This took place when Cicero was standing for the Prætorship, and the confusion consequent upon it was so great that it was for awhile impossible to carry on the election. In the year after his Prætorship Cornelius was put upon his trial, and the two speeches were made.
The matter seems to have been one of vital interest in Rome. The contest on the part of the Senate was for all that made public life dear to such a body. Not to bribe--not to be able to lay out money in order that money might be returned ten-fold, a hundred-fold--would be to them to cease to be aristocrats. The struggles made by the Gracchi, by Livius Drusus, by others whose names would only encumber us here, by this Cornelius, were the expiring efforts of those who really desired an honest Republic. Such were the struggles made by Cicero himself; though there was present always to him an idea, with which, in truth, neither the demagogues nor the aristocrats sympathized, that the reform could be effected, not by depriving the Senate of its power, but by teaching the Senate to use it honestly. We can sympathize with the idea, but we are driven to acknowledge that it was futile.
Though we know that this was so, the fragments of the speeches, though they have been made intelligible to us by the "argument" or story of them prefixed by Asconius in his notes, cannot be of interest to readers. They were extant in the time of Quintilian, who speaks of them with the highest praise.[146] Cicero himself selects certain passages out of these speeches as examples of eloquence or rhythm,[147] thus showing the labor with which he composed them, polishing them by the exercise of his ear as well as by that of his intellect. We know from Asconius that this trial was regarded at the time as one of vital interest.
We have two letters from Cicero written in the year after his Prætorship, both to Atticus, the first of which tells us of his probable competition for the Consulship; the second informs his friend that a son is born to him--he being then forty-two years old--and that he is thinking to undertake the defence of Catiline, who was to be accused of peculation as Proprætor in Africa. "Should he be acquitted," says Cicero, "I should hope to have him on my side in the matter of my canvass. If he should be convicted, I shall be able to bear that too." There were to be six or seven candidates, of whom two, of course, would be chosen. It would be much to Cicero "to run," as our phrase goes, with the one who among his competitors would be the most likely to succeed. Catiline, in spite of his then notorious character--in the teeth of the evils of his government in Africa--was, from his birth, his connections, and from his ability, supposed to have the best chance. It was open to Cicero to defend Catiline as he had defended Fonteius, and we know from his own words that he thought of doing so. But he did not; nor did Cicero join himself with Catiline in the canvassing. It is probable that the nature of Catiline's character and intentions were now becoming clearer from day to day. Catiline was tried and acquitted, having, it is said, bribed the judges.