicero declares that he was present at the council of the
immortal gods, from which he, a man who makes disaster to his country
the means of his own glorification, was sent as a protector to this city
and its citizens, and not as its executioner. As if, forsooth, your
consulship was not the cause of that conspiracy, and as if the reason
why the commonwealth was not rent asunder at that time was because it
had you for a protector.

But, I suppose, you are raised to a higher pinnacle by what you
planned for the state after your consulship, in company with your wife
Terentia, when you were holding trials under the Plautian law4 at your
own home and condemning some of the conspirators to pay fines; when one
built your country house at Tusculum, another that at Pompeii, and still
another bought your house for you. But the man who could do nothing for
you was the most liable to false accusation; he it was who had come to
attack your house, or who had plotted against the senate; in short, you
were quite convinced of his guilt. If my charges are false, render an
account of the amount of the patrimony which you inherited, and of what
has come to you from lawsuits, and tell us where you got the money to
buy your house and build your villas at Tusculum and Pompeii regardless
of expense. If you are silent, who can doubt but that you amassed that
wealth from the blood and wretchedness of the citizens?

3 But, I suppose, a parvenu Arpinate of the breed of Marcus Crassus
imitates that great man's merits, scorns the enmity of the nobles, holds
the state dear, and is deflected from the truth neither by fear nor by
favour, such are his loyalty and virtuous spirit. On the contrary, he is
the most unstable of men, a suppliant to his enemies, insulting to his
friends, an adherent now of this party and now of that, loyal to no one,
an unstable senator, a mercenary counsel, free from disgrace in no
member of his body, with a false tongue, thievish hands, a bottomless
gullet, fleeing feet; most dishonoured in that part of his body which
cannot honourably be named. And although such is his character, he yet
has the assurance to say, "Fortunate Rome, born in my consulate."
"Fortunate in having you for her consul," Cicero? Nay, ill-starred and
wretched in having endured that most ruthless proscription, when after
embroiling your country and filling all virtuous citizens with fear, you
forced them to obey your cruel mandates; when all the courts and all the
laws were subservient to your will; when after annulling the Porcian law
and robbing us all of our freedom, you alone took the power of life and
death over all of us into your own hands. And not content with having
done all this with impunity, you even insult us by recalling it, and you
do not allow these men to forget their slavery. Do, Cicero, I beseech
you, have done, have accomplished, what you wish: it is enough for us to
have endured it; will you also burden our ears with your hatred, and
even pursue us with the tiresome refrain, "Let arms yield to the toga,
the laurel to the tongue"? Just as if it were in the toga and not in
arms that you did what you boast of, and as if there were any difference
between you and a dictator like Sulla except the mere title of your office.

4 But why should I enlarge upon your presumption, when you declare that
Minerva taught you all the arts, that Jupiter, greatest and kindest of
the gods, admitted you to their council, and that Italy brought you back
from exile upon its shoulders? I beseech you, O Romulus of Arpinum, who
by your transcendent merit surpass every Paulus, Fabius and Scipio, what
place, pray you, do you hold in this state? What part in public life do
you desire? Who is your friend and who your enemy? You play maidservant
to the man against whom you plotted in the state. You follow the one
through whose influence you returned from your exile at Dyrrachium. You
truckle to the power of those whom you formerly called tyrants. Those
who once seemed to you the best of citizens you now call mad and
frenzied. You plead the cause of Vatinius, you think ill of Sestius, you
assail Bibulus with impudent language, you praise Caesar, you are most
obsequious to him whom you most hated; you think one thing about the
state when you stand up, another when you sit; you revile some, hate
others, vile turncoat that you are, showing loyalty neither to one side
nor to the other.
***(translation taken from Lacus Curtius)