ould withdraw and renounce the new monarchy,
was at least the natural and so far the truest expression of their
desperate position. The mountains and above all the sea had been
in those times ever since the memory of man the asylum not only
of all crime, but also of intolerable misery and of oppressed right;
it was natural for Pompeians and republicans to wage a defiant war
against the monarchy of Caesar, which had ejected them,
in the mountains and on the seas, and especially natural for them
to take up piracy on a greater scale, with more compact organization,
and with more definite aims. Even after the recall of the squadrons
that had come from the east they still possessed a very considerable
fleet of their own, while Caesar was as yet virtually without
vessels of war; and their connection with the Dalmatae who had risen
in their own interest against Caesar,(38) and their control
over the most important seas and seaports, presented the most
advantageous prospects for a naval war, especially on a small scale.
As formerly Sulla's hunting out of the democrats had ended
in the Sertorian insurrection, which was a conflict first waged
by pirates and then by robbers and ultimately became a very serious war,
so possibly, if there was in the Catonian aristocracy or among
the adherents of Pompeius as much spirit and fire as in the Marian
democracy, and if there was found among them a true sea-king,
a commonwealth independent of the monarchy of Caesar and perhaps a match
for it might arise on the still unconquered sea.

Parthian Alliance

Far more serious disapproval in every respect is due to the idea
of dragging an independent neighbouring state into the Roman civil war
and of bringing about by its means a counter-revolution;
law and conscience condemn the deserter more severely than the robber,
and a victorious band of robbers finds its way back to a free
and well-ordered commonwealth more easily than the emigrants who are
conducted back by the public foe. Besides it was scarcely probable
that the beaten party would be able to effect a restoration in this way.
The only state, from which they could attempt to seek support,
was that of the Parthians; and as to this it was at least doubtful
whether it would make their cause its own, and very improbable
that it would fight out that cause against Caesar.

The time for republican conspiracies had not yet come.

Caesar Pursues Pompeius to Egypt

While the remnant of the