Cicero

At once, then, Antony was highly elated, and all men were fearful that he would make himself sole ruler, and Cicero most fearful of all. For Antony saw that Cicero’s power in the state was reviving, and knew that he was attached to Brutus and his party, and was therefore disturbed at his presence in the city. And besides, they had previously been somewhat suspicious of one another because of the marked difference in their lives.

Fearing these things Cicero at first was inclined to sail to Syria with Dolabella, as his legate; but the consuls elect to succeed Antony,[*](In 43 B.C.) Hirtius and Pansa, who were good men and admirers of Cicero, begged him not to desert them, and undertook to put down Antony if Cicero would remain at Rome. So Cicero, who neither distrusted nor trusted them altogether, let Dolabella go without him, and after agreeing with Hirtius and Pansa to spend the summer at Athens, and to come back again when they had assumed office, set off by himself.

But there was some delay about his voyage, and, as is often the case, new and unexpected reports came from Rome, to the effect that Antony had undergone a wonderful change and was doing and administering everything to please the senate, and that matters needed only Cicero’s presence to assume the best possible complexion; he therefore blamed himself for his excessive caution and turned back again to Rome.

And in his first expectations he was not disappointed; for a great crowd of people, moved with joy and longing for him, poured forth to meet him, and almost a day’s time was consumed in the friendly greetings given him at the gates and as he entered the city. On the following day, however, when Antony convened the senate and invited him to be present, Cicero did not come, but kept his bed, pretending to be indisposed from fatigue.

The truth, however, seemed to be that he was afraid of a plot against him, in consequence of some suspicion and of information that had unexpectedly come to him on the road. But Antony was indignant at the implication and sent soldiers with orders to bring Cicero or burn down his house; but since many opposed this course and entreated him to desist, he did so, after merely taking sureties.

And thenceforward they kept up this attitude, quietly ignoring one another and mutually on their guard, until the young Caesar came from Apollonia,[*](Where he was studying.) assumed the inheritance of the elder Caesar, and engaged in a dispute with Antony concerning the twenty-five million drachmas which Antony was detaining from the estate.[*](Caesar’s widow had made Antony guardian of the estate.)