Let us return for an instant, in
conclusion, to that famous letter, already quoted, in which Cicero
describes the entertainment of Caesar at Cumae in December, 45.
It contains an expression which has given rise to very mistaken
conclusions both about Caesar's own habits and those of his day. After
telling Atticus that his guest sat down to dinner when the bath was
over he goes on: "[Greek: Emetikaen] agebat; itaque et edit et bibit
[Greek: adeos] et iucunde, opipare sane et apparate, nec id solum, sed
bene cocto
condito, sermone bono, et si quaeri, libenter."
Even good scholars used formerly to make the mistake of supposing that
Caesar, a man habitually abstemious, or at least temperate, had made
up his mind to over-eat himself on this occasion, as he was intending
to take an emetic afterwards. And even now it may be as well to point
out that medical treatment by a course of emetics was a perfectly well
known and valued method at this time;[453] that Caesar, whose health
was always delicate, and at this time severely tried, was then under
this treatment, and could therefore eat his dinner comfortably,
without troubling himself about what he ate and drank: and that the
apt quotation from Lucilius, and the literary conversation which (so
Cicero adds) followed the dinner, prove beyond all question that this
was no glutton's meal, but one of that ordinary and rational type, in
which repose and pleasant intercourse counted for more than the mere
eating and drinking.
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