Book 17
1
Marcus Cicero in his speech For Marcus Caelius §6. writes as follows: As to the charge made against his chastity and published by all his accusers, not in the form of actual charges, but of gossip and calumnies, Marcus Caelius will never take that so much to heart, as to repent that he was not born ugly. They think that Cicero has not used the proper word in saying paeniteat, or repent, and they go so far as to add that it is almost absurd; for, they say, we regularly use paenitere when things which we ourselves have done, or which have been done in accordance with our wish and design, later begin to displease us and we change our opinion about them. But that no one correctly says that he repents being born or repents being mortal, or because he feels pain from any chance injury or wound inflicted upon his body; for in such cases there is no design or choice on our part, but such things happen to us against our will by some necessity or force of nature. In the same way, they continue, it was not a matter of choice with Marcus Caelius with what person he was born; yet he says that ' he did not repent this,' as if there were in that circumstance ground for a feeling of repentance.
