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Updated: May 5, 2025
Atticus's replies are lost; it is said that he was prudent enough, after his friend's unhappy death, to reclaim and destroy them. They would perhaps have told us, in his case, not very much that we care to know beyond what we know already. Rich, luxurious, with elegant tastes and easy morality a true Epicurean, as he boasted himself to be Atticus had nevertheless a kind heart and an open hand.
A Life of Cicero would probably be of great use to us, had fortune spared it; for Nepos knew Cicero well, and had access through Atticus to all his correspondence. At Atticus's request he wrote also a biography of Cato at greater length than the short one which we possess. It has been observed by Merivale that the Romans were specially fitted for biographical writing.
I take basilica to mean the saunterers in a basilica, as we might say "the park" for the company in it, "the exchange" for the brokers in it. I feel certain that Prof. Tyrrell is wrong in ascribing the words sed sunt to a quotation from Atticus's letter. What is wanted is to remove the full stop after sunt.
Some passages in his letters to Atticus might lead us to suspect that, as Disraeli concludes, he was rather a collector than a real lover of art. His appeals to his friend to buy up for him everything and anything, and his surrender of himself entirely to Atticus's judgment in such purchases, do not bespeak a highly critical taste.
Cicero will therefore put up notices in Atticus's various places of business or residence of his intention to appear in due course. It is not only if I had as much leisure as you, but also if I chose to send letters as short as yours usually are, should I easily beat you and be much the more regular in writing.
Like a gust of wind, the unexpected poet might have swept the conversation into his own ether, if at this juncture the doors had not opened to admit a group of well known actors. There was a general exclamation of surprise, special entertainments being almost unknown at Atticus's dinners. The host turned smiling to his guests.
"Though I acknowledge," said I, "that I have listened with pleasure to your Elogies on a very worthy man, for whom I have the warmest esteem, they have led me insensibly to the recollection of our common miseries, which our present conversation was intended to suspend. But I would willingly hear what is Atticus's opinion of Caesar."
Perhaps Cicero's language betrays the warmth of personal admiration, especially as in a later passage of the same dialogue he makes Atticus dissent altogether from his own view. No doubt Atticus's judgment is based on too high a standard, for high finish was impossible in the then state of the language. Still Cato wrote probably in a designedly rude style through his horror of Greek affectation.
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