Cicero replied in a bitter invective, in which he exposed the whole life and conduct of his enemy to public contempt and detestation. The most singular feature of this harangue is the personal abuse and coarseness of expression it contains, which appear the more extraordinary when we consider that it was delivered in the Senate-house, and directed against an individual of such distinction and consequence as Piso. Cicero applies to him the opprobrious epithets of bellua, furia, carnifex, furcifer, &c.; he banters him on his personal deformities, and upbraids him with his ignominious descent on one side of the family, while, on the other, he had no resemblance to his ancestors, except to the sooty complexion of their images.

Pro Milone.—When Milo was candidate for the Consulship, the notorious demagogue Clodius supported his competitors, and during the canvass, party spirit grew so violent, that the [pg 174]two factions often came to blows within the walls of the city. While these dissensions were at their height, Clodius and Milo met on the Appian Way—the former returning from the country towards Rome, and the latter setting out for Lanuvium, both attended by a great retinue. A quarrel arose among their followers, in which Clodius was wounded and carried into a house in the vicinity. By order of Milo, the doors were broken open, his enemy dragged out, and assassinated on the highway. The death of Clodius excited much confusion and tumult at Rome, in the course of which the courts of justice were burned by a mob. Milo having returned from the banishment into which he had at first withdrawn, was impeached for the crime by the Tribunes of the people; and Pompey, in virtue of the authority conferred on him by a decree of the Senate, nominated a special commission to inquire into the murder committed on the Appian Way. In order to preserve the tranquillity of the city, he placed guards in the Forum, and occupied all its avenues with troops. This unusual appearance, and the shouts of the Clodian faction, which the military could not restrain, so discomposed the orator, that he fell short of his usual excellence. The speech which he actually delivered, was taken down in writing, and is mentioned by Asconius Pedianus as still extant in his time. But that beautiful harangue which we now possess, is one which was retouched and polished, as a gift for Milo, after he had retired in exile to Marseilles.

In the oration, as we now have it, Cicero takes his exordium from the circumstances by which he was so much, though, as he admits, so causelessly disconcerted; since he knew that the troops were not placed in the Forum to overawe, but to protect. In entering on the defence, he grants that Clodius was killed, and by Milo; but he maintains that homicide is, on many occasions, justifiable, and on none more so than when force can only be repelled by force, and when the slaughter of the aggressor is necessary for self-preservation. These principles are beautifully illustrated, and having been, as the orator conceives, sufficiently established, are applied to the case under consideration. He shows, from the circumstantial evidence of time and place—the character of the deceased—the retinue by which he was accompanied—his hatred to Milo—the advantages which would have resulted to him from the death of his enemy, and the expressions proved to have been used by him, that Clodius had laid an ambush for Milo. Cicero, it is evident, had here the worst of the cause. The encounter appears, in fact, to have been accidental; and though the servants of Clodius may, perhaps, have been the assailants, [pg 175]Milo had obviously exceeded the legitimate bounds of self defence. The orator accordingly enforces the argument, that the assassination of Clodius was an act of public benefit, which, in a consultation of Milo’s friends, was the only one intended to have been advanced, and was the sole defence adopted in the oration which Brutus is said to have prepared for the occasion. Cicero, while he does not forego the advantage of this plea, maintains it hypothetically, contending that even if Milo had openly pursued and slain Clodius as a common enemy, he might well boast of having freed the state from so pernicious and desperate a citizen. To add force to this argument, he takes a rapid view of the various acts of atrocity committed by Clodius, and the probable situation of the Republic, were he to revive. When the minds of the judges were thus sufficiently prepared, he ascribes his tragical end to the immediate interposition of the providential powers, specially manifested by his fall near the temple of Bona Dea, whose mysteries he had formerly profaned. Having excited sufficient indignation against Clodius, he concludes with moving commiseration for Milo, representing his love for his country and fellow-citizens,—the sad calamity of exile from Rome,—and his manly resignation to whatever punishment might be inflicted on him.

The argument in this oration was perhaps as good as the circumstances admitted; but we miss through the whole that reference to documents and laws, which gives the stamp of truth to the orations of Demosthenes. Each ground of defence, taken by itself, is deficient in argumentative force. Thus, in maintaining that the death of Clodius was of no benefit to Milo, he has taken too little into consideration the hatred and rancour mutually felt by the heads of political factions: but he supplies his weakness of argument by illustrative digressions, flashes of wit, bursts of eloquence, and appeals to the compassion of the judges, on which he appears to have placed much reliance328. On the whole, this oration was accounted, both by Cicero himself and by his contemporaries, as the finest effort of his genius; which confirms what indeed is evinced by the whole history of Roman eloquence, that the judges were easily satisfied on the score of reasoning, and attached more importance to pathos, and wit, and sonorous periods, than to fact or law.

Pro Rabirio Postumo.—This is the defence of Rabirius, who was prosecuted for repayment of a sum which he was [pg 176]supposed to have received, in conjunction with the Proconsul Gabinius, from King Ptolemy, for having placed him on the throne of Egypt, contrary to the injunctions of the Senate.

Pro Ligario.—This oration was pronounced after Cæsar, having vanquished Pompey in Thessaly, and destroyed the remains of the Republican party in Africa, assumed the supreme administration of affairs at Rome. Merciful as the conqueror appeared, he was understood to be much exasperated against those who, after the rout at Pharsalia, had renewed the war in Africa. Ligarius, when on the point of obtaining a pardon, was formally accused by his old enemy Tubero, of having borne arms in that contest. The Dictator himself presided at the trial of the case, much prejudiced against Ligarius, as was known from his having previously declared, that his resolution was fixed, and was not to be altered by the charms of eloquence. Cicero, however, overcame his prepossessions, and extorted from him a pardon. The countenance of Cæsar, it is said, changed, as the orator proceeded in his speech; but when he touched on the battle of Pharsalia, and described Tubero as seeking his life, amid the ranks of the army, the Dictator became so agitated, that his body trembled, and the papers which he held dropped from his hand329.

This oration is remarkable for the free spirit which it breathes, even in the face of that power to which it was addressed for mercy. But Cicero, at the same time, shows much art in not overstepping those limits, within which he knew he might speak without offence, and in seasoning his freedom with appropriate compliments to Cæsar, of which, perhaps, the most elegant is, that he forgot nothing but the injuries done to himself. This was the person whom, in the time of Pompey, he characterized as monstrum et portentum tyrannum, and whose death he soon afterwards celebrated as divinum in rempublicam beneficium!

The oration of Tubero against Ligarius, was extant in Quintilian’s time, and probably explained the circumstances which induced a man, who had fought so keenly against Cæsar at Pharsalia, to undertake the prosecution of Ligarius.

Pro Rege Dejotaro.—Dejotarus was a Tetrarch of Galatia, who obtained from Pompey the realm of Armenia, and from the Senate the title of King. In the civil war he had espoused the cause of his benefactors. Cæsar, in consequence, deprived him of Armenia, but was subsequently reconciled to him, and, while prosecuting the war against Pharnaces, visited him in his original states of Galatia. Some time after[pg 177]wards, Phidippus, the physician of the king, and his grandson Castor, accused him of an attempt to poison Cæsar, during the stay which the Dictator had made at his court. Cicero defended him in the private apartments of Cæsar, and adopted the same happy union of freedom and flattery, which he had so successfully employed in the case of Ligarius. Cæsar, however, pronounced no decision on the one side or other.

The Philippics against Antony, like those of Demosthenes, derive their chief beauty from the noble expression of just indignation, which indeed composes many of the most splendid and admired passages of ancient eloquence. They were all [pg 178]pronounced during the period which elapsed between the assassination of Cæsar, and the defeat of Antony at Modena. Soon after Cæsar’s death, Cicero, fearing danger from Antony, who held a sort of military possession of the city, resolved on a voyage to Greece. Being detained, however, by contrary winds, after he had set out, and having received favourable intelligence from his friends at Rome, he determined to return to the capital. The Senate assembled the day after his arrival, in order, at the suggestion of Antony, to consider of some new and extraordinary honours to the memory of Cæsar. To this meeting Cicero was specially summoned by Antony, but he excused himself on pretence of indisposition, and the fatigue of his journey. He appeared, however, in his place, when the Senate met on the following day, in absence of Antony, and delivered the first of the orations, afterwards termed Philippics, from the resemblance they bore to those invectives which Demosthenes poured forth against the great foe of the independence of Greece. Cicero opens his speech by explaining the motives of his recent departure from Rome—his sudden return, and his absence on the preceding day—declaring, that if present, he would have opposed the posthumous honours decreed to the usurper. His next object, after vindicating himself, being to warn the Senate of the designs of Antony, he complains that he had violated the most solemn and authentic even of Cæsar’s laws; and at the same time enforced, as ordinances, what were mere jottings, found, or pretended to have been found, among the Dictator’s Memoranda, after his death.

Antony was highly incensed at this speech, and summoned another meeting of the Senate, at which he again required the presence of Cicero. These two rivals seem to have been destined never to meet in the Senate-house. Cicero, being apprehensive of some design against his life, did not attend; so that the Oration of Antony, in his own justification, which he had carefully prepared in intervals of leisure at his villa, near Tibur, was unanswered in the Senate. The second Philippic was penned by Cicero in his closet, as a reply to this speech of Antony, in which he had been particularly charged with having been not merely accessary to the murder of Cæsar, but the chief contriver of the plot against him. Some part of Cicero’s oration was thus necessarily defensive, but the larger portion, which is accusatory, is one of the severest and most bitter invectives ever composed, the whole being expressed in terms of the most thorough contempt and strongest detestation of Antony. By laying open his whole criminal excesses from his earliest youth, he exhibits one continued scene of debauch[pg 179]ery, faction, rapine, and violence; but he dwells with peculiar horror on his offer of the diadem to Cæsar, at the festival of the Lupercalia—his drunken debauch at the once classic villa of Terentius Varro—and his purchase of the effects that belonged to the great Pompey—on which last subject he pathetically contrasts the modesty and decorum of that renowned warrior, once the Favourite of Fortune, and darling of the Roman people, with the licentiousness of the military adventurer who now rioted in the spoils of his country. In concluding, he declares, on his own part, that in his youth he had defended the republic, and, in his old age, he would not abandon its cause.—“The sword of Catiline I despised; and never shall I dread that of Antony.” This oration is adorned with all the charms of eloquence, and proves, that in the decline of life Cicero had not lost one spark of the fire and spirit which animated his earlier productions. Although not delivered in the Senate, nor intended to be published till things were actually come to an extremity, and the affairs of the republic made it necessary to render Antony’s conduct and designs manifest to the people, copies of the oration were sent to Brutus, Cassius, and other friends of the commonwealth: hence it soon got into extensive circulation, and, by exciting the vengeance of Antony, was a chief cause of the tragical death of its author.

From the Senate, Cicero proceeded directly to the Forum, where, in his fourth Philippic, he gave an account to the people of what had occurred, and explained to them, that Antony, though not nominally, had now been actually declared the enemy of his country. This harangue was so well received by an audience the most numerous that had ever listened to his orations, that, speaking of it afterwards, he declares he would have reaped sufficient fruit from the exertions of his [pg 180]whole life, had he died on the day it was pronounced, when the whole people, with one voice and mind, called out that he had twice saved the republic330.

Brutus being as yet unable to defend himself in the field, withdrew into Modena, where he was besieged by Antony. Intelligence of this having been brought to Rome, Cicero, in his fifth Philippic, endeavoured to persuade the Senate to proclaim Antony an enemy of his country, in opposition to Calenus, who proposed, that before proceeding to acts of hostility, an embassy should be sent for the purpose of admonishing Antony to desist from his attempt on Gaul, and submit himself to the authority of the Senate. After three days’ successive debate, Cicero’s proposal would have prevailed, had not one of the Tribunes interposed his negative, in consequence of which the measure of the embassy was resorted to. Cicero, nevertheless, before any answer could be received, persisted, in his sixth and seventh Philippics, in asserting that any accommodation with a rebel such as Antony, would be equally disgraceful and dangerous to the republic. The deputies having returned, and reported that Antony would consent to nothing which was required of him, the Senate declared war against him—employing, however, in their decree, the term tumult, instead of war or rebellion. Cicero, in his eighth Philippic, expostulated with them on their timorous and impolitic lenity of expression. In the ninth Philippic, pronounced on the following day, he called on the Senate to erect a statue to one of the deputies, Servius Sulpicius, who, while labouring under a severe distemper, had, at the risk of his life, undertaken the embassy, but had died before he could acquit himself of the commission with which he was charged. The proposal met with considerable opposition, but it was at length agreed that a brazen statue should be erected to him in the Forum, and that an inscription should be placed on the base, importing that he had died in the service of the republic.

The Philippics, hitherto mentioned, related chiefly to the affairs of Cisalpine Gaul, the scene of the contest between D. Brutus and Antony. A long period was now elapsed since the Senate had received any intelligence concerning the chiefs of the conspiracy, Marcus Brutus and Cassius, the former of whom had seized on the province of Macedonia, while the latter occupied Syria. Public despatches, however, at length arrived from M. Brutus, giving an account of his successful proceedings in Greece. The Consul Pansa having communicated the contents at a meeting of the Senate, and having [pg 181]proposed for him public thanks and honours, Calenus, a creature of Antony, objected, and moved, that as what he had done was without lawful authority, he should be required to deliver up his army to the Senate, or the proper governor of the province. Cicero, in his tenth Philippic, replied, in a transport of eloquent and patriotic indignation, to this most unjust and ruinous proposal, particularly to the assertion by which it was supported, that veterans would not submit to be commanded by Brutus. He thus succeeded in obtaining from the Senate an approbation of the conduct of Brutus, a continuance of his command, and pecuniary assistance.

About the same time accounts arrived from Asia, that Dolabella, on the part of Antony, had taken possession of Smyrna, and there put Trebonius, one of the conspirators, to death. On receiving this intelligence, a debate arose concerning the choice of a general to be employed against Dolabella, and Cicero, in his eleventh Philippic, strenuously maintained the right of Cassius, who was then in Greece, to be promoted to that command. In the twelfth and thirteenth, he again warmly and successfully opposed the sending a deputation to Antony. All further mention of pacification was terminated by the joyful tidings of the total defeat of Antony before Modena, by the army under Octavius, and the Consuls Hirtius and Pansa—the latter of whom was mortally wounded in the conflict. The intelligence excited incredible joy at Rome, which was heightened by the unfavourable reports that had previously prevailed. The Senate met to deliberate on the despatches of the Consuls communicating the event. Never was there a finer opportunity for the display of eloquence, than what was afforded to Cicero on this occasion; of which he most gloriously availed himself in the fourteenth Philippic. The excitation and tumult consequent on a great recent victory, give wing to high flights of eloquence, and also prepare the minds of the audience to follow the ascent. The success at Modena terminated a long period of anxiety. It was for the time supposed to have decided the fate of Antony and the Republic; and the orator, who thus saw all his measures justified, must have felt the exultation, confidence, and spirit, so favourable to the highest exertions of eloquence. This, with the detestable character of the conquered foe,—the wounds of Pansa, who was once suspected by the Republic, but by his faithful zeal had gradually obtained its confidence, and at length sealed his fidelity with his blood,—the rewards due to the surviving victors,—the honours to be paid to those who had fallen in defence of their country,—the thanksgivings to be rendered to the immortal gods,—all afforded topics of tri[pg 182]umph, panegyric, and pathos, which have been seldom supplied to the orator in any age or country. In extolling those who had fallen, Cicero dwells on two subjects; one appertaining to the glory of the heroes themselves, the other to the consolation of their friends and relatives. He proposes that a splendid monument should be erected, in common to all who had perished, with an inscription recording their names and services; and in recommending this tribute of public gratitude, he breaks out into a funeral panegyric, which has formed a more lasting memorial than the monument he suggested.

Besides the complete orations above mentioned, Cicero delivered many, of which only fragments remain, or which are now entirely lost. All those which he pronounced during the five years intervening between his election to the Quæstorship and the Ædileship have perished, except that for M. Tullius, of which the exordium and narrative were brought to light at the late celebrated discovery by Mai, in the Ambrosian library at Milan. Tullius had been forcibly dispossessed (vi armata) by one of the Fabii of a farm he held in Lucania; and the whole Fabian race were prosecuted for damages, under a law of Lucullus, whereby, in consequence of depredations committed in the municipal states of Italy, every family was held responsible for the violent aggressions of any of its tribe. A large fragment of the oration for Scaurus forms by far the most valuable part of the discovery in the Ambrosian library. The oration, indeed, is not entire, but the part we have of it is tolerably well connected. The charge was one of provincial embezzlement, and in the exordium the orator announces that he was to treat, 1st, of the general nature of the accusation itself; 2d, of the character of the Sardinians; 3d, of that of Scaurus; and, lastly, of the special charge concerning the corn. Of these, the first two heads are tolerably entire; and that in which he exposes the faithless character of the Sardinians, and thus shakes the cred[pg 183]ibility of the witnesses for the prosecution is artfully managed. The other fragments discovered in the Ambrosian library consist merely of detached sentences, of which it is almost impossible to make a connected meaning. Of this description is the oration In P. Clodium; yet still, by the aid of the Commentary found along with it, we are enabled to form some notion of the tenor of the speech. The well-known story of Clodius finding access to the house of Cæsar, in female disguise, during the celebration of the mysteries of Bona Dea, gave occasion to this invective. A sort of altercation had one day passed in the Senate between Cicero and Clodius, soon after the acquittal of the latter for this offence, which probably suggested to Cicero the notion of writing a connected oration, inveighing against the vices and crimes of Clodius, particularly his profanation of the secret rites of the goddess, and the corrupt means by which he had obtained his acquittal. In one of his epistles to Atticus, Cicero gives a detailed account of this altercation, which certainly does not afford us a very dignified notion of senatorial gravity and decorum.

Of those orations of Cicero which have entirely perished, the greatest loss has been sustained by the disappearance of the defence of Cornelius, who was accused of practices against the state during his tribuneship. This speech, which was divided into two great parts, was continued for four successive days, in presence of an immense concourse of people, who testified their admiration of its bright eloquence by repeated applause332. The orator himself frequently refers to it as among the most finished of his compositions333; and the old critics cite it as an example of genuine eloquence. “Not merely,” says Quintilian, “with strong, but with shining armour did Cicero contend in the cause of Cornelius.” We have also to lament the loss of the oration for C. Piso, accused of oppression in his government—of the farewell discourse delivered to the Sicilians, (Quum Quæstor Lilybæo discederet,) in which he gave them an account of his administration, and promised them his protection at Rome—of the invective pronounced in the Senate against Metellus, in answer to a harangue which that Tribune had delivered to the people concerning Cicero’s conduct, in putting the confederates of Catiline to death without trial; and, finally, of the celebrated speech De Proscriptorum Liberis, in which, on political grounds, he opposed, while admitting their justice, the claims of the children of those whom Sylla had proscribed and disqualified from holding [pg 184]any honours in the state, and who now applied to be relieved from their disabilities. The success which he obtained in resisting this demand, is described in strong terms by Pliny: “Te orante, proscriptorum liberos honores petere puduit334.” A speech which is now lost, and which, though afterwards reduced to writing, must have been delivered extempore, afforded another strong example of the persuasiveness of his eloquence. The appearance of the Tribune, Roscius Otho, who had set apart seats for the knights at the public spectacles, having one day occasioned a disturbance at the theatre, Cicero, on being informed of the tumult, hastened to the spot, and, calling out the people to the Temple of Bellona, he so calmed them by the magic of his eloquence, that, returning immediately to the theatre, they clapped their hands in honour of Otho, and vied with the knights in giving him demonstrations of respect335. One topic which he touched on in this oration, and the only one of which we have any hint from antiquity, was the rioters’ want of taste, in creating a tumult, while Roscius was performing on the stage336. This speech, the orations against the Agrarian law, and that De Proscriptorum Liberis, have long been cited as the strongest examples of the power of eloquence over the passions of mankind: And it is difficult to say, whether the highest praise be due to the orator, who could persuade, or to the people, who could be thus induced to relinquish the most tempting expectations of property and honours, and the full enjoyment of their favourite amusements.

In the age of that declamation which prevailed at Rome from the time of Tiberius to the fall of the empire, it was the practice of rhetoricians to declaim on similar topics with those on which Cicero had delivered, or was supposed to have delivered, harangues. It appears from Aulus Gellius337, that in the age of Marcus Aurelius doubts were entertained with regard to the authenticity of certain orations circulated as productions of Cicero. He was known to have delivered four speeches almost immediately after his recall from banishment, on subjects closely connected with his exile. The first was addressed to the Senate338, and the second to the people, a few days subsequently to his return339; the third to the college of Pontiffs, in order to obtain restitution of a piece of ground on the Palatine hill, on which his house had formerly stood, but had been demolished, and a temple erected on the spot, with a view, as he feared, to alienate it irretrievably from the proprietor, by thus consecrating [pg 185]it to religious purposes340. The fourth was pronounced in consequence of Clodius declaring that certain menacing prodigies, which had lately appeared, were indubitably occasioned by the desecration of this ground, which the Pontiffs had now discharged from religious uses. Four orations, supposed to have been delivered on those occasions, and entitled, Post Reditum in Senatu, Ad Quirites post Reditum, Pro domo sua ad Pontifices, De Haruspicum Responsis, were published in all the early editions of Cicero, without any doubts of their authenticity being hinted by the commentators, and were also referred to as genuine authorities by Middleton in his Life of Cicero. At length, about the middle of last century, the well-known dispute having arisen between Middleton and Tunstall, concerning the letters to Brutus, Markland engaged in the controversy; and his remarks on the correspondence of Cicero and Brutus were accompanied with a “Dissertation on the Four Orations ascribed to M. T. Cicero,” published in 1745, which threw great doubts on their authenticity. Middleton made no formal reply to this part of Markland’s observations; but he neither retracted his opinion nor changed a word in his subsequent edition of the Life of Cicero.

Soon afterwards, Ross, the editor of Cicero’s Epistolæ Familiares, and subsequently Bishop of Exeter, ironically showed, in his “Dissertation, in which the defence of P. Sulla, ascribed to Cicero, is clearly proved to be spurious, after the manner of Mr Markland,” that, on the principles and line of argument adopted by his opponent, the authenticity of any one of the orations might be contested. This jeu d’esprit of Bishop Ross was seriously confuted in a “Dissertation, in which the Objections of a late Pamphlet to the Writings of the Ancients, after the manner of Mr Markland, are clearly Answered; and those Passages in Tully corrected, on which some of the Objections are founded.—1746.” This dissertation was printed by Bowyer, and he is generally believed to have been the author of it341. In Germany, J. M. Gesner, with all the weight attached to his opinion, and Thesaurus, strenuously defended these orations in two prelections, held in 1753 and 1754, and inserted in the 3d volume of the new series of the Transactions of the Royal Academy at Gottingen, under the title Cicero Restitutus, in which he refuted, one by one, all the objections of Markland.

After this, although the Letters of Brutus were no longer considered as authentic, literary men in all countries—as De Brosses, the French Translator of Sallust, Ferguson, Saxius, in his Onomasticon, and Rhunkenius—adopted the orations as genuine. Ernesti, in his edition of Cicero, makes no mention of the existence of any doubts respecting them; and, in his edition of Fabricius342, alludes to the controversy concerning them as a foolish and insignificant dispute. A change of opinion, however, was produced by an edition of the four orations which Wolfius published at Berlin in 1801, to which he prefixed an account of the controversy, and a general view of the arguments of Markland and Gesner. The observations of each, relating to particular words and phrases, are placed below the passages as they occur, and are followed by Wolf’s own remarks, refuting, to the utmost of his power, the opinions of Gesner, and confirming those of Markland. Schütz, the late German editor of Cicero, has completely adopted the notions of Wolf; and by printing these four harangues, not in their order in the series, but separately, and at the end of the whole, along with the discarded correspondence between Cicero and Brutus, has thrown them without the classical pale as effectually as Lambinus excluded the once recognized orations, In pace, and Antequam iret in Exilium. In the fourth volume of his new edition of the works of Cicero now proceeding in Germany, Beck has followed the opinion of Wolf, after an impartial examination of the different arguments in his notes, and in an excursus criticus devoted to this subject.

Markland and Wolf believe, that these harangues were written as a rhetorical exercise, by some declaimer, who lived not long after Cicero, probably in the time of Tiberius, and who had before his eyes some orations of Cicero now lost, (perhaps those which he delivered on his return from exile,) from which the rhetorician occasionally borrowed ideas or phrases, not altogether unworthy of the orator’s genius and eloquence. But, though they may contain some insulated Ciceronian expressions, it is utterly denied that these orations can be the continued composition of Cicero. The arguments against their authenticity are deduced, first from their matter; and, secondly, from their style. These critics dwell much on the numerous thoughts and ideas inconsistent with the known sentiments, or unsuitable to the disposition of the author,—on the relation of events, told in a different manner from that in which they have been recorded by him in his undoubted works,—and, finally, on the gross ignorance shown of the laws, [pg 187]institutions, and customs of Rome, and even of the events passing at the time. Thus it is said, in one of these four orations, that, on some political occasion, all the senators changed their garb, as also the Prætors and Ædiles, which proves, that the author was ignorant that all Ædiles and Prætors were necessarily senators, since, otherwise, the special mention of them would be superfluous and absurd. What is still stronger, the author, in the oration Ad Quirites post reditum, refers to the speech in behalf of Gabinius, which was not pronounced till 699, three years subsequently to Cæsar’s recall; whereas the real oration, Ad Quirites, was delivered on the second or third day after his return. With regard to the style of these harangues, it is argued, that the expressions are affected, the sentences perplexed, and the transitions abrupt; and that their languor and want of animation render them wholly unworthy of Cicero. Markland particularly points out the absurd repetition of what the declaimer had considered Ciceronian phrases,—as, “Aras, focos, penates—Deos immortales—Res incredibiles—Esse videatur.” Of the orations individually he remarks, and justly, that the one delivered by Cicero in the Senate immediately after his return, was known to have been prepared with the greatest possible care, and to have been committed to writing before it was pronounced; while the fictitious harangue which we now have in its place, is at all events, quite unlike anything that Cicero would have produced with elaborate study. The second is a sort of compendium of the first, and the same ideas and expressions are slavishly repeated; which implies a barrenness of invention, and sterility of language, that cannot be supposed in Cicero. Of the third oration he speaks, in his letters to Atticus, as one of his happiest efforts343; but nothing can be more wretched than that which we now have in its stead,—the first twelve chapters, indeed, being totally irrelevant to the question at issue.

The oration for Marcellus, the genuineness of which has also been called in question, is somewhat in a different style from the other harangues of Cicero; for, though entitled Pro Marcello, it is not so much a speech in his defence, as a panegyric on Cæsar, for having granted the pardon of Marcellus at the intercession of the Senate. Marcellus had been one of the most violent opponents of the views of Cæsar. He had recommended in the Senate, that he should be deprived of the province of Gaul: he had insulted the magistrates of one of Cæsar’s new-founded colonies; and had been present at Pharsalia on the side of Pompey. After that battle he retired to Mitylene, where he was obliged to remain, being one of the [pg 188]few adversaries to whom the conqueror refused to be reconciled. The Senate, however, one day when Cæsar was present, with an united voice, and in an attitude of supplication, having implored his clemency in favour of Marcellus, and their request having been granted, Cicero, though he had resolved to preserve eternal silence, being moved by the occasion, delivered one of the most strained encomiums that has ever been pronounced.

This oration, which Middleton declares to be superior to anything extant of the kind in all antiquity, and which a celebrated French critic terms, “Le discours le plus noble, le plus pathetique, et en meme tems le plus patriotique, que la reconnaissance, l’amitié, et la vertu, puissent inspirer à une ame elevée et sensible,” continued to be not only of undisputed authenticity, but one of Cicero’s most admired productions, till Wolf, in the preface and notes to a new edition of it, printed in 1802, attempted to show, that it was a spurious production, totally unworthy of the orator whose name it bore, and that it was written by some declaimer, soon after the Augustan age, not as an imposition upon the public, but as an exercise,—according to the practice of the rhetoricians, who were wont to choose, as a theme, some subject on which Cicero had spoken. In his letters to Atticus, Cicero says, that he had returned thanks to Cæsar pluribus verbis. This Middleton translates a long speech; but Wolf alleges it can only mean a few words, and never can be interpreted to denote a full oration, such as that which we now possess for Marcellus. That Cicero did not deliver a long or formal speech, is evident, he contends, from the testimony of Plutarch, who mentions, in his life of Cicero, that, a short time afterwards, when the orator was about to plead for Ligarius, Cæsar asked, how it happened that he had not heard Cicero speak for so long a period,—which would have been absurd if he had heard him, a few months before, pleading for Marcellus. Being an extemporary effusion, called forth by an unforeseen occasion, it could not (he continues to urge) have been pre[pg 189]pared and written beforehand; nor is it at all probable, that, like many other orations of Cicero, it was revised and made public after being delivered. The causes which induced the Roman orators to write out their speeches at leisure, were the magnitude and public importance of the subject, or the wishes of those in whose defence they were made, and who were anxious to possess a sort of record of their vindication. But none of these motives existed in the present case. The matter was of no importance or difficulty; and we know that Marcellus, who was a stern republican, was not at all gratified by the intervention of the senators, or conciliated by the clemency of Cæsar. As to internal evidence, deduced from the oration, Wolf admits, that there are interspersed in it some Ciceronian sentences; and how otherwise could the learned have been so egregiously deceived? but the resemblance is more in the varnish of the style than in the substance. We have the words rather than the thoughts of Cicero; and the rounding of his periods, without their energy and argumentative connection. He adduces, also, many instances of phrases unusual among the classics, and of conceits which betray the rhetorician or sophist. His extolling the act of that day on which Cæsar pardoned Marcellus as higher than all his warlike exploits, would but have raised a smile on the lips of the Dictator; and the slighting way in which the cause of the republic and Pompey are mentioned, is totally different from the manner in which Cicero expressed himself on these delicate topics, even in presence of Cæsar, in his authentic orations for Deiotarus and Ligarius.