MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO, only son of the orator and his wife Terentia, was born in 65 B.C. At the age of 17 he served with Pompey in Greece and commanded a squadron of cavalry at the battle of Pharsalus. In 45 he was sent to Athens to study rhetoric and philosophy, but abandoned himself to a life of dis sipation. It was during his stay at Athens that his father dedi cated the de 0 ficiis to him. After the murder of Caesar (44) he attracted the notice of Brutus, by whom he was offered the post of military tribune, in which capacity he rendered good service to the Republican cause. After the battle of Philippi (42), he took refuge with Sextus Pompeius in Sicily, where the remnants of the Republican forces were collected. He took advantage of the amnesty granted by the Treaty of Misenum (39) to return to Rome, where he took no part in public affairs, but resumed his former dissipated habits. In spite of this, he received signal marks of distinction from Octavian, who not only nominated him augur, but accepted him as his colleague in the consulship (3o). He had the satisfaction of carrying out the decree which ordered that all the statues of Antony should be demolished, and thus "the divine justice reserved the completion of Antony's punish ment for the house of Cicero" (Plutarch). He was subsequently appointed proconsul of Asia or Syria, but nothing further is known of his life. In spite of his debauchery, there is no doubt that he was a man of considerable education and no mean soldier, while Brutus, in a letter to his father (Epp. ad Brutum, ii. 3), even goes so far as to say that the son would be capable of at taining the highest honours without borrowing from the father's reputation.