in a narrower circle than ever; but I think in a larger. When I look back on what is past, I observe a multitude of errours, but no crimes. I have been far from following the advice which Cælius gave to Cicero; Id melius statuere quod tutius sit: and I think, may say to myself what Dolabella says in one of his letters to the same Cicero: Satisfactum est jam a te, vel officio, vel familiaritati: satisfactum etiam partibus, et ei reipublicæ, quam tu probabas. Reliquum est, ubi nunc est respublica: ibi simus potius, quàm, dum illam veterem sequamur, simus in nullâ. What my memory has furnished on this head (for I have neither books nor papers here concerning home affairs) is writ with great truth, and with as much clearness as I could give it. If ever we meet, you will, perhaps, not think two or three hours absolutely thrown away in reading it. One thing I will venture to assure you of beforehand, which is, that you will think I never deserved more to be commended, than while I was the most blamed; and, that you will pronounce the brightest part of my character to be that, which has been disguised by the nature of things, misrepresented by the malice of men, and which is still behind a cloud. In what is past, therefore, I find no great source of uneasiness. As to the present, my fortune is extremely reduced; but my desires are still more so. Nothing is more certain than this truth, that all our wants, beyond those which a very moderate income will supply, are purely imaginary; and that his happiness is greater, and better assured, who brings his mind up to a temper of not feeling them, than his who feels them, and has wherewithal to supply them.
