In personal beauty he was the first of all his countrymen; in vigour of mind indefatigable; liberal to excess; in spirit elevated above the nature and conception of man; in the grandeur of his designs, the celerity of his military operations, and in his cheerful endurance of dangers, exactly resembling Alexander the Great when sober and free from passion.
Food he took for the sustenance of life, not for pleasure. Though he was closely connected in relationship with Caius Marius, and was also son-in-law to Cinna, whose daughter he could by no intimidation be induced to divorce, though Marcus Piso, a man of consular rank, to gratify Sylla, had divorced Annia, who had been wife of Cinna, and though he was only about nineteen years old when Sylla assumed the government of the state, yet the ministers and creatures of Sylla, more than himself, made search for him, in order to kill him; on which he changed his clothes, and, putting on a dress far inferior to his rank, escaped out of the city in the night.
Afterwards, while he was still very young, he was taken by pirates, and during the whole time that he was detained by them, behaved in such a manner, that he became an object both of terror and veneration to them; nor did he ever, by night or by day, take off his shoes or his girdle, for why should so remarkable a circumstance be omitted, though it cannot be told with any grace of style? It would require too much space to speak of all his various and numerous services, or of the conduct of the Roman magistrate, who then governed Asia, and who, through timidity, shrunk from seconding his efforts.
Let what follows be mentioned, as a specimen of the conduct of a man soon to become so great. On the night succeeding the day on which he was ransomed by the public money of several states, which, however, he managed so as to make the pirates give hostages to those states, he collected a squadron of private vessels hastily fitted out, and sailing to the place where the pirates were, dispersed part of their fleet, sunk part, took several of their ships and men, and then, delighted at the success of his nocturnal expedition, returned to his friends.
Having lodged his prisoners in custody, he proceeded to Bithynia, to the proconsul Junius, the governor of Asia, and requested him to give orders for putting the prisoners to death. During this period, Publius Clodius, a man of noble birth, eloquent, and daring, who knew no control for his words or actions but his own will, who fearlessly executed what he wickedly conceived, who bore the infamy of an incestuous commerce with his own sister, and who had been publicly accused of having committed adultery amidst the most solemn religious rites of the Roman people; this man, I say, being actuated by a most violent enmity to Marcus Cicero, for how, indeed, could anything like friendship subsist between characters so dissimilar?
It was Cicero alone, though he was not named in this law, that was meant to be affected by it. Thus a man, who had performed the highest services to the state, received, in return for having saved his country, the penalty of exile. Nor, since the exile and recal of Numidicus, had the banishment of any one excited more regret, or the return more joy.
His house, which had been pulled down with great malice by Clodius, the senate rebuilt with equal magnificence. To praise Cato for his honesty, would be rather derogatory to him than otherwise; but to accuse him of ostentatiously displaying it, would seem but just; for when all the populace of the city, together with the consuls and the senate, poured forth to salute him as he was sailing up the Tiber, he did not disembark to meet them until he arrived at the spot where the treasure was to be landed. This man, in other respects irreproachable, and unstained by dissipation, knew no limits, and imposed no restraint on himself, in his pursuit of wealth and glory.
When he was setting out for Syria, the tribunes of the people strove in vain to detain him, by announcing unfavourable omens; and, had their curses taken effect on him alone, the loss of the general, while the army was safe, would have been rather an advantage to the public. Crassus had crossed the Euphrates, and was on his march towards Seleucia, when king Orodes, surrounding him with an immense force of cavalry, slew him, together with the greater part of the Roman army.
He fought often in pitched battles, often on his march, often made sudden attacks; twice he penetrated into Britain; and of nine campaigns, scarcely one passed without his justly deserving a triumph. But near Alesia such achievements were effected as it was scarcely for man to attempt, and for little less than a deity to accomplish. But he employed the whole power of that consulship in laying restraints on bribery. It was not more the feeling excited against this deed, than the will of Pompey, that caused Milo to be condemned on his trial; though Marcus Cato publicly gave his opinion in favour of his acquittal.
Had he given it sooner, several would, doubtless, have followed his example, and have approved of the sacrifice of such a member of the community, than whom there never lived one more pernicious to the state, or a greater enemy to all good men. Had this man died two years before recourse was had to arms, after he had finished the structures erected at his own expense, his theatre, and the buildings around it, and when he was attacked by a violent disorder in Campania, at which time all Italy offered prayers for his recovery, an honour never before paid to any citizen, fortune would not have had opportunity to work his overthrow, and he would have carried undiminished to the shades below the greatness that he enjoyed in this upper world.
For producing the civil war, and all the calamities that ensued from it, through a space of twenty successive years, there was no one that supplied more flame and excitement than Caius Curio, a tribune of the people. He was of noble birth, eloquent, intrepid, prodigal alike of his own fortune and reputation, and those of others; a man ably wicked, and eloquent to the injury of the public, and whose passions and desires no degree of wealth or gratification could satisfy.
Whether this attachment was the result of his own choice, or the consequence of a bribe of ten thousand sestertia [47] , as has been said, we shall leave undetermined.
Of these and the preceding transactions, the detail is given in the larger volumes of others, and will, I trust, be sufficiently set forth in mine. Let my work now resume its intended character; though I would first congratulate Quintus Catulus, the two Luculli, Metellus, and Hortensius, that after having flourished in the state without envy, and enjoyed great eminence without danger, they died in the course of nature before the commencement of the civil broils, and while the state was still quiet, or at least not tending to its fall.
In the consulship of Lentulus and Marcellus, seven hundred and three years after the foundation of the city, and seventy-eight before the commencement of your consulate, Marcus Vinicius, the civil war blazed forth. The cause of one of the leaders appeared to be the better, that of the other was the stronger. On one side everything was specious, on the other was greater power. The consuls and senate conferred supreme authority, not on Pompey, but on his cause.
Of the consuls, Marcellus was more violent than was reasonable; Lentulus saw that his own security [48] was incompatible with that of the state. Marcus Cato insisted that it were better for them to die, than for the state to listen to offers from a private citizen. Finding that the consuls had sailed, he returned to the city, and having represented in the senate, and in a general assembly of the people, the motives of his proceedings, and the cruel necessity under which he lay, in being compelled to take arms by the hostility of others, he resolved to go into Spain.
His progress, rapid as it was, was for some time retarded by the conduct of Marseilles, which, with more honesty than good policy, unseasonably assumed the arbitration between those great men in arms; a case in which such only ought to interpose as have power to enforce submission to their award.
Both the commanders, and all men of every description who wished to follow them, were permitted to go to Pompey. Scarcity of provisions, however, began to be felt, and more severely by the besiegers than the besieged. Pompey, though his friends advised a very different course, most of them recommending him to transfer the war into Italy; and indeed no movement could have been more beneficial to his party; others persuading him to protract the contest, a plan which, from the increasing popularity of his cause, would daily be more and more productive of good, yet, yielding to his natural impetuosity, marched in pursuit of the enemy.
Forsaken Repose
The day of battle at Pharsalia, so fatal to the name of Rome, the vast effusion of blood on both sides, the two heads of the state meeting in deadly conflict, the extinction of one of the luminaries of the Commonwealth, and the slaughter of so many and so eminent men on the side of Pompey, the limits of this work do not allow me to describe at large. Nothing would have been more admirable, more noble, more illustrious, than this victory, for the nation did not miss one citizen, except those who fell in battle, had not obstinacy defeated the exertions of compassion, as the conqueror granted life more freely than the vanquished received it.
But who, when his benefactor is in adversity, remembers his benefits? Who thinks that any gratitude is due to the unfortunate? Or when does a change of fortune not produce a change in attachments? Men were despatched by the king, at the instigation of Theodotus and Achillas, to meet Pompey on his arrival, who was now accompanied in his flight by his wife Cornelia, having taken her on board at Mitylene, and to desire him to remove from the transportation into a vessel which was come to receive him.
Such was the end of a most upright and excellent man, in the fifty-eighth year of his age, and on the day before his birthday, after three consulships and as many triumphs, after subduing the whole world, and after reaching a degree of exaltation beyond which it is impossible to ascend; fortune having made such a revolution in his condition, that he who lately wanted earth to conquer, could now scarcely find sufficient for a grave. Of those who have made a mistake of five years in the age of this great man, who lived almost in our own times, what can I say but that they have not given due attention to the matter, especially as the succession of years, from the consulship of Atilius and Servilius, was so easy to settle?
This I mention, not to censure others, but to escape censure myself. Pompey was no longer on earth, but his name still had influence everywhere. A strong devotion to his cause excited a formidable war in Africa, conducted by king Juba, and by Scipio, who had been consul, and whom Pompey, two years before his death, had chosen for a father-in-law; their strength being augmented by Marcus Cato, who brought some legions to them, though with the utmost difficulty, by reason of the badness of the roads, and the scarcity of provisions, and who, when the soldiers offered him the supreme command, chose rather to act under a person of superior dignity.
My promise to be brief reminds me with what haste I must pursue my narrative.
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His clemency to the vanquished, on this occasion, was such as he had shown to those whom he had previously defeated. The battle was restored by the effect of shame rather than of courage; and greater efforts were made by the leader than by his men. Labienus and Varius fell in the engagement. He had five triumphs; the figures displayed in that for Gaul were made of citron wood; in that for Pontus, of acanthus wood [51] ; in that for Alexandria, of tortoise-shell [52] ; in that for Africa, of ivory; and in that for Spain, of polished silver. The money arising from the spoils was somewhat more than six hundred thousand sestertia [53].
But this great man, who had used all his victories with so much mercy, was not allowed peaceable possession of supreme power more than five months; for after returning to Rome in the month of October, he was killed on the ides of March by a band of conspirators under Brutus and Cassius; the former of whom, though he had promised him a second consulship, he had not by that means secured to his interest, and the latter he had offended by putting him off to another time.
They had even drawn into their murderous plot Decimus Brutus and Caius Trebonius, the most intimate of all his adherents, men who had been raised to the highest dignity by the success of his party, with several others of great note. The immortal gods had given him many presages and signs of his approaching danger; for the aruspices had forewarned him carefully to beware of the ides of March; his wife Calpurnia, terrified by a vision in the night, besought him to stay at home that day; and he received a paper from one that met him, containing an account of the conspiracy, but which he did not read.
These, with the body of the conspirators, attended by a band of gladiators belonging to Decimus Brutus, seized on the Capitol. On this Mark Antony the consul convened the senate. Then was proposed by Cicero, and approved by a resolution of the senate, the imitation of that famous decree of the Athenians, enacting a general oblivion of the past.
Caius Octavius, his father, was of a family which, though not patrician, was of a highly honourable equestrian rank. He possessed a sound understanding and a virtuous disposition; his conduct was distinguished by probity, and his wealth was great. On his way home to stand for the consulship, he died, leaving a son, who was under the age of manhood. When the news of the murder of his uncle reached him, he received from the centurions of the legions of that neighbourhood an offer of their support, and that of the troops; which Salvidienus and Agrippa advised him not to reject.
On his approach to the city, he was met by immense crowds of his friends; and when he was entering the gate, the orb of the sun over his head was seen regularly curved [55] into a circular arm, and coloured like a rainbow, as if setting a crown on the head of a man who was soon to become so great. Soon after, he spread malicious insinuations that Octavius was plotting against him; the falsehood of which was detected to his disgrace. The madness of the consuls Antony and Dolabella soon burst forth into open acts of abominable tyranny.
Everything had its price, the consul setting the Commonwealth to sale. He even resolved to seize on the province of Gaul, which had been decreed to Decimus Brutus, consul elect; while Dolabella allotted the provinces beyond sea to himself. This charge, he in his twentieth year executed with the greatest bravery in the neighbourhood of Mutina. Decimus Brutus was relieved from a siege; and Antony was forced to quit Italy in disgraceful and solitary flight. One of the consuls, however, fell in the field, and the other died of a wound a few days after.
To Brutus and Cassius were decreed those provinces, which they themselves, without any authority from the senate, had already seized; those who furnished them with troops were commended, and all the foreign settlements were committed to their direction. All these proceedings were recited and approved in decrees of the senate. To Decimus Brutus, because he had escaped with life by the kindness of another, a triumph was even voted. The bodies of Hirtius and Pansa were honoured with a funeral at the public expense. About the time that he entered the camp, Juventius Laterensis, a man whose life was consistent with his death, having earnestly dissuaded Lepidus from joining Antony, who had been proclaimed a rebel, and finding his counsel disregarded, ran himself through with his sword.
Plancus, with his usual duplicity, after long debating in his mind which party he should follow, and with much difficulty forming a resolution, supported for some time Decimus Brutus, who was consul elect, and his own colleague, boasting of acting thus in letters to the senate; but soon after betrayed him.
Asinius Pollio was steadfast in his purpose, faithful to the Julian party, and adverse to that of Pompey. Both these officers made over their troops to Antony. For, though he had been the most intimate of all his friends, he became his murderer, and threw on his benefactor the odium of that fortune of which he had reaped the benefit. It was during these times that Marcus Tullius, in a series of orations, branded the memory of Antony with eternal infamy. He, indeed, assailed Antony in splendid and noble language, but Canutius, a tribune, attacked him with constant abuse.
Their defence of liberty cost both of them their lives; the proscription commenced with the blood of the tribune, and ended with that of Cicero, as if even Antony were satiated with the death of such a man.
Lepidus was then declared an enemy by the senate, as had previously been the case with Antony. He had afterwards also a triumph. But you have gained nothing, Mark Antony, for the indignation bursting from my mind and heart, compels me to say what is at variance with the character of this work, you have gained nothing, I say, by paying the hire for closing those divine lips, and cutting off that noble head, and by procuring, for a fatal reward, the death of a man, once so great as a consul, and the preserver of the Commonwealth.
You deprived Marcus Cicero of a life full of trouble, and of a feeble old age; an existence more unhappy under your ascendancy, than death under your triumvirate; but of the fame and glory of his actions and writings you have been so far from despoiling him that you have even increased it. He lives, and will live in the memory of all succeeding ages. And as long as this body of the universe, whether framed by chance, or by wisdom, or by whatever means, which he, almost alone of the Romans, penetrated with his genius, comprehended in his imagination, and illustrated by his eloquence, shall continue to exist, it will carry the praise of Cicero as its companion in duration.
All posterity will admire his writings against you, and execrate your conduct towards him; and sooner shall the race of man fail in the world, than his name decay. The calamity of this whole period no one can sufficiently deplore; much less can any one find language to express it.
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One thing demands observation, that there prevailed towards the proscribed the utmost fidelity in their wives, a moderate share of it in their freedmen, some portion in their slaves, and in their sons none at all; so intolerable to men is the delay of hope, on whatever grounds it be conceived. Plancus, too, had interest enough to procure a like sentence upon his brother Plotius Plancus. Let us here mention an affair which was omitted in its proper place; for the character of the agent does not allow a screen to be cast over his act. Similar fortune attended Milo in a similar attempt; for while he was besieging Compsa, a town of the Hirpini, he was killed by the stroke of a stone, and paid the penalty of his offences against Publius Clodius, and against his country, on which he was making war.
He was a restless character, and carried his bravery even to rashness. Yet the anger of the prince, though often provoked, went no further than this, that, satisfied with a sentence of disgrace from the censors, instead of the punishment which a dictator might inflict, he banished them from the country, declaring that it was a great unhappiness to him, to be obliged either to depart from his nature, or suffer his dignity to be violated.
But I must return to the course of my narrative. In Asia, Dolabella, having by a stratagem deluded Caius Trebonius, who had been consul, and with whom he was at enmity, had slain him at Smyrna. In Macedonia, Marcus Brutus had drawn over to his side the legions of Caius, the brother of Mark Antony, and those of Vatinius, near Dyrrachium, who willingly joined him.
Antonius he had attacked in the field; Vatinius he had overawed by the dignity of his character; as Brutus was reckoned preferable to any leader of the times, and Vatinius was considered inferior to every one; a man in whom deformity of person vied with depravity of mind, so that his soul seemed lodged in an habitation perfectly adapted to it.
He was seven legions strong. At that time, Capito, my uncle, a man of senatorial rank, seconded Agrippa in the prosecution of Caius Cassius. While these transactions were passing in Italy, Cassius by active and successful operations, had got possession of Rhodes, an enterprise of extreme difficulty. Brutus had subdued the Lycians, and both of them had then marched their armies into Macedonia, while Cassius, on every occasion, acting against his nature, exceeded even Brutus in clemency. You cannot find two men whom fortune more propitiously attended, or whom, as if tired of them, she sooner deserted, than Brutus and Cassius.
No war was ever more stained with the blood of illustrious men. The son of Cato fell in it; and the same fate carried off Lucullus and Hortensius, sons of the most eminent men in the state. Varro, when ready to die, predicted with great freedom of speech, in mockery of Antony, several circumstances respecting his death, which were well suited to his character, and which really came to pass. Livius Drusus, father of Julia Augusta, and Quintilius Varus, did not even try the mercy of the enemy; for Drusus slew himself in his tent; and Varus, after decking himself with all the insignia of his honours, was slain by the hand of a freedman, whom he compelled to be his executioner.
Such was the end assigned by fortune to the party of Marcus Brutus, who was then in his thirty-seventh year, and whose mind had been incorrupt till the day which obscured all his virtues by the rashness of one act. Cassius was as much the better commander, as Brutus was the better man. Of the two, you would rather have Brutus for a friend; as an enemy, you would stand more in dread of Cassius.
In the one there was greater ability, in the other greater virtue. The proscribed, whom fortune had rescued from immediate danger, flocked to him from the camp of Brutus, from Italy, and from other parts of the world; for to those who had no position in the state [62] , any leader appeared sufficient, as Fortune did not give them an option, but merely pointed out a refuge; and to those who are fleeing from a destructive tempest, any anchoring-place serves for a harbour.
Sextus was quite illiterate, and in his language barbarous; but he was of a bold spirit, prompt to act, and quick to judge. He was a freedman among his own freedmen [63] ; a slave to his slaves; envying men of dignity, to become subservient to the meanest. On the other sides, Fulvia the wife of Antony, in whom there was nothing feminine but the form, was throwing everything into confusion and tumult. On the Perusians great severities were inflicted, rather through the violence of the soldiers than with the consent of their commander. The city was burnt; but of this conflagration Macedonicus, one of the principal inhabitants, was the author, who, after setting fire to his house and effects, stabbed himself, and fell amid the flames.
Who can sufficiently wonder at the changes of fortune, and the uncertain vicissitudes of human affairs? Who must not either hope, or fear, some alteration in his present circumstances, or something contrary to what is expected? The testimony which I would give to a stranger, I will not withhold from my own grandfather. Being in Campania, at the departure of Nero from Naples, whose party, through intimate friendship for him, he had supported, and being unable, from the pressure of age and weakness of body to follow him, he run himself through with his own sword.
By this proceeding, whoever forms a fair judgment, must allow that no less benefit was conferred by Pollio on Antony than had be bestowed by Antony on Pollio. About this time, the wicked schemes of Salvidienus Rufus were detected. In this treaty it was resolved to assign Sicily and Achaia to Pompey; but with this his restless mind could not be long content; and the only advantage that his coming produced to his country was, that he stipulated for the recal and safety of all the proscribed, and of others who, for various reasons, had taken refuge with him.
Statius Murcus, who, by joining Pompey with his famous fleet, had doubled his strength, he loaded with false accusations, because Menas and Menecrates had disdained such a man as his colleague, and put him to death in Sicily. At this time Domitius Calvinus, being, on the expiration of his consulship, made governor of Spain, gave an instance of strict discipline, comparable to the usage of old times; for he put to death by the bastinado a centurion of the first rank, named Vibillius, for having shamefully fled in the field of battle.
To build ships, to collect soldiers and seamen, and to train them in naval exercises and evolutions, was the charge of Marcus Agrippa, a man of distinguished courage, proof against toil, watching, and danger; who knew perfectly well how to obey, that is, to obey one; others, he certainly wished to command: Having built a very fine fleet in the Avernian and Lucrine lakes, he brought, by daily practice, both soldiers and seamen to a thorough knowledge of military and naval business. But Fortune, on this occasion, gave a severe shock to him who was invincible by human power; for a storm, arising from the south-west, shattered and dispersed the greater part of his fleet near Velia and the promontory of Palinurus.
For, though he was unarmed and in his cloak, carrying with him nothing but his name, he went into the camp of Lepidus, and avoiding the weapons which were thrown at him by the order of that infamous man, one of which pierced through his mantle, he boldly seized the eagle of a legion. Then might be seen the difference between the commanders. His life, and the disposal of his property, were granted to his entreaties; his dignity, which he was ill qualified to support, was taken from him.
A sudden mutiny then broke out in the army; for when troops consider their own great numbers, they are apt to revolt from discipline, and to scorn to ask what they think themselves able to obtain by force; but it was soon quelled, partly by the firmness, and partly by the liberality of the prince. A grand addition was made at this time to the colony of Capua. Its lands were public property; and, in exchange for these, others, producing revenues of much larger value, to the amount of twelve hundred sestertia [66] , were assigned them in the island of Crete; a promise was also given to them of the acqueduct, which to this day is an exceedingly fine ornament, productive of both health and pleasure.
Agrippa, for his singular services in this war, was rewarded with the distinction of a naval crown, an honour never before conferred on any Roman. For Antony, at the head of thirteen legions, having entered Armenia and Media, and marching through those countries against the Parthians, had to encounter their king in the field. At first he lost two legions, with all their baggage and engines, with Statianus, one of his lieutenant-generals; afterwards, he himself, to the great hazard of the whole army, became often involved in difficulties from which he despaired of escape; and when he had lost no less than a fourth part of his soldiers, he was saved by the advice and fidelity of a captive Roman.
This man had been made a prisoner when the army of Crassus was cut off, but as this change in his condition had produced no alteration in his feelings, he came by night to an outpost of the Romans, and gave them warning not to proceed by the road which they intended, but to make their escape through a woody part of the country. This proved the preservation of Mark Antony and his legions, out of which, however, and the whole army, was lost, as we have said, one fourth part of the soldiers, and one third of the servants and slaves; while of the baggage hardly anything was saved.
Yet Antony called this flight of his, because he escaped from it with life, a victory. In the third year after, having returned into Armenia, and having, by some artifice, got its king Artavasdes into his power, he threw him into chains, which, not to fail in respect for him, he made of gold. But his passion for Cleopatra daily increasing, as well as the strength of those vices which are ever nourished by wealth, licence, and flattery, he determined to make war upon his country.
Previously, however, he had given orders that he should be called the new Father Bacchus; after riding in his chariot, in the character of Bacchus, through the city of Alexandria, with a chaplet of ivy on his head, a golden-coloured robe, a thyrsus in his hand, and buskins on his feet. Titius soon followed the example of this uncle of his. On one side, both the soldiers and the commander were full of energy; on the other, everything showed want of spirit; on the one, the seamen were in full strength; on the other, they were greatly weakened by want of provisions; on the one, the ships were moderate in size and active; on the opposite, more formidable only in appearance.
When the engagement began, there was everything ready on one side, the commander, the seamen, the soldiers; on the other, nothing but the soldiers. Cleopatra first began the flight, and Antony chose rather to be the companion of a flying queen than of a fighting soldiery; and the general, whose duty it had been to punish deserters, became a deserter from his own army. The courage of his men, though deprived of their head, held out a long time in a most determined struggle; despairing of victory, they sought death in the conflict. It was universally allowed, that the soldiery acted the part of an excellent commander, and the commander that of a most dastardly soldier.
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Who can doubt, therefore, whether he who took to flight at the will of Cleopatra, would, in case of success, have regulated his conduct by her will or his own? The army on land submitted in like manner, Canidius having precipitately fled to join Antony. What blessings that day procured to the world, what an improvement it produced in the state of the public welfare, who would attempt to recount in such a hasty narrative as this abridgment?
The victory was attended with the greatest clemency; only a few were put to death; and these were such as would not deign to sue for mercy. From this lenity of the leader, a judgment may be formed of the limits which he would have prescribed to himself in success, had he been allowed, both at the beginning of his triumvirate and in the plains of Philippi. Let us not pass unnoticed the memorable conduct and language of Asinius Pollio.
Antony killed himself courageously enough, so as to compensate by his death for many faults of effeminacy. Cleopatra, eluding the vigilance of her guards, and causing an asp to be brought in to her, put an end to her life by its bite, showing no signs of womanish fear. The cruelty of Antony took off Decimus Brutus; and the same Antony deprived Sextus Pompey of life, though, on conquering him, he had pledged his honour to secure to him even his rank.
Brutus and Cassius died voluntary deaths, without waiting to make trial of the disposition of the conquerors. The end of Antony and Cleopatra I have just related. Canidius died in a more cowardly manner than was consistent with his frequent professions. On this occasion, making not the least stir, but dissembling his knowledge of the matter, he watched the proceedings of this hot-headed young man, and then crushing him with wonderful despatch, and without any disturbance either of men or business, he stifled the direful seeds of a new and fast reviving civil war, the author meeting the punishment due to his criminal purposes.
Here we may produce an instance of conjugal affection parallel to that of Calpurnia, wife of Antistius, whom we have mentioned above [72] ; Servilia, the wife of Lepidus, swallowed burning coals, and thus gained immortal fame as a compensation for a premature death. There is no good which men can desire of the gods, none that the gods can bestow on men, none that can be conceived in wishes, none that can be comprised in perfect good fortune, which Augustus on his return did not realise to the state, to the Roman people, and to the world.
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The principal men, who had enjoyed triumphs and the highest honours, were induced by the encouragement of the prince to add to the decorations of the city. He himself could only be persuaded to accept of the consulship, which he was prevailed upon to hold, though he made many endeavours to prevent it, for eleven years; the dictatorship, which the people resolutely pressed upon him, he as resolutely refused.
A recital of the wars waged under his command, of his victories that gave peace to the world, and of his numerous works both in Italy and abroad, would give full employment to a writer, who should dedicate the whole of his life merely to those subjects. Mindful of our declared purpose, we have laid before our readers only a general view of his administration. When the civil wars were composed, as we have said, and the parts of the state, which a long succession of contests had lacerated, began to coalesce, Dalmatia, which had continued rebellious for two hundred and twenty years, was reduced to make a full acknowledgment of the Roman supremacy.
The Alps, inhabited by fierce and barbarous nations, were entirely subdued. Into this province a Roman army was first sent in the consulship of Scipio and Sempronius Longus, in the first year of the second Punic War, and two hundred and fifty years from the present time, under the command of Scipio, the uncle of Africanus; and a war was maintained there for two hundred years, with so much bloodshed on both sides, that, while Rome lost several armies and generals, the struggle was often attended with dishonour, and sometimes even with danger, to her empire.
This province brought death to the Scipios; this province employed our forefathers in a disgraceful contest of twenty years with the general Viriathus; this province shook Rome itself with the terror of the Numantine war. In this province was made the scandalous treaty of Quintus Pompeius, and the more scandalous one of Mancinus, which the senate rescinded by delivering up that commander with ignominy. Yet there were some who felt dissatisfied with this most happy state of affairs. For it is frequently the case, that a desperate man chooses to fall amidst public ruin, rather than to sink by himself, and desires, if he must perish, to escape notice among a multitude.
But he was not more successful in keeping the secret than the former conspirators; for being thrown into prison, he suffered, with his accomplices, the death best suited to his life. Let us not defraud of due commemoration the very meritorious conduct of an excellent man, Caius Sentius Saturninus, who was consul at this time. Such conduct I think comparable to any of the celebrated acts of the early consuls; but such is our nature, that we more readily bestow praise on action of which we hear, than on those which we see; we view present merit with envy, and past with veneration; thinking ourselves obscured by the one, but stimulated by the other.
He is said to have been a youth of excellent natural qualities, happy in temper and ability, and capable of filling the high station for which he was educated. Not long after, being sent with an army, under a commission also from his stepfather, to inspect and regulate the provinces in the east, he displayed in those countries instances of every kind of virtue; and, having marched his legions into Armenia, and reduced it under the power of the Roman people, he bestowed the government of it, [which had been taken from] Artavasdes [74] , on [Tigranes.
Some time before this, the censorship of Plancus and Paulus was spent in quarrelling with each other, producing neither honour to themselves nor advantage to the public; for one of them wanted the requisite capacity, the other the requisite character, for a censor. Paulus could hardly fill the office; and Plancus ought to have shrunk from it; for he could not charge young men, or hear others charge them, with any crime of which he in his old age was not guilty. The war in Pannonia, which had commenced in the consulate of Agrippa and Marcus Vinicius your grandfather, and which, raging with great fury, threatened Italy with imminent danger, was then conducted by Nero.
The Pannonian nations, the tribes of the Dalmatians, the situations of the countries and rivers, the numbers of their people and the extent of their strength, the numerous and most glorious victories gained in that war by this consummate general, we shall describe in another place. Let this work preserve its character.
In consequence of this success Nero enjoyed the honour of an ovation. But while all things on this side of the empire were conducted with the greatest success, a severe loss was sustained by the troops in Germany, under the command of the lieutenant-general Marcus Lollius, a man who was always more anxious to get money than to discharge his duty, and, while he carefully concealed his vices, was extremely profligate.
The change and management of the German war was then delegated to Claudius Drusus the brother of Nero, a youth of as many and as great virtues as human nature can cherish, or industry acquire; and of whose genius it is doubtful whether it was better adapted for the arts of war or of peace. His sweet and engaging manners, his courteous and unassuming demeanour [75] towards his friends, are said to have been inimitable.
The comeliness of his person approached very near to that of his brother. But, when he had conquered a great part of Germany, after shedding a profusion of the blood of the inhabitants in various parts, the cruelty of the fates snatched him from the world while he was consul, and in the thirtieth year of his age. The burden of the war then devolved on Nero, who executed it with his usual valour and success; and, carrying his victorious arms over every part of Germany, without any loss of the troops committed to his charge, an object always of great solicitude with this commander, he subdued it so effectually as to reduce it nearly to the state of a tributary province.
Another triumph, and another consulship, were in consequence conferred upon him. Of this man, every one must think and acknowledge that his character is a composition of vigour and gentleness, and that it is hard to find any person, either more fond of ease, more ready to undergo the fatigue of business, or more anxious to despatch what is required of him, without any display of activity.
An account of the sentiments of the people on this occasion, of the feelings of individuals, of the tears shed by every one on taking leave of this great man, and how near his country was to insisting on his stay, must be reserved for my history at large. But one thing must be mentioned even in this hasty narration; that he spent seven years at Rhodes in such a manner, that all proconsuls and legates going into the transmarine provinces waited on him there with compliments, lowering their fasces to him always even in his private character, if such majesty was ever private, and acknowledging his retirement more to be respected than their high employments.
The whole world was sensible that Nero had withdrawn from the guardianship of the city. Not only the Parthians, renouncing their alliance of Rome, laid their hands on Armenia; but Germany, when the eyes of its conqueror were turned away, rose up in rebellion. But in the city, in that same year, thirty from the present time, in which the emperor Augustus, being consul with Caninius Gallus, gratified the eyes and minds of the Roman people, on occasion of dedicating a Temple to Mars, with most magnificent spectacles of gladiators and a sea-fight, a calamity disgraceful to mention, and dreadful to call to mind, fell upon his own house.
His daughter Julia, utterly regardless of the dignity of her father and husband, indulged in every excess which a woman can practice or allow at the instigation of luxury and libidinousness, measuring her license to be vicious by the eminence of her station, and pronouncing everything lawful that gratified her desires. Julia was banished to the island [of Pandataria], and thus removed from the sight of her country and her parents; though, indeed, her mother Scribonia accompanied her, and remained a voluntary sharer in her exile.
This noble youth had an interview with the king of the Parthians in an island of the Euphrates, each having an equal number of attendants. This grand and memorable spectacle, of the Roman army standing on one side, and the Parthian on the other, while the most illustrious heads of the greatest empires in the world held their meeting, I had the good fortune to behold, soon after my entrance into the army, being then a military tribune.
This rank I attained, Marcus Vinicius, while serving under your father and Publius Silius in Thrace and Macedonia; and having since seen Achaia, Asia, all the provinces in the east, and the mouth and both shores of the Pontic sea, I now receive much pleasure from the recollection of so many events, places, nations, and cities. The Parthian was first entertained at a banquet by Caius, on our bank; then Caius by the king, on the bank opposite.
Caius then marched into Armenia, and, at the beginning, conducted nearly everything well; but afterwards, in a conference near Artigera, where he had rashly exposed himself, being severely wounded by a man named Adduus, he became, in consequence, less active in body, and mentally less capable of benefiting the public. He had about him, also, a crowd of courtiers, who encouraged his vices by adulation; for flattery is always attendant on high station, and, by this means, he was so far perverted, that he wished to spend his life in the most retired and distant corner of the globe, rather than return to Rome.
However, after many struggles he consented, and having reluctantly set out for Italy, he fell sick and died at a town in Lycia, which they called Limyra. But Fortune, though she had frustrated the hopes entertained of those illustrious names, had already restored to the republic its own peculiar safeguard. For before the death of either, Tiberius Nero coming home from Rhodes, in the consulate of Publius Vicinius, your father, had filled his country with incredible joy. The joy of that day, the concourse of all ranks of men, the prayers offered by people stretching their hands, as it were, up to heaven itself, and the hopes then conceived of perpetual security, and of the eternal duration of the Roman empire, we shall scarcely be able to represent fully in our large work, much less can we attempt to do justice to them here.
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I must be content with observing that he was all in all to every one [77]. Then shone forth to parents a certain hope of security for their children, to husbands of provision for their wives, to landowners of retaining their patrimony, and to all men, of safety, quiet, peace, and tranquillity; so that nothing further could be hoped, nor could hope have a happier prospect of fulfilment.
At the very sight of him, tears of joy sprung from the eyes of the soldiers, and there appeared in their salutations an unusual degree of spirit, a kind of exultation, and an eager wish to touch his hand. Of his meritorious and celebrated consulship we have already spoken. The campaign of that year was protracted to the month of December, and rewarded our exertions with abundant success.
The whole extent of Germany was traversed by our army; nations were conquered that were almost unknown to us even in name. The Longobardi, a nation exceeding even the Germans in fierceness, were crushed. I cannot forbear inserting the following incident, whatever may be thought of it, among affairs of so much greater magnitude. This request was granted. Nothing now remained to be conquered in Germany, except the nation of the Marcomanni, who, under the command of Maroboduus, had forsaken their original abode, and having retired into the interior parts of the country, now dwelt in plains surrounded by the Hercynian forest.
No haste could be an excuse for passing this chieftain without notice. Maroboduus was of distinguished birth, of great bodily strength, of a bold, daring spirit, and though a barbarian by birth, was no barbarian in understanding. He held a sovereignty over his nation, not gained by party struggles or by chance, nor variable at the will of his subjects, but steady and firmly established; and animated by a kingly spirit, he determined to lead away his people far from the Romans, and to proceed to some place, where, being beyond the reach of more powerful arms, he might render his own supreme.
Accordingly, having taken possession of the country above mentioned, he brought all the neighbouring tribes under his dominion, either by force, or on terms of agreement. He had a guard for the protection of his person; and his army being brought, by continual practice, to a close resemblance to the discipline of the Romans, he advanced his power to such a height as to become formidable even to our empire.
Towards the Romans he so conducted himself, that, though he did not attack us, he plainly showed, that if he should be attacked, he had abundance of strength and inclination to make resistance. For nations and individuals revolting from us, there was with him a safe refuge; and he acted the part, wholly or with but little dissimulation, of a rival. His army, which he had raised to seventy thousand foot, and four thousand horse, he prepared, by constant exercise in warfare against his neighbours, for more important business than he had then in hand.
He was formidable likewise on this account, that having Germany on his left and front, Pannonia on the right, and Noricum at the back of his territory, he was dreaded by them all, as being always ready to attack them. Nor did he allow Italy to be unconcerned at the growth of his power; for the frontier of his dominions was distant little more than two hundred miles from the summit of the Alps, which form the boundary of Italy.
Fortune sometimes frustrates, sometimes retards, the purposes of men. The commands of necessity were consequently preferred to the call of glory; for it was not thought safe to keep the army at such a distance in the interior country, and leave Italy open to an enemy so near it. Of the states and nations which rose in insurrection, the number of men amounted to more than eight hundred thousand; two hundred thousand foot were assembled, well appointed with arms, and nine thousand horse.
Of this immense multitude, commanded by very active and able leaders, one part was intended to march against Italy, which joins their country at the confines of Nauportum and Tergeste; another part had already made an irruption into Macedonia, and a third was appointed to guard their own countries. The chief command was vested in three leaders, the two Batones and Pinnes. With regard to the Pannonians, they had all some knowledge, not only of the discipline, but also of the language of the Romans; and most of them understood something of letters, and were no strangers to exercises of the mind.
No other nation ever entered on war so soon after resolving on it, or so speedily put its determinations in execution. Roman citizens were murdered, traders slain, and, in that quarter of the country most remote from the general, a vast number of soldiers [80] cut off. All Macedonia was reduced by their arms, and everything in every part wasted with fire and sword. Troops were accordingly levied; all the veterans were everywhere called out; and not only men, but women, were compelled to furnish freedmen for soldiers, in proportion to their income.
The prince was heard to say in the senate, that, unless they were on their guard, the enemy might in ten days come within sight of the city of Rome. We love books and we appriciate those who take the time to review them and write their thoughts down. There are folders for authors, folders for bloggers, folders for reviewers specifically pure readers are welcome as well and everything is for every body. If you like reading book reviews join us. If you are looking for a book to read next, surf these pages. If you write reviews either on Goodreads or on a blog, you are welcome here.
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