X B.C. 62. ACCUSED BY ANTONIUS. 133 doubt that if it was true he would have said so in confidence to his intimate friend, from whom he really seems to have concealed nothing. Besides, he alludes to it in a letter to Antonius himself in a way inconsistent with the idea of guilt.' But at the same time I agree with Wieland and Abeken that there is evidence, although obscure, of the existence of some pecuniary transaction between Antonius and Cicero, and that Antonius owed him money, which he was very dilatory in paying.2 As to the origin and nature of this debt we know nothing whatever, and it is both unfair and uncharitable to attribute it to so corrupt a cause as a bargain for a share in the plunder of a province which he had voluntarily resigned to Antonius. It must, however, be admitted that his conduct was inconsistent with regard to this man. An impeachment was hanging over his head, and, in a letter to Sextius, Cicero says that he had defended him in the Senate, gravissime ac diligentissime, although everybody felt that Antonius had not behaved towards him as he ought. But, writing to Atticus, he told him that he was informed that Pompey was determined on his return to Rome to get Antonius superseded in his government, and he declared that the case was so bad that he could not in honour nor without loss of credit defend him. Moreover, he said he had no inclination to do so, on account of the calumnious rumours he had set afloat respecting himself.3 Although Catiline and most of his accomplices were dead, the ramifications of the wide-spread conspiracy still remained to be disclosed. Cæsar himself was not free from the suspicion of having been privy to the plot. Lucius Vettius accused him before the quæstor Novius Niger, and Q. Curius impeached him in the Senate, claiming the reward which had been offered to the first discoverer of the conspiracy. Vettius avowed himself ready to produce the most damning evidence of his guilt—a letter written to Catiline by his own hand 1 Ad. Div. v. 5. 2 Ad. Att. i. 12. This depends upon the assumption that the name Teucris, which occurs in several of Cicero's letters to Atticus, means Antonius. I believe that it does. 3 Ad. Att. i. 12. If the letter to Sextius was written after the one to Atticus, quoted in the text, that is, if Cicero, notwithstanding what he said to Atticus, did after all defend Antonius, the case would be much worse. I have followed the order in which Schutz and Abeken place the correspondence. and Curius declared that his information was derived from Catiline himself. Whether Cæsar was guilty or not cannot now be either affirmed or denied with certainty; at all events, he was too crafty or too powerful to be caught. He appealed to Cicero in the Senate, and proved from his lips that he had himself at an early period volunteered to give information about the conspiracy. This was no doubt a strong presump. tive proof of innocence, and so completely turned the tables upon Curius that he was held not to be entitled to the reward he claimed as the first informer about the plot. As to Vettius, he was almost torn to pieces by the mob while addressing them in the Forum, and Cæsar had him thrown into prison. He also got the quæstor imprisoned for allowing a superior magistrate (Cæsar was then prætor) to be summoned. before him. Several others of high rank were, however, found guilty and banished. Amongst them was Autronius. He had been Cicero's schoolfellow and friend in boyhood; his colleague in the quæstorship; and he now came to him, and over and over again with tears besought him to defend him; but Cicero refused, and appeared as a witness against him.1 Next came on the trial of P. Sulla. The accusation against him was that he had been implicated in two separate conspiracies with Catiline. Against the first of these charges he was defended by Hortensius, and against the other by Cicero. The prosecutor was Lucius Torquatus. He twitted Cicero with inconsistency in appearing as the advocate of a man who was accused of taking part in the conspiracy which he had crushed with such severity; of defending Sulla, and giving evidence against Autronius, who was one of the conspirators. But the answer was easy. Autronius he said was guilty, and Sulla was innocent. Cicero admitted that there were some crimes, such as that of treason, or, as he called it, parricide against one's country, of which a man might be so notoriously guilty that no advocate would be bound or ought to defend him. But he denied that there was a tittle of evidence affecting Sulla. Apparently all that Torquatus relied upon Two years afterwards, during the consulship of Julius Cæsar and Bibulus (B.C. 59), Autronius was put upon his trial, and Cicero did then defend him, but without success. ET. 45. DEFENCE OF P. SULLA. 135 was a statement by the Allobroges ambassadors that they had asked Cassius when he was trying to engage them in the plot what Sulla thought of it, and he answered "I don't know." Torquatus argued that this was a proof of guilt, for Cassius did not exculpate him! Of course Cicero had no difficulty in dealing with logic like this. He said that the question in a criminal trial was not whether the accused was exculpated, but whether the charge was proved. He showed also that during the progress of the conspiracy Sulla was not at Rome but at Naples, thus establishing what we should call an alibi; and he declared that during his consulship he had never discovered, nor suspected, nor heard anything that compromised or affected him. In the course of his speech he defended himself against a personal attack of Torquatus, who had the hardihood to charge him with having falsified the public records and altered the evidence given in the Senate by the informers. It shows how low was the tone of morality at Rome when so monstrous an accusation was possible; and the surprising thing is, that Cicero does not seem to have manifested anything like the indignation at the charge which we should have expected. I need not say that he triumphantly vindicated himself, although one would have thought that no vindication was required. The rest of the speech consisted chiefly in an appeal to the past life of his client as evidence of his innocence. Surely he had had misfortune enough in having the consulship to which he had been elected torn from him, when all his hopes were dashed to the ground, and his joy was changed to mourning and tears. But his own sorrow at the thought of Sulla's misfortunes he declared overpowered him, and he would say no more. He left, therefore, the case in the hands of the jury, with an earnest hope that they would, like him, show compassion on innocence as they had shown severity towards guilt, and by their verdict that day relieve both himself and them from the false charge of cruelty. MYSTERIES OF THE BONA DEA AND TRIAL OF CLODIUS. Et. 44-45. B.C. 62-61. GREAT as had been Cicero's popularity, and glorious his triumph over the enemies of the state, it was not to be expected that such measures could be taken, and such a conspiracy be crushed, without creating bitter enemies against himself. The ramifications of the plot were so extensive, and the social and moral condition of Rome was so corrupt, that numbers of the young men connected with the aristocracy, against whom there was no positive proof, were accomplices in the design; or, if not, were at all events disappointed that Catiline had failed. And of course they looked upon Cicero as the sole cause of his failure, and hated him accordingly. But it was not from disappointed conspirators or jealous rivals that the storm which shattered. his fortunes arose. The blow came from a different and unexpected quarter, and it was on this wise it happened. Amongst the numerous rites and solemn festivals of religion at Rome there was one of a peculiarly sacred and mysterious character in which women alone took part, and which had never been profaned by the eye of the other sex. This was the service in honour of the Bona Dea-the goddess who gave fruitfulness in marriage-which was celebrated on the 1st of May, at the house of the first consul or the first prætor, and at which prayers were offered up for the safety of the whole Roman people (pro salute populi Romani). No lodge of freemasons ever excluded the presence of women more carefully from its ceremonies than the votaries of the B.C. 62-61. INTRUSION OF CLODIUS. 137 Not even a sign Statues Bona Dea excluded the presence of men. We may imagine, therefore, the consternation of the Roman citizens in the beginning of May B.C. 62, when the rumour ran like lightning through the streets that a man had been discovered disguised as a woman in the house of Cæsar the prætor, during the celebration there of the mysteries of the Bona Dea. It was too true. One of the most profligate young patricians of that profligate age, Publius Clodius Pulcher, had introduced himself dressed in woman's clothes into the house at night, and had dared to profane the sacred ceremonies by his presence. He contrived to escape by the help of a maid-servant from the infuriated matrons,1 and as his face was muffled up he hoped that his identity would not be known. Scandal declared that his object was to carry on an intrigue with Pompeia, Cæsar's wife, but this is almost incredible. No time or place can be conceived less favourable for such a purpose, and Clodius must have been mad to choose the mysteries of the Bona Dea as an opportunity for a love affair. No doubt he sought only to gratify a prurient curiosity, and his past life and character were in unison with the exploit. He had already seduced his own sister Clodia; his intrigue with Mucia, Pompey's wife, was the cause of her divorce from her husband; and he was notorious for every kind of debauchery and vice. Graceful in person, eloquent in speech, and nearly related to many of the first families in Rome, he had already made himself infamous by his immoralities. He was a younger son of Appius Claudius, and a direct descendant of that Appius Claudius the decemvir, who gained such a bad X |