It was in seeing this, and yet not quite believing that it must be so, that the agony of Cicero's life consisted.

There could have been no hope for freedom, no hope for the Republic, when Rome had been governed as it was during the Consulship of Caesar; but Cicero could still hope, though faintly, and still buoy himself up with remembrances of his own year of office.
In carrying on the story of the newly-adopted child to his election as Tribune, I have gone beyond the time of my narration, so that the reader may understand the cause and nature and effect of the anger which Clodius entertained for Cicero.

This originated in the bitter words spoken as to the profanation of the Bona Dea, and led to the means for achieving Cicero's exile and other untoward passages of his life.

In the year 60 B.C., when Metellus Celer and Afranius were Consuls, Clodius was tried for insulting the Bona Dea, and the since so-called Triumvirate was instituted.

It has already been shown that Cicero, not without many doubts, rejected the first offers which were made to him to join the forces that were so united.