10 April 44 BCE: To Atticus (at Rome) from Cicero (at Lanuvium)
Cicero would really like to know what's going on in Rome, please!
You don’t really think I’m hearing news at Lanuvium, do you? But I suspect you over there hear something new every day. This business is ready to burst. For when Matius is like this, what do you think the rest are like? For my part, I grieve that—as has never before happened in any state—the republic has not been restored alongside liberty. It’s horrible—how they talk, how they threaten. And I fear a war in Gaul as well, and even where Sextus may escape to.1
But while all these things rush together around us, the Ides of March offer consolation. Moreover, our heroes did everything that could be done themselves, gloriously and magnificently; the matters that remain require money and men—which we have none of.
That’s all I have for you. You, meanwhile, if you have any news (for I expect there is some every day), send it to me at once, and if there’s no news, let us keep to our custom anyway, and allow no interruption in our little letter exchange. I at least will not be the one to start it.
Read Ad Atticum 14.4 in Latin here | Check the glossary here
Since 45 BCE, Sextus Pompey had continued to oppose Caesar and his commanders in Spain, with an army he had raised himself.