If anyone says that this desire is morally right, he is mad, for he is approving the death of the laws and liberty and is thinking that their hideous and detestable oppression is glorious. Cicero, De Officiis 3.83 (late October 44 BC) Utterly deplorable! According to Gaius Matius, our problems are insoluble: ‘for if a man of such genius as Caesar could not find a way out, who will find one now?’ In short, he was saying that everything has had it–I am inclined to agree, but he said it with glee… ’ Cicero, Letters to Atticus 14.1.1, in April 44 BC,three weeks after Caesar’s murder After crossing the Rubicon, Caesar moved south with exceptional speed, helped by minimal resistance on his route through Italy. It was not that he was profiting from a continuing coolness between the Italian towns and Rome, as if it had been persisting since the Social Wars of the 80s. Rather, he had prepared his ground. For some while he had been sending funds from Gaul to supporters who were to apply them to local sympathies in Italy, here with a benefaction, there with new buildings.
What do You think about The Classical World (2005)?
