§2.16.1Magno dolore me adfecissent tuae litterae, nisi iam et ratio ipsa depulisset omnis molestias et diuturna desperatione rerum obduruisset animus ad dolorem novum.
Your letter would have affected me with great grief, if reason itself had not already driven away all troubles, and if my mind had not grown callous to new grief through long-standing despair of affairs.
sed tamen, qua re acciderit ut ex meis superioribus litteris id suspicarere, quod scribis, nescio; quid enim in illis fuit praeter querelam temporum? quae non meum animum magis sollicitum habent quam tuum.
But yet, why it happened that you suspected from my previous letter what you write, I do not know; for what was in them besides a complaint about the times? Which do not keep my mind more anxious than yours.
nam non eam cognovi aciem ingeni tui, quod ipse videam, te id ut non putem videre; illud miror, adduci potuisse te, qui me penitus nosse deberes, ut existimares aut me tam improvidum, qui ab excitata fortuna ad inclinatam et prope iacentem desciscerem, aut tam inconstantem, ut conlectam gratiam florentissimi hominis effunderem a meque ipse deficerem et, quod initio semperque fugi, civili bello interessem.
For I have not known your sharpness of mind to be such that, what I see myself, I do not think you see; I wonder at this, that you, who ought to know me thoroughly, could be induced to think either that I am so improvident as to desert from a lofty fortune to one that is declining and almost prostrate, or so inconstant as to throw away the accumulated favor of a most flourishing man, abandon myself, and take part in a civil war, which from the beginning and always I have avoided.
quod est igitur meum 'triste consilium'?
What then is my 'sad plan'?
§2.16.2ut discederem fortasse in aliquas solitudines.
Perhaps that I should withdraw into some solitudes.
Nosti enim non modo stomachi mei, cuius tu similem quondam habebas, sed etiam oculorum in hominum insolentium indignitate fastidium.
For you know the squeamishness not only of my stomach, of which you once had a similar one, but also of my eyes at the indignity of insolent men.
accedit etiam molesta haec pompa lictorum meorum nomenque imperi, quo appellor.
There is added also this troublesome parade of my lictors and the name of imperator by which I am called.
eo si onere carerem, quamvis parvis Italiae latebris contentus essem; sed incurrit haec nostra laurus non solum in oculos, sed iam etiam in voculas malevolorum.
If I were free from that burden, I would be content with however small hiding places in Italy; but this laurel of ours runs not only into the eyes but already even into the whispers of the malevolent.
quod cum ita esset, nil tamen umquam de profectione nisi vobis approbantibus cogitavi.
Although this was so, yet I have never thought of departure except with your approval.
sed mea praediola tibi nota sunt; in his mihi necesse est esse, ne amicis molestus sim.
But my little estates are known to you; in these I must be, so as not to be troublesome to my friends.
quod autem in maritimis facillime sum, moveo non nullis suspicionem velle me navigare; quod tamen fortasse non nollem, si possem ad otium;
But because I am very easily on the coast, I excite suspicion in some that I want to sail; which yet perhaps I would not be unwilling to do, if I could do so for leisure; for indeed for war, how is it suitable?
nam ad bellum quidem qui convenit? praesertim contra eum, cui spero me satis fecisse, ab eo, cui iam satis fieri nullo modo potest.
Especially against him to whom I hope I have given satisfaction, on the side of him to whom now satisfaction can in no way be given.
§2.16.3deinde sententiam meam tu facillime perspicere potuisti iam ab illo tempore, cum in Cumanum mihi obviam venisti.
Next, you could have perceived my opinion very easily already from that time when you came to meet me in my Cuman estate.
non enim te celavi sermonem T. Ampi;
For I did not conceal from you the talk of T.
vidisti, quam abhorrerem ab urbe relinquenda, cum audissem; nonne tibi adfirmavi quidvis me potius perpessurum quam ex Italia ad bellum civile exiturum? quid ergo accidit, cur consilium mutarem? nonne omnia potius, ut in sententia permanerem? credas hoc mihi velim, quod puto te existimare, me ex his miseriis nihil aliud quaerere nisi ut homines aliquando intellegant me nihil maluisse quam pacem, ea desperata nihil tam fugisse quam arma civilia.
Ampius; you saw how I shrunk from leaving the city when I had heard it; did I not affirm to you that I would suffer anything rather than go out from Italy to a civil war? What then has happened, why I should change my plan? Rather, has not everything happened to make me remain in my opinion? I would wish you to believe me in this, which I think you estimate, that I seek nothing else from these miseries than that men may at length understand that I have preferred nothing to peace, and, when that was despaired of, have fled nothing so much as civil arms.
huius me constantiae puto fore ut numquam paeniteat.
I think that I shall never repent of this consistency.
etenim memini in hoc genere gloriari solitum esse familiarem nostrum, Q Hortensium, quod numquam bello civili interfuisset;
For indeed I remember that our friend, Q.
hoc nostra laus erit inlustrior, quod illi tribuebatur ignaviae, de nobis id existimari posse non arbitror.
Hortensius, used to boast in this matter, that he had never taken part in a civil war; our praise in this will be more illustrious, because in his case it was attributed to cowardice, while about us I do not think that such an opinion can be held.
§2.16.4nec me ista terrent, quae mihi a te ad timorem fidissime atque amantissime proponuntur.
Nor do those things terrify me, which are proposed to me by you most faithfully and lovingly to excite fear.
nulla est enim acerbitas, quae non omnibus hac orbis terrarum perturbatione impendere videatur; quam quidem ego a re publica meis privatis et domesticis incommodis libentissime vel istis ipsis, quae tu me mones ut caveam, redemissem.
For there is no bitterness which does not seem to threaten everyone in this disturbance of the whole world; which indeed I would have most gladly redeemed from the republic by my private and domestic misfortunes, or even by those very things which you advise me to beware of.
§2.16.5filio meo, quem tibi carum esse gaudeo, si erit ulla res publica, satis amplum patrimonium relinquam in memoria nominis mei; sin autem nulla erit, nihil accidet ei separatim a reliquis civibus.
To my son, whom I am glad is dear to you, if there shall be any republic, I shall leave a sufficiently ample patrimony in the memory of my name; but if there shall be none, nothing will happen to him separately from the rest of the citizens.
nam quod rogas ut respiciam generum meum, adulescentem optimum mihique carissimum, an dubitas, qui scias quanti cum illum tum vero Tulliam meam faciam, quin ea me cura vehementissime sollicitet, et eo magis, quod in communibus miseriis hac tamen oblectabar specula, Dolabellam meum vel potius nostrum fore ab iis molestiis, quas liberalitate sua contraxerat, liberum? velim quaeras, quos ille dies sustinuerit, in urbe dum fuit, quam acerbos sibi, quam mihimet ipse socero non honestos.
For as to your asking me to look after my son-in-law, a most excellent youth and very dear to me, do you doubt, since you know how highly I value both him and indeed my Tullia, that this care anxieties me most vehemently, and all the more because, in the midst of common miseries, I was yet comforted by this hope, that my, or rather our, Dolabella would be free from those troubles which he had contracted by his liberality? I would wish you to inquire what days he endured while he was in the city, how bitter to himself, how dishonorable to myself as his father-in-law.
§2.16.6itaque neque ego hunc Hispaniensem casum exspecto, de quo mihi exploratum est ita esse, ut tu scribis, neque quicquam astute cogito.
And so I neither wait for this Spanish outcome, about which it is clear to me that it is as you write, nor do I plan anything craftily.
si quando erit civitas, erit profecto nobis locus; sin autem non erit, in easdem solitudines tu ipse, ut arbitror, venies, in quibus nos consedisse audies.
If ever there shall be a state, there will surely be a place for us; but if there shall be none, you yourself, as I think, will come into the same solitudes in which you will hear that we have settled.
sed ego fortasse vaticinor et haec omnia meliores habebunt exitus.
But perhaps I am prophesying, and all these things will have better outcomes.
recordor enim desperationes eorum, qui senes erant adulescente me.
For I recall the despairs of those who were old men when I was a youth.
Eos ego fortasse nunc imitor et utor aetatis vitio.
Perhaps I am now imitating them and indulging in the vice of age.
velim ita sit; sed tamen—.
I would wish it to be so; but yet...
§2.16.7togam praetextam texi Oppio puto te audisse; nam Curtius noster dibaphum cogitat, sed eum infector moratur.
I think you have heard that a toga praetexta is being woven for Oppius; for our Curtius is thinking of a twice-dyed robe, but the dyer delays him.
hoc aspersi, ut scires me tamen in stomacho solere ridere.
I sprinkled this in so that you might know that I am yet accustomed to laugh in my anger.
de re Dolabellae quod scripsi, suadeo videas, tamquam si tua res agatur.
As to what I wrote about Dolabella's business, I advise you to look to it, just as if your own business were at stake.
extremum illud erit: nos nihil turbulenter, nihil temere faciemus; te tamen oramus, quibuscumque erimus in terris, ut nos liberosque nostros ita tueare, ut amicitia nostra et tua fides postulabit.
This will be the last thing: we shall do nothing turbulently, nothing rashly; yet we beg you, in whatever lands we may be, to protect us and our children in such a way as our friendship and your loyalty shall demand.