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Epistulae ad Familiares, V. vi.

of the plebs, and all the others to whom you had written, to believe me rather than your letters. Anyhow the whole business has been postponed till the month of January, but we find no difficulty in holding our own.

2 Roused by your congratulations—for you wrote to me some time ago, wishing me luck on having bought a house from Crassus—I have now bought that very house for three thousand five hundred sestertia,[1] a considerable time after you congratulated me on having done so. The consequence is that I must tell you I am so heavily in debt, that I am eager to join a conspiracy, if anybody would let me in; but while some exclude me because they hate me, and indeed make no secret of their hatred of the man who crushed the other conspiracy,[2] others distrust me and fear that I am trying to circumvent them, and do not believe that one who has released the money-lenders from a blockade can possibly be short of money. As a matter of fact there is plenty of money to be got at six per cent. Speaking for myself, my achievements have secured me one advantage—I am looked upon as "a good name.[3]"

3 I have inspected your own house, too, and its whole design, and it has pleased me very much.

4 As for Antonius,[4] though everybody remarks the cessation of his services to me, it did not prevent my defending him in the Senate with much earnestness and assiduity, and I greatly impressed the Senate with my address and the weight of my personality.

5 I should be glad if you would write to me more frequently.

  1. ↑ 3,500,000 sesterces; a huge sum, not less that £30,000.
  2. ↑ The Catilinarian, the object of which was, as Cicero always maintained, to evade the payment of debts. The money-lenders therefore had reason to be grateful to him.
  3. ↑ "A good debt."
  4. ↑ C. Antonius. See Ep. v.
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