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The Historians' History of the World 05 [The Roman Republic]
- Автор: Gutenberg
- Год: 1905
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: История
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He even erected again the statues of Sulla and Pompey, which had been thrown down by the populace. And any machinations against him, or reflections upon him, he chose rather to put a stop to than punish. Accordingly, with regard to any conspiracies against him which were discovered, or nightly cabals, he went no further than to intimate by a proclamation that he knew of them; and as to those who indulged themselves in the liberty of reflecting severely upon him, he only warned them in a public speech not to persist in their obloquy. He bore with great moderation a virulent libel written against him by Aulus Cæcina, and the abusive lampoons of Pitholaus, most highly reflecting on his reputation.
His other actions and declarations, however, with regard to the public, so far outweigh all his good qualities, that it is thought he abused his power and was justly cut off. For he not only accepted of excessive honours, as the consulship every year successively, the dictatorship for life, and the superintendency of the public manners, but likewise the titles of “imperator,” and “father of his country,” besides a statue amongst the kings, and a throne in the place allotted to the senators in the theatre. He even suffered some things to be decreed for him that were unsuitable to the greatest of human kind; such as a golden chair in the senate house and upon the bench when he sat for the trial of causes, a stately chariot in the Circensian procession, temples, altars, images near the gods, a bed of state in the temples, a peculiar priest, and a college of priests, like those appointed in honour of Pan, and that one of the months should be called by his name. He indeed both assumed to himself, and granted to others, every kind of distinction at pleasure. In his third and fourth consulship he had only the title of the office, being content with the power of dictator, which was conferred upon him at the same time; and in both years he substituted other consuls in his room, during the three last months; so that in the intervals he held no assemblies of the people for the election of magistrates, excepting only tribunes and ædiles of the commons; and appointed officers, under the name of prefects, instead of the prætors, to administer the affairs of the city during his absence. The honour of the consulship, which had just become vacant by the sudden death of one of the consuls, he instantly conferred, the day before the 1st of January, upon a person who requested it of him, for a few hours.
With the same unwarrantable freedom, regardless of the constant usage of his country, he nominated the magistrates for several years to come. He granted the insignia of the consular dignity to ten persons of prætorian rank. He called up into the senate some who had been made free of the city, and even natives of Gaul, who were little better than barbarians. He likewise appointed to the management of the mint and the public revenue of the state some of his own servants; and entrusted the command of three legions, which he left at Alexandria, to an old catamite of his, the son of his freedman Rufinus.
He gave way to the same extravagance in his public conversation, as T. Ampius informs us; according to whom he said: “The commonwealth is nothing but a name, without substance, or so much as the appearance of any. Sulla was an illiterate fellow to lay down the dictatorship. Men ought to be more cautious in their converse with me, and look upon what I say as a law.” To such a pitch of arrogance did he proceed that, when a soothsayer brought him word that the entrails of a victim opened for sacrifice were without a heart, he said: “The entrails will be more favourable when I please; and it ought not to be regarded as any ill omen if a beast should be destitute of a heart.”
But what brought upon him the greatest and most invincible odium was his receiving the whole body of the senate sitting, when they came to wait upon him before the temple of Venus Genitrix, with many honourable decrees in his favour. Some say, as he attempted to rise, he was held down by C. Balbus. Others say he did not attempt it at all, but looked somewhat displeased at C. Trebatius, who put him in mind of standing up. This behaviour appeared the more intolerable in him because, when one of the tribunes of the commons, Pontius Aquila, would not rise up to him, as in his triumph he passed by the place where they sat, he was so much offended, that he cried out, “Well then, master tribune, take the government out of my hands.” And for some days after, he never promised a favour to any person, without this proviso, “if Pontius Aquila will allow of it.”
To this extraordinary affront upon the senate, he added an action yet more outrageous. For when, after the sacrifice of the Latin festival, he was returning home, amidst the incessant and unusual acclamations of the people, one of the crowd put upon a statue of him a laurel crown, with a white ribbon tied round it, and the tribunes of the commons, Epidius Marullus and Cæsetius Flavus, ordered the ribbon to be taken away and the man to be carried to prison; being much concerned either that the mention of his advancement to regal power had been so unluckily made, or, as he pretended, that the glory of refusing it had been thus taken from him, he reprimanded the tribunes very severely, and dismissed them both from their office. From that day forward, he was never able to wipe off the scandal of affecting the name of king; though he replied to the people, when they saluted him by that title, “My name is Cæsar, not King.” And at the feast of the Lupercalia, when the consul Antony in the rostra put a crown upon his head several times, he as often put it away, and sent it into the Capitol to Jupiter. A report was extremely current that he had a design of removing to Alexandria or Ilium, whither he proposed to transfer the strength of the empire, and to leave the city to be administered by his friends. To this report it was added that L. Cotta, one of the fifteen commissioners entrusted with the care of the Sibyl’s books, would make a motion in the house that, as there was in those books a prophecy that the Parthians should never be subdued but by a king, Cæsar should have that title.[130] This was why the conspirators precipitated the execution of their design.c
APPIAN COMPARES CÆSAR WITH ALEXANDER
“Happy in all things, magnificent; and with just reason comparable to Alexander; for they were both beyond measure ambitious, warlike, ready in the execution of what they had resolved and hardy in dangers; they spared not their bodies; and in war relied not so much upon their conduct, as upon their bravery and good fortune. The one went a long journey in a country without water to go to Ammon, happily crossed over the bottom of the Pamphylian Gulf, the sea being retired as if his genius had locked up the waters; as another time marching in the champian, it caused it to cease from raining. He navigated an unknown sea; being in the Indies, he first scaled the walls of a city, and leaped down alone into the midst of his enemies, receiving thirteen wounds; was always victorious; and whatever war he was engaged in, he ended it in one or two battles.
“In Europe he subdued many barbarous people, and reduced them under his obedience, together with the Grecians, a fierce people, and lovers of liberty, who never before obeyed any person but Philip; who commanded them for some time under the honourable title of general of the Greeks. He carried his arms almost through all Asia with an incredible celerity. And to comprise in a word the happiness and power of Alexander, all the countries he saw he conquered; and as he was designing to conquer the rest, he died.
“As for Cæsar, passing the Ionian Sea in the midst of winter, he found it calm, as well as the British Ocean, which he passed without any knowledge of it in a time when his pilots, driven by storm against the English rocks, lost their ships; another time embarking alone by night in a little boat, and rowing against the waves, he commanded the pilot to hoist sail and rather to consider the fortune of Cæsar than the sea. He threw himself more than once all alone into the midst of his enemies, when his men were all struck with panic fear; and is the only general of the Romans that ever fought thirty times in pitched battle against the Gauls, and subdued in Gaul forty nations, before so dreadful to the Romans, that in the law dispensing with priests and old men from going to war, the wars against the Gauls are excepted, and the priests and all men obliged to bear arms. Before Alexandria, seeing himself alone enclosed upon a bridge, he laid down his purple, threw himself into the sea, and pursued by his enemies, swam a long time under water, only by intervals lifting up his head to take breath; till coming near his ships, he held up his hands, was known, and so saved.