In that year Sulpicius perished, and in the next, three of our greatest orators, Quintus Catulus, Marcus Antonius, and Caius Julius, were cruelly killed." This was the time of the civil war between Marius and Sulla. "In the same year I took lessons from Molo the Rhodian, a great pleader and master of the art." In the next chapter he tells us that he passed his time also with Diodatus the Stoic, who afterward lived with him, and died in his house. Here we have an authentic description of the manner in which Cicero passed his time as a youth at Rome, and one we can reduce probably to absolute truth by lessening the superlatives. Nothing in it, however, is more remarkable than the confession that, while his young intellect rejoiced in the subtle argumentation of the Greek philosophers, his clear common sense quarrelled with their inability to reach any positive conclusion. But before these days of real study had come upon him he had given himself up to juvenile poetry. He is said to have written a poem called Pontius Glaucus when he was fourteen years old. This was no doubt a translation from the Greek, as were most of the poems that he wrote, and many portions of his prose treatises.[35] Plutarch tells us that the poem was extant in his time, and declares that, "in process of time, when he had studied this art with greater application, he was looked upon as the best poet, as well as the greatest orator in Rome." The English translators of Plutarch tell us that their author was an indifferent judge of Latin poetry, and allege as proof of this that he praised Cicero as a poet, a praise which he gave "contrary to the opinion of Juvenal." But Juvenal has given no opinion of Cicero's poetry, having simply quoted one unfortunate line noted for its egotism, and declared that Cicero would never have had his head cut off had his philippics been of the same nature.[36] The evidence of Quintus Mucius Scævola as to Cicero's poetry was perhaps better, as he had the means, at any rate, of reading it. He believed that the Marius, a poem written by Cicero in praise of his great fellow-townsman, would live to posterity forever. The story of the old man's prophecy comes to us, no doubt, from Cicero himself, and is put into the mouth of his brother;[37] but had it been untrue it would have been contradicted.