(441)
I. The empire, which had been long thrown into a disturbed and unsetted
state, by the rebellion and violent death of its three last rulers, was
at length restored to peace and security by the Flavian family, whose
descent was indeed obscure, and which boasted no ancestral honours; but
the public had no cause to regret its elevation; though it is
acknowledged that Domitian met with the just reward of his avarice and
cruelty. Titus Flavius Petro, a townsman of Reate [721], whether a
centurion or an evocatus [722] of Pompey’s party in the civil war, is
uncertain, fled out of the battle of Pharsalia and went home; where,
having at last obtained his pardon and discharge, he became a collector
of the money raised by public sales in the way of auction. His son,
surnamed Sabinus, was never engaged in the military service, though some
say he was a centurion of the first order, and others, that whilst he
held that rank, he was discharged on account of his bad state of health:
this Sabinus, I say, was a publican, and received the tax of the fortieth
penny in Asia. And there were remaining, at the time of the advancement
of the family, several statues, which had been erected to him by the
cities of that province, with this inscription: “To the honest
Tax-farmer.” [723] He afterwards turned usurer amongst the Helvetii, and
there died, leaving behind him his wife, Vespasia Pella, and two sons by
her; the elder of whom, Sabinus, came to be prefect of the city, and the
younger, Vespasian, to be emperor. Polla, descended of a good family, at
Nursia [724], had for her father Vespasius Pollio, thrice appointed (442)
military tribune, and at last prefect of the camp; and her brother was a
senator of praetorian dignity. There is to this day, about six miles
from Nursia, on the road to Spoletum, a place on the summit of a hill,
called Vespasiae, where are several monuments of the Vespasii, a
sufficient proof of the splendour and antiquity of the family. I will
not deny that some have pretended to say, that Petro’s father was a
native of Gallia Transpadana [725], whose employment was to hire
workpeople who used to emigrate every year from the country of the Umbria
into that of the Sabines, to assist them in their husbandry [726]; but
who settled at last in the town of Reate, and there married. But of this
I have not been able to discover the least proof, upon the strictest
inquiry.
II. Vespasian was born in the country of the Sabines, beyond Reate, in a
little country-seat called Phalacrine, upon the fifth of the calends of
December [27th November], in the evening, in the consulship of Quintus
Sulpicius Camerinus and Caius Poppaeus Sabinus, five years before the
death of Augustus [727]; and was educated under the care of Tertulla, his
grandmother by the father’s side, upon an estate belonging to the family,
at Cosa [728]. After his advancement to the empire, he used frequently
to visit the place where he had spent his infancy; and the villa was
continued in the same condition, that he might see every thing about him
just as he had been used to do. And he had so great a regard for the
memory of his grandmother, that, upon solemn occasions and festival days,
he constantly drank out of a silver cup which she had been accustomed to
use. After assuming the manly habit, he had a long time a distaste for
the senatorian toga, though his brother had obtained it; nor could he be
persuaded by any one but his mother to sue for that badge of honour. She
at length drove him to it, more by taunts and reproaches, than by her
entreaties (443) and authority, calling him now and then, by way of
reproach, his brother’s footman. He served as military tribune in
Thrace. When made quaestor, the province of Crete and Cyrene fell to him
by lot. He was candidate for the aedileship, and soon after for the
praetorship, but met with a repulse in the former case; though at last,
with much difficulty, he came in sixth on the poll-books. But the office
of praetor he carried upon his first canvass, standing amongst the
highest at the poll. Being incensed against the senate, and desirous to
gain, by all possible means, the good graces of Caius [729], he obtained
leave to exhibit extraordinary [730] games for the emperor’s victory in
Germany, and advised them to increase the punishment of the conspirators
against his life, by exposing their corpses unburied. He likewise gave
him thanks in that august assembly for the honour of being admitted to
his table.
III. Meanwhile, he married Flavia Domitilla, who had formerly been the
mistress of Statilius Capella, a Roman knight of Sabrata in Africa, who
[Domitilla] enjoyed Latin rights; and was soon after declared fully and
freely a citizen of Rome, on a trial before the court of Recovery,
brought by her father Flavius Liberalis, a native of Ferentum, but no
more than secretary to a quaestor. By her he had the following children:
Titus, Domitian, and Domitilla. He outlived his wife and daughter, and
lost them both before he became emperor. After the death of his wife, he
renewed his union [731] with his former concubine Caenis, the freedwoman
of Antonia, and also her amanuensis, and treated her, even after he was
emperor, almost as if she had been his lawful wife. [732]
(444) IV. In the reign of Claudius, by the interest of Narcissus, he was
sent to Germany, in command of a legion; whence being removed into
Britain, he engaged the enemy in thirty several battles. He reduced
under subjection to the Romans two very powerful tribes, and above twenty
great towns, with the Isle of Wight, which lies close to the coast of
Britain; partly under the command of Aulus Plautius, the consular
lieutenant, and partly under Claudius himself [733]. For this success he
received the triumphal ornaments, and in a short time after two
priesthoods, besides the consulship, which he held during the two last
months of the year [734]. The interval between that and his
proconsulship he spent in leisure and retirement, for fear of Agrippina,
who still held great sway over her son, and hated all the friends of
Narcissus, who was then dead. Afterwards he got by lot the province of
Africa, which he governed with great reputation, excepting that once, in
an insurrection at Adrumetum, he was pelted with turnips. It is certain
that he returned thence nothing richer; for his credit was so low, that
he was obliged to mortgage his whole property to his brother, and was
reduced to the necessity of dealing in mules, for the support of his
rank; for which reason he was commonly called “the Muleteer.” He is said
likewise to have been convicted of extorting from a young man of fashion
two hundred thousand sesterces for procuring him the broad-stripe,
contrary to the wishes of his father, and was severely reprimanded for
it. While in attendance upon Nero in Achaia, he frequently withdrew from
the theatre while Nero was singing, and went to sleep if he remained,
which gave so much (445) offence, that he was not only excluded from his
society, but debarred the liberty of saluting him in public. Upon this,
he retired to a small out-of-the-way town, where he lay skulking in
constant fear of his life, until a province, with an army, was offered
him.
A firm persuasion had long prevailed through all the East [735], that it
was fated for the empire of the world, at that time, to devolve on some
who should go forth from Judaea. This prediction referred to a Roman
emperor, as the event shewed; but the Jews, applying it to themselves,
broke out into rebellion, and having defeated and slain their governor
[736], routed the lieutenant of Syria [737], a man of consular rank, who
was advancing to his assistance, and took an eagle, the standard, of one
of his legions. As the suppression of this revolt appeared to require a
stronger force and an active general, who might be safely trusted in an
affair of so much importance, Vespasian was chosen in preference to all
others, both for his known activity, and on account of the obscurity of
his origin and name, being a person of whom (446) there could be not the
least jealousy. Two legions, therefore, eight squadrons of horse, and
ten cohorts, being added to the former troops in Judaea, and, taking with
him his eldest son as lieutenant, as soon as he arrived in his province,
he turned the eyes of the neighbouring provinces upon him, by reforming
immediately the discipline of the camp, and engaging the enemy once or
twice with such resolution, that, in the attack of a castle [738], he had
his knee hurt by the stroke of a stone, and received several arrows in
his shield.
V. After the deaths of Nero and Galba, whilst Otho and Vitellius were
contending for the sovereignty, he entertained hopes of obtaining the
empire, with the prospect of which he had long before flattered himself,
from the following omens. Upon an estate belonging to the Flavian
family, in the neighbourhood of Rome, there was an old oak, sacred to
Mars, which, at the three several deliveries of Vespasia, put out each
time a new branch; evident intimations of the future fortune of each
child. The first was but a slender one, which quickly withered away; and
accordingly, the girl that was born did not live long. The second became
vigorous, which portended great good fortune; but the third grew like a
tree. His father, Sabinus, encouraged by these omens, which were
confirmed by the augurs, told his mother, “that her grandson would be
emperor of Rome;” at which she laughed heartily, wondering, she said,
“that her son should be in his dotage whilst she continued still in full
possession of her faculties.”
Afterwards in his aedileship, when Caius Caesar, being enraged at his not
taking care to have the streets kept clean, ordered the soldiers to fill
the bosom of his gown with dirt, some persons at that time construed it
into a sign that the government, being trampled under foot and deserted
in some civil commotion, would fall under his protection, and as it were
into his lap. Once, while he was at dinner, a strange dog, that wandered
about the streets, brought a man’s hand [739], and laid it under the
table. And another time, while he was at supper, a plough-ox throwing
the yoke off his neck, broke into the room, and after he had frightened
away all the attendants, (447) on a sudden, as if he was tired, fell down
at his feet, as he lay still upon his couch, and hung down his neck. A
cypress-tree likewise, in a field belonging to the family, was torn up by
the roots, and laid flat upon the ground, when there was no violent wind;
but next day it rose again fresher and stronger than before.
He dreamt in Achaia that the good fortune of himself and his family would
begin when Nero had a tooth drawn; and it happened that the day after, a
surgeon coming into the hall, showed him a tooth which he had just
extracted from Nero. In Judaea, upon his consulting the oracle of the
divinity at Carmel [740], the answer was so encouraging as to assure him
of success in anything he projected, however great or important it might
be. And when Josephus [741], one of the noble prisoners, was put in
chains, he confidently affirmed that he should be released in a very
short time by the same Vespasian, but he would be emperor first [742].
Some omens were likewise mentioned in the news from Rome, and among
others, that Nero, towards the close of his days, was commanded in a
dream to carry Jupiter’s sacred chariot out of the sanctuary where it
stood, to Vespasian’s house, and conduct it thence into the circus. Also
not long afterwards, as Galba was going to the election, in which he was
created consul for the second time, a statue of the Divine Julius [743]
turned towards the east. And in the field of Bedriacum [744], before the
battle began, two eagles engaged in the sight of the army; and one of
them being beaten, a third came from the east, and drove away the
conqueror.
(448) VI. He made, however, no attempt upon the sovereignty, though his
friends were very ready to support him, and even pressed him to the
enterprise, until he was encouraged to it by the fortuitous aid of
persons unknown to him and at a distance. Two thousand men, drawn out of
three legions in the Moesian army, had been sent to the assistance of
Otho. While they were upon their march, news came that he had been
defeated, and had put an end to his life; notwithstanding which they
continued their march as far as Aquileia, pretending that they gave no
credit to the report. There, tempted by the opportunity which the
disorder of the times afforded them, they ravaged and plundered the
country at discretion; until at length, fearing to be called to an
account on their return, and punished for it, they resolved upon choosing
and creating an emperor. “For they were no ways inferior,” they said,
“to the army which made Galba emperor, nor to the pretorian troops which
had set up Otho, nor the army in Germany, to whom Vitellius owed his
elevation.” The names of all the consular lieutenants, therefore, being
taken into consideration, and one objecting to one, and another to
another, for various reasons; at last some of the third legion, which a
little before Nero’s death had been removed out of Syria into Moesia,
extolled Vespasian in high terms; and all the rest assenting, his name
was immediately inscribed on their standards. The design was
nevertheless quashed for a time, the troops being brought to submit to
Vitellius a little longer.
However, the fact becoming known, Tiberius Alexander, governor of Egypt,
first obliged the legions under his command to swear obedience to
Vespasian as their emperor, on the calends [the 1st] of July, which was
observed ever after as the day of his accession to the empire; and upon
the fifth of the ides of the same month [the 28th July], the army in
Judaea, where he then was, also swore allegiance to him. What
contributed greatly to forward the affair, was a copy of a letter,
whether real or counterfeit, which was circulated, and said to have been
written by Otho before his decease to Vespasian, recommending to him in
the most urgent terms to avenge his death, and entreating him to come to
the aid of the commonwealth; as well as a report which was circulated,
that Vitellius, after his success against Otho, proposed to change the
winter quarters of the legions, and remove those in Germany to a less
(449) hazardous station and a warmer climate. Moreover, amongst the
governors of provinces, Licinius Mucianus dropping the grudge arising
from a jealousy of which he had hitherto made no secret, promised to join
him with the Syrian army, and, among the allied kings, Volugesus, king of
the Parthians, offered him a reinforcement of forty thousand archers.
VII. Having, therefore, entered on a civil war, and sent forward his
generals and forces into Italy, he himself, in the meantime, passed over
to Alexandria, to obtain possession of the key of Egypt [745]. Here
having entered alone, without attendants, the temple of Serapis, to take
the auspices respecting the establishment of his power, and having done
his utmost to propitiate the deity, upon turning round, [his freedman]
Basilides [746] appeared before him, and seemed to offer him the sacred
leaves, chaplets, and cakes, according to the usage of the place,
although no one had admitted him, and he had long laboured under a
muscular debility, which would hardly have allowed him to walk into the
temple; besides which, it was certain that at the very time he was far
away. Immediately after this, arrived letters with intelligence that
Vitellius’s troops had been defeated at Cremona, and he himself slain at
Rome. Vespasian, the new emperor, having been raised unexpectedly from a
low estate, wanted something which might clothe him with divine majesty
and authority. This, likewise, was now added. A poor man who was blind,
and another who was lame, came both together before him, when he was
seated on the tribunal, imploring him to heal them [747], and saying that
they were admonished (450) in a dream by the god Serapis to seek his aid,
who assured them that he would restore sight to the one by anointing his
eyes with his spittle, and give strength to the leg of the other, if he
vouchsafed but to touch it with his heel. At first he could scarcely
believe that the thing would any how succeed, and therefore hesitated to
venture on making the experiment. At length, however, by the advice of
his friends, he made the attempt publicly, in the presence of the
assembled multitudes, and it was crowned with success in both cases
[748]. About the same time, at Tegea in Arcadia, by the direction (451)
of some soothsayers, several vessels of ancient workmanship were dug out
of a consecrated place, on which there was an effigy resembling
Vespasian.
VIII. Returning now to Rome, under these auspices, and with a great
reputation, after enjoying a triumph for victories over the Jews, he
added eight consulships [749] to his former one. He likewise assumed the
censorship, and made it his principal concern, during the whole of his
government, first to restore order in the state, which had been almost
ruined, and was in a tottering condition, and then to improve it. The
soldiers, one part of them emboldened by victory, and the other smarting
with the disgrace of their defeat, had abandoned themselves to every
species of licentiousness and insolence. Nay, the provinces, too, and
free cities, and some kingdoms in alliance with Rome, were all in a
disturbed state. He, therefore, disbanded many of Vitellius’s soldiers,
and punished others; and so far was he from granting any extraordinary
favours to the sharers of his success, that it was late before he paid
the gratuities due to them by law. That he might let slip no opportunity
of reforming the discipline of the army, upon a young man’s coming much
perfumed to return him thanks (452) for having appointed him to command a
squadron of horse, he turned away his head in disgust, and, giving him
this sharp reprimand, “I had rather you had smelt of garlic,” revoked his
commission. When the men belonging to the fleet, who travelled by turns
from Ostia and Puteoli to Rome, petitioned for an addition to their pay,
under the name of shoe-money, thinking that it would answer little
purpose to send them away without a reply, he ordered them for the future
to run barefooted; and so they have done ever since. He deprived of
their liberties, Achaia, Lycia, Rhodes, Byzantium, and Samos; and reduced
them into the form of provinces; Thrace, also, and Cilicia, as well as
Comagene, which until that time had been under the government of kings.
He stationed some legions in Cappadocia on account of the frequent
inroads of the barbarians, and, instead of a Roman knight, appointed as
governor of it a man of consular rank. The ruins of houses which had
been burnt down long before, being a great desight to the city, he gave
leave to any one who would, to take possession of the void ground and
build upon it, if the proprietors should hesitate to perform the work
themselves. He resolved upon rebuilding the Capitol, and was the
foremost to put his hand to clearing the ground of the rubbish, and
removed some of it upon his own shoulder. And he undertook, likewise, to
restore the three thousand tables of brass which had been destroyed in
the fire which consumed the Capitol; searching in all quarters for copies
of those curious and ancient records, in which were contained the decrees
of the senate, almost from the building of the city, as well as the acts
of the people, relative to alliances, treaties, and privileges granted to
any person.
IX. He likewise erected several new public buildings, namely, the temple
of Peace [750] near the Forum, that of Claudius on the (453) Coelian
mount, which had been begun by Agrippina, but almost entirely demolished
by Nero [751]; and an amphitheatre [752] in the middle of the city, upon
finding that Augustus had projected such a work. He purified the
senatorian and equestrian orders, which had been much reduced by the
havoc made amongst them at several times, and was fallen into disrepute
by neglect. Having expelled the most unworthy, he chose in their room
the most honourable persons in Italy and the provinces. And to let it be
known that those two orders differed not so much in privileges as in
dignity, he declared publicly, when some altercation passed between a
senator and a Roman knight, “that senators ought not to be treated with
scurrilous language, unless they were the aggressors, and then it was
fair and lawful to return it.”
X. The business of the courts had prodigiously accumulated, partly from
old law-suits which, on account of the interruption that had been given
to the course of justice, still remained undecided, and partly from the
accession of new suits arising out of the disorder of the times. He,
therefore, chose commissioners by lot to provide for the restitution of
what had been seized by violence during the war, and others with
extraordinary jurisdiction to decide causes belonging to the centumviri,
and reduce them to as small a number as possible, for the dispatch of
which, otherwise, the lives of the litigants could scarcely allow
sufficient time.
XI. Lust and luxury, from the licence which had long prevailed, had also
grown to an enormous height. He, therefore, obtained a decree of the
senate, that a woman who formed an union with the slave of another
person, should be considered (454) a bondwoman herself; and that usurers
should not be allowed to take proceedings at law for the recovery of
money lent to young men whilst they lived in their father’s family, not
even after their fathers were dead.
XII. In other affairs, from the beginning to the end of his government,
he conducted himself with great moderation and clemency. He was so far
from dissembling the obscurity of his extraction, that he frequently made
mention of it himself. When some affected to trace his pedigree to the
founders of Reate, and a companion of Hercules [753], whose monument is
still to be seen on the Salarian road, he laughed at them for it. And he
was so little fond of external and adventitious ornaments, that, on the
day of his triumph [754], being quite tired of the length and tediousness
of the procession, he could not forbear saying, “he was rightly served,
for having in his old age been so silly as to desire a triumph; as if it
was either due to his ancestors, or had ever been expected by himself.”
Nor would he for a long time accept of the tribunitian authority, or the
title of Father of his Country. And in regard to the custom of searching
those who came to salute him, he dropped it even in the time of the civil
war.
XIII. He bore with great mildness the freedom used by his friends, the
satirical allusions of advocates, and the petulance of philosophers.
Licinius Mucianus, who had been guilty of notorious acts of lewdness,
but, presuming upon his great services, treated him very rudely, he
reproved only in private; and when complaining of his conduct to a common
friend of theirs, he concluded with these words, “However, I am a man.”
Salvius Liberalis, in pleading the cause of a rich man under prosecution,
presuming to say, “What is it to Caesar, if Hipparchus possesses a
hundred millions of sesterces?” he commended him for it. Demetrius, the
Cynic philosopher [755], (455) who had been sentenced to banishment,
meeting him on the road, and refusing to rise up or salute him, nay,
snarling at him in scurrilous language, he only called him a cur.
XIV. He was little disposed to keep up the memory of affronts or
quarrels, nor did he harbour any resentment on account of them. He made
a very splendid marriage for the daughter of his enemy Vitellius, and
gave her, besides, a suitable fortune and equipage. Being in a great
consternation after he was forbidden the court in the time of Nero, and
asking those about him, what he should do? or, whither he should go? one
of those whose office it was to introduce people to the emperor,
thrusting him out, bid him go to Morbonia [756]. But when this same
person came afterwards to beg his pardon, he only vented his resentment
in nearly the same words. He was so far from being influenced by
suspicion or fear to seek the destruction of any one, that, when his
friends advised him to beware of Metius Pomposianus, because it was
commonly believed, on his nativity being cast, that he was destined by
fate to the empire, he made him consul, promising for him, that he would
not forget the benefit conferred.
XV. It will scarcely be found, that so much as one innocent person
suffered in his reign, unless in his absence, and without his knowledge,
or, at least, contrary to his inclination, and when he was imposed upon.
Although Helvidius Priscus [757] was the only man who presumed to salute
him on his return from Syria by his private name of Vespasian, and, when
he came to be praetor, omitted any mark of honour to him, or even any
mention of him in his edicts, yet he was not angry, until Helvidius
proceeded to inveigh against him with the most scurrilous language.
(456) Though he did indeed banish him, and afterwards ordered him to be
put to death, yet he would gladly have saved him notwithstanding, and
accordingly dispatched messengers to fetch back the executioners; and he
would have saved him, had he not been deceived by a false account
brought, that he had already perished. He never rejoiced at the death of
any man; nay he would shed tears, and sigh, at the just punishment of the
guilty.
XVI. The only thing deservedly blameable in his character was his love
of money. For not satisfied with reviving the imposts which had been
repealed in the time of Galba, he imposed new and onerous taxes,
augmented the tribute of the provinces, and doubled that of some of them.
He likewise openly engaged in a traffic, which is discreditable [758]
even to a private individual, buying great quantities of goods, for the
purpose of retailing them again to advantage. Nay, he made no scruple of
selling the great offices of the state to candidates, and pardons to
persons under prosecution, whether they were innocent or guilty. It is
believed, that he advanced all the most rapacious amongst the procurators
to higher offices, with the view of squeezing them after they had
acquired great wealth. He was commonly said, “to have used them as
sponges,” because it was his practice, as we may say, to wet them when
dry, and squeeze them when wet. It is said that he was naturally
extremely covetous, and was upbraided with it by an old herdsman of his,
who, upon the emperor’s refusing to enfranchise him gratis, which on his
advancement he humbly petitioned for, cried out, “That the fox changed
his hair, but not his nature.” On the other hand, some are of opinion,
that he was urged to his rapacious proceedings by necessity, and the
extreme poverty of the treasury and exchequer, of which he took public
notice in the beginning of his reign; declaring that “no less than four
hundred thousand millions of sesterces were wanting to carry on the
government.” This is the more likely to be true, because he applied to
the best purposes what he procured by bad means.
XVII. His liberality, however, to all ranks of people, was excessive.
He made up to several senators the estate required (457) by law to
qualify them for that dignity; relieving likewise such men of consular
rank as were poor, with a yearly allowance of five hundred thousand
sesterces [759]; and rebuilt, in a better manner than before, several
cities in different parts of the empire, which had been damaged by
earthquakes or fires.
XVIII. He was a great encourager of learning and the liberal arts. He
first granted to the Latin and Greek professors of rhetoric the yearly
stipend of a hundred thousand sesterces [760] each out of the exchequer.
He also bought the freedom of superior poets and artists [761], and gave
a noble gratuity to the restorer of the Coan of Venus [762], and to
another artist who repaired the Colossus [763]. Some one offering to
convey some immense columns into the Capitol at a small expense by a
mechanical contrivance, he rewarded him very handsomely for his
invention, but would not accept his service, saying, “Suffer me to find
maintenance for the poor people.” [764]
XIX. In the games celebrated when the stage-scenery of (458) the theatre
of Marcellus [765] was repaired, he restored the old musical
entertainments. He gave Apollinaris, the tragedian, four hundred
thousand sesterces, and to Terpinus and Diodorus, the harpers, two
hundred thousand; to some a hundred thousand; and the least he gave to
any of the performers was forty thousand, besides many golden crowns. He
entertained company constantly at his table, and often in great state and
very sumptuously, in order to promote trade. As in the Saturnalia he
made presents to the men which they were to carry away with them, so did
he to the women upon the calends of March [766]; notwithstanding which,
he could not wipe off the disrepute of his former stinginess. The
Alexandrians called him constantly Cybiosactes; a name which had been
given to one of their kings who was sordidly avaricious. Nay, at his
funeral, Favo, the principal mimic, personating him, and imitating, as
actors do, both his manner of speaking and his gestures, asked aloud of
the procurators, “how much his funeral and the procession would cost?”
And being answered “ten millions of sesterces,” he cried out, “give him
but a hundred thousand sesterces, and they might throw his body into the
Tiber, if they would.”
XX. He was broad-set, strong-limbed, and his features gave the idea of a
man in the act of straining himself. In consequence, one of the city
wits, upon the emperor’s desiring him “to say something droll respecting
himself,” facetiously answered, “I will, when you have done relieving
your bowels.” [767] He enjoyed a good state of health, though he used no
other means to preserve it, than repeated friction, as much (459) as he
could bear, on his neck and other parts of his body, in the tennis-court
attached to the baths, besides fasting one day in every month.
XXI. His method of life was commonly this. After he became emperor, he
used to rise very early, often before daybreak. Having read over his
letters, and the briefs of all the departments of the government offices;
he admitted his friends; and while they were paying him their
compliments, he would put on his own shoes, and dress himself with his
own hands. Then, after the dispatch of such business as was brought
before him, he rode out, and afterwards retired to repose, lying on his
couch with one of his mistresses, of whom he kept several after the death
of Caenis [768]. Coming out of his private apartments, he passed to the
bath, and then entered the supper-room. They say that he was never more
good-humoured and indulgent than at that time: and therefore his
attendants always seized that opportunity, when they had any favour to
ask.
XXII. At supper, and, indeed, at other times, he was extremely free and
jocose. For he had humour, but of a low kind, and he would sometimes use
indecent language, such as is addressed to young girls about to be
married. Yet there are some things related of him not void of ingenious
pleasantry; amongst which are the following. Being once reminded by
Mestrius Florus, that plaustra was a more proper expression than plostra,
he the next day saluted him by the name of Flaurus [769]. A certain lady
pretending to be desperately enamoured of him, he was prevailed upon to
admit her to his bed; and after he had gratified her desires, he gave her
[770] four hundred (460) thousand sesterces. When his steward desired to
know how he would have the sum entered in his accounts, he replied, “For
Vespasian’s being seduced.”
XXIII. He used Greek verses very wittily; speaking of a tall man, who
had enormous parts:
Makxi bibas, kradon dolichoskion enchos;
Still shaking, as he strode, his vast long spear.
And of Cerylus, a freedman, who being very rich, had begun to pass
himself off as free-born, to elude the exchequer at his decease, and
assumed the name of Laches, he said:
----O Lachaes, Lachaes,
Epan apothanaes, authis ex archaes esae Kaerylos.
Ah, Laches, Laches! when thou art no more,
Thou’lt Cerylus be called, just as before.
He chiefly affected wit upon his own shameful means of raising money, in
order to wipe off the odium by some joke, and turn it into ridicule. One
of his ministers, who was much in his favour, requesting of him a
stewardship for some person, under pretence of his being his brother, he
deferred granting him his petition, and in the meantime sent for the
candidate, and having squeezed out of him as much money as he had agreed
to give to his friend at court, he appointed him immediately to the
office. The minister soon after renewing his application, “You must,”
said he, “find another brother; for the one you adopted is in truth
mine.”
Suspecting once, during a journey, that his mule-driver had alighted to
shoe his mules, only in order to have an opportunity for allowing a
person they met, who was engaged in a law-suit, to speak to him, he asked
him, “how much he got for shoeing his mules?” and insisted on having a
share of the profit. When his son Titus blamed him for even laying a tax
upon urine, he applied to his nose a piece of the money he received in
the first instalment, and asked him, “if it stunk?” And he replying no,
“And yet,” said he, “it is derived from urine.”
Some deputies having come to acquaint him that a large statue, which
would cost a vast sum, was ordered to be erected for him at the public
expense, he told them to pay it down immediately, (461) holding out the
hollow of his hand, and saying, “there was a base ready for the statue.”
Not even when he was under the immediate apprehension and peril of death,
could he forbear jesting. For when, among other prodigies, the mausoleum
of the Caesars suddenly flew open, and a blazing star appeared in the
heavens; one of the prodigies, he said, concerned Julia Calvina, who was
of the family of Augustus [771]; and the other, the king of the
Parthians, who wore his hair long. And when his distemper first seized
him, “I suppose,” said he, “I shall soon be a god.” [772]
XXIV. In his ninth consulship, being seized, while in Campania, with a
slight indisposition, and immediately returning to the city, he soon
afterwards went thence to Cutiliae [773], and his estates in the country
about Reate, where he used constantly to spend the summer. Here, though
his disorder much increased, and he injured his bowels by too free use of
the cold waters, he nevertheless attended to the dispatch of business,
and even gave audience to ambassadors in bed. At last, being taken ill
of a diarrhoea, to such a degree that he was ready to faint, he cried
out, “An emperor ought to die standing upright.” In endeavouring to
rise, he died in the hands of those who were helping him up, upon the
eighth of the calends of July [24th June] [774], being sixty-nine years,
one month, and seven days old.
XXV. All are agreed that he had such confidence in the calculations on
his own nativity and that of his sons, that, after several conspiracies
against him, he told the senate, that either his sons would succeed him,
or nobody. It is said likewise, that he once saw in a dream a balance in
the middle of the porch of the Palatine house exactly poised; in one
(462) scale of which stood Claudius and Nero, in the other, himself and
his sons. The event corresponded to the symbol; for the reigns of the
two parties were precisely of the same duration. [775]
* * * * * *
Neither consanguinity nor adoption, as formerly, but great influence in
the army having now become the road to the imperial throne, no person
could claim a better title to that elevation than Titus Flavius
Vespasian. He had not only served with great reputation in the wars both
in Britain and Judaea, but seemed as yet untainted with any vice which
could pervert his conduct in the civil administration of the empire. It
appears, however, that he was prompted more by the persuasion of friends,
than by his own ambition, to prosecute the attainment of the imperial
dignity. To render this enterprise more successful, recourse was had to
a new and peculiar artifice, which, while well accommodated to the
superstitious credulity of the Romans, impressed them with an idea, that
Vespasian’s destiny to the throne was confirmed by supernatural
indications. But, after his elevation, we hear no more of his miraculous
achievements.
The prosecution of the war in Britain, which had been suspended for some
years, was resumed by Vespasian; and he sent thither Petilius Cerealis,
who by his bravery extended the limits of the Roman province. Under
Julius Frontinus, successor to that general, the invaders continued to
make farther progress in the reduction of the island: but the commander
who finally established the dominion of the Romans in Britain, was Julius
Agricola, not less distinguished for his military achievements, than for
his prudent regard to the civil administration of the country. He began
his operations with the conquest of North Wales, whence passing over into
the island of Anglesey, which had revolted since the time of Suetonius
Paulinus, he again reduced it to subjection. Then proceeding northwards
with his victorious army, he defeated the Britons in every engagement,
took possession of all the territories in the southern parts of the
island, and driving before him all who refused to submit to the Roman
arms, penetrated even into the forests and mountains of Caledonia. He
defeated the natives under Galgacus, their leader, in a decisive battle;
and fixing a line of garrisons between the friths of Clyde and Forth, he
secured the Roman province from the incursions of the people who occupied
the parts of the island (463) beyond that boundary. Wherever he
established the Roman power, he introduced laws and civilization amongst
the inhabitants, and employed every means of conciliating their
affection, as well as of securing their obedience.
The war in Judaea, which had been commenced under the former reign, was
continued in that of Vespasian; but he left the siege of Jerusalem to be
conducted by his son Titus, who displayed great valour and military
talents in the prosecution of the enterprise. After an obstinate defence
by the Jews, that city, so much celebrated in the sacred writings, was
finally demolished, and the glorious temple itself, the admiration of the
world, reduced to ashes; contrary, however, to the will of Titus, who
exerted his utmost efforts to extinguish the flames.
The manners of the Romans had now attained to an enormous pitch of
depravity, through the unbounded licentiousness of the tines; and, to the
honour of Vespasian, he discovered great zeal in his endeavours to effect
a national reformation. Vigilant, active, and persevering, he was
indefatigable in the management of public affairs, and rose in the winter
before day-break, to give audience to his officers of state. But if we
give credit to the whimsical imposition of a tax upon urine, we cannot
entertain any high opinion, either of his talents as a financier, or of
the resources of the Roman empire. By his encouragement of science, he
displayed a liberality, of which there occurs no example under all the
preceding emperors, since the time of Augustus. Pliny the elder was now
in the height of reputation, as well as in great favour with Vespasian;
and it was probably owing not a little to the advice of that minister,
that the emperor showed himself so much the patron of literary men. A
writer mentioned frequently by Pliny, and who lived in this reign, was
Licinius Mucianus, a Roman knight: he treated of the history and
geography of the eastern countries. Juvenal, who had begun his Satires
several years before, continued to inveigh against the flagrant vices of
the times; but the only author whose writings we have to notice in the
present reign, is a poet of a different class.
C. VALERIUS FLACCUS wrote a poem in eight books, on the Expedition of the
Argonauts; a subject which, next to the wars of Thebes and Troy, was in
ancient times the most celebrated. Of the life of this author,
biographers have transmitted no particulars; but we may place his birth
in the reign of Tiberius, before all the writers who flourished in the
Augustan age were extinct. He enjoyed the rays of the setting sun which
had illumined that glorious period, and he discovers the efforts of an
ambition to recall its meridian splendour. As the poem was left (464)
incomplete by the death of the author, we can only judge imperfectly of
the conduct and general consistency of the fable: but the most difficult
part having been executed, without any room for the censure of candid
criticism, we may presume that the sequel would have been finished with
an equal claim to indulgence, if not to applause. The traditional
anecdotes relative to the Argonautic expedition are introduced with
propriety, and embellished with the graces of poetical fiction. In
describing scenes of tenderness, this author is happily pathetic, and in
the heat of combat, proportionably animated. His similes present the
imagination with beautiful imagery, and not only illustrate, but give
additional force to the subject. We find in Flaccus a few expressions
not countenanced by the authority of the most celebrated Latin writers.
His language, however, in general, is pure; but his words are perhaps not
always the best that might have been chosen. The versification is
elevated, though not uniformly harmonious; and there pervades the whole
poem an epic dignity, which renders it superior to the production
ascribed to Orpheus, or to that of Apollonius, on the same subject.