Pliny Natural History, Vol. I (Loeb Latin-English)

those who dedicate to others. Then I could say: "Why do you read these things, Emperor? They were written for the common crowd, for farmers, for the mass of craftsmen, and finally for those who have leisure for their studies: why do you make yourself a judge?" When I was planning this work, you were not on this list: I knew you were too great for me to think you would descend to this! Furthermore, there is a certain public rejection even by scholars: Marcus Tullius [Cicero] used it, though he was placed beyond any risk of his genius being doubted, and (which we may wonder at) he is defended by an advocate:

But if Lucilius, who was the first to sharpen the edge of satire, thought he should say this, and Cicero thought it should be borrowed, especially when writing about the Republic, how much more reasonably do we defend ourselves against any judge? But I have now removed these excuses from myself by the dedication, since it makes a great difference whether one chooses a judge or has one assigned by lot, and there is a great difference in the preparation between an invited guest and one who is thrust upon you. When candidates, while elections were raging, deposited money with Cato—that enemy of bribery who delighted in defeats as if they were unearned honors—it was a claim of innocence.

a. Cicero, De Oratore 2.25. As Lucilius used to say, he wanted his writings read neither by the very unlearned nor by the most learned, as the former would understand nothing, and the latter perhaps more than he did himself; therefore he wrote: "I do not care if Persius reads me" (for he was, as we knew, the most learned of all our men), "I want Laelius Decimus" (whom we knew as a good man and not illiterate, but not a Persius).