e him that there were reasons, which he could not disclose in a
letter[182]. The true reasons, however, did appear in some later letters.
In one Cicero said: "I am in favour of Varro, and the more so because he
wishes it, but you know he is

[Greek: deinos aner, tacha ken kai anaition aitiooito.]

So there often flits before me a vision of his face, as he grumbles, it may
be, that my part in the treatise is more liberally sustained than his; a
charge which you will perceive to be untrue[183]." Cicero, then, feared
Varro's temper, and perhaps his knowledge and real critical fastidiousness.
Before these explanations Atticus had concluded that Cicero was afraid of
the effect the work might produce on the public. This notion Cicero assured
him to be wrong; the only cause for his vacillation was his doubt as to how
Varro would receive the dedication[184]. Atticus would seem to have
repeatedly communicated with Varro, and to have assured Cicero that there
was no cause for fear; but the latter refused to take a general assurance,
and anxiously asked for a detailed account of the reasons from which it
proceeded[185]. In order to stimulate his friend, Atticus affirmed that
Varro was jealous of some to whom Cicero had shown more favour[186]. We
find Cicero eagerly asking for more information, on this point: was it
Brutus of whom Varro was jealous? It seems strange that Cicero should not
have entered into correspondence with Varro himself. Etiquette seems to
have required that the recipient of a dedication should be assumed ignorant
of the intentions of the donor till they were on the point of being
actually carried out. Thus although Cicero saw Brutus frequently while at
Tusculum, he apparently did not speak to him about the _De Finibus_, but
employed Atticus to ascertain his feeling about the dedication[187].

Cicero's own judgment about the completed second edition of the _Academica_
is often given in the letters. He tells us that it extended, on the whole,
to greater length than the first, though much had been omitted; he adds,
"Unless human self love deceives me, the books have been so finished that
the Greeks themselves have nothing in the same department of literature to
approach them.... This edition will be more brilliant, more terse, and
altogether better than the last[188]." Again: "The Antiochean portion has
all the point of Antiochus combined with any polish my style may
possess[189]." Also: "I have finished the boo