Dio's Rome Volume VI Part 8

12. 3rd Book of Dio: "It is done not merely by the actual men who rule them, but also by those who share the power with those rulers."

(Bekker, Anecd. p.130, 23, and p.164, 32.)

In the preceding fragment we have, apparently, some comment of Dio himself on the change in the Roman government (from monarchy to republic) together with sc.r.a.ps of two speeches,--namely, that of the envoys of Tarquinius to the Roman people, and that of Brutus in reply.

[Frag. XII]

1. --Valerius, the colleague of Brutus, although he had proved himself the most democratic of men came near being murdered in short order by the mult.i.tude: they suspected him, in fact, of being eager to become sole sovereign. They would have slain him, indeed, had he not quickly antic.i.p.ated their action by courting their favor. He entered the a.s.sembly and bent the rods which he had formerly used straight, and took away the surrounding axes that were bound in with them. After he had in this way a.s.sumed an att.i.tude of humility, he kept a sad countenance for some time and shed tears: and when he at last managed to utter a sound, he spoke in a low fearful voice with a suggestion of a quaver. [The general subject is speechmaking.] (Mai, p. 141.)

2. On account of whom (plur.) also [Collatinus] was enraged.

Consequently Brutus so incited the populace against him that they came near slaying him on the spot. They did not quite do this, however, but compelled him to resign without delay. They chose as colleague to the consul in his place Publius Valerius, who had the additional t.i.tle of Poplicola. This appellation translated into Greek signifies "friend of the people" or "most democratic." (Zonaras, 7, 12. Cp. Haupt, _Hermes_ XIV.)

[Frag. XIII]

--The temple of Jupiter was dedicated by Horatius, as determined by lot, although Valerius made the declaration that his son was dead, and arranged to have this news brought to him during the very performance of his sacred office, with the purpose that Horatius under the blow of the misfortune and because in general it was impious for any one in grief to fulfill the duties of priest, should yield to him the dedication of the structure. The other did not refuse credence to the report--for it was noised abroad by many trustworthy persons--yet he did not surrender his ministry: on the contrary, after bidding some men to leave unburied the body of his son, as if it were a stranger's, in order that he might seem unconcerned regarding the rites due to it, he then performed all the necessary ceremonies. (Valesius, p.577.)

[Frag. XIV]

1. (Tarquinius continued to supplicate Klara Porsina.) (Zonaras, 7, 12. Cp. Tzetz. Hist. 6, 201. Plutarch, Poplic. 16, has "Lara Porsina.")

2. Dio in 4th Book: "But they overran the Roman territory and harried everything up to the wall." (Bekker, Anecd. p.152, 3 and 1.) 3.

Larta Porsenna, an Etruscan, or, perhaps, Klara Porsenna, was proceeding against Rome with a great army. But Mucius, a n.o.ble Roman soldier, after equipping himself in arms and dress of Etruscans then started to spy upon them, wis.h.i.+ng to kill Porsenna. Beside the latter at that time was sitting his secretary, who in the Etruscan tongue was called Clusinus; and Mucius, doubtful which might be the king, killed Clusinus instead of the king. The man was arrested, and when Porsenna asked him: "Why in the world did you do this thing? What injury had you received from him?" the other cried out: "I happen to be not Etruscan but Roman; and three hundred others of like mind with me who are now hunting thee to slay thee." This he had spoken falsely; and, with his right hand thrust into the fire, he gazed on Porsenna as though another were suffering: and when the prince enquired: "Why do you look fixedly upon us?" he said: "Reflecting how I erred in failing to slay thee and in thy stead killed one whom I thought Porsenna." And when Porsenna exclaimed: "You shall now become my friend!" Mucius rejoined: "If thou becom'st a Roman." Porsenna admiring the man for his uprightness becomes a friend to the Romans and checks the tide of battle. (Tzetzes, Chiliades, VI, 201-223.)

(Cp. Scholia on John Tzetzes's Letters in Cramer's Anecd. Oxon., vol.

III, p.360, 30: "Clusinus was the name of Porsenna's secretary, according to what Dio says"; and Zonaras, 7, 12: "Drawing his sword he killed his secretary, who was sitting beside him and was similarly arrayed.")

4. Dio's 4th Book: "And he [Footnote: Porsenna.] presented to the maiden [Footnote: Claelia] both arms (or so some say) and a horse." (Bekker, Anecd. p.133, 8.)

5. After this the Tarquins endeavored on several occasions, by forming alliances with tribes bordering on Roman dominions, to recover the kingdom; but they were all destroyed in the battles save the sire, who, moreover, was called Superbus (or, as a Greek would say, Proud).

Subsequently he found his way to Cyme of Opicia and there died. Thus the careers of the Tarquins reached a conclusion. And after their expulsion from the kingdom consuls, as has been stated, were chosen by the Romans. One of these was Publius Valerius, who became consul four times,--the one to whom also the name Poplicola was applied. (Zonaras 7, 12 sq. Cp. Haupt, _Hermes_ XIV.)

6. And the management of the funds they a.s.signed to others in order that the men holding the consular office might not possess the great influence that would spring from their having the revenues in their power. Now for the first time "stewards" began to be created and they called them _quaestors_. These in the first place tried capital cases, from which fact they have obtained this t.i.tle,--on account of their _questionings_ and on account of their search for truth as the result of _questionings_. But later they acquired also management of the public funds and received the additional name of Stewards ([Greek: tamiai]). After a time the courts were delivered over to different persons, while these officials were managers of the funds. (Zonaras 7, 13. Cp. Haupt, _Hermes_, XIV.)

7. Dio's 4th Book: "And they provided them [Footnote: Probably a reference to the quaestors.] with separate t.i.tles besides in general making very different provision for them in the different cases."

(Bekker, Anecd. p.133, 16.)

8. Dio in 5th Book: "The lords filling them with hope on certain points." (Ib. p.140, 10.)

9. Dio in 5th Book: "With this accordingly he honored him." (Ib.

p.175, 19.)

[Frag. XV]

--To a large extent success consists in planning secretly, acting at the opportune moment, following one's own counsel somewhat, and in having no chance to fall back upon any one else, but being obliged to take upon one's self the responsibility for the issue, however it turns out.

[Footnote: Fragment XV may perhaps be a comment on dictators.h.i.+ps.]

(Mai, p.142.)

[Frag. XVI]

1. They had recourse to civil strife. And the reason is plain. Those whose money gave them influence desired to surpa.s.s their inferiors in all respects as though they were their sovereigns, and the weaker citizens, sure of their own equal rights, were unwilling to obey them even in some small point. The one cla.s.s, insatiate of freedom, sought to enjoy the property of the other; and this other, uncontrolled in its pride of place, to enjoy the fruits of the former's labors. So it was that they sundered their former relations, wherein they were wont harmoniously to a.s.sist each other with mutual profit, and no longer made distinctions between foreign and native races. Indeed, both disdained moderation, and the one cla.s.s set its heart upon an extreme of dominion, the other upon an extreme of resistance to voluntary servitude; consequently they missed the results accomplished by their previous allied efforts and inflicted many striking injuries, partly in defence against each other's movements and partly by way of antic.i.p.ating them. More than all the rest of mankind they were at variance save in the midst of particularly threatening dangers that they incurred in the course of successive wars,--wars due chiefly to their own dissensions; and for the sake of the respite many prominent men on several occasions brought on these conflicts purposely. This, then, was the beginning of their suffering more harm from each other than from outside nations. And the complexion of their difficulties inspires me to p.r.o.nounce that it was impossible that they should be deprived of either their power or their sway, unless they should lose it through their own contentions. (Mai, ib.)

2. They were especially irritated that the senators were not of the same mind after obtaining something from them as they were while requesting it, but after making them numbers of great promises while in the midst of danger failed to perform the slightest one of them when safety had been secured. (Mai, p.143.)

3. So to the end that they might not fight in a compact ma.s.s, but each division struggle separately for its own position and so become easier to handle, they divided the army. [Footnote: Cp. Livy, II, 30.] (Ib.)

4. --The populace, as soon as Valerius the dictator became a private citizen, began a most bitter contest, going so far even as to overturn the government. The well-to-do cla.s.ses insisted, in the case of debts, upon the very letter of the agreement, refusing to abate one iota of it, and so they both failed to secure its fulfillment and came to be deprived of many other advantages; they had failed to recognize the fact that an extreme of poverty is the heaviest of curses and that the desperation which results from it is, especially if shared by a large number of persons, very difficult to combat. This is why not a few politicians voluntarily choose the course which is expedient in preference to that which is absolutely just. Justice is often worsted in an encounter with human nature and sometimes suffers total extinction, whereas expediency, by parting with a mere fragment of justice, preserves the greater portion of it intact.

Now the cause of most of the troubles that the Romans had lay in the unyielding att.i.tude adopted by the more powerful cla.s.s toward its inferiors. Many remedies were afforded them against delays in payment of debts, one of which was that in case it happened that several persons had been lending to anybody, they had authority to divide his body piecemeal according to the proportionate amounts that he was owing. Yet, however much this principle had been declared legal, still it had surely never been put into practice. For how could a nation have proceeded to such lengths of cruelty when it frequently granted to those convicted of some crime a refuge for their preservation and allowed such as were thrust from the cliffs of the Capitoline to live in case they should survive the experience? (Mai, p.143. Cp. Zonaras.

7, 14.)

5. --Those who were owing debts took possession of a certain hill and having placed one Gaius at their head proceeded to secure their food from the country as from hostile territory, thereby demonstrating that the laws were weaker than arms, and justice than their desperation.

The senators being in terror both that this party might become more estranged and that the neighboring tribes in view of the crisis might join in an attack upon them proposed terms to the rebels offering everything that they hoped might please them. The seceders at first were for brazening it out, but were brought to reason in a remarkable way. When they kept up a series of disorderly shouts, Agrippa, one of the envoys, begged them to hearken to a fable and having obtained their consent spoke as follows. Once all the Members of Man began a contention against the Belly, saying that they worked and toiled without food or drink, being at the beck and call of the Belly in everything, whereas it endured no labor and alone got its fill of nourishment. And finally they voted that the Hands should no longer convey aught to the Mouth nor the latter receive anything, to the end that the Belly might so far as possible come to lack both food and drink and so perish. Now when this measure was determined and put into execution, at first the entire body began to wither away and next it collapsed and gave out. Accordingly, the members through their own evil state grew conscious that the Belly was the salvation of them and restored to it its nourishment.

On hearing this the mult.i.tude comprehended that the abundance of the prosperous also supports the condition of the poor; therefore they showed greater mildness and accepted a reconciliation on being granted a release from their debts and from seizures therefor. This then, was voted by the senate. (Mai, p.144. Cp. Zonaras 7, 14.) The account of John of Antioch, frag. 46 (Muller, fr. hist gr. IV, p.556) regarding this secession of the plebs seems to have been taken from intact books of Dio. (Cp. Haupt, _Hermes_ XIV, p.44, note 1; also G. Sotiriadis, Zur Kritik des Johannes von Antiochia, Supplem. annal. philol. vol.

XVI, p.50.)

6. And it seemed to be most inconsistent with human conditions, and to many others also, some willingly, some unwillingly [lacuna]

--Whenever many men gathered in a compact body seek their own advantage by violence, for the time being they have some equitable agreement and display boldness, but later they become separated and are punished on various pretexts. (Mai, p.146. Cp. Zonaras, 7, 15.)

7. Through the tendency, natural to most persons, to differ with their fellows in office (it is always difficult for a number of men to attain harmony, especially in a position of any influence)--through this natural tendency, then, all their power was dissipated and torn to shreds. None of their resolutions was valid in case even one of them opposed it. They had originally received their office for no other purpose than to resist such as were oppressing their fellow-citizens, and thus he who tried to prevent any measure from being carried into effect was sure to prove stronger than those who supported it. (Mai, ib. Cp. Zonaras 7, 15.)

[Frag. XVII]

1. For it is not easy for a man either to be strong at all points or to possess excellence in both departments,--war and peace,--at once.

Those who are physically strong are, as a rule, weak-minded and success that has come in unstinted measure generally does not luxuriate equally well everywhere. This explains why after having first been exalted by the citizens to the foremost rank he was not much later exiled by them, and how it was that after making the city of the Volsci a slave to his country he with their aid brought his own land in turn into an extremity of danger. (Mai, p. 146. Cp. Zonaras 7,16.)

[Sidenote: B.C. 491 (_a.u._ 263)] 2. --The same man wished to be made praetor, and upon failing to secure the office became angry at the populace; and in his displeasure at the great influence of the tribunes he employed greater frankness in speaking to that body than was attempted by others whose deeds ent.i.tled them to the same rank as himself. A severe famine occurring at the same time that a town Norba needed colonizing, the mult.i.tude censured the powerful cla.s.ses on both these points, maintaining that they were being deprived of food and were being purposely delivered into the hands of enemies for manifest destruction. Whenever persons come to suspect each other, they take amiss everything even that is done in their behalf, and yield wholly to their belligerent instincts. Coriola.n.u.s had invariably evinced contempt for the people, and after grain had been brought in from many sources (most of it sent as a gift from princes in Sicily) he would not allow them to receive allotments of it as they were pet.i.tioning. Accordingly, the tribunes, whose functions he was especially eager to abolish, brought him to trial before the populace on a charge of aiming at tyranny and drove him into exile. It availed nothing that all his peers exclaimed and expressed their consternation at the fact that tribunes dared to pa.s.s such sentences upon _their_ order. So on being expelled he betook himself, raging at his treatment, to the Volsci, though they had been his bitterest foes. His valor, of which they had had a taste, and the wrath that he cherished toward his fellow-citizens gave him reason to expect that they would receive him gladly, since they might hope, thanks to him, to inflict upon the Romans injuries equal to what they had endured, or even greater. When one has suffered particular damage at the hands of any party, one is strongly inclined to believe in the possibility of benefit from the same party in case it is willing and also able to confer favors. (Mai, p.147. Cp. Zonaras 7, 16.) 3. For he was very angry that they, who were incurring danger for their own country would not even under these conditions withdraw from the possessions of others. When, accordingly, this news also was brought, the men did not cease any the more from factional strife. They were, indeed, so bitterly at variance that they could be reconciled not even by dangers. But the women, Volumnia the wife of Coriola.n.u.s and Veturia his mother, gathering a company of the other most eminent ladies visited him in camp and took his children with them; and they caused him to end the war not only without requiring the submission of the country, but without even demanding restoration from exile. For he admitted them at once as soon as he learned they were there, and granted them a conversation, the course of which was as follows. While the rest wept without speaking Veturia began: "Why are you surprised, my child? Why are you startled? We are not deserters, but the country has sent to you, if you should yield, your mother and wife and children, if otherwise, your spoil; hence, if even now you still are angry, kill us first. Why do you weep? Why turn away? Can you fail to know how we have just ceased lamenting the affairs of state, in order that we might see you? Be reconciled to us, then, and retain no longer your anger against your citizens, friends, temples, tombs; do not come rus.h.i.+ng down into the city with hostile wrath nor take by storm your native land in which you were born, were reared, and became Coriola.n.u.s, bearer of this great name. Yield to me, my child, and send me not hence without result, unless you would see me dead by own hand."

At the end of this speech she sighed aloud, and tearing open her clothing showed her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and touching her abdomen exclaimed: "See, my child, this brought you forth, these reared you up." When she had said this, his wife and the children and the rest of the women joined in the lament, so that he too was cast into grief. Recovering himself at length with difficulty he embraced his mother and at the same time kissing her replied: "Mother, I yield to you. Yours is the victory, and let the other men, too, bestow their grat.i.tude for this upon you.

For I can not endure even to see them, who after receiving such great benefits at hands have treated me in such a way. Hence I never even enter the city. Do you keep the country instead of me, since you have so wished it, and I will take myself out of the way of you all."

Having spoken thus he withdrew. For through fear of the mult.i.tude and shame before his peers, in that he had made an expedition against them at all he would not accept even the safe return offered him, but retired among the Volsci, and there, either as the result of a plot or from old age, died. (Mai, p.148. Zonaras, 7, 16. Cp. John Tzetzes, Letters, 6, p.9, 16.)

4. Dio Cocceia.n.u.s himself and numberless others who have set forth the deeds of the Romans, tell the story of this Marcus Coriola.n.u.s. This Marcus, as he was formerly called and later Gnaeus, had along with these the name of Coriola.n.u.s. When the Romans were warring against the city of Coriola.n.u.s [_sic_], and had all turned to flight at full speed, the man himself turned toward the hostile city and finding it open alone set fire to it. As the flames rose brilliantly he mounted his horse and with great force fell upon the rear of the barbarians, who were bringing headlong flight upon the Romans. They wheeled about and when they saw the fire consuming the city, thinking it was sacked they fled in another direction. He, having saved the Romans and sacked the city, which we have already said was called Coriola.n.u.s, received, in addition to his former names Marcus and Gnaeus, the t.i.tle of Coriola.n.u.s, from the rout. But (the usual treatment that jealousy accords to benefactors) after a little in the course of reflections they fine the man. The man excessively afflicted with most just wrath leaves his wife, his mother, and his country, and goes to the Corioli, and they receive the man. Then after that they arrayed themselves against the Romans. And had not his spouse and mother at the breaking out of that war run and torn apart their tunics and stood about him naked,--Veturia and Volumnia were their names,--and checked him with difficulty from the battle against the Romans, Rome would have made a resolve to honor benefactors. But brought to a halt by the prayers of his mother and of his spouse he stopped the war against the Romans, and he himself leaving behind the Corioli and the Romans hurried to another land, smitten by sorrow. (Tzetzes, Hist. 6, 527-560. Cp.

Haupt, _Hermes_, XIV.)

5. I pa.s.s over mention of the n.o.ble Marcus Coriola.n.u.s, and with Marcus himself also Marcus Corvinus; of whom the one, having sacked unaided a city named Coriola.n.u.s and burned it down, although the entire army of the Romans had been routed, was called Coriola.n.u.s, though otherwise termed Marcus. (Tzetzes, Hist. 3, 856-861.)

[Frag. XVIII]

[Sidenote: B.C. 486 (_a.u._ 268)] Ca.s.sius after benefiting the Romans was put to death by that very people. So that thereby it is made plain that there is no element deserving confidence in mult.i.tudes. On the contrary they destroy men who are altogether devoted to them no less than men guilty of the greatest wrongs. With respect to the interest of the moment on various occasions they deem those great who are the cause of benefits to them, but when they have profited to the full by such men's services they no longer regard them as having any nearer claims than bitterest foes. For Ca.s.sius, although he indulged them, they killed because of the very matters on which he prided himself: and it is manifest that he perished through envy and not as a result of some injustice committed. (Mai, p.150.)

[Frag. XIX]

1. For the men from time to time in power when they became unable to restrain them by any other method stirred up purposely wars after wars in order that they might be kept busy attending to those conflicts and not disturb themselves about the land. (Mai, ib. Zonaras 7, 17.)

2. At any rate they were so inflamed with rage by each of the two as to promise with an oath victory to their generals: with regard to the immediate attack they thought themselves actually lords of fortune.

(Mai, p.150.)