Cicero And The Fall Of The Roman Republic/Chapter 5

by James Leigh Strachan-Davidson

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CHAPTER V.

CICERO AND CATILINE.

63 B.C.

N describing the conspiracy of Catiline we lie under one grave disadvantage. Atticus was by Cicero's side throughout this period, and no letters passed between them; and so the detail of events, as they appeared from day to day, is wanting. We cannot, as in each subsequent crisis of Cicero's life, reconstruct an absolutely trustworthy picture of his plans, his hopes, and his fears. We cannot say positively what Cicero knew or believed about Catiline at the moment, but only what the consul chose to announce to the world. Our main authority is the collection of four speeches which Cicero delivered to the Senate or the people during the last two months of his consulship. The accounts of the later writers, Appian, Plutarch, and Dio Cassius, are probably founded to some extent on Cicero's own story as told in the lost treatise on his consulship. Besides these we possess the monograph of Sallust on the Catilinarian conspiracy. This as the work of a contemporary and a Cæsarian is of especial value. We have the satisfaction of finding that the writer on the Cæsarian side gives substantially the same account of the conspirators and their plans as that which we gather from Cicero's own speeches. In presence of this agreement we may feel pretty confident that we have a story trustworthy and correct in its main outlines.

Lucius Sergius Catilina was a member of an ancient patrician family which had been famous in the early days of the Republic, but which had long fallen into obscurity. None of its members had attained the consulship during the last two hundred years, and the name of the Sergii is scarcely mentioned in the history of the period when Rome was conquering and ruling the world.

During the Civil War Catiline had been a partisan of Sulla and had taken an active part in the bloody work of the Proscription. His brother was one of the victims, and a dark story ran that the infamy which Lepidus earned in later years had been anticipated in the first Proscription, and that Catiline was himself responsible for the insertion of his kinsman's name in the list.^[1] Since then he had risen through the various magistracies till he attained the government of Africa as pro-prætor. After his return he was accused of extortion on evidence which Cicero, though he thought of accepting a brief for the defence, evidently believed to be overwhelming.^[2] He was acquitted by the jury, but according to Quintus Cicero^[3] the verdict cost him a ruinous sum in bribes. At any rate we find him immediately afterwards overwhelmed with debt, and ready for desperate methods of extrication. He had by this time completely deserted his old party and was among the most violent members of the opposition. The hopes which the democrats had of useful service from him are attested by Cæsar's action when in 64 B.C. he brought to trial the assassins of Sulla's Proscription. Everyone knew that Catiline had been a ring-leader amongst these; but Cæsar, who throughout his life let by-gones be by-gones whenever he had any present purpose to serve, screened him from punishment. In private life Catiline was known to be both dissolute and unscrupulous. He had many of the qualities necessary for a revolutionary chief—a powerful frame, a fearless temper, great capacity for endurance, a ready tongue, and a faculty of adapting himself to his company and winning familiarity with good and bad alike. At the same time he was hopelessly deficient, as the event showed, in the most essential qualifications of a leader, the cool head, the keen eye for the real forces to be dealt with, and the power of co-ordinating means to ends.

We have seen that in the years of Pompey's absence the democratic party under its recognised leaders Cæsar and Crassus was engaged in fruitless attempts to establish itself as a power independent both of the Senate and of Pompey. This was the object of the attempt of Crassus, as censor, on Egypt in 65 B.C. and of the Agrarian Law of Rullus in 63 B.C. It must be supposed that Cæsar and his associates counted on the political shortsightedness of both Pompey and the Senate to frustrate any cordial action between the two until the new power should have grown too strong to be successfully resisted. A consummation closely resembling this actually resulted some years later when Cæsar established himself in Gaul, so that the project must be deemed not wholly chimerical, if only the first step could be safely taken. This first step was however prevented on both occasions, by Catulus and by Cicero. In the meantime the democrats had striven hard to gain possession of the consulship. Catiline and Antonius were supported by all the efforts of the party against Cicero in 64 B.C. and Catiline again at the next year's elections. An active and unscrupulous man like Catiline, once possessed of the consulship, would have been able to help forward the long-cherished schemes of the party, and if at the same time he could have found means to shake off the burden of his debts and to provide for himself in the future, he might easily have been induced to confine his operations within the limits prescribed by his more sober coadjutors. Crassus and Cæsar could have kept Catiline quiet by flinging him a rich province to worry, just as Cicero converted Catiline's associate Caius Antonius by the gift of Macedonia.

The frustration of these plans brought to light the weak point in the position of the democrats. They had within their ranks men who could not afford to wait, to whom the want of immediate success meant absolute ruin; these could not be withheld from attempts which in their failure brought discredit on the democratic party, but which, if they had succeeded, would have destroyed that party altogether and profited no one but Pompey. At the head of this desperate class was Catiline himself, and around him were other men of high family whom reckless luxury and extravagance had brought to the verge of bankruptcy and ruin. If these men could see their way clear to a political revolution, they might hope to restore their fortunes in a general scramble for the good things of the government; but, if they were debarred from this chance, they were resolved to fall back on counsels of despair, and, as Catiline afterwards put it, "to extinguish the fire which would consume them by bringing down the roof-tree on the top of it."^[4] The evil precedents of Marius and of Sulla appealed with fatal seductiveness to these ruined aristocrats. A civil war, a massacre, a proscription, a confiscation appeared things possible and hopeful. They could point to men who in the late troubles had suddenly emerged from poverty to enormous wealth and from obscurity to domination.^[5] Their power of judgment was impaired, partly by the dazzling contrast of these hopes with their present embarrassments, partly by the deluding atmosphere of secret cabals in which the vapourings and daydreams of one hour are apt to become the fixed ideas of the next, and above all perhaps by the impatience of weakness which, when once men have begun to conspire, makes them feel that suspense is intolerable and that something, no matter what, must be done. To eyes so blinded the occasion seemed not unfavourable. The noble conspirators, though their fortunes were hopelessly undermined, still kept up the show of wealth and profusion, and could command the services of armed slaves, of clients and of retainers. Rome was full as Sallust tells us^[6] of fugitive rascals from all the world; the remnant of the sufferers by the last revolution likewise lingered on there in hopeless poverty. These would be ready enough for deeds of bloodshed; and the mass of the populace crowded together in a great city without industry, pauperised by doles of State corn, puffed up with the conceit that they were the masters of the world and yet painfully conscious that they gained little either in comfort or in dignity by their pre-eminence, would, it was thought, welcome a disturbance in which they might hope to gain, while at the worst they had nothing to lose. In the country towns of Italy the conspirators though they might number in their ranks some Italians of good position^[7] who had been drawn into the vortex of fashionable life in the capital, would find little favour with the rank and file of the citizens, who were sounder and more industrious than the masses in Rome itself; but they counted that the country-folk would be slow to move, and that they would have time to strike the great blow before a sufficient force could be raised against them. On the other hand Sulla had stored up for them an ample supply of revolutionaries in the very men whom he had intended to be the guardians of his government. The veterans^[8] of his Asiatic army were richly rewarded from the spoils of the conquered party, and were planted out as colonists over Italy: it was supposed that their interests had been effectually bound up with the maintenance of Sulla's ordinances. But these professional soldiers seem not to have made good farmers. Some of them had sold their holdings and gone to swell the pauper population of Rome, others remained, having squandered their donatives and involved themselves in debt, and these naturally looked for a fresh call to civil war as the best means of restoring their fortunes.

While these resources lay ready to the hand of the conspirators, the forces at the disposal of the government were invitingly weak. There was no garrison and no tolerable police force in the city of Rome; the officers and public slaves who attended the magistrates might be overpowered by a resolute gang of assassins, especially if their attention could be distracted by the alarm of fire in various parts of the city. The only efficient army of the State was far away with Pompey in Asia, and all the troops available were a few cohorts in Cisalpine Gaul and the scanty retinue of two commanders, Lucius Lucullus and Marcius Rex, who were waiting for their triumphs outside the city gates.

On these considerations the schemes of this party within a party were based. A military force was to be raised in Upper Italy which was to advance as quickly as might be on the city; its approach was to be the signal for fire-raising within the walls, which would, it was hoped, give the opportunity for a sudden assault. Catiline was to seize the government with the same title of consul, which Marius and Cinna had borne, there was to be a general abolition of debt and recall of condemned criminals, and the old story of massacre and confiscation was to be renewed.

It will now be clear how widely the plans of Catiline differed from those of Cæsar. The revolution projected by the great leaders of the democratic party was an elaborate and far-reaching scheme. It recognised the fact that Rome was no longer the chief strategical point, and that the first requisite was a base of operations in the provinces. A remote country such as Spain or Egypt would be the best fitted for the silent equipment of an armed force which might eventually co-operate with partisans at home. To train an army for civil war and generals fit to command it must needs occupy, if not so long a stretch of time as Cæsar afterwards employed in the same task in Gaul, at least several years of hard fighting with enemies who were to be sought on the frontiers of the Empire. In the meantime the rival interests in Rome were to be alarmed as little as possible; the Senate and Pompey were to be left to counteract each other by their mutual jealousies, and the Roman Knights were to be kept quiet by being allowed to see Crassus, the greatest of all the moneyed men, at the head of the movement. Viewed as a plan of revolution, the defect in this scheme lay not in the general lines on which it was framed, but in the great difficulty of getting it launched. Catiline's plan on the other hand presented a fatal facility in its initial stage, but it led up necessarily to a result the very contrary of that which Cæsar hoped to accomplish. Its first effect was to produce a cordial union between the Senate and the equestrian order. Now one of two things must happen: either these two united would be strong enough to deal with Catiline—this of course was the actual result,—or else the senatorial government would collapse and Catiline would be able to carry out his full programme and establish in Rome a revolutionary government of the same bloody type as that of Marius and Cinna. The conspirators forgot that in one essential point their situation differed from that of which Cinna had taken advantage. The revolutionary movement of 87 B.C. had been possible because Sulla and his army were engaged with Mithridates. It took Sulla three years to dispose of his great enemy, and until this was done, happen what might in Italy, he could not stir.^[9] A three years' respite was thus allowed to the new government, and it was only by its own folly that it did not use the time in building up a military and political power against which Sulla would have found it hard to contend. But what chance was there of a similar respite for Catiline? Mithridates was already driven from Asia and Pompey was ready to set sail immediately. A massacre in Rome would have brought the Nobles thronging to his camp; he would have returned with his veteran army; his name would have rallied all Italy to his standard, and the hasty levies of the insurgents, led by men not one of whom had ever commanded an army in the field, would have been swept like chaff before him.^[10] The difference between Cæsar and Catiline reminds one of the choice placed before the peasant of the Scottish legend, who found himself in the presence of a magic sword and horn, and whose fate was to depend on whether he first drew the sword or first blew the horn. Cæsar avoided the challenge to Pompey until he had provided himself with a weapon. The fate of Catiline, even had his first effort succeeded, would have been that of the peasant in the tale, who was torn in pieces by the spirits whom his blast evoked—

"Woe to the fool that ever he was born,
That did not draw the sword before he blew the horn."

It is obvious that Crassus, however willing he may have been to use Catiline as a tool in his designs against his rival Pompey, can have had no sympathy with his schemes of national bankruptcy, and we may be sure that Cæsar was no less averse to a movement which would have united the Senate and Pompey, the constitutional and the military power, once for all firmly together, and would have postponed indefinitely the chances of revolution. Both Crassus and Cæsar got wind of the plot which was formed inside the ranks of their party. They did their best at first to gain for Catiline an official position which would have enabled him to dispense with actual armed rebellion; when this failed and it was manifest that the conspirators would proceed with their further designs, Cæsar^[11] and Crassus both warned Cicero of the danger and gave him such information as they possessed about the plot. The subsequent utterances of both may be cited in evidence of the reality of the conspiracy and the imminence of the danger. When Cæsar fourteen years later wrote of the "ultimum Senatus Consultum" that the State had never had recourse to it saving when "the city was almost in flames and the audacity of malefactors was striking terror into the hearts of all men,"^[12] he must have been understood by all Rome to refer to Catiline. Crassus is still more explicit. A year after Catiline's death he declared in the Senate:^[13] "I owe it to Cicero that I am a senator, that I am a citizen, that I am a free man, that I draw the breath of life; whensoever I look on my wife, on my home, or on my country, I behold a blessing for which I am indebted to him."

The consular elections were unusually late that year. The polling was fixed for the 20th of October, and Manlius, a veteran centurion of Sulla's army and a confederate of Catiline, was said to have come to Rome with a gang of his associates, intending to organise a riot on the election day^[14] In view of this danger Cicero assembled the Senate on the 19th, and obtained a decree postponing the election till the 28th in order to give time for further inquiries. Next day (October 20th) he publicly questioned Catiline in the Senate^[15] with regard to seditious and inflammatory words which he was reported to have used in addressing the people. Catiline showed a bold front: he replied "that there were two bodies in the State, the one weak with a feeble head, the other strong without a head; to this he would take good care that a head should be supplied." Cicero thought that the challenge should be taken up at once, but he could not on this occasion carry the Senate with him. The resolutions passed were mild and colourless, and Catiline strode forth from the Senate-house triumphant.

On the 21st^[16] of October the consul laid fresh information before the House. He told the senators that he had reason to know that the revolutionary party had lost patience, that an armed insurrection under the leadership of Manlius was impending in Etruria, and that the 27th of October was fixed for the outbreak. Next day (the 22d) the statement of the consul was taken into consideration and the Senate resolved to proclaim that a state of civil war had begun,^[17] thus recognising in the consul the power to use extreme measures of resistance, which were permissible only when the commonwealth was in danger. This "Extreme Decree," as it was termed, was expressed in the words, "Let the consuls see to it that the State takes no harm." Under this modest form the magistrate was commissioned to exercise, though always on his own responsibility, whatever force he might deem necessary for the salvation of the Republic. Within the city the plans of the conspirators had not yet developed into overt acts which Cicero could visit with immediate punishment; but levies were ordered throughout Italy, and the consul Antonius and the prætor Metellus Celer were directed to take the field against the insurgents. Manlius appeared in arms, just as Cicero had announced, on the 27th of October at Fæsulæ in Etruria.

The consular elections were held in Rome on the 28th of October. Catiline had hoped for the opportunity of a riot in which the consul might be assassinated. Cicero warned the senators beforehand and many of them retired from Rome for the day.^[18] He himself appeared as returning officer on the Campus Martius, guarded by a strong body of friends, and

WALLS OF FÆSULÆ (FIESOLE).

(Duruy)

the gleam of a corselet which could be seen between the folds of the consul's civic gown proclaimed his danger to the world. The popular feeling was deeply stirred; Catiline saw that an attack on that day would be hopeless, and kept quiet. The voters gave their voices against him, and Silanus and Murena were elected consuls. Three days later, on the 1st of November, an attempt to surprise the stronghold of Præneste was frustrated by the vigilance of Cicero, who had received intelligence from his spies, and who gave orders that the town should be carefuIly garrisoned and guarded.^[19]

Though the forces of his confederates were actually in the field and Catiline had arranged shortly to put himself at their head, he thought proper to occupy the intervening days with a clumsy display of innocence, offering himself to the custody of one magistrate after another, and finally taking up his quarters with Marcus Marcellus, whom he begged to keep watch over his movements.^[20] Cicero tells us^[21] that down to the time when Catiline actually joined the rebels in Etruria—"there are men in this House, who either do not see what is hanging over us, or seeing it pretend not to see, who have nourished the hopes of Catiline by the mildness of their proposals, and have given strength to the new-born conspiracy by refusing to believe in it; and there are many outside, not only of the bad but of the simple, who have followed their lead, and who, if I had taken extreme measures against Catiline, would have called my action cruel and tyrannical." Something like a dramatic exposure of the childish pretences of Catiline was desired by the consul, and for this his adversary soon gave him an occasion.

On the evening of the 6th of November a meeting of the conspirators was held at which it was agreed that Catiline should forthwith set out from Rome and take command of the troops raised by Manlius, leaving the other chiefs of the conspiracy to continue their operations in the city. He would fain have Cicero disposed of before his departure, and two of his associates, Cornelius and Vargunteius, promised to procure him this satisfaction. They were on sufficiently friendly terms with the consul to be able to make their way into his house as morning callers, and they arranged to take advantage of this opportunity to murder him the first thing next day. Cicero, however, was well served by his spies. Next morning the murderers found the door barred against them, and a number of the principal senators assembled to witness the discomfiture of the men whose presence verified what Cicero had announced beforehand as to their names and their purpose. Next night the conspirators met again and decided that, notwithstanding the failure of the assassination, Catiline's departure could no longer be delayed.

On the following morning (Nov. 8th) Cicero summoned the Senate to the temple of Jupiter Stator on the Palatine. Catiline himself, who was resolved not to throw off the mask until the very last moment, had the audacity to be present. This was Cicero's opportunity. He knew that Catiline was about to join the insurgents, and he wished to emphasise this his first act of overt rebellion. He wished likewise to have the correctness of his own information publicly attested, and to avoid the supposition that Catiline's hypocritical protestations had duped the consul, and that his escape from Rome was a success scored against the government. He therefore turned upon him in the tremendous invective which has been preserved to us under the title of the First Catilinarian Oration. The opening words—"Quousque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra?"—are perhaps more universally known than any other sentence from an ancient author, and the whole speech well merits its fame as a masterpiece of passionate and defiant eloquence. Throughout, Cicero assumes the tone of one who has complete command of the situation. He mocks at Catiline's affectation of innocence, he reveals all his actions and projects before his face, charges him with all that had occurred at the secret meetings of the conspirators during the last two nights, and explains to him where his comrades are to meet him on the road, how the silver eagle which is to serve as their standard has gone on before, and how Manlius awaits his arrival. As consul, Cicero has ample evidence and ample precedent for ordering him to execution on the spot, but it does not suit his convenience to do so. "I will have you put to death, Catiline," he says,^[22] "but it shall be later on, when it will be impossible to find anyone so vile, anyone so abandoned, anyone so like yourself, as to deny that I am justified in the act. So long as there is anyone left to plead for you, you shall live; and you shall live, as you live now, hemmed in by my guards—many and trusty they are—so that you cannot stir a finger against the State: the eyes and ears of many, when you least suspect it, shall in the future as in the past spy out your ways and keep watch on your actions."

If Catiline wishes to keep up the farce for a few hours longer and to represent himself as an innocent man driven friendless into exile by the threats of the consul, Cicero will humour him so far. "Go," he says,^[23] "I order you; go into banishment, if that is what you want me to say. And if," he continues,^[24] "you wish to blast the name of me, whom you are pleased to call your enemy, withdraw in very truth into some distant land. I shall scarcely be able to survive the ill-fame which will attach to me, if you allow yourself to be driven from the country by the command of the consul. But if you wish to be the instrument of my praise and my reputation, then set forth with all your crew of reprobates, betake yourself to Manlius, summon all criminals to your standard, sever yourself from every honest man, declare war against your country, glory in the act of impiety, that it may be clear that you have not been thrust forth among strangers, but that you have sought the company of your fellows. You will go at last," he adds,^[25] "well I know it, to that camp whither your unbridled and insane desires have long been summoning you. It is no painful task that I impose upon you but an inexpressible pleasure. For this mad adventure it is, that nature has fashioned you, that choice has trained you, that fortune has spared you. You never loved peace, nor even war unless it were war as a pirate. You have found for yourself a gang of ruffians, recruited from among broken men, whom not only all luck but all hope has deserted. In the midst of such a crew how you will take your joy, how you will triumph in delight, how you will revel in satisfaction, when in the whole circle of your associates you never hear the voice of one honest man, nor see one honest man's face."

That night Catiline left the city for Etruria. Next day (Nov. 9th) Cicero addressed a speech (the Second Catilinarian Oration) to the Roman People, in which he announced the departure of Catiline, and laid before them the whole situation. He exults in the thought that he is now permitted to fight with the traitor in the daylight. "For this one leader of this intestine war, I have beaten him beyond a doubt. No longer will his dagger play against my breast. I have done with the perils which I have had to face on the Campus and in the Forum and in the Senate-house and even within the walls of my own home. He has lost his vantage ground now that he is driven from the city. We shall wage a fair war with none to hinder us against a declared enemy. Unquestionably we have ruined the man and triumphed over him, now that we have drawn him from his secret ambush into open piracy."^[26]

Cicero answers to the people, as he had already done to the Senate, the criticisms which he fears will be made on his policy in allowing the rebel captain to put himself at the head of his forces. He protests that though he would have been justified in killing him, yet that his execution would have been useless to the commonwealth. Catiline's associates would have declared his innocence, would have made a martyr of him, and would have used the outcry against the consul in order to carry out Catiline's schemes more effectively. Now that he has set himself in arms against the State, no one can any longer pretend to disbelieve in his conspiracy, and so not only he but his accomplices whom he leaves behind can be safely dealt with. To these last Cicero addresses significant words of warning. "They are conscious," he says,^[27] "that all the resolutions of their council of the night before last have been reported to me. I exposed them all yesterday in the Senate. Catiline took fright and departed. What are they waiting for? Nay, but they are much mistaken if they think that my lenity is going to last for ever. . . One boon I will still grant them; let them go forth, let them start on their journey, let them not suffer their Catiline to pine with grief for want of them. I will show them the road: he has gone along the Aurelian Way; if they will but make haste, they may catch him up towards evening. . . . One word more; either go they shall, or keep quiet; or else if they remain in the city and do not mend their ways let them look to receive their deserts." Further on^[28] he returns to the same theme—"If my mildness heretofore has seemed to anyone to argue want of vigour, I would reply that it has been waiting till this which lay concealed should spring to light. For the future I can no longer forget that this is my native land, that I am the consul of all these Romans, that it is with them that I have to live or for them that I have to die. There is no guard set upon the gates, no ambush upon the road. If anyone wishes to go forth, he can use his own discretion. But if anyone dares to stir a finger in the city, if I take him, I will not say in any accomplished act, but in any attempt or effort against the nation, then I say that I will make him feel that in this city there are consuls who will not sleep, there are magistrates who will do their duty, there is a Senate which will stand firm, there are forces in arms, there is a prison which our ancestors established to be the scene of vengeance for heinous and red-handed crime."

With this warning Cicero left things to run their course in the city. Outside, the armies of Metellus Celer in the valley of the Po and of Antonius in Etruria were hurriedly reinforced by fresh levies. Meanwhile Catiline had fulfilled Cicero's predictions by joining the band of Manlius at Fæsulæ. Disguise was no longer possible, and he assumed the dress and title of consul in open rebellion against the State. The Senate replied by declaring Catiline and Manlius enemies, and summoning those who had followed them to disperse. Rewards had already been offered for the denunciation of their confederates within the city. Sallust tells us^[29] that these decrees produced no effect. None of the conspirators in the capital came forward to give evidence, and none of those in the field deserted their standard. Catiline's force now amounted to ten thousand men. He felt himself strong enough to refuse the aid of the runaway slaves who would gladly have flocked to him. He feared that their presence might alarm those who looked with indifference or with favour on his movement, and so spoil his chance of support from the populace of the capital.

While the forces were thus mustering on either side, Cicero was annoyed by a foolish and ill-timed contest among his own followers. At the recent consular election Silanus and Murena had headed the poll with Servius Sulpicius Rufus for third and Catiline for fourth. A law had been lately passed increasing the penalties against bribery, and Cato, the sworn foe of electoral corruption, whose characteristic it was to be instant in season and out of season, must needs choose this moment, when all the fortunes of the commonwealth were at stake, to divide the friends of the constitution by trying to unseat Murena on a charge of bribery and treating.

Cicero protested against the folly of throwing the city again into the confusion of a contested election; he offered himself as counsel for Murena, and delivered on his behalf a speech^[30] which is a very model of playful and persuasive eloquence, the more pleasant because it comes as an interlude in the grim tragedy of the Catilinarian orations. The serious arguments of the consul as to the political necessities of the time are relieved by a sportive attack on the technical subtleties which form the stock in trade of the lawyer Sulpicius, and on the precisian doctrines which Cato has imbibed from his Stoic tutors. "I must tell you, gentlemen, that those eminent qualities which we observe in Marcus Cato are all his own; what we sometimes find wanting in him is to be set down not to his nature but to his master, Zeno, whose doctrines have been caught up from learned tutors by our most talented friend, and that not as a topic for discussion, which is the usual way, but as a rule of life." Cicero laughed the jurors into a good humour by a ludicrous application of Stoic maxims to the practical exigencies of Roman politics, and they unanimously acquitted Murena. The additional peril which Cato's obstinate purism would have created was thus happily averted. It is difficult to realise that this witty and sparkling speech was uttered by a man in hourly danger of his life, and with all the responsibilities of a tremendous political crisis weighing upon him. "What a merry man we have for consul," was Cato's remark, as he listened from the accusers' bench. It never seems to have occurred to Cato, that Cicero's merriment was pressed into the service of the State, and that his own austerity was helping on the projects of the very men whose execution he was himself to urge a few days later.

The trial of Murena took place about the end of November. Meanwhile the conspirators in the city anxiously awaited the appearance of Catiline and his army. Their chief was Publius Cornelius Lentulus Sura, who had been consul in 71 B.C., and had been afterwards expelled from the Senate by the censors. He had recovered his seat by being again elected to the prætorship, and was now serving that office. He appears to have been a man of flighty and credulous temperament. He lent his ears to designing soothsayers who persuaded him that a Sibylline oracle had foretold the domination in Rome of three Cornelii. Part of the prophecy, they said, had been already fulfilled by Cinna and Sulla, and Lentulus was marked by fate to be the third. Other senators and knights of good family, Autronius, Gabinius, Statilius, Cassius, and Cethegus were associated with him. Cethegus was supposed to be the most energetic of the conspirators and always urged immediate and violent measures. Cicero had failed as yet to get evidence of any overt act which would justify the arrest of these men, but at length their own folly gave him the desired opportunity.

There were present in Rome at this time some envoys from the Allobroges of Transalpine Gaul. The Allobroges were overwhelmed with a burden of debt to Roman money-lenders and were ready for any desperate action. In the meantime they had sent an embassy to Rome to beg some relief from the government. These Gallic envoys were introduced to Gabinius by a certain freedman named Umbrenus, and Gabinius and the rest conceived the wild idea of associating the Allobroges in the conspiracy and inducing them to supply Catiline with cavalry for the invasion of Italy. The Gauls at first listened with sympathy; but on further consideration they reflected that they might gain more by betraying their tempters to the government than by engaging seriously in so desperate a cause. They accordingly took counsel with Fabius Sanga, the patron of their tribe, who at once gave notice to Cicero. The Allobroges were instructed to continue their negotiations with the conspirators and to obtain from them if possible written documents. With incredible stupidity Lentulus and his associates fell into the trap. They gave the Gauls letters in their own handwriting, addressed to the senate and people of the Allobroges, undertaking to perform what they had promised verbally to the envoys, and urging the Allobroges in turn to send the assistance which their envoys had promised. The Gauls were to visit Catiline on their way north, and they bore with them a letter from Lentulus to Catiline in which he advised him to admit the slaves into the ranks of his band.

By the evening of the 2d of December all was settled, and the Allobroges started on their homeward journey that night. They were accompanied by Volturcius, one of the confederates, and attended by a considerable escort. Cicero was duly informed of all this, and made his preparations accordingly^[31] The great northern road from Rome crosses the Tiber at the Mulvian Bridge some two miles above the city. Cicero set two of the prætors in ambush with armed bands in farm-houses on each side of the water. These waited until the Allobroges and their companions were crossing in the darkness; then advancing simultaneously they occupied the two ends of the bridge. Thus not only were the letters seized, but the whole party was caught on the bridge. They were conveyed to Rome and deposited at the consul's house about daybreak (Dec. 3d). Cicero forthwith summoned to his presence Gabinius, Cethegus, Statilius, and Lentulus. Messages were likewise sent to some of the principal senators, who hurried to the consul's house. Contrary to the advice of these, Cicero declined to open the letters. He preferred at once to convoke the Senate, so that the evidence might come out in open court. In the meantime, acting on a hint from the Allobroges, he sent one of the prætors to search the house of Cethegus, where a store of swords and daggers was soon found. These were immediately seized.

As soon as the Senate had assembled, Cicero took Lentulus by the hand and led him into the House. This show of gentle force exercised by the consul in person was considered due to the dignity of the prætor; the other conspirators, being but private men, were arrested with less ceremony. Volturcius was first admitted to give evidence under promise of pardon, and detailed the instructions with which he was charged for Catiline, who was to be urged to advance as soon as possible on Rome, so as to be before the city during the festival of the Saturnalia; this would be the most convenient opportunity for his accomplices to co-operate with fire and sword within the city. Next came the Allobroges with their evidence as to the messages and letters with which they had been entrusted, and as to the promises which Lentulus had made them on the strength of his Sibylline oracle (see above, p. I32 ). When confronted on this point, Lentulus' assurance forsook him, and he did not venture to deny the charge. But the most overwhelming evidence was that of the letters themselves which lay still unopened on the table. The accused were called upon, one by one, and each acknowledged his own hand and seal before the thread was cut and the correspondence inciting to a Gallic invasion of Italy was read to the House.^[32] After this there could be no question as to the guilt of the prisoners: and to close the mouths of all objectors for the future Cicero directed that the evidence should be taken down word for word by certain trustworthy senators, and then immediately copied out and published. The fidelity of the document was thus guaranteed by its being at once subjected to the criticism of those who had heard the evidence, and it was impossible to maintain with any plausibility that the record had been tampered with afterwards.^[33] The Senate next^[34] resolved by an unanimous vote that Lentulus should be required to resign his magistracy, and that he should then be remanded with the rest to safe-keeping. Cethegus, Statilius, and Gabinius were already secured, and orders for arrest were issued against five other ring-leaders, of whom however one only, Cœparius, was actually caught. The prisoners were guarded in the houses of magistrates and senators, two of them being committed to the charge of Cæsar and Crassus. By this choice of guardians the consul meant to indicate that he put no trust in the rumour which made Cæsar and Crassus accessories to the conspiracy, but regarded them as loyal and trustworthy citizens. After thus providing for the custody of the prisoners, the Senate with equal unanimity passed a vote of thanks to Cicero because "by his courage, wisdom, and forethought the commonwealth had been delivered from the greatest dangers." At the same time a solemn Thanksgiving was voted to the gods for having blessed the efforts of the consul "to rescue the city from conflagration, the citizens from massacre, and Italy from war." Thanksgivings had often been decreed for the success of commanders in the field, but Cicero was the first to whom it had ever befallen to receive such a recognition of his services in the city.

Late in the afternoon of the same day (Dec. 3d) Cicero assembled the people and recounted to them the events of the last twenty-four hours. This speech, the Third Catilinarian Oration, is our main authority for the incidents which have been already detailed. The statements are fully confirmed not only by Plutarch but by Sallust, whose master, Cæsar, voted on this day in agreement with the rest of the Senate; we are justified in concluding from this unanimity that the facts were absolutely plain and notorious and that there were not two opinions as to the guilt of the accused. Thus Cicero's first object was fully attained; the conspirators in the city, whose machinations had hitherto been hidden from the public, were now caught in a flagrant act rebellion, and an act which had conspicuously failed. In presence of their egregious folly Cicero may well have exulted that Catiline was no longer at hand to be their guide, and it is not surprising that he should have been tempted to magnify the sagacity of the leader whom they had lost in comparison with the eptitude of those who remained behind. "Catiline," he exclaims, "would never have fixed for our information the season of the Saturnalia, or announced so long beforehand the day of doom and destruction for the commonwealth; he would never have been so simple as to allow me to lay hands on his own seal, his own letters, or the eye-witnesses of his guilt." "When I drove him from the city, Romans, I had this in my mind that, Catiline once away, I had no reason to fear the sleepy Lentulus or the bloated Cassius or the raving maniac Cethegus."^[35]

The conflict was not yet over, but a first great success had been scored, and Cicero was fully justified in addressing his fellow-citizens in a tone of triumph and confidence;^[36] "Night is now upon us; so do you, Romans, offer your thanks to that Jupiter who watches over the city and over you, and then return to your homes. Though the danger has been averted, yet I would have each one of you keep watch and ward over his own house this night as you did last night. That you shall not be called upon to do so much longer and that you shall enjoy quiet from this time forward, that shall be my care, Romans."

The multitude greeted his words with acclamation, and escorted him back in honour to the house of a friend with whom he was to lodge for the night. The consul could not sleep that night in his own home, for it was in the possession of the Vestal Virgins, who each year celebrated in the house of one of the magistrates certain rites of the "Good Goddess" from which all males were rigorously excluded.

After the interval of one day (Dec. 4th), during which it appears that further evidence was being taken and rewards voted to the informers,^[37] the Senate assembled for the third time on the 5th, the famous Nones of December, and the consul asked its advice on the question what was to be done with Lentulus and his fellows. The place of meeting was the temple of Concord at the foot of the Capitoline Hill. The Forum^[38] was filled with citizens who had armed themselves at the consul's bidding, and the slopes of the Capitol were occupied by bodies of Roman Knights, amongst whom Cicero's friend Atticus was conspicuous.^[39]

FRIEZE OF THE TEMPLE OF CONCORD.

(Duruy.)

The accounts which have been preserved to us of this great debate are strangely conflicting. Plutarch^[40] relates "that the only one of Cato's speeches surviving in his time was that delivered on this occasion; for Cicero the consul had trained certain writers of special intelligence to use signs which expressed the sense of many letters in a few short marks, and had set them here and there in the Senate-house. For the keeping and employment of what are called shorthand writers had not yet begun, but it is said that this occasion was the first when men struck on the track of any such invention." It might have been hoped that this precaution would have secured us an authentic account of the speeches and motions before the House. Nevertheless we find perplexing discrepancies. Sallust omits Cicero's speech altogether, and Plutarch and Dio Cassius^[41] give accounts of it which are in contradiction of each other, and neither of which agrees very well with the published version. Brutus, who in later years wrote a life of his uncle Cato, went hopelessly astray, believing that Cato was the first to propose the punishment of death. Luckily for us, this blunder caused Cicero to give us in a confidential letter^[42] of criticism, addressed to Atticus, a plain statement of some of the facts, which is our best guide through the labyrinth of contradiction. Lastly as to the nature of Cæsar's proposal, we have two distinct versions; the one, easy in itself but irreconcilable with what we know of the order of debate, is propounded by Appian^[43] and Plutarch; the other, vouched for by Cicero in his published speech and by Sallust, fits in with the other facts as they are known to us but presents serious internal difficulties. This is not the place for a full discussion of these vexed questions: I will only say that I believe that the contemporary authorities, Cicero and Sallust, have preserved the true account of the order of debate and of Cæsar's proposal, and that I shall follow them rather than Appian and Plutarch in the subsequent narrative.

Cicero first put the question to Silanus, the consul elect, who thereupon moved that the five prisoners should be put to death. He was followed by the other senators of consular rank, who all supported the motion. The prætorian benches were next to be consulted. Among the first in this rank came Cæsar, who was praetor-elect and would enter on office at the end of the month. Cæsar, if we may trust Sallust's version^[44] of his speech, while fully agreeing as to the guilt of the accused and acknowledging that no punishment could be too severe for their crimes, urged that the Senate should nevertheless consider not the deserts of the prisoners but its own character as the guardian of the laws and the constitution. He pointed out with much force that it is just by cases like this that bad precedents are set up and the habit of obedience to the law broken through; it was thus that the Thirty at Athens had begun their tyranny by putting to death without trial men of notoriously criminal character. To let the prisoners go would be manifestly impolitic, but without breaking the law which forbade that any Roman citizen should be punished with death except by command of the People, measures might be taken which would render the conspirators powerless to do harm for the future. He therefore proposed that the property of the culprits should be confiscated, and that they should be confined in chains in corporate towns of Italy, and that it should be declared illegal for anyone to bring before the Senate or the People any proposal for their release.

It is obviously very difficult to understand how such a proposal could follow on such an argument. Cæsar by proposing an alternative sentence seems to acknowledge the right of the Senate to try these men and to condemn them to punishment of some sort. Why was the Senate better qualified to pronounce a sentence of imprisonment for life, than a sentence of death? This question, though it seems to force itself on the notice of the reader, is never clearly stated, much less solved, by any of our authorities. Appian evades it by making Cæsar propose a mere remand of the prisoners for a legal trial later on. Sallust and Cicero give us little help in explanation, though they state the facts correctly. The most probable answer seems to be that imprisonment in the days of the Roman Republic was not fully recognised as a species of punishment, but only as a harsh method of safe-keeping. For this reason it was not mentioned amongst the punishments against which a right of appeal was guaranteed to Roman citizens. All the laws which treat of the right of appeal speak of death, of scourging and of fine, as the penalties which are appealed against. The Senate then, or rather the consul acting under the advice of the Senate, is justified (so we must suppose Cæsar to maintain) in punishing dangerous enemies of the State so long as the punishment inflicted is not one forbidden totidem verbis by the statute. Thus Cæsar's motion may be^[45] held to "keep on the windy side of the law," though it seems a strange subtlety to say that a court, not qualified to pronounce any "capital" sentence (which in this age commonly meant a sentence of death to be avoided by voluntary exile and self-deprivation of citizenship), should nevertheless have the right to inflict a punishment infinitely more severe.

Whatever the reasonableness of Cæsar's proposal, his speech produced a strong effect, and many of the senators of prætorian rank signified their assent. Silanus the consul-elect took alarm, and explained away his own motion by an unworthy quibble. It was worded in the terms "that the extreme penalty be inflicted on the prisoners," and he now interpreted this to mean the same as Cæsar's proposal; "for perpetual imprisonment," he said "is the extreme penalty which can be inflicted on a Roman citizen."^[46] Many of Cicero's friends approved of Cæsar's motion, as it would undoubtedly relieve the consul from the risk and responsibility which he would incur by the actual infliction of death.^[47] His brother Quintus is said to have been among those who wavered.^[48]

At this point Cicero intervened in the debate with the speech which he afterwards published as the Fourth Catilinarian Oration. As consul, he was not like the rest called upon to deliver his opinion in the order of his place, but might interpose with a magisterial statement at any moment which he deemed expedient. In another respect the consul differs from the ordinary senator. He is present to ask and receive the advice of the Senate, not to give advice himself. He must therefore refrain, much as an English judge charging a jury refrains, from expressing his adhesion to one side or the other, though by his method of summing up and laying the question before the House he may indicate pretty clearly what is his own opinion. In this speech Cicero insists on two points: first he wishes that the Senate shall decide according to what it deems good for the State without regard to what may be the personal consequences to himself; these he is ready and proud to accept: secondly he protests against any delay. "Now whatever is to be done, whichever way your minds and your resolutions incline, you must decide before nightfall. You see what a crime has been brought before your bar. If you suppose that only a few are associated in it, you are much mistaken; this mischief has spread further than we thought; it has not only infected Italy, but it has crossed the Alps, and working its way in darkness has already laid hold on several provinces. It cannot be crushed out by withholding your hand and putting off the day of reckoning. Whatever the nature of the punishment which you select, you must inflict it instantly."^[49]

He next proceeds to explain to the senators the alternatives presented to them—"I see that there are two motions before the House, the first that of Decimus Silanus, who proposes that those who have attempted to destroy this commonwealth shall be punished by death, the other that of Caius Cæsar who, while exempting them from death, provides for every other punishment in its most aggravated form. Both these senators have pronounced sentences stern as their own dignity and the gravity of the crisis demand. The one thinks that men who have attempted to slaughter the Roman people, to destroy our Empire, to blot out the name of Rome, ought not to be allowed to enjoy a moment longer the life and breath which we all draw in common; and he bears in mind that this punishment has often been inflicted on wicked citizens in this commonwealth. The other perceives that death has not been established by Heaven as a punishment, but that it is either a debt due to nature, or a haven of rest from toils and troubles; and so wise men never meet it with reluctance, and brave men often seek it of their own will. But chains, and chains to be worn for ever, are truly a device framed for the exemplary punishment of heinous crimes. He adds a heavy penalty on the townships in which they are to be confined, if any of the prisoners escapes from his bonds; he commits them to a dreadful prison, and provides as the crimes of these wretches deserve, that no one shall be allowed to propose to alleviate by decree of Senate or People the penalty to which he condemns them, thus depriving them even of hope, so often the sole consolation of men in trouble: he orders further that their property be confiscated. All that he leaves to these criminals is life, and if he had taken this too, by a single pang he would have relieved them from all the pangs of mind and body and all the expiation of their crime. And for this it was that the men of old, in order to see before the eyes of the wicked some terror in their lifetime, thought it well to teach that pains and penalties not unlike this are reserved for the impious in the world below; they understood, it is clear, that if these were set aside death in itself was nothing to fear. Now, Senators, I see what course is for my own benefit. If you accept the proposal of Caius Cæsar, it is probable, since he has professed those politics which are supposed to be in favour with the many, that having him for the adviser and the voucher for this sentence I shall have less to fear from the attacks of the multitude; if the other proposal be adopted, I do not know but that more of trouble may be in store for me. But let all considerations of my danger give way to the interests of the State. For Cæsar, as his own dignity and the splendour of his ancestry required, has laid this sentence in our hands, as a pledge of his enduring loyalty to the State. The truth is, that Caius Cæsar knows that the Sempronian Law is intended for the benefit of Roman citizens, and that the man who is an enemy to the State cannot by any possibility be a citizen; he knows likewise that the very man^[50] who carried the Sempronian Law paid the penalty of his treason without the command of the People. . . . And so a man of his known kindliness and clemency does not hesitate to commit Publius Lentulus to a life-long dungeon and chains; he provides that for the future no man shall be permitted to gain credit for himself by alleviating the punishment of Lentulus, or to pose as the people's friend, while bringing calamity on the Roman People; he adds that his goods are to be confiscated, so that to all the other torments of mind and body want and beggary are to be added. Therefore, whether you vote with him, you will have given me a coadjutor beloved and acceptable to the commons, to help me to plead my cause to the multitude; or whether you prefer to follow the advice of Silanus, you will have an easy defence both for yourselves and me against any charge of cruelty, and I will maintain that this sentence was far the less severe of the two."

The next feature in the debate was the speech of Cato. He was tribune-elect, and would probably be asked for his opinion immediately after the senators of praetorian rank. Plutarch^[51] tells us that Cato severely rebuked his brother-in-law Silanus for his weakness, and fiercely attacked Cæsar for trying to intimidate the Senate, when he might be thankful if he himself escaped condemnation as an accomplice. Sallust's version of Cato's speech contains nothing about Silanus, and softens down the invective against Cæsar. But the main argument, as Sallust gives it, is so perfectly adapted to the situation, that there can be little doubt that it is the one which Cato actually used. This argument is that the situation calls for administrative action rather than for precise weighing of penalties.^[52] The prisoners are avowedly guilty, so that no injustice can be done; but the really vital question is what effect will the one or the other decision of the House have on the chances of Catiline and lais army.^[53]

When the question was brought to this point, a sensible man could hardly doubt what answer it was his duty to give. Cæsar's proposal was obviously and notoriously impracticable. What probability was there of such a sentence being carried out? How could the Senate prevent any magistrate from proposing the release of the prisoners? Cicero had later on the opportunity of proving in his own person the futility of such restrictive clauses. Clodius in the law which banished him provided that it should be unlawful to propose his recall, but this did not prevent its being both proposed and carried. The same would doubtless have been the case in this instance if Cæsar's motion had been adopted. An agitation would at once have been set on foot to review the sentence. Meanwhile Catiline and his companions in arms would have had no sense of discouragement or terror at the fate of their fellows. They would have regarded Lentulus as simply out of the game for the moment, until they could come and rescue him. His fate would have depended mainly on the issue of the military operations in the field, whereas, as we shall see presently, his mediate execution had a momentous effect on the decision of that issue.

Cato's speech determined the sense of the House, which Cicero had left doubtful. An effort was indeed made at the last moment to put off the decision, in spite of the protest which the consul had uttered against delay. Tiberius Claudius Nero moved to adjourn the question until further measures of defence against Catiline should be provided, and Silanus, tossed to and fro by conflicting anxieties, took refuge at last in this neutral proposal and announced that he should vote with Nero.^[54] But by the rules of

THE TULLIANUM: ANCIENT PRISON OF THE KINGS.

(Duruy)

the Roman Senate motions for adjournment had no precedence over those on the main question, and thus it happened that the proposal of Nero was never put to the vote. Cicero first submitted to the House the proposal of Cato, which was in substance the same as that of Silanus, but which was more fully and clearly expressed.^[55] This was carried by a great majority and all the other motions before the House necessarily dropped.

Cicero lost no time in carrying the sentence into execution. He at once dismissed the Senate, and proceeding to the Palatine, where Lentulus was confined, led him along the Sacred Way through the Forum to the door of the ancient prison of the Kings close to the Temple of Concord where the debate had been held. Hither he commanded the other prisoners to be conveyed, one by one, from their several places of detention. The multitude which thronged the Forum was as yet uncertain for what purpose they were being brought. As each arrived he was handed over to the magistrates charged with the care of executions, and by them thrust down into the subterranean vault of the prison, where he was immediately strangled. When all five had perished the consul turned to the assembled people and, humouring the superstition which forbade the ill-omened mention of death, announced their fate in the words, "They have lived their life." Night was failing when Cicero returned homewards amidst the flare of torches displayed at every door and the shouts of the multitude who hailed him as their deliverer and preserver.^[56]

The soundness of Cato's advice and the wisdom of Cicero's action were soon manifested; the army of Catiline, which had remained unaffected by all the previous decrees of the Senate, began, as soon as the news of Lentulus' execution arrived, to disperse and dwindle until it was reduced to three thousand men. These were soon confronted near Pistoria, some twenty miles from Fæsulæ, by a superior force under Petreius, a brave and experienced officer who was acting as lieutenant to the second consul Antonius. The whole of them were cut to pieces fighting bravely around their leader, whose gallant death atoned in some degree for the criminal stupidity of his attempt against the commonwealth. We may fairly apply to Catiline the lines in which Scott records the death of another Roman who, like him,

"For empire enterprised;
He stood the cast his rashness played,
Left not the victims he had made,
Dug his red grave with his own blade,
And on the field he lost was laid,
Abhorred, but not despised."

The defeat and death of Catiline happened on the Nones of January, exactly one month after the execution of Lentulus. There can be no question that the one event was the direct result of the other. Catiline had calculated on having to deal with a weak government, divided by party factions and hampered by constitutional scruples. He was met by a dramatic revelation of the total collapse of the schemes of his confederates in the city, and by a startling example of the length to which the consul and the Senate were prepared to go in dealing with them. Down to the Nones of December, it was not clear which party had most force on its side. When once this question seemed to be decided, Catiline lost his chief hopes of support. All the outer circle of his followers deserted him, and he was left alone with a handful of desperate men for whom there was no retreat.

No State trial, except that perhaps of Charles I., has ever been the subject of so much controversy as that which consigned Lentulus and his companions to the executioner. The clamour against Cicero's action began a few days later and never ceased until he was driven into banishment by a vote of the People. This condemnation was solemnly reversed, and the exile restored in triumph eighteen months later. But after nineteen centuries the controversy still rages, and the question is eagerly debated whether Cicero's act was that of a bold and public-spirited magistrate, who at a critical moment used his legitimate powers with rigour and discretion, or whether it was a judicial murder,^[57] perpetrated without legal warrant by a timid and self-seeking partisan. I will attempt to state very shortly the main points at issue.

The Roman constitution, while restricting the capital jurisdiction of the magistrate over citizens, allows him to use any amount of force against enemies of the State. A citizen may commit acts which constitute him an enemy, in which case he by his own deed renounces his civic privileges. The rule for the magistrate by Roman, as by English,^[58] law seems to be that he may not treat any citizen as an enemy on the ground of apprehended or future mischief nor on the ground of past offences, but only in the presence of overt acts implying grave and immediate danger to the State, which can only be repelled by the use of violent methods of self-defence. It follows that the executions must be on a scale not out of proportion to the necessity, and that they must not be continued after the imminent danger has ceased. If the conduct of the magistrate is afterwards called in question, the burden of proof that the forcible act was really necessary lies on him. On the other hand the moment that the necessity is present he is neglecting his duty if he fails to act on it. In extreme cases the private man has the same duty. In the colonies and dependencies of England the exercise of this terrible responsibility has been sometimes preceded by a solemn proclamation of "Martial Law." This proclamation does not, strictly speaking, make any alteration in the rights and duties which each magistrate and each citizen had before,^[59] but it calls attention to the fact that a state of war exists with all the extraordinary obligations which such condition implies; it indicates that the magistrate or the officer expects to be obliged to act on his extreme powers, and that he intends to do so. In Rome a corresponding proclamation is found in the decree of the Senate "that the consuls see to it that the State takes no harm." This decree, on the face of it, does not so much confer fresh powers, as call upon the magistrates to stir up the powers which they already possess. Nevertheless it is felt to make a grave difference in the situation, to bring home to the magistrate the responsibility for defending the commonwealth, and to justify acts which otherwise would be held tyrannous and outrageous. It authorises the consul, as Sallust says,^[60] "to employ every means of compulsion on aliens and Romans alike and to exercise extreme authority inside and outside the city."

As Cicero himself puts the case, the whole dispute resolves itself into the question, was Lentulus a citizen or an enemy? About Catiline who was openly in arms there could be no doubt; but Lentulus had not actually struck a blow: was he to be classed in the same category? There was no doubt on any hand as to the guilt of the accused. They were taken red-handed in the act of corresponding with the enemies of the State, and their own public confession constituted a plea of "Guilty." But how were they to be dealt with? The Law of Caius Gracchus said that no Roman citizen was to be condemned to death without the command of the People. The democratic exposition of that law was that, given a citizen, no amount of treason short of physically appearing in arms against the State could constitute an enemy. The view of the Senate was that a man who from inside the walls co-operated with insurgents was really and truly an enemy, and a more dangerous one because he was posted in ambush. The common-sense answer to the question seems to be that suggested by Cato's speech as reported by Sallust (above p. 147). If the peril from outside had been over, there would have been no public need for the execution of these men, and under those circumstances their rights as citizens would have revived, as they did in fact in the case of the four criminals^[61] who were included in the sentence of the Senate, and who escaped immediate seizure; but while Catiline was still threatening the commonwealth with a dangerous army, his confederates could not justly claim any immunity which conflicted with the public safety. The determining factor in the decision was the prospect of the effect which either course would produce on the operations in the field.

On the ground then of public necessity Cicero would have been justified in putting the Catilinarians to death by his own authority or by the advice of any assessors whom he might select to act with him. But in view of the fact that no case absolutely parallel had occurred since^[62] the Law of Caius Gracchus on which his adversaries mainly relied, he thought it better first to take the advice of the great public council which the constitution had provided for him. This was, strictly speaking, an innovation. The Senate had sometimes condemned rebels by name as public enemies, thereby directly advising the consul to put them to death; but such rebels had always been persons at large and in arms (as Fulvius), or supposed to be in arms (as Caius Gracchus), not prisoners under present detention. The difference however is one of circumstances, not of principle. In either case the decree of the Senate could make no difference in the legal responsibility of the consul. The legal justification of his act was, not that the Senate had ordered it, but that it was necessary for the preservation of the State. He would have been worthy of blame, if in order to carry out this consultation he had dangerously delayed his action. But when the advice of the Senate could be asked without practical inconvenience, it was clearly wise in the consul to obtain it. It was important for the sake of the moral impression to be produced, that the execution should appear, not as an act of violence or panic on the part of the magistrate, but as the deliberate judgment of the supreme council of the State, which had seen the proofs of guilt and heard the confessions of the prisoners. By confirming the action of the consul, the Senate, though it could take no legal responsibility off his shoulders, could yet give him moral support to justify his severity from the charge of cruelty and tyranny.^[63]

Cicero's action throughout seems then to have been both righteous and prudent. He never lost his head though pressed by open enemies without and beset with traitors within the city. He refrained from striking prematurely, but allowed time for Catiline to appear in the rebel camp and for Lentulus to commit himself by overt acts of treason. He made the guilt of the conspirators so manifest, that even Cæsar was obliged to concur in the verdict of "Guilty," and to sanction it by proposing an alternative sentence as on convicted criminals. He baffled all attempts within the city by his vigilance, and finally blasted the hopes of Catiline by the execution of his confederates. He acted throughout with the calmness and indifference to personal danger proper to the chief magistrate of the Imperial State. He carried the Senate and people with him at each step, and so when the crisis came he could adopt the stern measures which led up surely to success, and yet at the same time could avoid any division in the government and enable it to present an united front to the enemy. There appears not a single false step to mark from the day when Cicero detached his fellow-consul from Catiline to the day when he broke the back of a formidable conspiracy by the death of five most guilty persons.

Cicero was a man of mild temper and of constitutional timidity, but of honest heart and sincere purpose. On this occasion, in the presence of danger and under the stimulus of great responsibilities, he rose above himself and exhibited unexpected resources of strength and courage. Transformed by the exigencies of his duty into a man of action, he played his part with coolness, with vigour, and with marked practical success. His own conscience fully approved the deed. Nowhere, even in periods of the darkest depression and suffering, when all the world seems to have turned against him, do we find the least hint of a doubt that he has been in very truth the saviour of his country; nor do the personal misfortunes which his act entailed upon him ever lead him to regret the act itself. "For these two mighty generals," he writes^[64] of Cæsar and Pompey at the beginning of the Civil War, "so far from setting their achievements above my own, I would not change my battered fortunes for theirs which seem so glorious. For what man can be happy when his country is enslaved by him or deserted by him? . . . I am sustained by the proud reflection that, when I had the power, I did the State good service, or at any rate never had an intention that was not loyal, and that the Republic has foundered in the very storm which I foresaw fourteen years ago. I take this approving conscience with me as a companion in my flight."

---

1. Plutarch, Sulla, 32, 2.
2. Ad Att., i., 1, 1, "si judicatum erit meridie non lucere."
3. De Pet. Cons., 3, 10.
4. Sallust, Cat. 31, 9.
5. Sallust, Cat, 37, 6.
6. Sallust, Cat., 37, 5.
7. Sallust, Cat., 17, 4.
8. Sallust, Cat., 28, 4.
9. See above, pp. 14 and 28.
10. Their plan for holding Pompey in check was in keeping with the folly of the whole movement; they dreamed of pouncing on Pompey's children and having them for hostages.—See Plutarch, Cic., 18, 1.
11. Suet., Jul., 17.
12. Cæsar, Bell. Civ., 1, 5.
13. Ad Att., i., 14, 3.
14. Plutarch, Cic., 14, 2.
15. Pro Mur., 25, 51.
16. Cicero, Cat., i., 3, 7.
17. The precise date (October 22d) of the ultimum Senurns Consultum is fixed by the note of Asconius on Cicero's In Pisonem.
18. Cicero, Cat., i., 3, 7. This is perhaps the occasion on which, as Plutarch (Cic., 15, 1) asserts, Crassus brought to Cicero a number of letters which had been left at his house, warning him and other senators to keep out of the way. The story closely resembles that of the letter to Lord Monteagle about the Gunpowder Plot.
19. Cicero, Cat., i., 3, 8.
20. Cicero, Cat., i., 8, 19.
21. Cicero, Cat., i., 12, 30.
22. Cicero, Cat., i., 2, 5.
23. Cicero, Cat., i., 8, 20.
24. Cicero, Cat., i., 9, 23.
25. Cicero, Cat., i., 10, 25.
26. Cicero, Cat., ii., 1, 1.
27. Cicero, Cat., ii., 1, 1.
28. Cicero, Cat., ii., 12, 27.
29. Sallust, Cat., 36, 5.
30. Some extracts from the Pro Murena will be found above, pp. 94-98.
31. Cicero, Cat., iii., 2, 5.
32. Cicero, Cat., iii., 5, 10.
33. Pro Sulla, 14, 41.
34. Cicero, Cat., iii., 6, 14.
35. Cicero, Cat., iii., 7, 16.
36. Cicero, Cat., iii., 12, 29.
37. Cicero, Cat., iv., 5, 10.
38. Cicero, Cat., iv., 7, 14.
39. Ad Att., ii., 1, 7.
40. Plutarch, Cato Minor, 23, 3.
41. Plutarch, Cic., 21, 2. Dio Cassius, xxxvii., 35, 4.
42. Ad Att., xii., 21.
43. Appian, Bell. Civ., ii., 5 and 6; see below pp. 141 and 148.
44. Sallust, Cat., 51.
45. I assume that the "penal servitude" of later Roman law (by which a man undoubtedly lost his "caput") had not yet been invented, and that the "citizenship" and" liberty" of the prisoners would be technically intact, just as they were in the case of the insolvent debtor who was handed over to work in chains for his creditor (see Ortolan's Institutes of Justinian, iii., § 2027, n.). In this case the sentence would not be technically a "capital" one but might be regarded as detention indefinitely prolonged. Mommsen (Staats-Recht, iii., p. 1250, n. 1) holds on the contrary that perpetual imprisonment is really a death-sentence indefinitely suspended by way of grace. If however this is what Cæsar proposed, how could he with any plausibility afterwards declare his opinion (see below, p. 230), that the death-sentence had been illegal?
46. Plutarch, Cato Minor, 22, 5.
47. Plutarch, Cic., 21, 2.
48. Suetonius, Jul., 14.
49. Cicero, Cat., iv., 3, 6.
50. I.e., Caius Gracchus.
51. Plutarch, Cato Minor, 23, 1.
52. Sallust, Cat., 52, 3.
53. Sallust, Cat., 52, 17.
54. Sallust, Cat., 50, 4. That Nero's proposal came last of all is proved (in contradiction of Appian) by Cicero's statement (Ad Att., xii., 21, 1) that "all who spoke before Cato, excepting Cæsar, had spoken for death."
55. Ad Att., xii., 21, 1.
56. Plutarch, Cic., 22, 3.
57. "A brutal judicial murder" is Mommsen's expression in his Roman History. In his more recent work, the Staats-Recht (vol. iii., p. 1246), Mommsen takes a much more moderate view, holding that the Senatus consultum ultimum did really and legally justify the consul in treating all conspiring citizens as enemies caught on Roman territory; he now seems to blame Cicero only for consulting the Senate, instead of putting the prisoners to death on his own responsibility.
58. See Dicey, Law of the Constitution, Lecture vii.
59. Stephen, History of Criminal Law, p. 214.
60. Sallust, Cat., 29.
61. Sallust, Cat., 50, 4. The fate of these men is not expressly mentioned, but we should certainly have heard if they had been put to death. They probably were summoned before the prætor, but acknowledged their guilt by retiring into exile (as Verres did) without waiting for the verdict of a jury.
62. The precedent of the execution of the Bacchanalian conspirators. In 186 B.C. (see Livy, xxxix., 14, et seq.), as being previous to the Sempronian Law, probably went for nothing. At any rate Cicero never refers to it.
63. Cicero sometimes does injustice to his own case by yielding (as most orators are liable to yield) to the temptation of proving too much. In the process of refuting the charge of cruelty (as he is fully entitled to do) by alleging the concurrence of the Senate, he is led on to use expressions which seem to evade his own legal responsibility for the decision (e.g. In Pis., 7, 14). That Cicero, nevertheless, really strengthened his cause by this consultation seems to have been recognised by his adversaries; for they found it worth their while to assert that Cicero had forged the Senatus Consultum. This absurd invention found a place in the preamble of Clodius' decree of banishment (Pro Domo, 19, 59).
64. Ad Att., x., 4, 4.