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You were waiting for more Cicero, right? I certainly hope so, because I have an awful lot of Cicero for you right now.
As I've been footnoting more thoroughly, I find more of my commentary ends up in the footnotes. Which isn't necessarily bad, but does make me more away of what the footnotes in my edition do--or don't--include. Some odd glosses or lacks thereof, some useful explanations of people being referred to, some really good comments about when Cicero's argument is working well (or poorly), or when we can hypothesize about what he's responding to in the speeches we don't have.
It is not always clear when he's reporting what's Cicero is claiming, vs. when he's stating something as fact in the actual case, which is a little uncomfortable-making at times. But for my own peace of mind I'll assume that when he uses the term "sluttishness" about Clodia he's talking about how Cicero is trying to portray her.
Frankly, Clodius and Clodia sound like a lot of fun to hang around with. Caelius sounds like a shifty thug. But I always end up a bit prejudiced against the men being defended in these Greek and Roman cases, when the double standard is blatantly on display.
Chapter 36
However, if you'd prefer that I proceed more urbanely, I'll handle you so. I'll remove that severe and nearly rustic old man; then, from these men I'll assume the character of someone else, and especially your youngest brother, who is most urbane in this manner; who loves you the most; who for some cowardice that I don't know of, I believe, and fearing certain abandoned nights, always used to sleep as a little boy with his older sister. Thou shalt consider* him to speak with you:
"Why are you upset, sister? Why are you raging? Why have you started up a clamor with words, making a small matter into a big one? You caught sight of a neighboring young man; that man's fairness and height, features and eyes struck you; you wished to see him more often; you were sometimes at the same garden parties; as a woman of noble source you acquire that man--son of a stingy, tight-fisted family father--with him conquered by your resources. You can't; he kicks you, rejects you, pushes you away, he doesn't think your gifts are grand enough. Turn yourself toward another man. You have gardens by the Tiber, set up precisely in that place where the whole of youth comes for the sake of bathing; there you may choose love affairs daily; why are you bothering this man who spurns you?"
Chapter 37**
Now I come to you, Caelius, in turn, and I take up paternal authority and severity for myself. But I hesitate at the father which I particularly assume, some vehement and harsh Caecilian:***
"For now at last my soul burns, now my heart is heaped up with wrath or with that: O unlucky man, O wicked! (These fathers were cruel as iron.) What should I say, what should I wish? Those things you make with your disgraceful deeds, so that I wish in vain..."
These men are scarcely to be born. Such a father would say,
"Why did you hook up with that neighboring woman? Why did you not flee her well-known attractions?"
"Why^ did you get to know another woman, a stranger? Scatter and squander! For my part, you're allowed. If you do it, it'll hurt, not me. I have enough, so that I may take pleasure in what's left of my life."
Chapter 38
Caelius would respond to this stern and forthright old man that he had left the straight and narrow induced by no passion. What proof? No expenses, no resource-wasting, no money-borrowing. But it was his reputation. How few are able to flee that reputation, especially in such a slanderous state? Do you wonder that his neighbor, that woman, has a bad reputation, whose genuine brother is not able to flee diatribes on his iniquities? Truly that man is thus to a lenient and merciful father of this manner:
"He has broken doors; they will be repaired. He has torn his clothes; they will be mended."^^
Caelius's case is very uncomplicated. For what would there be against a man who can't easily defend himself? Now I say nothing against that woman; but, if there is another woman unlike her who makes herself available to everyone, who always plainly has someone picked out, in whose gardens, house, Baias estate love affairs are conducted by all as they please, who even nurtured young men and made up for a parsimonious father with her own resources; if a widow were living freely, an impudent woman brashly, a wealthy woman effusively, a lusty woman whorishly, then would I think it immodesty, if any man had greeted this woman?^^^
Chapter 39
Someone says: "Therefore, is this your training? Do you manage adolescence thus? Did a father entrust to you and deal with a boy for the sake of this, so that he spends his adolescence in love affairs and in pleasures, and so that you would defend his life and his studies?" Judges, if anyone had this strength of spirit and this capacity for virtue and effort, so that he rejected all pleasures and would complete the whole course of his life in the work of the body and effort of the mind, who did not enjoy rest, not relaxation, not his peers' hobbies, not parties, that he would think nothing should be experienced in life except what has been joined with praise and duty--well, in my opinion, I think he would be endowed or prepared by certain good divinities. I judge that those men of this sort were Camillus, Fabricius, Curius#, and all those who have done such great things as the least of these.
Chapter 40
Truly, these sorts of virtues are scarcely discovered nowadays not only in our current ways but even in books. Even the pages which contained that venerable severity have faded away; and not only among us, who followed this path and plan of life more with deeds than words, but also among the Greeks, the most learned men, to whom it was allowed (when they were not able to act) nevertheless to speak and to write honestly and magnificently, certain other principles sprang up as the ages of Greece passed.
---
* The best translation I could come up with for the mocking use here of the future imperative, which is antiquated and highly formal. The only other time I've seen it was in Livy, when people discuss what the law proclaims about how to treat someone who's done a terrible deed.
** Sadly, fake!Claudius only gets the one paragraph of commentary. Issues of "Just find a better boy!" when it's a murder charge at stake aside, I end up sort of wishing I could read stuff by Clodius himself. Or Clodia. They sound like much more fun than Cicero.
*** That is, a stock figure of the Stern Father from a comedy by Caecilius. The series of 'Why?' questions in the previous section were actually metered lines from one of his plays.
^ This is swapping around between pretending to be specific characters, and actual quotes from plays. It's hard to format.
^^ A quote from Terence, another Roman comedian. (Who tended to crib heavily from the Greeks, but anyway.) Wild young men getting into wacky trouble with conniving courtesans while their fathers mug dramatically in the background were apparently a big thing in said comedies.
^^^ The expected conclusion is that no, Caelius wasn't engaging in "adulterum"--which merely means improper sexual behavior, rather than specifically adultery--because it was with a woman who was already shameless, and thus a commentary only on her morals, not his. Which is a conclusion so face-palmy it says a great deal about Roman society that Cicero expected his entire audience would draw the right conclusion from this setup.
# Furius repelled the Gauls. Fabricius and Curius both fought Pyrrhus. Which is to say, of course kids these days don't measure up to that!
As I've been footnoting more thoroughly, I find more of my commentary ends up in the footnotes. Which isn't necessarily bad, but does make me more away of what the footnotes in my edition do--or don't--include. Some odd glosses or lacks thereof, some useful explanations of people being referred to, some really good comments about when Cicero's argument is working well (or poorly), or when we can hypothesize about what he's responding to in the speeches we don't have.
It is not always clear when he's reporting what's Cicero is claiming, vs. when he's stating something as fact in the actual case, which is a little uncomfortable-making at times. But for my own peace of mind I'll assume that when he uses the term "sluttishness" about Clodia he's talking about how Cicero is trying to portray her.
Frankly, Clodius and Clodia sound like a lot of fun to hang around with. Caelius sounds like a shifty thug. But I always end up a bit prejudiced against the men being defended in these Greek and Roman cases, when the double standard is blatantly on display.
Chapter 36
However, if you'd prefer that I proceed more urbanely, I'll handle you so. I'll remove that severe and nearly rustic old man; then, from these men I'll assume the character of someone else, and especially your youngest brother, who is most urbane in this manner; who loves you the most; who for some cowardice that I don't know of, I believe, and fearing certain abandoned nights, always used to sleep as a little boy with his older sister. Thou shalt consider* him to speak with you:
"Why are you upset, sister? Why are you raging? Why have you started up a clamor with words, making a small matter into a big one? You caught sight of a neighboring young man; that man's fairness and height, features and eyes struck you; you wished to see him more often; you were sometimes at the same garden parties; as a woman of noble source you acquire that man--son of a stingy, tight-fisted family father--with him conquered by your resources. You can't; he kicks you, rejects you, pushes you away, he doesn't think your gifts are grand enough. Turn yourself toward another man. You have gardens by the Tiber, set up precisely in that place where the whole of youth comes for the sake of bathing; there you may choose love affairs daily; why are you bothering this man who spurns you?"
Chapter 37**
Now I come to you, Caelius, in turn, and I take up paternal authority and severity for myself. But I hesitate at the father which I particularly assume, some vehement and harsh Caecilian:***
"For now at last my soul burns, now my heart is heaped up with wrath or with that: O unlucky man, O wicked! (These fathers were cruel as iron.) What should I say, what should I wish? Those things you make with your disgraceful deeds, so that I wish in vain..."
These men are scarcely to be born. Such a father would say,
"Why did you hook up with that neighboring woman? Why did you not flee her well-known attractions?"
"Why^ did you get to know another woman, a stranger? Scatter and squander! For my part, you're allowed. If you do it, it'll hurt, not me. I have enough, so that I may take pleasure in what's left of my life."
Chapter 38
Caelius would respond to this stern and forthright old man that he had left the straight and narrow induced by no passion. What proof? No expenses, no resource-wasting, no money-borrowing. But it was his reputation. How few are able to flee that reputation, especially in such a slanderous state? Do you wonder that his neighbor, that woman, has a bad reputation, whose genuine brother is not able to flee diatribes on his iniquities? Truly that man is thus to a lenient and merciful father of this manner:
"He has broken doors; they will be repaired. He has torn his clothes; they will be mended."^^
Caelius's case is very uncomplicated. For what would there be against a man who can't easily defend himself? Now I say nothing against that woman; but, if there is another woman unlike her who makes herself available to everyone, who always plainly has someone picked out, in whose gardens, house, Baias estate love affairs are conducted by all as they please, who even nurtured young men and made up for a parsimonious father with her own resources; if a widow were living freely, an impudent woman brashly, a wealthy woman effusively, a lusty woman whorishly, then would I think it immodesty, if any man had greeted this woman?^^^
Chapter 39
Someone says: "Therefore, is this your training? Do you manage adolescence thus? Did a father entrust to you and deal with a boy for the sake of this, so that he spends his adolescence in love affairs and in pleasures, and so that you would defend his life and his studies?" Judges, if anyone had this strength of spirit and this capacity for virtue and effort, so that he rejected all pleasures and would complete the whole course of his life in the work of the body and effort of the mind, who did not enjoy rest, not relaxation, not his peers' hobbies, not parties, that he would think nothing should be experienced in life except what has been joined with praise and duty--well, in my opinion, I think he would be endowed or prepared by certain good divinities. I judge that those men of this sort were Camillus, Fabricius, Curius#, and all those who have done such great things as the least of these.
Chapter 40
Truly, these sorts of virtues are scarcely discovered nowadays not only in our current ways but even in books. Even the pages which contained that venerable severity have faded away; and not only among us, who followed this path and plan of life more with deeds than words, but also among the Greeks, the most learned men, to whom it was allowed (when they were not able to act) nevertheless to speak and to write honestly and magnificently, certain other principles sprang up as the ages of Greece passed.
---
* The best translation I could come up with for the mocking use here of the future imperative, which is antiquated and highly formal. The only other time I've seen it was in Livy, when people discuss what the law proclaims about how to treat someone who's done a terrible deed.
** Sadly, fake!Claudius only gets the one paragraph of commentary. Issues of "Just find a better boy!" when it's a murder charge at stake aside, I end up sort of wishing I could read stuff by Clodius himself. Or Clodia. They sound like much more fun than Cicero.
*** That is, a stock figure of the Stern Father from a comedy by Caecilius. The series of 'Why?' questions in the previous section were actually metered lines from one of his plays.
^ This is swapping around between pretending to be specific characters, and actual quotes from plays. It's hard to format.
^^ A quote from Terence, another Roman comedian. (Who tended to crib heavily from the Greeks, but anyway.) Wild young men getting into wacky trouble with conniving courtesans while their fathers mug dramatically in the background were apparently a big thing in said comedies.
^^^ The expected conclusion is that no, Caelius wasn't engaging in "adulterum"--which merely means improper sexual behavior, rather than specifically adultery--because it was with a woman who was already shameless, and thus a commentary only on her morals, not his. Which is a conclusion so face-palmy it says a great deal about Roman society that Cicero expected his entire audience would draw the right conclusion from this setup.
# Furius repelled the Gauls. Fabricius and Curius both fought Pyrrhus. Which is to say, of course kids these days don't measure up to that!