to, of which something of the story has been told; the Philippics
of which I have got to speak are fourteen in number, making the total
number of speeches which we possess to be fifty-six. But of those spoken
by him we have not a half, and of those which we possess some have been
declared by the great critics to be absolutely spurious. The great
critics have perhaps been too hard upon them: they have all been
polished. Cicero himself was so anxious for his future fame that he led
the way in preparing them for the press. Quintilian tells us that Tiro
adapted them.[165] Others again have come after him and have retouched
them, sometimes, no doubt, making them smoother, and striking out
morsels which would naturally become unintelligible to later readers. We
know what he himself did to the Milo. Others subsequently may have
received rougher usage, but still from loving hands. Bits have been
lost, and other bits interpolated, and in this way have come to us the
speeches which we possess. But we know enough of the history of the
times, and are sufficient judges of the language, to accept them as upon
the whole authentic. The great critic, when he comes upon a passage
against which his very soul recoils, on the score of its halting
Latinity, rises up in his wrath and tears the oration to tatters, till
he will have none of it. One set of objectionable words he encounters
after another, till the whole seems to him to be damnable, and the
oration is condemned. It has been well to allude to this, because in
dealing with these orations it is necessary to point out that every word
cannot be accepted as having been spoken as we find it printed. Taken
collectively, we may accept them as a stupendous monument of human
eloquence and human perseverance.

[Sidenote: B.C. 45, aetat. 62.]

Late in the year, on the 12th before the calends of January, or the 21st
of December, there took place a little party at Puteoli, the account of
which interests us. Cicero entertained Caesar at supper. Though the date
is given as above, and though December had originally been intended to
signify, as it does with us, a winter month, the year, from want of
proper knowledge, had run itself out of order, and the period was now
that of October. The amendment of the calendar, which was made under
Caesar's auspices, had not as yet been brought into use, and we must
understand that October, the most delightful month of the year, was the
period in question. Cice