epealed. For if no one vetoes it, what course can be safer? But if
anyone is found to prohibit its passing, he will be equally able to veto
a decree of the senate. Nor is there need for the repeal of anything
else. For the previous law did not touch me: and if, on its publication,
I had chosen to speak in its favour, or to ignore it, as it ought to
have been ignored, it could not have done me any harm at all.[338] It
was at this point first that my judgment failed to assist me, nay, even
did me harm. Blind, blind, I say, was I in laying aside my senator's
toga, and in entreating the people; it was a fatal step to take before
some attack had been begun upon me by name.[339] But I am harping on the
past: it is, however, for the purpose of advising you, if any action is
to be taken, not to touch that law, in which there are many provisions
in the interests of the people. But it is foolish for me to be laying
down rules as to what you are to do and how. I only wish that something
may be done! And it is on that point that your letter displays much
reserve: I presume, to prevent my being too much agitated by despair.
For what action do you see possible to be taken, or in what way? Through
the senate? But you yourself told me that Clodius had fixed upon the
doorpost of the senate-house a certain clause in the law, "that it might
neither be put to the house nor mentioned."[340] How could
Domitius,[341] therefore, say that he would bring it before the house?
How came it about also that Clodius held his tongue, when those you
mention in your letter both spoke on the subject and demanded that a
motion should be brought in? But if you go to the people--can it be
carried except with the unanimous approval of the tribunes? What about
my property? What about my house? Will it be possible to have it
restored? Or, if that cannot, how can I be? Unless you see these
difficulties on the way to be solved, what is the hope to which you
invite me? But if, again, there is no hope, what sort of life is there
for me? So I await at Thessalonica the gazette of the proceedings of the
1st of August, in accordance with which I shall decide whether to take
refuge on your estate, in order at once to avoid seeing people I don't
want to see, to see you, according to your letter, and to be nearer at
hand in case of any motion being made (and this I understand is in
accordance with your view and that of my brother Quintus), or to depart
for Cyzicus. Now, my