he midst of which he had been born to high
rank, and had achieved the topmost place either by fortune or by merit.
For any heartfelt conviction as to what might be best for his country or
his countrymen, in what way he might most surely use his power for the
good of the citizens generally, we must, I think, look in vain to that
Pompey whom history has handed down to us. But, of all matters which
interested Cicero, the governance of men interested him the most. How
should the great Rome of his day rise to greater power than ever, and
yet be as poor as in the days of her comparative insignificance? How
should Rome be ruled so that Romans might be the masters of the world,
in mental gifts as well as bodily strength, in arts as well as in
arms--as by valor, so by virtue? He, too, was an oligarch by strongest
conviction. His mind could conceive nothing better than Consuls,
Praetors, Censors, Tribunes, and the rest of it; with, however, the
stipulation that the Consuls and the Praetors should be honest men. The
condition was no doubt an impossible one; but this he did not or would
not see. Pompey himself was fairly honest. Up to this time he had shown
no egregious lust for personal power. His hands were clean in the midst
of so much public plunder. He was the leader of the conservative party.
The "Optimates," or "Boni," as Cicero indifferently calls them--meaning,
as we should say, the upper classes, who were minded to stand by their
order--believed in him, though they did not just at that time wish to
confide to him the power which the people gave him. The Senate did not
want another Sulla; and yet it was Sulla who had reinstated the Senate.
The Senate would have hindered Pompey, if it could, from his command
against the pirates, and again from his command against Mithridates. But
he, nevertheless, was naturally their head, as came to be seen plainly
when, seventeen years afterward, Caesar passed the Rubicon, and Cicero in
his heart acknowledged Pompey as his political leader while Pompey
lived. This, I think, was the case to a sad extent, as Pompey was
incapable of that patriotic enthusiasm which Cicero demanded. As we go
on we shall find that the worst episodes in Cicero's political career
were created by his doubting adherence to a leader whom he bitterly felt
to be untrue to himself, and in whom his trust became weaker and weaker
to the end.

Then came Cicero's Praetorship. In the time of Cicero there were eight
Praetors