At this time he wrote to his friend Atticus various letters full of agonizing doubts as to what was demanded from him by his duty to his country, by his friendship for Pompey, by loyalty to his party, and by his own dignity.
As to a passage in one of those, Mr.Froude says "that Cicero had lately spoken of Caesar's continuance in life as a disgrace to the State." "It has been seen also that he had long thought of assassination as the readiest means of ending it,"[1] says Mr.Froude.The "It has been seen" refers to a statement made a few pages earlier, in which he translates certain words written by Cicero to Atticus.[2] "He considered it a disgrace to them that Caesar was alive." That is his translation; and in his indignation he puts other words, as it were, into the mouth of his literary brother of two thousand years before.

"Why did not somebody kill him ?" The Latin words themselves are added in a note, "Cum vivere ipsum turpe sit nobis."[3] Hot indignation has so carried the translator away that he has missed the very sense of Cicero's language.

"When even to draw the breath of life at such a time is a disgrace to us!" That is what Cicero meant.

Mr.Froude in a preceding passage gives us another passage from a letter to Atticus,[4] "Caesar was mortal."[5] So much is an intended translation.

Then Mr.Froude tells us how Cicero had "hailed Caesar's eventual murder with rapture;" and goes on to say, "We read the words with sorrow and yet with pity." But Cicero had never dreamed of Caesar's murder.