Gaius Caesar was born on the last day of August in 12 CE,
and
as the youngest son of the popular Germanicus he was
affectionately
called Caligula for the military boots he wore
as a child among
the soldiers on the Rhine.
After his father died, he was adopted
by Emperor Tiberius.
Although his two brothers and mother were killed,
Caligula managed
to survive by joining in the perversions
of the Emperor at Capri
for six years.
Tiberius
predicted that Caligula would mean his own death
and universal
ruin, saying he was nursing
a viper in Rome's bosom.
According
to Suetonius Caligula seduced Ennia Naevia,
the wife of praetorian
prefect Macro, who helped him stay
alive and alter the will of
Tiberius,
supplanting Tiberius Gemellus, grandson of Tiberius.
When Caligula entered Rome, a mob made him absolute ruler.
Caligula
stopped treason trials, recalled political exiles,
allowed suppressed
works to be published,
abolished the sales tax, doubled bounty
rates Tiberius had
promised praetorian cohorts, provided games
and spectacles,
and was greeted with enthusiasm
after the reclusive
years of his predecessor.
For several months Caligula gave his
personal attention to
governing before he suffered a serious illness.
At first Romans were delighted with Caligula's recovery;
but
then his behavior became monstrous for its atrocities
according
to historians such as Suetonius.
He was elected consul and chose
his uncle Claudius
as his companion consul.
Caligula transferred
elections from the Senate to the people
and moved the imperial
mint to Rome.
He had killed or drove to suicide many prominent
Romans
including Tiberius Gemellus and Macro.
As his profligate
spending used up funds, he revived
treason trials to take money
from the wealthy
and imposed new taxes.
He immediately accepted
the honors and titles
Augustus
had taken decades to reluctantly acquire.
Caligula slept with all three of his sisters,
treating Drusilla
like a wife.
When she died in 38 CE, he had her declared a goddess;
during mourning he made it a capital crime to
laugh, dine, or
bathe with relatives.
With imperial power his irrational behavior
had few boundaries,
as his peculiar whims no matter how cruel
were obeyed out of fear.
He often quoted Accius that he did not
mind being hated
as long as he was feared.
He doted on actors,
gladiators, and wives he desired.
He used senators' wives and
boys in a
palace brothel to raise money.
Many were killed for
their money, and older citizens
he called relatives in order to
inherit their property.
His greed was such that he enjoyed
wallowing
in large piles of gold.
Caligula forced many men to compete as
gladiators alone
and in groups and in doing so was not bound by
the usual laws.
The appearance of democracy soon gave way
to tyranny
as he abolished the elections.
In 39 Caligula went to Germany to punish a suspected
conspiracy
by executing the commander of the upper Rhine
legions, Gaetulicus,
and a possible heir apparent, Lepidus;
he sent his sisters Agrippina
and Livilla into exile.
After claiming to have fought Germans,
Caligula entered Gaul
to expropriate more money.
At Lyons he auctioned
imperial property at outrageous prices
and sponsored a contest
in Latin and Greek rhetoric
with humiliating punishments for the
losers.
Instead of crossing over to Britain, Caligula ordered
his soldiers
to pick up seashells, possibly a currency in some
countries.
He pretended to have made great conquests but in fact
had
only accepted the surrender of Adminius, who had been
banished
by his father, the British king Cymbeline.
Caligula established the kingdoms of Lesser Armenia, Pontus,
and part of Thrace for the three sons of Cotys
he had been raised
with at Rome.
His removal of the Armenian king allowed
the Parthians
to take over there.
Caligula gave the tetrarchies of Philip and
Herod Antipas to his
friend Herod Agrippa, who persuaded him to
change the plans
about his statue in the Jerusalem temple.
After
ordering Mauretanian king Ptolemy to kill himself,
his army was
resisted in trying to annex that kingdom.
Caligula's megalomania
aiming at his deification offended Jews,
whom he therefore hated.
After Jews had pulled down an altar Greeks had erected to him
in Jamnia of Palestine and after the pogrom against Jews
in Alexandria,
Caligula ordered a statue of himself be built and
installed in
the temple at Jerusalem.
When his governor Petronius balked at
this,
he ordered him to commit suicide;
but news of Caligula's
death arrived before that message.
According to Suetonius more than once he closed the granaries
and let people go hungry.
People who gathered at the Circus to
protest Caligula's misrule
were killed by soldiers.
As his crimes
increased, Caligula considered murdering the
most distinguished
senators and
moving the capital to Antium or Alexandria.
Since
he appeared to be sick both physically and mentally,
conspiracies
against him increased.
In 41 two officers of his praetorian guard
killed him;
his wife Caesonia, whom he had married after she bore
him
a daughter, was also killed along with the child.
While the Senate debated whether to restore the republic,
the
praetorian guard made Claudius Emperor, encouraged by
his promise
of 15,000 sesterces for each guard.
The Senate confirmed Claudius
as princeps.
Claudius was born in Lyon on August 1, 10
BC.
Thought a fool because of his physical disabilities,
his wandering
attention, and peculiar sense of humor,
Claudius had been either
ignored or ridiculed for years
even though he wrote extensive
histories on the reign of
Augustus, the Etruscans, and Carthage;
he also wrote an autobiography and a defense of Cicero.
He believed that Rome was great because of its ability to
change
with appropriate reforms
while holding to essential traditions.
He explained that he pretended to be stupid to survive under
Caligula,
but according to Suetonius nobody believed him.
He quickly gained
popularity by showing respect for the
Senate, dropping treason
trials, recalling exiles, canceling
Caligula's new taxes, and
sponsoring gladiator shows,
though his revival of the office of
censor in 47 was disliked.
Claudius tried to improve the quality
of senators and knights
by adding new ones and removing others.
He extended citizenship in the empire.
Sick slaves abandoned in
the temple of Aesculapius
were given their freedom if they recovered.
Claudius centralized administration by relying on the
emancipated
slaves of his household.
Narcissus as secretary handled all correspondence;
Pallas was responsible for finances;
Callistus dealt with petitions
and judicial matters;
and Polybius was librarian and his literary
advisor.
Pallas and Callistus began with no money
and ended up
multi-millionaires.
Claudius insured ships to protect the grain
supply
and had a new harbor built at Ostia.
Aqueducts and roads
were extended,
and it took eleven years to drain the Fucine Lake.
Appius Silanus, the former governor of Spain, was recalled
to
marry the mother of Claudius' wife Messalina;
but when he refused
to be Messalina's lover
(according to Dio Cassius), Narcissus
got him executed.
This caused Annius Vinicianus to form a plot
in 42 with the
Dalmatia governor Camillus Scribonianus;
but soldiers
feared the chaos of attempting to revive
the republic, and the
attempted revolt was quelled in five days.
Claudius freed Philo's
brother, the Alexandrian Alabarch
Alexander, whom Caligula had
imprisoned.
In Jerusalem the elder Gamaliel, grandson of Hillel,
was president of the Sanhedrin and made laws for the good
of the
whole community, treating Judean and non-Judean poor
the same
with help in times of need.
Herod Agrippa tried to build fortifications
in Jerusalem,
but Syrian governor Vibius Marsus
got Claudius to
revoke his permission.
After Claudius' friend Herod Agrippa died
in 44,
Judea reverted to a province.
According to Josephus, Claudius
issued an edict that the same
rights and privileges Jews had in
Alexandria should be extended
throughout the empire, and Greek
cities should maintain the
rights and privileges preserved to
them by Augustus.
Since the young Agrippa was too young to rule,
Claudius appointed Cuspius Fadus procurator of Judea.
He contained
a border dispute between Jews in Peraea and
citizens of Philadelphia,
and he sent out troops who killed
the prophet Theudas as he was
trying to lead
400 followers across the Jordan.
Fadus was replaced
by the son of the Alabarch Alexander,
Tiberius Julius Alexander,
who had become a
Roman knight and adopted pagan religion.
After Claudius put Felix, the brother of Pallas,
in charge
of Galilee, Ventidius Cumanus became procurator
of Judea and Samaria
in 48 and had to quell more serious
disturbances after a Roman
soldier offended the Temple
and a crowd at a festival.
After a
Galilean had been murdered, Galilean bandits led by
Eleazar ben
Dinai and forces Felix sent
from Acrabatene attacked Samaria.
Then the Samaritans appealed to Cumanus to send troops
from Caesarea,
and they killed many of Eleazar's followers.
Jewish worship was
tolerated in the empire, though some
may have been expelled from
Rome in 49;
Suetonius wrote that Jews caused disturbances in Rome
that were instigated by Chrestus,
by which he probably meant the
Christ.
Banditry in Judea increased, and Syrian governor Quadratus
had to send leaders of the Jews and Samaritans along with
Cumanus
and the tribune Celer
to Rome to be disciplined in 52.
The Mauretanian revolt was put down by forces led by
Suetonius
Paulinus in 41-42 and then by Hosidius Geta in 44,
resulting in
it becoming two provinces.
In 43 Claudius took away Lycia's independence
and made it
a province because of their savage vendettas;
but
he restored Rhodian independence
because he approved of their
morals.
In 44 Claudius restored Achaea and Macedonia to the Senate,
and Thrace was annexed as a province two years later.
Claudius
personally invaded Britain in 43 with four legions
and a total
of about 40,000 men.
He made Camulodunum (Colchester) capital
of the new
province of Britannia with few casualties.
Regni king
Cogidumnus was allowed to reign as his legate
at Noviomagus (Chichester),
and Iceni king Prasutagus
in Norfolk became his ally.
His general
Aulus Plautius was appointed governor and
was succeeded by Ostorius
Scapula in 47 until 52.
Romans thus ruled southeast England, colonized
Camulodunum, and spread their culture.
British rebels led by Caratacus
fought the Romans for
nine years until their leader was finally
captured and taken to Rome,
where he was respected for his courage.
Claudius suppressed the Druids, and the Senate futilely
tried to banish astrologers from Italy in 52.
Mithridates regained his kingship of Armenia,
while Claudius sent a letter to restrain Cotys,
king of Lesser Armenia, and Gotarzes
II and his brother
Vardanes fought a civil war in Parthia.
Gotarzes
came to terms with Vardanes after notifying him
of a conspiracy;
Vardanes returned to Seleucia
and ended its seven-year revolt.
However, the autocratic Vardanes was soon assassinated
while hunting,
and Gotarzes took over.
Discontented Parthians wanted Meherdates
released from
Rome and so appealed to Claudius and the Roman Senate
to end the tyranny of Gotarzes, arguing that Parthian princes
were given to Rome as hostages for these circumstances.
Claudius
sent Meherdates back
with Syrian governor Gaius Cassius.
However,
Meherdates detoured through Armenia during
winter, and he was
defeated by the Parthian forces of
Gotarzes, who soon became sick
and died;
he was succeeded by Media king Vonones II
and his son
Vologeses I.
In the Crimean Bosphorus another Mithridates revolted,
and
an alliance with Rome organized by King Cotys I was
responsible
for exterminating the town Uspe that had offered
to turn over
10,000 slaves; but the Romans could not handle
so many and decided
they could only slaughter them
in normal warfare.
Mithridates
eventually surrendered and was sent to Rome.
After his general
Corbulo attacked German Chauci led by
Gannascus, Claudius gave
him a triumph
but restrained further warfare.
In 48 Claudius made
a speech arguing that extending
citizenship to those on Rome's
frontiers had always
strengthened its empire in contrast to Sparta
and Athens,
who had segregated aliens.
The Senate responded by making some
Aedui Gaul chiefs senators.
A census that year counted
5,984,072 citizens,
probably including women and children.
In 51 a war broke out between Armenia's Mithridates and the
Iberians ruled by Pharasmanes and supported by Mithridates'
nephew
Radamistus, who pretended to make an agreement
with his uncle
but then treacherously killed him.
Rome decided to let Radamistus
keep his ill-gotten gains
but ordered Pharasmanes to withdraw
from Armenia.
The Roman governor of Cappadocia, Paelignus,
invaded
Armenia and ravaged the country.
Syrian governor Quadratus sent
a force to repair
these outrages; but he was recalled so as not
to provoke
a war with Parthia, for Vologases took the opportunity
to
send his Parthian army into Armenia, driving out the Iberians.
A winter epidemic forced the Parthians
to withdraw from Armenia, allowing Radamistus to come
back and punish people as traitors;
but they soon replaced him with his brother Tiridates.
Claudius was also greatly influenced by his wife Messalina,
who along with the imperial freedmen sold citizenship
rights for
money.
In 48 Gaius Silius decided not to wait until
the Emperor died of old age, arguing boldly,
"Only innocent people can
afford long-term plans.
Flagrant guilt requires audacity."1
Messalina agreed to marry Silius while
Claudius was sacrificing
at Ostia.
Narcissus asked the Emperor if he knew he was divorced,
and Claudius wondered if he was still Emperor.
Narcissus ordered
Messalina and her husband Silius executed.
Then Pallas persuaded
Claudius to marry his own niece
Agrippina the same year.
She got
Burrus appointed commander of the praetorian guard,
and two years
later her son Nero
was adopted by the Emperor.
Agrippina eliminated
enemies with private trials and executions,
aiming to have Nero
supplant Claudius' son Britannicus,
who, born in 41, was three
years younger than Nero.
Senator Annaeus Seneca was recalled
from
exile and became Nero's tutor.
Seneca prophetically dreamed
that
his pupil was really Caligula.
In 53 Nero married Octavia, the
daughter of Claudius.
As the health of Claudius deteriorated with
drinking and
gluttony, in 54 he was poisoned with mushrooms
probably
by Agrippina and her lover Pallas.
According to Suetonius, Claudius
had executed
several of his relatives, 35 senators, and 300 knights.
Nero was supported by praetorian prefect Burrus
and confirmed
the guard by giving each man 15,000 sesterces.
The Senate welcomed
Nero and heard his speech composed
by Seneca in which he promised
to follow the Augustan model,
end secret trials, stop court corruption,
and respect
the privileges of the Senate.
Claudius was deified,
and Nero could claim
he was the son of a god.
Only 16, Nero was
at first dominated by his mother Agrippina,
who murdered or drove
to suicide Nero's aunt Domitia Lepida,
proconsul of Asia Iunius
Silanus, and the freedman Narcissus.
According to Tacitus, Burrus
and Seneca
prevented other murders; disliking rule by a woman,
they gained control by replacing Pallas.
When Agrippina began
to show affection for her
step-son Britannicus, the boy was poisoned.
Nero became involved with the freedwoman Acte
and resented his
mother taking the side of his wife Octavia;
Agrippina had to retire
from the palace.
Suillius was banished in 58 after criticizing
Seneca,
whom he said had been exiled by Claudius for
committing adultery in the house of Germanicus.
Suillius accused Seneca of
gaining 300,000,000 sesterces
in four years of imperial friendship
by charging
high interest in Italy and the provinces.
Suillius
was charged with embezzling funds in Asia,
causing a civil war,
and convicting many knights.
At first the artistic young Emperor could hardly sign a
death
warrant and banned capital punishment.
In 57 Nero forbade killing
in circus contests;
instead he emphasized athletics and inaugurated
poetry and theater competitions.
In 61 he had a gymnasium and
baths built.
Nero reduced taxes and gave slaves permission
to
file civil complaints against unjust masters.
He pardoned authors
who wrote epigrams
criticizing his debaucheries.
Seneca, who had
wide financial interests,
improved the financial administration.
Governors were prosecuted for extortion.
The food supply was protected,
and the harbor
at Ostia was completed.
Colonies of veterans were
established in Italy.
Nero even tried to promote free trade by
removing
indirect taxes, but this proved too difficult.
After
Secundus was murdered by his slaves in 61,
the law allowed the
execution of 400 slaves in his palace,
although the urban commoners
protested.
The jurist Cassius Longinus proposed
stronger measures
to control slaves.
Tacitus complained that Nero sponsored "effeminate"
theatrical productions with eminent women
rehearsing indecent
parts.
Money was given out, and respectable people
were forced to spend it on vices,
while the disreputable did so gladly.
Promiscuity and degradation thrived.
Roman morals had long become impure,
but never was there so favorable an environment
for debauchery as among this filthy crowd.
Even in good surroundings
people find it hard to behave well.
Here every form of immorality competed for
attention, and no chastity, modesty,
or vestige of decency could survive.2
A. Didius governed Britain (52-57)
and reinstated Queen Cartimandua.
In 59 Suetonius Paulinus attacked
the hostile Druid center at
Mona.
When Iceni king Prasutagus died, expropriation of land,
flogging of his widow Boudicca, raping of his two daughters,
and
Roman exploitation by money-lenders like Seneca
led to a revolt,
as offending imperial agent
Catus Decianus withdrew to Gaul.
Camulodunum
was attacked,
and all the Romans there were slaughtered.
All of
the infantry in Rome's ninth legion were killed
while the cavalry
fled; about 70,000 were killed
when London and Verulamium were
sacked.
However, the greatly outnumbered but well disciplined
troops
of Paulinus managed near Lichfield to route the forces
of
Boudicca, who then took poison.
80,000 Britons were reported
killed
but only 400 Roman soldiers.
Paulinus took reprisals; but
famine did even more damage
as they had neglected to sow their
fields.
The new imperial agent Classicianus disliked Paulinus
and advised people to wait and surrender to a new governor,
who
would be more kind.
The imperial freed slave Polyclitus arrived
with an enormous
escort to investigate, but he was scorned by
the British.
Finally Nero sent in the more conciliatory
governor
Petronius Turpillianus.
In Asia Roman general Domitius Corbulo captured and burned
Artaxata and in 59 drove Tiridates out of Armenia,
establishing
Tigranes on the throne there.
Corbulo was appointed governor of
Syria.
Tigranes provoked Parthia by attacking Adiabene.
Nero sent
an army under consul Caesennius Paetus,
but in 62 he foolishly
surrendered his forces to the Parthians
at Rhandeia even though
Corbulo was nearby.
Paetus was dismissed, and Corbulo negotiated
a treaty
recognizing as king of Armenia the Parthian Tiridates.
In 66 Tiridates was ostentatiously crowned by Nero in Rome,
and
the same year he ordered his
best general Corbulo to commit suicide.
Nero set up Herod Agrippa's son Aristobulus as king of
Lesser
Armenia, added four cities to young Agrippa's kingdom,
and appointed
Felix procurator of the remainder of Judea.
Brigandage was rampant,
but Felix was friendly with the sicarii,
who mingled in
crowds and stabbed opponents
with short daggers; after Felix was
reprimanded by the
high priest Jonathan, that cleric was murdered
in this way.
Agrippa appointed Ishmael II high priest, and his
family
compelled landowners to pay them all tithes,
thus taking
away the income of the lower priests.
Roman cohorts were required
to subdue
a revolt led by an Egyptian Jew.
Greeks were fighting
Jews over who would control Caesarea;
eventually the Greeks bribed
Burrus to have
Nero deprive the Judeans of civil rights.
At two-year
intervals the greedy Felix was succeeded
by Festus about 60, Albinus
in 62, and Florus in 64;
in a deteriorating situation according
to Josephus
each governed worse than his predecessor.
Albinus
increased taxes, released bandits for money,
and was bribed to
ignore the crimes of the sicarii.
As procurator of Judea, Florus took 17 talents
from the Temple
treasury as back-taxes.
Offended by Judean mockery, Florus ordered
his soldiers to
attack the marketplace, and according to Josephus
they killed
and crucified about 3600 people.
The next day the
people led by priests demonstrated for peace.
Two cohorts arrived
from Caesarea and killed more Judeans
trying to occupy the Temple
in Jerusalem.
As Florus and the troops withdrew to Caesarea,
he
left one cohort with the priests to keep order.
Jews tried to
persuade Roman authorities they were not
in revolt and complained
about Florus.
The spiritual leader of the revolutionary Zealots
was
Eleazar ben Ananias of the Shammai school.
Those arguing for
peace were the followers of Hillel
who abhorred war, nobles benefiting
from Roman rule,
and the wealthy who feared revolutionary changes.
Already taxes to Rome were being withheld.
Agrippa gave a speech
pointing out the folly of going to war
with imperial Rome and
urged them to collect the
40 talents due Rome, though when he
tried to get them
to obey Florus, they drove him away.
The day
in June of 65 the Jews decided not to pay taxes
to Rome was later
commemorated as a victory.
Zealots led by Menahem took the fortress
at Masada.
When Nero became involved with Poppaea Sabina,
he had her husband
Otho sent to Lusitania as governor.
Under her influence Nero ordered
his mother Agrippina
murdered in 59 and his wife Octavia
three
years later when Burrus died.
That year Nero appointed as praetorian
prefects the successful
grain manager Faenius Rufus and the vicious
Sicilian Ofonius
Tigellinus; then he married Poppaea Sabina.
The
ex-slave Doryphorus was eliminated for opposing the
marriage as
was Pallas for his wealth.
Tigellinus gained power by appealing
to Nero's vices;
aristocrats, such as Cornelius Sulla in Gaul
and Rubellius Plautus in Asia, were soon being executed.
Tigellinus
also gained influence by accusing
Faenius Rufus of friendship
with Agrippina.
Seneca tried to restrain Nero from eliminating contenders,
saying, "No matter how many you slay,
you cannot kill your
successor."3
Seneca was attacked for his enormous wealth
and extravagant estate.
Since Seneca criticized Nero's amusements
in charioteering
and singing, they argued the Emperor no longer
needed a tutor.
Seneca thanked the Emperor for the wealth he had
bestowed
upon him, offered to give up his property
to imperial
agents, and asked to retire.
Nero expressed gratitude to his tutor
and hoped for his
continued counsel, fearing his retirement
would
make him seem mean.
Seneca dismissed his entourage and stayed
home
studying philosophy, escaping poison by living
on fresh fruit
and running water.
In 64 a fire broke out and burned
more than half of Rome in
a week.
Nero returned from Antium and attempted to relieve the
homeless, but a rumor spread that
he sang his poem on the sacking
of Troy.
To counter rumors that Nero ordered the blaze so that
he could rebuild and name a new city after himself,
the fire was
blamed on the unpopular Christians,
whose secret rituals many
misunderstood,
resulting in the persecution of innocent people
in Rome.
Spectacles of Christians being thrown to dogs (or lions)
or used as burning torches aroused sympathy
from many people and
increased Nero's unpopularity.
Nero had the city rebuilt in a
more ordered pattern,
but he also planned extravagant gardens,
palaces,
and an enormous statue of himself.
Italy and Greece were
ransacked for works of art
to replace the many treasures lost.
To raise money for these projects and for an ambitious
and impractical
canal from Ostia to Lake Avernus,
Nero increased taxes and even
put to death
six large landowners in Africa.
Like Caligula, when
he began to run out of money,
Nero resorted to robberies and cruel
blackmail.
According to Dio Cassius many were put to death,
while
many others purchased their lives
from Tigellinus for a great
price.
Gold and silver coins were also slightly debased.
The Senate resented the governing freedmen, Greeks,
and Asians,
but a plot to enthrone Calpurnius Piso was
squelched in 65; Faenius
Rufus, Seneca, Lucan,
and a total of eighteen died, and thirteen
were banished.
Nero became more tyrannical,
and Tigellinus was
ordered to track down suspects.
Before his death the next year
the novelist Petronius wrote
out a list of Nero's male and female
bed partners.
The Stoic philosopher Paetus Thrasea was condemned
to death after being accused by Cossutianus Capito,
whom Thrasea
had convicted of extortion in Cilicia.
Resentment also ended the
life of Marcius Barea Soranus
for governing Asia too well.
Soranus
had managed the clearing of the harbor at Ephesus
but got into
trouble by refusing to punish the people
of Pergamum for stopping
Nero's ex-slave
Acratus from removing their statues and pictures.
Nero suffered from megalomania and identified
with Apollo and
other gods.
During 67 he traveled in Greece to compete in poetic
and athletic festivals, claiming 1808 first prizes;
at Olympia
he was given the crown
even though he fell out of his chariot.
At Corinth he announced Greek immunity from taxation
while planning
a canal through the isthmus.
According to the historian Suetonius,
who described in detail
many crimes of Nero, the poetic Emperor
felt so guilty
that he believed the Furies were
pursuing him with
whips and torches.
At Athens he did not dare to participate in
the
Eleusinian mysteries after
the herald commanded all
criminals to withdraw before the ceremonies
began.
Tacitus calculated that Nero squandered
2,200,000,000 sesterces
in gifts.
Nero did not return to Rome until 68
to find the city suffering
a grain shortage.
Nevertheless the Emperor, preferring to perform
rather than rule,
went to Greek Naples, where he learned that
Gaul's
Lugdunensis (Lyons) governor Julius Vindex
had raised 100,000
men in revolt.
Hispania Tarraconensis governor Servius Sulpicius
Galba,
having discovered Nero's secret orders for his assassination,
changed his loyalty from Nero to the Senate and people
of Rome and was supported by Lusitanian governor Otho
and Baetica quaestor
Caecina.
African legate Clodius Macer also revolted.
However,
the German legate Verginius Rufus defeated Vindex
at Vesontio
(Besançon), and Vindex committed suicide.
In Rome Tigellinus fled, and the other praetorian prefect
Nymphidius
Sabinus offered the guards 30,000 sesterces
each to support the
Senate and proclaim Galba Emperor.
The Senate declared Nero an
enemy of Rome,
and he was soon killed.
Nero had been absorbed
in music, the arts, and mystery cults.
Plutarch and Josephus both
complained of calumnies
that soiled his memory.
Trajan and other
Emperors destroyed many works by Lucan,
Plutarch, Rusticus, and
others that commemorated his reign.
Yet the historians Suetonius
and Dio Cassius described his
behavior as outdoing the many evils
of Caligula.
Some Christians believed that Nero was the anti-Christ
as the first major persecutor of their faith.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca was born about 4 BC in Spain.
His father
was a lawyer and procurator,
who wrote books on rhetoric.
The
child was raised by an aunt in Rome.
Suffering bad health (possibly
the asthma that affected
his later years), young Seneca lived
for a while in Egypt,
where his aunt's husband was prefect.
Seneca
served as quaestor during the reign of Tiberius.
Seneca's skill
as an orator almost led the envious Caligula
to have him killed;
but the Emperor was persuaded
the sickly intellectual would die
soon.
When Claudius became Emperor, Seneca was accused
by the empress Messalina of adultery with Julia,
daughter of Germanicus,
and was banished to Corsica.
Eight years later in 49 Seneca was recalled to Rome by the
new empress Agrippina to tutor her son Nero;
the next year he
was appointed praetor.
When Nero became Emperor, Seneca served
as his chief advisor for civilian affairs.
Many attribute the
good government of Nero's first five years
to the influence of
Seneca, though in 59 he wrote the letter to
the Senate justifying
the murder of Nero's mother Agrippina.
According to Tacitus the
senator Suillius asked by what
philosophy Seneca acquired 300,000,000
sesterces in
four years of imperial friendship; then he suggests
it was
by huge rates of interest and legacies.
When the military
advisor Burrus died in 62, apparently unable
to control Nero's
crimes, Seneca decided to request retirement.
He was soon implicated
in the Piso conspiracy and was
ordered to commit suicide, which
he did in 65.
His wife also attempted suicide then, but she was
rescued.
Nine tragedies based on Greek plays have been attributed
to
Seneca, while the one historical drama Octavia was
probably written by an imitator soon after his death.
There is no evidence
they were performed,
but they easily could have been.
Four choral
interludes divide the plays into the five acts
recommended by
Horace.
The tragedies of Seneca were to have a great influence
on the rebirth of tragedy in Italy, France,
and England during
the Renaissance.
Seneca's Mad Hercules is based on the Heracles
of Euripides.
The prolog
(first act) is spoken by the goddess Juno,
who insane with jealousy
that her brother and husband Jupiter
fathered Hercules by another
woman,
intends to drive Hercules mad.
Yet she hopes her hate will
be changed to favor and that his
sons will remain unharmed by
Hercules overcoming himself and her.
His mother's husband Amphitryon
laments that Hercules cannot
enjoy the world he saved, because
prosperous crime is called
virtue, and good men obey the guilty
when might is right.
Amphitryon saw King Creon killed by Lycus.
Megara, the wife of Hercules, hopes her husband will come
back
soon from the underworld of the dead.
Lycus appears and wants
to marry Megara;
but as he killed her father, she hates him.
Lycus
asserts he rules with arms that
annul laws and says he will force
her.
Hercules arrives with Theseus and is informed by Amphitryon
that Lycus intends to kill his children, father, and wife.
Theseus
notes the spiritual principle of justice that makes each
person
suffer for their crimes when they return.
He warns those who rule
to refrain from bloodshed,
because they shall be judged more heavily.
Hercules kills the tyrannical Lycus; but then Juno makes him
mad
so that he kills his wife and his own children,
thinking they
belong to Lycus.
Realizing what he has done, Hercules destroys
his weapons
and threatens to kill himself to purge the earth of
such a person;
but Amphitryon, arguing this would be a sin in
full consciousness,
dissuades him, and Theseus offers his land
as a refuge.
This gruesome play reflects how imperial Rome suffers
from the violence of its own great leaders,
who often killed their
own children.
The Trojan Women by Seneca combines elements from
a
play of that name and Hecuba by Euripides.
Hecuba observes that Troy is being looted while it burns.
Pyrrhus,
the son of Achilles, for his late father intends to
sacrifice Polyxena, daughter of Hecuba and Priam.
Agamemnon argues against
this murder called marriage;
he knows how such guilt comes back.
Pyrrhus says no law forbids killing a prisoner;
but Agamemnon
says that shame may.
Yet the prophet Calchas insists the Trojan
princess
must die for the Fates.
Then Andromache tries to hide
her little son from Ulysses,
who has come to kill him too.
The
wily Ulysses gets the boy by threatening to disturb
the sacred
grave of her husband Hector.
She condemns Ulysses for putting
the blame on the
prophet and the innocent gods.
Helen appears
with the lie that Polyxena
is to be married to Achilles' son.
Finally a messenger describes how the boy leaped to
his death,
and the princess was stabbed by Pyrrhus.
Hecuba declares the war
is over.
By showing the horrors of defeat, Seneca,
like Euripides,
protests the folly of war.
Seneca's Phoenician Women only exists as four acts without
a chorus based primarily on Euripides'
play of the same name.
In the first act Oedipus is seeking death
while Antigone
encourages him to live and control
the mad strife
between his sons.
Oedipus knows they are mad for sovereignty but
in the
brief second act does not care what crimes they commit.
In the third and fourth acts Jocasta pleads with her sons
not
to fight each other, courageously telling them
they must slay
her first.
Polyneices has lost faith in his brother
and his mother's
promises.
Jocasta takes heart when Eteocles puts aside his weapons.
She argues they do their cause harm by inflaming the land
with
hostile arms and spreading terror.
She notes that unwelcome empire
will not be long maintained;
but Eteocles seems to have hardened
himself
to holding power even if he must endure hatred.
Though
Oedipus and his sons seem to lack redemption,
Jocasta nobly pleads
against war for personal ambition.
Based on Euripides,
Seneca's Medea begins with that woman
invoking a curse
on Corinth king Creon and his royal line,
because he dissolved
her marriage to Jason
so that he could marry Creon's daughter.
Her nurse offers the Stoic advice of curbing her temper and
yielding
to fate; but Medea argues with Creon
that unjust sovereignty never
endures long.
Creon tells her to leave his land,
but Medea asks
for her husband to join her.
Medea sets her will on limitless
revenge, resenting that Jason
did not even talk with her before
deciding to leave her.
Jason appears and tells Medea that he persuaded
Creon
not to kill her but to let her flee.
Medea believes he is
merely getting her
out of the way so that he can marry Creusa.
In Seneca's version Jason wants to keep their children
and argues
the queen can benefit them.
Medea begs for her children or at
least
the chance to embrace them once more.
Again Medea turns
to black magic and even spills her blood
on the altar as she prepares
a poisoned bridal robe for Creusa.
In the last act a messenger
announces that the king and his
daughter are dead as flames consume
the palace.
Then to make Jason suffer, the insane Medea kills
both their
sons in his presence even though Jason
offers himself
for the last remaining son.
Seneca may have used this horrendous
story to comment on
the intrigues of women in the courts of Claudius
and Nero.
Seneca's Phaedra follows the story of Hippolytus
by Euripides.
Young Hippolytus,
son of Theseus and the Amazon queen,
prays at the shrine of chaste
Diana.
While her husband Theseus is visiting the underworld,
Phaedra
has fallen in love with her stepson Hippolytus.
Her nurse warns
her that Hippolytus hates women,
but Phaedra hopes he can be overcome
by love.
Phaedra wants to prevent her sin by dying.
Hippolytus
tells the nurse how he enjoys the purity of
rustic life free of
ambition, fear, and jealousy.
Hippolytus admits he hates women
and believes
they initiate most wickedness.
Phaedra asks to be
his servant and offers him the regency
if he will take her in
his arms.
Her heart is consumed by this mad love.
Hippolytus never
heard anything so foul and draws his sword.
Rejected, Phaedra
wishes to die.
Hippolytus tells her to live and leaves his sullied
sword.
The nurse suggests a countercharge and
accuses Hippolytus
of raping her mistress.
Rescued by Hercules, Theseus returns
to find that Phaedra wants
to die.
She refuses to say why until he threatens to torture her
nurse.
Phaedra says her body was violated and points to the sword.
Believing his son by the Amazon is guilty, Theseus calls upon
his third boon from Neptune to strike Hippolytus down.
In the
next act a messenger describes how Hippolytus was
dragged to death
by his chariot's horses near the stormy sea.
Theseus mourns for
having wished him dead.
When the remains of Hippolytus are brought
in,
Phaedra admits that it was her unchastity not his;
then she
kills herself.
Theseus realizes he is guilty of punishing an innocent
man.
Once again Seneca has portrayed
the destructiveness of human
passions.
Seneca's version of Oedipus cannot match
the greatness
of Sophocles.
Oedipus wants
to relieve the pestilence in Thebes
and learns from Creon that
the god instructs them
to banish the murderer of King Laius.
Oedipus
promises to do so but resists Creon's advice
he abdicate until
he learns that he killed his father Laius
and married his mother
Jocasta.
Then Oedipus gouges out his own eyes with his fingers.
Jocasta commits suicide, and Oedipus hopes the plague
will depart
the city with him.
Oedipus felt guilty for causing his own mother's
death.
Did Seneca regret having been complicit
in Nero's murder
of his mother?
Seneca's Agamemnon also does not equal that of Aeschylus.
Seneca emphasized the horrifying heritage of Aegisthus by
presenting
as prolog the ghost of Thyestes, who ate his own
sons and fathered
Aegisthus by his daughter.
Clytemnestra is so wicked that she
argues to her nurse
that the safest path of crime is greater crimes.
She resents her husband's sacrificing their daughter and his
making
Achilles give up a maiden, and she is jealous of
Agamemnon's captive
prize, Cassandra.
Yet to her paramour Aegisthus
Clytemnestra argues
his royal right to enjoy her.
Only in antagonism to him does she
soften to realize
she needs forgiveness too.
She chides Aegisthus
for being grandson
as well as son of Thyestes.
The psychic Cassandra
describes how Clytemnestra
wrapped Agamemnon in a robe
and cut
off his head with an ax.
Their daughter Electra helps her younger
brother Orestes
to escape with Strophius to Phocis and then verbally
challenges her mother, hoping to die; but Aegisthus believes
a
worse punishment will be to imprison her
until she tells them
where Orestes is.
Clytemnestra has to direct her wrath to killing
Cassandra,
who exults that Mycenae's leader is overthrown
and
predicts the queen's fatal madness.
Seneca chose the most dramatic
Greek plays and explored
the psychological emotions that
drove
powerful people to tragedy.
Most gruesome of all is Seneca's Thyestes.
Plays of
that name by Sophocles and one by Varius Rufus
performed in 29
BC to celebrate the victory
at Actium are no longer extant.
In
the prolog the ghost of Tantalus, grandfather of Atreus
and Thyestes,
has been called by a Fury out of hell,
where he hungrily cannot
reach food.
Tantalus warns the Fury not to soil his hands with
sinful slaughter but to keep his altars clean.
Atreus believes
he must be avenged
on his brother to be a successful king.
He
revels in compelling his subjects not only to endure
but to approve
his actions, while his minister notes
it is better to win approval
in their hearts.
Atreus thinks people must be made to want what
they dislike,
while his minister advises his king to want what
is right.
The minister warns no throne can stand when there is
neither shame nor law nor trust nor piety.
Probably this scene
reflects Seneca's attempts to advise Nero.
Atreus resents his
brother Thyestes for raping his wife and
stealing the golden fleece
and his throne.
Atreus aims to make Thyestes tear and eat his
children's flesh.
To gain his trust he pretends to offer him
partnership
in ruling Argos.
To test if Thyestes fathered his own sons Agamemnon
and Menelaus, he intends to have them
cooperate in punishing Thyestes.
Wanting nothing, Thyestes tells Atreus
supreme power is nothing
to him.
His house is undefended but secure;
because his estate
is small, his peace is great.
Tantalus, the son of Thyestes, reminds
his father that
Atreus is asking him to be king too, and so Thyestes
agrees,
as Atreus seems to be putting enmity away.
The sons of
Thyestes will be hostages, and the
brothers Thyestes and Atreus
give up their claims.
Thyestes offers to serve Atreus,
who invites
his brother to a sacrifice.
A messenger brings a detailed description
of how
Atreus butchered the three sons of Thyestes on an altar,
cooked their flesh, and served it to his brother at a banquet.
Then being showed their severed heads and hands,
Thyestes asks
that they be given a funeral;
but Atreus indicates Thyestes has
already consumed them.
Finally for his revenge Thyestes
trusts
the gods will punish Atreus.
Once more Seneca explores how ambition
causes rulers to devour each other's children.
Seneca's longest play, Hercules on Oeta, is based on
The Women of Trachis by Sophocles
and portrays the death
and deification of Hercules, the hero Romans
admired
for the many difficult tasks he accomplished.
His wife
Deianira is jealous of the
captured Oechalian princess Iole.
If
she should become pregnant by Hercules, Deianira threatens
to
tear the child from the womb and kill Hercules or die herself.
Yet consciously she only aims to charm her husband by giving
him
a robe with a potion she got from the dying centaur Nessus,
who
had been killed by Hercules for molesting her.
Nessus promised
its charm would "fix a wavering lover;"
but its poison
was to accomplish his revenge and fulfill the
prophecy that Hercules
would be killed
by someone he had defeated.
Their son Hyllus reports
to his mother how the poisoned robe
destroyed the flesh of his
father Hercules.
Deianira asks Hyllus to kill her with a sword;
but he goes after her to try to prevent her death.
Hercules regrets being the victim of a woman and ironically
wishes he were killed by some opponent like Nessus.
Hyllus reports
to Alcmena, the mother of Hercules,
that her son is dying and
that Deianira killed herself,
explaining to her and Hercules the
treachery of Nessus.
In the last act Philoctetes describes how
Hercules prepared
and lit his own funeral pyre, and then Alcmena
eulogizes
her son and hears his divine voice from heaven.
Purged
of his body, his celestial spirit
has once again conquered hell.
Perhaps this ending is Seneca's pagan answer
to the growing Christian
myth of resurrection.
Octavia is the only Roman historical play to survive,
though
heroic warriors were occasionally commemorated in festivals.
The plight of Octavia is as grim as any mythical tragic figures.
Her mother was put to death by her father Claudius,
who was poisoned
by Agrippina (her stepmother and
mother-in-law since she married
her step-brother Nero).
Her brother Britannicus was ordered
killed
by her husband Nero.
The play is set in 62, three years after
Nero
has murdered his mother Agrippina.
Realizing Octavia never
loved him,
Nero now wants to marry his mistress Poppaea.
The character Seneca describes the first age when war was
unknown;
by the third era people were controlled
by sacred laws; but in
the fourth agriculture, greed for gold,
and iron led to the development
of weapons and war.
Now he laments that crime is king.
Nero enters
requesting the decapitated heads
of banished Plautus and Sulla.
Seneca asks if this is just treatment;
but Nero replies that justice is for
those who have no need to fear.
Seneca suggests clemency,
but Nero prefers putting enemies down.
A Caesar should be feared,
though Seneca says he should be loved.
Instead of just orders
approved by consent,
Nero uses the sword.
His wife Octavia must
die so that
he can marry the beautiful Poppaea.
Seneca suggests
that a husband should delight in the virtues
of fidelity, honor,
purity, and goodness,
because beauty withers.
The people do not
approve of his marriage,
but Nero insists on marrying the woman
who already carries his child.
Agrippina's ghost comes to complain
of this marriage
and prophesies a death will punish the crimes
of her tyrannical son Nero.
A mob has gathered on Octavia's behalf,
and Nero orders it
tamed by suffering oppression.
The prefect reports the mob is
put down;
but Nero is not satisfied with the deaths of only the
ringleaders.
Octavia must die for the mob's revolt.
Octavia is
taken away, and the chorus sadly concludes,
"Rome loves to
see the blood
of her own children on her hands."4
As a witness
to such intrigues, it is easy to see why
Seneca was drawn to writing
violent tragedies
in which he tried to insert some humane appeals.
Seneca's writings helped to make Stoicism
a popular Roman philosophy.
"On Providence" answers the question of his friend Lucilius
why many evils happen to good people
if the world is governed
by providence.
Seneca accepted the Stoic idea that the orderly
universe
could not persist without some caretaker.
Seneca believed
the gods are best to the best people,
and Nature never allows
the good to be harmed by the good,
for a friendship between the
gods
and the good is forged by virtue.
Fathers restrain their
sons with severe discipline in order to
prepare them for the world,
because they love them.
Though misfortunes may happen to good
people, evil cannot.
The evils God keeps away from the good are
sin, crime, greed, lust, and avarice.
God protects and defends
the good
but not necessarily their baggage.
Good is found within
and does not need good fortune.
The mind and courage were given
to withstand
what is sad, dreadful, and hard to bear.
Good people
become more capable by maintaining poise
and assimilating all
that occurs.
They regard all adversity as exercise to gain strength.
They turn every hardship and difficulty into advantage.
Disaster
is virtue's opportunity.
What matters is not what you bear but
how you bear it.
A soft and easy life tends to produce weak people.
One should never feel sorry for the good, because
although
they may be called unhappy,
they can never actually be unhappy.
Seneca asked if the dictator Sulla
was happy
because his way to the forum was cleared by the sword.
Struggling to hold on to things can bring pain;
it is better not
to cling to them.
Seneca wrote that he does not submit against
his will;
he is God's follower, not his slave,
because he knows
all things
proceed according to eternal laws.
Everything must
be given up eventually,
and dying is short and easy.
After Seneca went into exile to Corsica in 41,
he wrote for
his mother "Consolation to Helvia."
He knew of no one
who was the object of grief
writing to console, and he hesitated
to exacerbate her sorrow.
However, he believed the treatment would
be
worth the pain of opening the wounds.
Seneca assured his mother
that he was happy
and could not be made unhappy, because
Nature
requires no extra equipment for happiness.
The wise are neither
elated by prosperity nor depressed
by adversity but rely on themselves
for satisfaction.
Though he acknowledged that emotions are not
always
under control and that distraction
only tends to cheat
them for a while,
grief overcome by reason can be appeased forever.
For the primal source of the mind is the heavenly spirit.
Seneca
argued that exile is not bad, as many peoples
have changed their
homes.
Marcus Brutus
had noted that
exiles carry their virtues with them.
Seneca observed
that Nature fashioned Caligula to show
the height of vice when
it is combined with power,
and he ridiculed his extravagance in
spending a million
on hard-to-get foods for one meal.
It is absurd
to believe that one's financial balance
is more important than
mental balance.
There can never be enough for the greedy,
but
Nature is satisfied with little.
The mind can never be exiled,
because it is divine
and free to explore all time and space.
Seneca wrote "On Firmness" to his young
Epicurean
friend Serenus.
Seneca argued that the wise can not truly be injured.
Fortune may snatch away what she has given;
but she does not give
virtue, and it can never be taken away.
Instead of shrinking from
difficult circumstances,
the wise consider even injury profitable
as making
trials of virtue and proving one's self.
The wise may
be wounded, but injuries received
may be overcome, arrested, and
healed.
Verbal insults are even less difficult, and the wise regard
them
with a smile; for true criticisms are beneficial,
and false
ones are irrelevant.
Seneca wrote his long essay On Anger to his older brother
Novatus, later known as Gallio
when he governed Achaea starting
in 52.
Seneca called anger the most hideous and frenzied
of all
the emotions, and he noted
it has been called temporary insanity.
Because it causes numerous crimes and wars,
no plague has harmed
the human race as much.
Aristotle
defined anger as the desire to repay suffering.
No creature is
more loving than humans,
but Seneca asked what is more cruel than
anger.
Humans were born to help each other,
but in anger they
destroy each other.
He referred to Plato's
analysis that both punishment and
anger are not consistent with
good because one injures,
and the other takes pleasure in injuring.
Reason remains the mistress as long as she keeps apart
from the
passions; but if she mingles with them,
she becomes contaminated
and cannot hold them back.
Passion and reason are not separate
and transform
the mind toward the better or the worse.
If reason
surrenders to anger, how can it free itself?
Seneca criticized Aristotle's view
that anger
can be useful as a soldier.
For Seneca following the leadership
of reason is not anger,
which he describes as willfulness.
In
the analogy anger would be disobedient soldiers.
Seneca found no reason for hating wrong-doers
since error causes
their mistakes.
Does one hate the members of one's own body
when
undergoing surgery?
Anger can be replaced by the desire to heal.
Seneca observed that anger is unbalanced
and usually goes farther
than it should,
For it indulges its own impulses, is capricious in judgment,
refuses to listen to evidence, grants no opportunity
for defense, maintains whatever position it has seized,
and is never willing to surrender its judgment
even if it is wrong.5
Reason, however, postpones action in order to
listen to both
sides and sift out the truth.
Seneca described three stages of
anger as:
1) a menace prompts passion involuntarily;
2) an act
of volition assumes it is right to revenge
one's hurt or punish
another; and
3) one wishes to take vengeance whether it is right
or not.
Although the first reaction cannot be controlled,
the
other two stages can be banished by judgment.
Some argued that anger is expedient
because it escapes contempt
and terrifies the wicked.
Seneca replied that powerful anger
may
cause one to be feared,
which is worse than being scorned,
and
powerless anger exposes one to ridicule.
Seneca found that it
is easier to be virtuous
but costly to indulge in vices.
He suggested
not falling into anger;
but if one does, to do no wrong.
Anger
is best corrected by delay.
Arrogance and ignorance make us prone
to anger.
Anger is especially dangerous, because more than
any
other vice it can affect a whole state.
Nothing is worse than
the enmity anger breeds,
as nothing is more deadly than war.
Seneca
urged us to fight against ourselves,
to conquer anger so that
it will not conquer us.
He suggested keeping it hidden in the
depths of the heart
so that it should not drive but can be driven.
If the countenance is unruffled, the voice gentle,
and the step
slow, gradually the inner person will conform.
Let us remember
that even the wisest have faults,
and let us forgive the foolish.
For Seneca the greatest punishment for wrong-doing
is having done
it because of the torture of remorse.
Vengeance exposes the doer
to more injuries.
Seneca asked us to find time to love
and not
waste time on evil things.
He then gave numerous examples of anger,
pointing out
that in most cases it is the result
of attaching
great value to petty things.
In "On the Shortness of Life" Seneca addressed Paulinus,
who was in charge of Rome's grain supply.
Seneca recommended leisure
for the practice of philosophy
by being detached from involvement
rather than
wasting one's time pursuing fortunes
and pleasures
that do not last.
He considered spending time in drinking and
lust
as the sorriest abuse of time, for he thought avarice, wrath,
and unjust hatreds were more manly sins.
For Seneca only philosophers
really live and can explore
the wisdom of past philosophers.
He
suggested that Paulinus take time for himself
as he had given
much of his life to the state.
It is better to know the balance
sheet
of one's life than of the public grain supply.
"On Tranquillity of Mind" was also written to Serenus,
Nero's prefect of police.
He had asked Seneca how he could stop
his mental vacillations that prevent tranquillity.
Seneca observed
that mental balance is disturbed
by unrealized desires and the
inability
either to control or yield to passions.
Although Seneca
recommended quiet retirement,
he also valued willingness to be
of service to individuals
and humanity with one's intelligence
and counsel.
Stoics claim the whole world as their fatherland
and thus afford virtue a broad scope.
Seneca advised choosing
friends who are free from passions,
because we are affected by
those nearest.
Thrift leads to contentment; even the poor can
be wealthy
by being thrifty, whereas without thrift
even riches
will fail to satisfy.
One should avoid laboring for empty ends
or without motivation.
Seneca suggested cutting down on
gadding
about and making the rounds.
Instead of being stuck in a rigid
program,
being adaptable is helpful.
When Emperor Nero was eighteen, he signed his first
death warrant,
commenting that
he wished he had never learned to write.
At that
time Seneca wrote "On Clemency" to
recommend mercy to
the Emperor so that
he could enjoy a clear conscience.
Seneca
considered this the most humane of the virtues.
A high spirit
is distinguished by composure, serenity,
and the lofty disregard
of insult and injury.
Gentleness enhances the security of kings,
because although frequent punishment may crush a few,
it provokes
the hatred of all.
A stern king by destroying enemies may only
multiply them.
Although his temper flared in youth, Augustus
learned
clemency and gained a great reputation over the years.
Seneca commended the early reign of the young
Nero during which
he could boast of
not shedding blood anywhere in the world.
Perhaps
the greatest problem with cruelty is
that one must keep to the
same road,
as crimes need more crimes to protect them.
Seneca praised the ruler whose solicitude is all-embracing,
who fosters every part of the commonwealth as a member
of himself,
who inclines to milder courses than punishment,
who is reluctant
to use harsh remedies, whose spirit is free
of hostility and cruelty,
who wields power with even temper
in order to satisfy his subjects,
who makes his prosperity
a public asset, who offers easy access
and is affable in
conversation, whose amiability wins affection,
who is
sympathetic to reasonable requests but not impatient
with
the unreasonable—such a person is loved, defended,
and cherished
by the whole state.
Humans require skillful handling without passions
like anger.
Just as we treat diseases without getting angry,
so
human problems can also be treated gently.
One must learn that
wishing to be feared
is as bad as being in fear.
Seneca asked
why anyone would lead such a life
when one can be harmless to
all.
Only the king who provides security to others is secure.
Most of books two and three of "On Clemency" are lost,
but Seneca concluded the first book by comparing the prince
who
saves the lives of fellow citizens in the exercise of duty
as
a godlike power, while to kill multitudes without
discrimination
is like the power of fire and ruin.
Seneca also wrote "On the Happy Life" to his brother
Gallio.
Seneca accepted the Stoic premise that the happy life
is in harmony with its own nature.
It is attained with a sound
mind that is courageous and energetic,
careful of one's body but
without anxiety, and attentive to all
the advantages of life without
being too attached to any.
The happy person is free from fear
and desire by the gift of reason.
Concord and unity result from
virtues,
while discord comes from the vices.
Asked why he has
so much wealth when he discounts the
value of money, Seneca replied
that he is not equal to the best,
though he is better than the
wicked.
He was content to be reducing his vices.
While acknowledging
that philosophers do not always practice
what they preach, Seneca
held that they practice much
of what their virtuous minds conceive.
Seneca thought it noble to aim at high things.
He hoped to do
nothing for opinion but everything
for conscience, endeavoring
to be guilty
of nothing that impaired human liberty.
Seneca found more expression for virtue with riches
than in
poverty; for being poor requires only endurance,
but riches need
moderation, liberality,
diligence, orderliness, and grandeur.
Because he was willing to give up his riches,
Seneca believed he was not owned by them
as some people are.
Why condemn wisdom
to poverty?
Seneca believed that wealth acquired
without harming
anyone or base dealing is honorable.
Although he was known for
his generosity, Seneca's critics
were skeptical of the means he
used to gain such immense
wealth in such a short time by using
his imperial favor.
Seneca argued that the wise can use wealth
by sharing it with the worthy.
Yet he held that riches themselves
are not a good,
because though desirable they cannot make one
good.
Seneca's longest work On Benefits discusses ingratitude
as the most common vice.
Great souls seek to do benefits; they
search for good persons
even after discovering bad people.
The
most important part of a benefit is the good will
that bestows
it; the ignorant regard only what meets the eye.
A benefit is
a virtuous act that no power can undo.
The most important benefits
are the necessary;
the useful are second; the pleasurable,
especially
things that endure, are third.
The best benefits anticipate one's
desire;
next is to indulge a request.
Seneca concluded this work
by noting that it is not the proof
of a fine spirit to give a
benefit and lose it,
but rather to lose and still to give.
During the last three years of his life Seneca could concentrate
on philosophy and wrote more than a hundred letters
to Lucilius, the procurator in Sicily.
Seneca's short discussions of philosophical
issues later
inspired the essay form used so well by Montaigne,
Francis Bacon, and Emerson.
Seneca wrote that a friend must be
trusted,
but before that you must judge.
Philosophy promises the
feeling of fellowship
and of belonging to the human community.
For Seneca the motto of living in conformity with nature
did not
mean torturing one's body nor rejecting simple
standards of cleanliness
nor adopting a hideous diet.
Philosophy calls for a simple life,
not a crude life of penance.
He found a compromise between the
ideal and popular
morality in a life that can be admired and understood.
Seneca found that part of the joy of learning is that
it enabled
him to teach so as to benefit others besides himself.
In his 7th
Letter Seneca warned against watching the
butchery and slaughter
of the shows in the arena.
He suggested retiring into yourself
as much as possible
and associating with people who are likely
to improve you.
Seneca wrote for later generations helpful recommendations
that he hoped would be like successful medicine to lessen sores.
Seneca delighted in quoting Epicurus
in many letters,
though he believed the Stoic sages feel their
troubles
but overcome them,
while the Epicureans do not even feel
them.
He felt the wise can do without friends
although they do
not desire to do without them.
Seneca's teacher Hecato recommended
the best love philter:
"If you wish to be loved, love."6
Although philosophy is not a popular occupation,
Seneca believed
that it molds and builds character, orders life,
regulates conduct,
shows what to do and what not to do,
and keeps one on a correct
course without fear or worry.
The duty and proof of wisdom is
that word
and deed should be in accord.
It may take time but terrors
may be quieted, incitements
quelled, illusions dispelled, extravagance
checked,
and greed reprimanded.
In Letter 41 Seneca mentioned
the divine spirit
that is near you, with you, and inside you.
This divine spirit resides within us, guards us, and watches us.
As we treat it, so it will treat us.
No one is good without God,
and no one can rise above fortune without help from God.
This
is what prompts us to noble and exalted endeavors.
In the 47th Letter Seneca was glad to hear that Lucilius
lived
on friendly terms with his slaves
as an enlightened person should.
Seneca laughed at those who thought it degrading to eat
with a
slave but would fill their bellies
and then vomit everything up.
Though he did not question having slaves,
Seneca recommended being
kind and courteous to them.
He observed that many people are slaves
to sex or money
or ambition, and all are slaves to hope or fear.
He believed it is better to have slaves
respect you than fear
you.
To be respected truly is to be loved; love and fear do not
mix.
Seneca believed discipline should be verbal,
as correctional
beatings are for animals only.
Seneca felt the concern of a friend
as his own, writing,
Friendship creates a community of interest
between us in everything.
We have neither successes nor setbacks
as individuals; our lives have a common end.
No one can lead a happy life if he thinks only
of himself and turns everything to his own purposes.
You should live for the other person
if you wish to live for yourself.7
Seneca advised against quibbling since straightforwardness
and simplicity are in harmony with goodness.
Seneca found greater
power and value in that which
creates (God) than in matter.
In
humans the body should serve this better spirit.
Seneca held that
the supreme good is virtue alone.
People make mistakes because
they consider
the parts of life but not life as a whole.
The greater
part of progress is the desire to make progress.
Those who wish
to be happy should conclude that
the good consists only in what
is honorable.
God relates to the soul; but sensual goods are only
opinions.
Seneca justified suicide, writing that the wise live
as long as they should, not as long as they can;
quality of life
is more important than quantity.
Dying well is more important
than dying early or late
if it means escaping living ill.
Yet
Seneca believed in learning as long as one is ignorant;
even the
old can learn.
Reason perfects humans and makes them blessed.
Virtue is the sole good, and there is no good without it.
Seneca observed that so-called pleasures,
when they go beyond
reasonable limits, become punishments.
In Letter 88 he discussed
from the ethical viewpoint
liberal studies that are supposed to
make a person free.
Seneca believed that the pursuit of wisdom
leads to freedom
but questioned whether literary scholarship leads
to virtue.
As to music he preferred bringing harmony to his mind
by getting his thoughts in tune.
He wanted to learn how to avoid
uttering plaintive notes
when things went against him in life.
He asked what was the use of mastering a horse
if one is carried
away by unbridled emotions,
or of overcoming an opponent in wrestling
or boxing
if one is overcome by temper.
Liberal studies alone
do not improve character,
but they may prepare the mind to acquire
moral values.
In the 89th Letter Seneca focused on the moral part
of
philosophy and divided it into three sections.
First, theory
assigns everything its proper place
and assesses value;
second
is to control impulses;
and third is to harmonize action resulting
from impulses
in order to attain consistency with the values.
He recommended studying not to increase knowledge,
but to improve
it.
Seneca believed life is a gift of the immortal gods,
but living
well is the gift of philosophy
that is bestowed by the gods.
Philosophy
does not construct arms for use in war,
but it is a voice for
peace,
calling all humans to live in harmony.
Seneca seemed to
be criticizing Epicureans when he wrote
that his philosophy did
not take the citizen out of public life
nor gods out of the world
nor hand morality over to pleasure;
he held that nothing is good
unless it is honorable.
Virtue for Seneca is all important, and
it only comes to
character by schooling, training, and continuing
practice.
Even the best people must cultivate virtue.
Things can
be made easier by viewing them with equanimity.
Disasters, losses,
and injuries have no more power
against virtue than a cloud against
the sun.
In discussing refraining from bloodshed in Letter 95,
Seneca
thought it a little thing
not to harm those you ought to help.
Yet to treat others with kindness is worthy of great praise.
Seneca
believed that all that is part of God and humanity
is one—parts
of one great body.
Nature created us from the same source and
for the same end,
engendering in us mutual friendship
and establishing
fairness and justice.
Like Socrates,
Seneca held it is more wretched
to commit injury than to suffer
it.
Since our birth is common, let us possess things in common.
Freedom cannot be won without sacrifices.
If you value freedom
highly,
everything else must be valued as little.
In Letter 105 Seneca observed that to be feared is to fear.
No one can strike terror into others
and still enjoy peace of
mind.
Not wronging others is a good start toward peace of mind.
People without self-restraint lead disordered lives,
experiencing
fear equal to the injuries they do others
because of conscience
demanding answers.
To expect punishment is to suffer it,
and to
deserve it is to expect it.
Those with bad consciences may find
circumstances
of impunity but never freedom from anxiety.
Even
in his time Seneca noted that philosophy was
degenerating from
the study of wisdom
to philology, the study of words.
Seneca found
that we are naturally attracted
by wealth, pleasures, good looks,
political advancement,
and other enticing prospects,
and we are
repelled by exertion, death, pain, and limitations.
He concluded
that we need to train ourselves
not to crave the former while
not being afraid of the latter.
He suggested retreating from attractive
things and
rousing ourselves to meet what attacks us.
He compared
this to leaning forward while walking uphill
and leaning back
when coming down.
In his last letter Seneca explained that the
Epicureans
by making pleasure its ideal hold that
good resides
in the senses;
but the Stoics find good in the intellect
that
is able to judge good and bad
according to virtue and honor.
After the Zealots took Masada, Eleazar persuaded the ministers
in the Temple at Jerusalem to refuse any offerings from pagans.
Josephus wrote that abolishing the sacrifices
for Rome and Caesar
made war inevitable.
Influential citizens sent delegations to
King Agrippa and Florus,
and Agrippa sent 2,000 horsemen
to help
preserve peace with Rome.
Civil war broke out in Jerusalem between
the insurgents
in the Temple area and the prominent citizens of
the upper city.
The king's troops were driven out of the upper
city,
burning the high priest's house, the palaces of Agrippa
and
Berenice, and the office that recorded debts.
It took two
days to capture the fortress of Antonia
and kill the garrison.
The high priest Ananias was caught and murdered
along with his
brother.
Menahem behaved so savagely that Eleazar turned
against
him, and Menahem was executed.
Then Romans commanded by Metilius
were allowed
to depart without their arms or baggage.
At the same
time the people of Caesarea massacred the
Jewish colony, resulting
in 20,000 dead according to Josephus.
Many were also killed in
Scythopolis, Ascalon, and Ptolemais.
In Alexandria, where Philo's
nephew Tiberius Alexander
was governing, it was reported that
50,000 Jews were killed.
Syrian governor Cestius Gallus led 30,000 soldiers
from Antioch
against Judea.
Zealots in Jerusalem ignored Sabbath laws to prepare
for war.
After storming the walls of the Temple for six days,
Cestius withdrew to Antioch,
having lost 5,300 soldiers and 480
cavalry.
Pagan attacks against Jews led Shammai followers
to adopt
a boycott against goods from pagans.
Some of the Hillelites who
objected were killed after a debate
in the house of Eleazar ben
Ananias.
In Galilee about 4,000 rebels were led by John of Gischala.
The Sanhedrin appointed as governor of Galilee the historian
Flavius
Josephus, who was born in Jerusalem in 38
and in 64
had gained
the friendship of Nero's wife Poppaea in Rome.
He raised and trained
a large army in Galilee;
but he returned some treasures to Agrippa
while claiming
he had sent them as booty to Jerusalem.
John's
friend Simon ben Gamaliel was president of the
Sanhedrin and sent
four envoys to remove Josephus
from office in favor of John of
Gischala; but Josephus had
enough support to send the envoys back
to Jerusalem
in chains, thus stimulating civil war in Galilee.
Nero replaced Cestius with the proven commander
Flavius Vespasian,
who sent his son Titus
to bring two legions from Alexandria.
At
the Syrian capital Antioch, the empire's third largest city,
Vespasian
gathered the forces of King Agrippa, allies,
and Roman troops
totaling about 50,000 men.
As Vespasian's army invaded Galilee,
many of the followers
of Josephus fled, while some found shelter
with him at Tiberias.
Vespasian easily took Gabara, burned the
town,
and enslaved its people.
Josephus sent his assessment of
the situation to Jerusalem
authorities, suggesting he negotiate
or they send reinforcements.
Vespasian besieged Jotapata, where
more rebels had gathered,
and Josephus went there to encourage
the Jews.
While Jotapata was holding out for 47 days, Japha revolted;
but Roman forces led by Trajan (father of the Emperor)
and Titus
eventually killed 15,000 and enslaved 2,130.
Also according to
Josephus who may have exaggerated
numbers, 11,600 Samaritans were
slain on Mt. Gerizim.
Finally Jotapata fell, and the dead were
estimated at 40,000.
Josephus managed to hide and surrendered
when Vespasian
sent to him a friend, the historian giving himself
a
philosophical speech on why suicide is a bad idea.
Jewish piratical activities were reduced when the Romans
took
Joppa, and only two women survived
the slaughter and suicides
at Gamala.
At Gischala John asked Titus for the Sabbath day and
then
broke his word by fleeing to Jerusalem,
though 6,000 following
him were killed.
As Vespasian declared a truce in Galilee, the
bandits and
revolutionaries gathered in Jerusalem or held out
at Masada.
In the Temple the Zealots arrested members of the royal
family
and replaced the high priests with individuals elected
or
chosen by lot, outraging Ananus, who called them tyrants
and
the scum of the nation.
Joshua also tried to persuade arriving
Idumaeans not to join
the Zealots, but Simon son of Cathla said
they came to fight
for freedom but found the gates closed against
them.
The Idumaeans broke through to join the Zealots,
and rock-throwing
escalated into bloody brawls
in the Temple, leaving 8,500 dead.
The Zealots were victorious and elected seventy members
to a new
Sanhedrin.
After eliminating Ananus and Joshua, the Zealots
and
Idumaeans began slaughtering people
who would not join their rebel
cause.
The distinguished citizen Zechariah was tried and acquitted
by the seventy; but two rebels killed him
and declared an end
to trials.
This disgusted the Idumaeans, who released 2,000 citizens
from the city to join Simon Bar-Giora at Masada,
and many went
home themselves.
As long as Jews were killing each other in Jerusalem,
Vespasian
refrained from attacking it for two years, allowing
his troops
to squelch resistance in Peraea and Idumaea.
Many fled Jerusalem,
though some were killed by Zealots
out of fear they would join
the Romans.
Peace advocate Jochanan ben Zakkai escaped Jerusalem
by being carried in a coffin disguised by a funeral procession.
John of Gischala broke with the Zealots,
causing more factional
fighting.
The Sicarii came out of Masada to raid Engedi,
killing
many and stealing provisions for Masada.
Simon Bar-Giora proclaimed
liberty to slaves,
with armed gangs drove Zealots back into Jerusalem,
and invaded Idumaea.
Zealots captured Simon's wife, causing his
men to
kill people outside of Jerusalem until they returned her.
Simon's ravaging of Idumaea with a large army caused many
Idumaeans
and deserters from Simon to flee into Jerusalem.
There Idumaeans
and deserters from John's army attacked
the Zealots and John,
forcing the Zealots led by
Eleazar ben Simon to take refuge in
the inner Temple
while John's forces held the outer court.
The
council of Jerusalem led by Matthias invited
Simon Bar-Giora to
enter the city as their protector
with an army of 10,000;
they
were joined by the army of 5,000 Idumaeans.
News of Nero's death and his appointment by the Senate
as Emperor
reached Galba in Spain,
which he had governed for eight years.
While marching to Rome he sent an assassin
to eliminate Clodius
Macer in Africa.
In Lower Germany Fabius Valens had his commander
Fonteius Capito killed without waiting for such orders.
Nero's
freedmen and political advisors were executed except
for Tigellinus,
whose enemies Galba chose not to reward.
The wealthy but parsimonious
Galba refused to pay
the troops what had been promised them.
After
the conspiracy of the ambitious Nymphidius failed,
Galba ordered
his supporters executed without a hearing.
On the first day of
69 CE legions in Upper Germany led by
Caecina refused to renew
their oaths of loyalty to Galba.
Two days later troops on the
lower Rhine led by the
unrewarded Fabius Valens acclaimed
their
commander Vitellius Emperor.
Having no sons, Galba designated
as his successor
Piso Licinianus, who was acceptable to the Senate;
but this alienated Otho, the first commander to support Galba
and governor of Lusitania for ten years.
Otho promised the praetorian
guard the usual money and
ordered a troop of cavalry to kill Galba
and Piso.
On January 15 Otho was proclaimed Emperor
as Galba was
beheaded in the forum.
120 people claiming rewards for participating
were later ordered executed by Vitellius.
Otho was hated as a friend of Nero and because he showed
that
imperial power could be bought
from soldiers willing to kill a
Caesar.
Vitellius and Otho each commanded about 100,000 troops.
Valens and Caecina led their divisions for Vitellius over the
snowy Alps and met in Transpadane Italy.
Tacitus noted that some
authorities reported efforts among the
soldiers to have the armies
declare an armistice and let the
Senate choose an Emperor.
Paulinus
was said to have delayed Otho's side to make peace
rather than
have a fight between two scoundrels.
Tacitus believed that such
self-control among soldiers was
unrealistic given the love of
power and Rome's imperial history.
Equality could be maintained
when Rome was weak,
but conquests of the world and the destruction
of rival powers
provided secure enjoyment of wealth
and the desire
to continue those habits.
Rome had experienced civil war with
many leaders such as
Marius,
Sulla, Pompey,
Julius Caesar, and Antony,
who were more capable
than Otho and Vitellius.
The army of Vitellius defeated Otho's forces at Cremona,
and
according to Dio Cassius 40,000 men on each side were killed.
Plutarch noted that in civil wars more are killed because
no quarter
is given, captives yielding no advantage.
After a reign of three
months Otho gallantly committed suicide
to prevent further civil
strife.
While the Rhine armies of 60,000 soldiers and camp followers
plundered Italy, the Senate confirmed
the imperial power of Vitellius.
Vitellius celebrated his victory with gladiator combats
at Lugdunum
and Cremona.
The lavish spending (900,000,000 sesterces) and gluttonous
habits of Vitellius soon drained the treasury of Rome
while his
cruel executions and tortures lost sympathy.
Vitellius ordered
astrologers to leave Italy by a specified day;
Dio Cassius wrote
that astrologers commanded him
to depart life on the day on which
he was killed.
During the civil wars citizenship was extended
to many
provincials—by Galba to tribes in central Gaul,
by Otho
to Lingones in eastern Gaul,
and by Vitellius to those in Spain
and Africa.
Meanwhile Syrian governor Mucianus persuaded Vespasian
to assume
the position of Emperor for the good of the country.
Alexandrian
commander Tiberius Alexander pledged his
troops to Vespasian on
July 1 in 69, and a few days later
legions in Judea took an oath
to Vespasian in person.
By July 15 all of Syria was loyal to Vespasian,
and Mucianus
began marching an army of 20,000 west through Asia
Minor.
Legions in the Danube region of Pannonia and Moesia also
joined the Vespasian cause, as Antonius Primus led
50,000 men into Italy against Caecina's troops, who put
their commander under
arrest when he told them
to desert to Primus.
Once again armies
from the north defeated
the Emperor's defenders at Cremona.
The
attempt of Valens to bring reinforcements from Gaul
ended in his
capture and execution.
Vitellius tried to send 20,000 troops,
but they quickly deserted to Primus.
Envoys from Rome included the Stoic philosopher
Musonius Rufus,
whose lectures to the soldiers on the
blessings of peace and the
dangers of war
were greeted with laughter and derision.
Believing
that philosophy is what is fit and proper,
Musonius Rufus also
wrote that girls should have the same
education as boys, that
in marriage husband and wife should
care for one another for all
of life, and that men should follow
the same sexual code they
demand of women.
The ascetic Musonius Rufus also criticized the
pleasures
of eating as dangerous and believed the only excuse
for sexual intercourse is procreation.
He said philosophers will
not resent an injury,
and he advised them to live by agriculture.
Vespasian's older brother Flavius Sabinus, whom Otho
had made
prefect of Rome, offered Vitellius
a million gold pieces and exile
for his abdication;
but praetorian guards attacked and killed
Sabinus
before the forces of Primus arrived
to annihilate them
and execute Vitellius.
The Roman Senate met to invest Flavius
Vespasian
as Emperor, making his son Domitian Caesar.
While the
victors hunted down the defeated
and looted the city, Domitian
was preoccupied
with seducing women.
Primus was really in charge
until Mucianus arrived.
In the lower Rhine region the Batavian leader Iulius Civilis,
who had been falsely charged with treason by army
commander Fonteius
Capito, supported the cause of Vespasian
organized by Primus and
attacked Vitellian garrisons.
Besieging Vetera, Civilis invited
independent German tribes
to join him; even the more peace-loving
Chauci participated.
Flaccus declared for Vespasian and was lynched
by troops loyal to Vitellius.
News that Vitellius had been defeated
and the capitol
in Rome was burned stimulated Druid prophecies
of conquest by Nordic peoples.
Treviri chiefs Iulius Classicus
and Iulius Tutor lured
Roman commander Vocula away from Moguntiacum
with false promises of aid, assassinated him,
and gathered his
forces into the Gallic imperial army.
However, other Gallic tribes
meeting at a conference at
Durocortorum (Rheims) refused to join
the Rhineland revolt.
After Vetera capitulated, German tribes
ignored the terms
and massacred Roman troops.
Gauls probably feared
their territories would be plundered
by independent German tribes,
described by Tacitus
as preferring warfare to farming.
Germans
avoided private feuds by compensating
the families of victims
with cattle or sheep.
Veleda was treated as a goddess,
and in
the Sitones tribe women were the dominant sex.
In the summer of 70 Mucianus sent eight Roman legions
(including
two from Spain and one from Britain) led by
Cerialis to recover
Trevirorum (Trier) and drive the
Batavians back to their homeland.
Cerialis argued to the Treviri and Lingones Gauls that
"lust,
greed, and the roving spirit"
motivated the Germans to invade
Gaul.
Noting that stability depended on armies, armies on pay,
and pay came from taxes, he pointed out that
Gauls now were in
leadership roles.
He then warned them,
You are surely not going to tell me that you expect
a milder regime when Tutor and Classicus are your rulers
or that less taxation than now will be required to provide
the armies to defend you from the Germans and Britons?
For if the Romans are expelled—which Heaven forbid!—
what else will result but world-wide war in which
each nation's hand will be turned against its neighbor?
The good luck and good discipline of eight hundred years
secured the erection of this imperial fabric, whose
destruction must involve its destroyers in the same downfall.
But yours will be the most dangerous situation, for you have
the riches and resources which are the main causes of war.8
The forces of Tutor and Classicus did join with Civilis in
attacking the Roman legions, but they were defeated.
Civilis collected
his forces at Vetera but after another battle
withdrew beyond
the Rhine.
Rebellion against Roman legions had only brought more
legions.
The German people eventually asked Civilis to end the
war;
Batavia was able to retain its status as untaxed except for
military levies, and Roman frontier defense was re-organized.
During the Passover festival John's force of 6,000
treacherously attacked the Zealots to become master
of the Temple, about 2,400
surviving Zealots joining him.
Factional fighting in Jerusalem
between John's Zealots
and Simon's army burned down all the buildings
around
the Temple and destroyed most of the stored grain.
Emperor
Vespasian's son Titus arrived with his army
of 80,000 at Jerusalem
early in 70.
Using Josephus as a mouthpiece, Titus demanded only
that they submit to Roman rule and pay their taxes,
but Josephus
recorded there was no civil answer.
The forces of Simon and John
cooperated
in facing the common threat of the Romans.
The Roman
army captured two walls
but were driven out by the desperate Jews.
The Romans spent four days paying their legions
and Josephus
circled the wall making verbal appeals,
arguing that their nation
should not bear arms
but depend on the judgment of God.
The famine
was destroying the people in Jerusalem
and would eventually reach
the fighting men.
To induce surrender Titus had as many as five
hundred
prisoners in a day crucified in view of the walls.
Partisans
told people this was how
the Romans were treating deserters.
So
Titus ordered prisoners to have their hands cut off and sent
to
convince those in Jerusalem they were not the deserters.
In three days the Roman army built a wall around
Jerusalem to force them to surrender.
The famine became worse, and Simon
had Matthias
tortured to death for favoring the Romans.
After
a deserter was found picking gold coins out
of his excreta, Arabs
and Syrians began
cutting open refugees to ransack their bellies.
The Romans captured the Antonia fortress
and once again summoned
the Jews to surrender.
The Romans set fire to the Temple gates,
and Titus' orders
to the contrary did not stop the fire
from spreading
to the Temple.
Still the people said they had sworn to accept
no terms.
So the Roman soldiers burned and sacked the city.
Six
thousand Jews were slaughtered in the inner court
as most of the
Temple burned to the ground.
Leaders retreated to the upper city
called Zion,
which was also leveled by fire.
Josephus recorded
that about a million lives were lost
in the siege of Jerusalem;
97,000 were captured,
and over 40,000 townspeople were released.
The aged and sick were slaughtered,
and those suspected of having
resisted were executed.
Children under 17 and most of the women
were sold as slaves.
The best looking were saved for the triumphal
procession.
Most were sent in irons to hard labor in Egypt or
were
given to Titus to be killed by sword or beasts in games.
During this sorting by Fronto 11,000 died of starvation.
At Caesarea 2,500 were killed fighting in the arena
to celebrate
the birthday of Vespasian's son Domitian.
At Antioch people asked
Titus to expel the Jews,
but he refused to even cancel their privileges.
Josephus reported Eleazar ben Jairus claiming that all the towns
in Syria exterminated Jews, including 18,000 in Damascus.
Of the
three remaining fortresses
Herodium gave up immediately.
Some
in Machaerus surrendered to Judea's new governor
Bassus to save
their captured leader Eleazar
and were released; but 1700 men
of the lower town
trying to escape were killed,
while the women
and children were enslaved.
At Masada Sicarii led by Eleazar ben
Jairus held out
until 73 when Judea's new governor Silva had a
ramp built.
Then 960 people killed each other in a suicide pact;
only two women and five children survived.
In Alexandria the Jewish
council turned in 600 Sicarii,
who were tortured for refusing
to acknowledge Caesar as lord.
Vespasian ordered the Temple of
Onias in Egypt closed.
In Cyrene Catullus murdered 3,000 wealthy
Jews,
but his attempt to accuse Jews in Rome failed.
As Mucianus was heading toward Italy, Flavius Vespasian
occupied
Alexandria to control the essential Egyptian grain.
He entered
Rome in the summer of 70, and the next year
Vespasian celebrated
the end of the Jewish and Rhenish wars
by closing the Janus temple.
Cerialis was appointed governor of Britain in 71 and began
the conquests of the Brigantes in the north and the Silures
in Wales that were continued by Frontinus (74-78).
Vespasian figured the
state needed 4,000,000,000 sesterces.
He greatly increased provincial
taxes and revoked
tax immunities given to Greece by Nero.
He collected
fees from candidates for office, sold pardons
to the innocent
and guilty (paid to his mistress Caenis),
and appointed greedy
procurators so that he could
squeeze them for money like sponges.
He reduced to provincial status Achaea, Lycia, Rhodes,
Byzantium,
and Samos as well as the kingdoms
of Trachian Cilicia and Commagene.
Vespasian conceded Latin rights to Spain.
Vespasian sponsored a temple of peace near the forum,
a temple
to Claudius, and the amphitheater
later called the Colosseum.
He paid teachers of Greek and Latin rhetoric large annual
salaries
and awarded prizes to poets and artists.
However, irritated by
anarchistic Cynics and for their
criticizing his making the Emperor's
office hereditary,
Mucianus persuaded Vespasian in 71 to expel
all the
philosophers and astrologers from Rome except Musonius.
Helvidius while praetor criticized monarchy so strongly
that Vespasian
left the Senate in tears,
declaring he would be succeeded by his
son or no one.
Helvidius was banished for sedition and then put
to death,
though Vespasian tried to recall the executioners.
Some
Cynics returned, resulting in the flogging of
Diogenes and the
execution of Heras.
Vespasian tried to restore the collapsed moral
foundations
by assuming the office of Censor.
Any woman who took
another man's slave as a lover
was to lose her freedom, and no
one lending money
to a minor was entitled to collect the debt.
Suetonius wrote he found no evidence of an innocent
person being
executed during Vespasian's reign.
Vespasian died of illness at the age of 69,
prophesying he
was about to become a god.
He was succeeded by his son Titus,
who was captain of the
guards and had already been assisting him
as secretary and
reading the Emperor's speeches in the Senate.
Titus had a passion for boys as well as
for the Jewish queen Berenice.
He provided such lavish gladiator shows that
5,000 beasts were
killed in one day.
During a two-year reign Titus did his best
to help the victims
of three major disasters—the eruption of
Mount Vesuvius,
a three-day fire in Rome, and a terrible plague.
Titus banished informers from the city or made sure
they were
severely punished.
By accepting the office of chief priest he
said
he refrained from committing any murder.
Titus stopped accusers
from prosecuting anyone
by more than one law for the same offense.
He prevented challenges to wills because
the deceased did not
have free status.
Titus also died of illness, which may have been
assisted
by the ice treatment of his brother Domitian,
who succeeded
him.
As he was dying, Titus said that he had made one mistake.
Many believed he referred to his taking his brother's wife
Domitia; others thought he should have killed Domitian
when he found him
plotting against him;
but Jews believed his sin was entering the
sacred part
of the Jerusalem Temple after his victory.
Domitian used the censorial office to nominate senators directly,
and during the Flavian era many provincials joined the Senate.
A new official called the iuridicus took over civilian
jurisdiction from the governor in some of the larger provinces.
Agricola governed Britain for six years until 84 CE
with an efficient
military that constructed
1300 miles of roads and sixty forts.
Criticism of imperial Rome was recorded by Tacitus in the
words
of the Briton noble Calgacus, who described their
robbery, butchery,
and rapine in the lying name
of "government," creating
a desolate "peace."
He claimed their women were raped
or seduced;
their money was consumed in taxes; their land was
stripped of its harvest for Roman granaries;
and their men were
crippled by building roads under
the lash and were often sold
as slaves.
In a major battle the Romans led by Agricola
killed
about 10,000 Britons while losing only 360 men.
The Dacian war led by Decebalus in Moesia broke out in 85
and
was not ended until 88 when two legions at Moguntiacum
led by
Antonius Saturninus also revolted.
So Domitian, after having put
to death one group of envoys,
made a treaty with Decebalus,
who
accepted vassal status the next year.
The loyalty of the governor
in Lower Germany helped to crush
the revolt of Saturninus before
Domitian arrived.
Suetonius believed that Domitian's Chattian
campaigns of 83
and 89 were not justified by military necessity.
In 89 Domitian issued an edict
banishing philosophers and astrologers.
Domitian strictly enforced collecting the two-drachma tax
from
Jews that previously had gone to the Temple
at Jerusalem, and
proselytizing for the Jewish religion
(and possibly the Christian) was punished with exile,
though Tertullian noted that he recalled
most of them.
To gain money Domitian also tried to tax anyone
practicing
the Jewish religion even if they were not circumcised.
With the fall of Jerusalem the Sanhedrin dissolved;
burnt offerings
ended; and the chief priests
of the Sadducean party disappeared.
Jochanan ben Zakkai of the Pharisees developed
a center for the
study of the law at Jamnia.
His memory helped to retain short
oral sayings
from the Torah called "Halacha."
Deductions showing how ordinances from the law
came from scriptures
became Midrash
and new interpretations formed the Talmud.
His lectures applying the words of the prophets and
relating scripture
to historical events in the
Roman period were called "Hagadah."
Jochanan was succeeded by Gamaliel,
a direct descendant of Hillel.
When King Agrippa II died in 92, Domitian incorporated
his kingdom
into the province of Syria.
The wealthy proselyte to Judaism,
Flavius Clemens,
was condemned to death in 95, witnessed by the
four chief rabbis from Palestine—
Gamaliel, Eliezer, Joshua,
and Akiba.
Like some of the Julian Emperors, lack of funds made
Domitian
greedy, and fear of assassination made him cruel.
Domitian sponsored
extravagant entertainment
in the Colosseum and the Circus.
Suetonius
believed that Domitian's strict oversight of the
judicial system
raised the standard of justice considerably.
Domitian sentenced
Vestals convicted of unchastity to death.
He also punished informers
severely.
Although he enjoyed eunuchs himself, Domitian strictly
prohibited castration and regulated
the price of the remaining
eunuchs.
Domitian increased legionary pay from nine to twelve
gold pieces per year; but needing money,
he tried to reduce the
military establishment.
As this endangered the frontiers, he began
resorting to
extortion and confiscation of property,
executing
several senators on trivial charges.
Domitian killed so many people
that he ordered
no records kept for posterity.
Eventually his
friends and freedmen conspired to murder him
at the age of 44
in 96 CE.
After the brilliant writing of Virgil,
Horace, and Ovid
in the
Augustan era, the literature in the later first century
reflected
the increasing decadence of the imperial culture.
Although
later attributed to Dionysius of Halicarnassus or
Longinus, the
author of a first-century treatise On the Sublime
is considered
unknown by scholars.
This work claims to correct a work by Cecilius,
a friend of Dionysius.
The sublime (hypsos) is defined
as excellent expression
with elegance of conception and style.
The five sources of the sublime discussed and illustrated
from literature are the grandeur of thought including nobility
of character, inspired emotion, effective style using
rhetorical figures, noble
diction using skillful metaphors
and imagery, and dignified and
elevated composition
with organic unity.
The author's first thought
on the sublime is that humans
have benevolence and truth in common
with the gods.
The sublime uplifts our souls and exalts us with
joy.
The sublime pleases everyone and
does not lose its grandeur
when reread.
The author considered the first source,
nobility
of soul, the most important.
Poets may use romantic exaggeration,
but the finest oratory adheres to reality and truth.
The author of On the Sublime questions why his age lacks
this quality and why literature is declining.
One common view
is that democracy nursed great
men of letters, because freedom
fosters imagination
and inspires hope amid keen competition.
Orators
get more practice in helping
to shed light on affairs of state.
Also the love of money and the recent insatiable craving
they
suffer has made them slaves to the love of pleasure,
petty-minded,
and ignoble.
Greater wealth has led to extravagance, which gives
birth
to pretentiousness, vanity, and luxury;
these in turn breed
insolence, lawlessness, and shamelessness.
A judge who accepts
a bribe considers only his own private
interest as just and honorable.
Some hunt others to death, lay traps for legacies,
and bargain
their souls for gain from any and every source.
Such people are
better off being ruled than living in freedom.
Otherwise their
consuming greed might set the world
on fire with their evil deeds.
The apathy of the current generation results from having
no motives
but to be praised or enjoy pleasures,
never having the honorable
desire to serve others.
Aesop's Fables
were adapted into Latin poetry by Phaedrus,
a freed slave of Augustus, and into Greek
by Babrius,
passing on the wisdom of these fabulous animal tales.
Perhaps the oldest extant novel, Chaereas and Callirhoe
by Chariton, is from this era.
This Hellenistic adventure story
is quite well written in Greek
and is set during the last part
of the Peloponnesian War
that
ended in 404 BC.
The beautiful Callirhoe, daughter of the renowned
Sicilian
leader Hermocrates who defeated the Athenian navy,
marries
Chaereas, the son of his political rival.
Her frustrated suitors
trap Chaereas into jealousy,
and he kicks his just pregnant wife,
apparently killing her;
but she revives only to be abducted by
tomb robbers.
They sell her to the wealthy Dionysius of Miletus,
whom she marries rather than abort her child.
Chaereas learns
she is alive and searches for her;
but he is captured, sold into
slavery, and crucified at Caria.
Near death his identity becomes
known to Mithridates,
who attempts by letters to reunite the couple.
Dionysius appeals to the king of Persia to keep Callirhoe,
thinking
Chaereas is dead.
In Babylon the great beauty of Callirhoe even
captivates
the great king; but Chaereas joins an Egyptian revolt against
the Persian empire and captures her and the Persian queen.
Chaereas releases the queen and returns to Sicily with his wife.
This story centers around the beauty of Callirhoe and the
worship
of Aphrodite, showing that erotic love
was alive and well in Greek
culture.
Perhaps to balance his fawning eulogy of Claudius
after his
death, Seneca also wrote a satire usually
called "The Pumpkinification
of Claudius."
Seneca's brother Gallio commented that Claudius
had been hauled into heaven on a hook.
In Seneca's Apocolocyntosis
Augustus speaks against
Claudius in the divine Senate, accusing
him of killing his
two great-granddaughters, his grand-niece Messalina,
and others without specifying charges and ascertaining facts.
Augustus warns them
that if they create such gods,
no one will believe that they themselves
are gods.
Augustus proposes
that Claudius be deported from heaven;
the motion is carried;
and Mercury takes Claudius off to hell.
At the tribunal of Aeacus
Claudius is charged with
murdering 35 senators, 221 Roman knights,
and countless others.
Aeacus pronounces him guilty and sentences
him
to suffer what he had caused.
He is ordered to throw dice
continually
from a broken dice cup.
After serving as governor of Bithynia, Petronius became
Nero's
"arbiter of taste" in 63.
The resentment of his rival
Tigellinus led to a charge
of conspiracy with Scaevinus.
In 66
Petronius casually opened his vein, bound it,
and opened it again
as he enjoyed one last luxurious feast.
Finally he wrote out a
list of Emperor Nero's sex partners
and sent it to him with his
seal.
Only fragments from two books of The Satyricon
by
Petronius remain; but they give a flavor of his
hedonistic life artfully portrayed in a novel.
Encolpius criticizes the artificiality
of rhetoric and
blames parents for not disciplining their children.
Yet Petronius knew the value
of Epicurean self-discipline, writing,
If greatness, poet, is your goal,
the craft begins with self-control.
For poems are of the poet part,
and what he is decides his art.
With character true poems begin.
Poet, learn your discipline.9
Extant portions of The Satyricon describe the phallic
worship
of Priapus and various homosexual and heterosexual episodes.
A lavish banquet hosted by Trimalchio is described in detail.
Niceros notes that it is better to tell a joke than to be one.
Then he tells a story of a soldier who turned into a wolf.
Habinnus
prefers whole-wheat bread made without bleach
to white bread because
it is more healthy and less constipating.
The poet Eumolpus observes
that in their times they are so
besotted with drink and steeped
in debauchery that they
lack the strength to study the great achievements
of the past.
Vice, rather than logic and dialectic,
is the subject
they teach and learn.
The poetry of Eumolpus reflects on the drunk
and barren
rabble for which the Roman legions sack the world
with
steel, catering to greed.
The Senate became as corrupt as the
people, bidding for fees,
consulting for cash, and auctioning
freedom for gold.
The greatness ripened, but now it rots as degenerates
inherit Rome and in their greed despise the ancient strength.
Eumolpus pretends to be wealthy and brags that in Croton
his
new friends can get them off for any crime they commit.
Yet Encolpius
feels an outlaw's life is miserable,
because he is always waiting
to be punished.
Eventually Encolpius and Gito escape, but Eumolpus
is thrown
off a cliff by the enraged townspeople.
The frankness
of Petronius is not for all tastes, but he did
describe the decadence
in Rome during the era of Nero.
The poet Persius was born on
December 4, 34 CE in an equestrian
family.
His father died when he was six, and in Rome he was educated
in literature by the dissolute Remmius Palaemon
and in oratory
by Verginius Flavus.
At 16 Persius turned to Cornutus, the Stoic
freedman
from the house of Seneca.
In his verses he thanked Cornutus
for straightening his erratic
behavior with his Socratic dexterity,
as his mind submitted to the pressure of reason.
When Persius
died at age 27, Cornutus arranged for the
publication of his Satires.
They were praised by Lucan, Quintilian, and Martial.
Persius chided
myopic fathers for brainwashing their sons,
asking how this could
happen
if they cherished the ancient spirit.
He criticized traditional
religion by noting that flesh profits
from sin, while asking what
use was gold to a temple.
Instead Persius suggested we give the
gods
a soul where human and divine commands
are blended, a mind which is pure within,
a heart steeped in fine old honor.
Let me bring these to the temple,
and I'll win the favor of heaven
with a handful of grain.10
Persius wrote how vice can make one insensible,
as thick fat
surrounds one's conscience, having no feelings
of guilt nor notion
of loss, like one laying on the bottom
no longer sending bubbles
to the surface.
He prayed that when sadistic lust incites despots
to savage
cruelty, their punishment might be to see Goodness
and
then waste with the remorse at having betrayed her.
His Fourth
Satire has Socrates ask
Alcibiades if his idea
of the highest good is to dine forever
among the flesh-pots.
He lamented that no one tries to delve into
one's heart,
but everyone seems to be watching the bag on the
back
of the person in front.
Persius cautioned those, who are
greedily overwhelmed
by the sight of cash, who are led by their
prick,
who are secure yet dun debtors before harsh tribunals.
He suggested they spit out what is not them,
shirk off the crowd,
live alone,
and consider how sparse their furniture is.
He observed
the natural law that disqualifies
the incompetent from performing.
Persius asked his readers if philosophy taught them
how to live
well, if they could tell the true from the counterfeit,
if they
could distinguish what to aim for and what to avoid,
if their
wants were modest, their housekeeping thrifty,
and were they nice
to their friends.
Martial received his name for having been born on the
first of
March in Spain about 40 CE.
He came to Rome about 64, and his
earliest surviving work
celebrated the opening of the Colosseum
in 80.
By the time he published his first book of Epigrams
about
five years later he claimed to be known throughout the world.
Martial lived on the fourth floor in a simple room
and survived
by attending a rich patron.
He gained a small country estate about
twenty miles from
Rome and by 94 had bought a small house in Rome.
In one poem he wrote how he sent the six-year-old
slave girl Erotion
to his parents.
About 98 Martial returned to Spain and died a
few years later.
Like Ovid,
he claimed that his life was more strict
than his poetry, asking
indulgence of the Censor.
Of a man who denied that God exists
he noted he may be right
in regard to justice, or else how could
this man be wealthy?
To the poor he held out little hope,
since
these days only the rich get even more
He satirized a jockey
of the Blues for dropping back
to win a bribe by losing the race.
Martial was reluctant to give up his freedom to marry
for money
and wrote this epigram:
Why have I no desire to marry riches?
Because, my friend, I want to wear the breeches.
Wives should obey their husbands; only then
Can women share equality with men.11
Martial did not agree with those who criticized the degenerate
morals of the time, as he believed the government was mild
and
that they were assured happiness and peace.
Those who moan about
bad times should not accuse
our morals but blame their own.
Yet
he wrote that anyone who calls the whole world
nice seems to see
no difference between virtue and vice.
Marcus Annaeus Lucanus known as Lucan was
born in 39 CE at
Corduba in Spain.
His father was a knight in a prominent family.
Lucan was raised in Rome and also was probably influenced
by the
Stoicism of his uncle Seneca's freedman Cornutus.
He studied in
Athens before being recalled
to join a close circle of Nero's
friends.
The Emperor appointed him quaestor
before the legal age
and also augur.
After Seneca fell out of favor, Lucan in 64 was
banned
from reciting in public or advocating in the courts.
The
next year he joined the conspiracy of Calpurnius
to overthrow
Nero and was forced to commit suicide at age 25
along with his
father and his uncles Seneca and Gallio.
Nero's early reign promoted
literary culture, and young Lucan
wrote various works of poetry
and plays.
His epic poem on the civil war between Pompey
and Julius
Caesar breaks off in the tenth book.
In Civil War Lucan wrote of "legality conferred
on crime"
in which a mighty people attacked their own guts.
A pact of tyranny was broken, and all the forces of the world
were shaken with the conflict.
Lucan lamented this excessive freedom
of the sword
that offered Latin blood to hated nations.
He bitterly
thought that this bloodshed could have won
more earth and sea
for fellow citizens.
Lucan aimed to reveal the causes of the war.
He noted that mighty structures tend to collapse on themselves,
for prosperity sets limits to growth.
He found no loyalty among
associates in tyranny,
especially after Crassus
was killed in the Parthian disaster.
After Pompey's wife (and
Caesar's daughter) Julia died,
their alliance was shattered.
Pompey had great achievements
but was declining,
while the power of Caesar
was rising.
Rome's subduing of the world brought excessive wealth,
and with prosperity morals declined.
Violence became the measure
of legality, as tribunes and
consuls disrupted justice, while
the people
sold their votes for bribes.
By crossing the Rubicon Caesar abandoned peace
and desecrated law.
The Senate expelled turbulent tribunes,
and
everyone headed for their leader's standards.
Caesar resented Pompey's
control of grain in the world
and claimed he was ridding enslaved
Rome of its master.
Before they fled, the senators gave the consuls
war powers.
Pompey's forces left Rome to Caesar.
In the second book Lucan described
the gory civil wars of Marius and Sulla.
Cato tells Brutus that civil war is the greatest crime,
but virtue
must follow destiny.
Pompey
heads east to arouse that portion of his empire.
Warlike Caesar
follows and drives him out of Italy.
The ghost of Julia appears
and warns Pompey if
he severs
his pledges with the sword, civil war will cause him
to join her.
Caesar's soldiers rob the treasures in the temple,
and for the first time a Caesar is richer than Rome.
To build
siege towers and ships to capture
Massilia Caesar
needs strong wood.
When the soldiers refuse to strike the sacred
trunks,
Caesar himself
takes up the ax
until the soldiers fear him more than the gods.
At one point soldiers from both sides try to bring peace
and mingle
in both camps; but Petreius calls his enslaved
sword-hands back
to wicked battle,
arguing liberty should not be surrendered for
peace.
So he brings back their love of wickedness, and they
proceed to commit every horror inflicted in battle's blind night.
In Libya
Caesar's forces led by Curio
are defeated by Pompey's African
allies.
Pompey's army is supplied by sea and has Caesar's forces
cornered
at Dyrrhachium; but Pompey
restrains their violence
in this civil war and allows his adversary
to escape.
Pompey also could have returned to Italy and imitated
Caesar's recent conquest there; but he refuses to return home
without first disbanding his soldiers.
So he follows Caesar
to Thessaly, where Lucan noted the
first smelting of copper had
driven people into wicked warfare.
Pompey
hopes to win the conflict by his patience;
but eastern kings and
peoples protest
being detained from their native lands.
Lucan
even has Cicero expressing the
impatience of the
soldiers to fight, while Pompey
laments
he could have won a peace without slaughter.
So fate is
turned over to Fortune in a fight at Pharsalus.
Usually freely
describing the gruesome violence,
Lucan cannot bear to write about
the horrors of the civil strife.
Here the soldiers waging war were not assembled
from the royal auxiliaries but wielded weapons
in their hands unasked: that place contained
brothers and their fathers.
Here is your madness, your frenzy,
your wickedness, Caesar.
Mind of mine, shun this part of battle and leave it
to darkness and from my words let no age learn of
horrors so immense, of how much
is licensed in civil war.12
Lucan believed this battle changed the destiny of Rome
and
nations for future generations, and he regretted
not being able
to prevent the loss of liberty.
Pharsalia did not have those elements of battle which
other calamities had: there, Rome was ruined by the
destinies of warriors, here by entire peoples,
a soldier's death there was here a nation's death;
here streamed Achaean blood, Pontic and Assyria—
-all that gore is stopped from sticking and congealing
on the plain by a torrent of Roman gore.
From this battle the peoples receive a mightier wound
than their own time could bear; more was lost than life
and safety: for all the world's eternity we are prostrated.
Every age which will suffer slavery
is conquered by these swords.
How did the next generation and the
next deserve to be born into tyranny?
Did we wield weapons or shield our throat
in fear and trembling?
the punishment of others' fear sits heavy on our necks.
If, Fortune, you intended to give a master to those
born after battle, you should have also
given us a chance to fight.13
Pompey realizes he
is defeated and refuses to multiply the ruin,
retiring from the
battle instead.
Caesar reins in the slaughter but releases his
men
to plunder the Pompey camp.
Pompey
flees, followed by a large portion of the Senate,
to join his
fleet of a thousand ships in Greek waters;
but he is eventually
killed in Egypt
by the ambitious young Ptolemy.
After Pompey's death Cato
takes the fleet to Corcyra,
where he is urged to consult an oracle
to see if people
will be permitted self-rule and the rule of law
or whether civil war will waste all.
Cato
needed no oracle to tell him Stoic truths, saying,
We are all connected with the gods above,
and even if the shrine is silent we do nothing
without God's will; no need has deity of any utterances:
the Creator told us at our birth once
and always whatever we can know."14
Lucan commended Cato's Stoic leadership in Africa
by example
in trying circumstances.
In Egypt Caesar
laments losing the one reward of civil war—
to grant survival
to the conquered.
Caesar
gives Ptolemy no reward but pardon and manages
to defeat the intrigues
of Pothinus.
As Lucan's narrative comes to an end,
Caesar
still has to deal with the wiles of the young Cleopatra.
Lucan's artistic protest against the violence of tyranny
was prematurely
shortened by the tyranny of Nero.
Statius was born at Neapolis about 45 CE and died there in
96.
His father was a poet, and Statius became a court poet
for
Domitian, praising the Emperor and describing the lifestyle
of
the wealthy freedmen in his Silvae.
Juvenal noted that
Statius himself was not wealthy
although he was a celebrity.
His
epic Thebaid is complete in twelve books,
but the Achilleid
only contains two books
on the education of the hero Achilles.
The prize Domitian gave Statius about 90 was probably
for the Thebaid, which took him twelve years to write.
The Thebaid begins with the blind Oedipus cursing his
sons
in their struggle for the crown of Thebes.
The brothers draw
lots, and Polynices has to go into exile
for a year while Eteocles
rules before they are to switch.
Jupiter announces to the gods
he will
destroy Thebes and punish Argos too.
Juno protests and
would prefer
to punish Samos and Mycenae.
Jupiter sends Mercury
to the underworld
to bring Laius back into the world.
Polynices
fights with Tydeus; but they are both taken in by
Argos king Adrastus
and married to his daughters
as the fulfillment of a prophecy.
Laius haunts Eteocles, inciting him against his brother.
Tydeus
is sent as the ambassador of Polynices to Thebes;
but when Eteocles
refuses to yield the throne after his year,
Tydeus leaves the
palace angrily.
Eteocles sends fifty men to ambush Tydeus;
but
he kills them all except Maeon,
who takes the news to Thebes and
then kills himself.
Jupiter orders Mars to arouse the war spirit
in Argos
though Venus pleads for Thebes.
When Tydeus returns
to Argos, Adrastus consults the seers
Amphiarus and Melampus.
Amphiarus tries to stop the violent conflict by asking,
"Why,
poor wretches, why rush into war,
when fate and heaven stand barring
the way?"15
He warns them of their bloody defeat.
Yet Polynices'
wife Argia urges her father to go to war.
After three years the Argives march to war
in contingents under
seven leaders.
As the Thebans prepare, Eteocles consults the blind
seer
Tiresias, who summons prominent ghosts from the underworld
and prophesies Thebes will be victorious.
The approaching Argives
suffer a drought after Bacchus
dries up the rivers, but Hypsipyle
leads them
to the water of the Langia River.
Hypsipyle tells how
the women of Lemnos murdered their
husbands, though Bacchus helped
her
save her father, King Thoas.
She was chosen queen; after using
men's weapons to attack
the Argonauts, the influence of Venus
brought about a truce.
Jason fathered twins with Hypsipyle but
then abandoned her.
News of Thoas being alive caused her to flee;
she was captured by pirates and enslaved.
The baby boy Archemorus
is killed by a snake, which is killed
by Capaneus; but Hypsipyle
is reunited
with her 20-year-old twin sons.
At the child's funeral
the seven commanders protect her
from the mourning parents, Lycurgus
and Eurydice.
In the funeral games the Argive warriors compete
in a
chariot race, running, discus, boxing, and wrestling.
Jupiter sends Mercury to get brutal Mars to instigate the war,
and the deluded Thebans rush to arms.
Jocasta with her daughters
goes to the Argive camp and asks
Polynices to come and demand
his kingdom from Eteocles,
and she will be the judge.
Either he
will get it, or he will fight with better right;
but the angry
Tydeus says to send him rather than let Polynices
foolishly trust
himself within the walls of Thebes,
or let Eteocles come there.
As war fury increases again, two tigers attack the charioteer
of Amphiarus and are killed by Aconteus.
Jocasta flees to Thebes,
and the battle begins in confusion.
Amphiarus drives his chariot
through an opening
of the earth into the underworld.
There its
king Pluto commands Tisiphone to bring
about the horrible events
of the war.
Believing the gods have deserted them, the Argives
retreat
and replace the seer Amphiarus with Melampus.
Then the
armies fight at the seven gates.
Ismene dreams Atys is her husband,
and he is killed.
Tydeus kills many, but he is mortally wounded
by Melanippus;
yet before he dies, he chews on the face
of the
decapitated Melanippus.
The incensed Thebans advance and fight over the body
of Tydeus
until Hippomedon on Tydeus' horse drives them
back to the Ismenus
River, where he is nearly drowned
but is allowed to die of his
wounds on the bank.
Atalanta prays for her son Parthenopaeus,
but he is killed in battle.
Four Argive leaders have been killed
and their camp is surrounded.
The Argives make a night attack
and then breach the walls of Thebes.
Tiresias prophesies that
Creon's son, Menoeceus, must die,
and after a heroic speech the
young man kills himself.
Capaneus tries to scale the battlement;
but he is struck down by Jupiter's lightning,
and the Argives
retreat.
The Furies stimulate Polynices and Eteocles
to engage
in single combat.
Even though Adrastus tries to stop it and offers
Polynices
his throne, the brothers slay each other.
Antigone prevents
Oedipus from injuring himself further,
and Ismene stanches the
self-inflicted wound
of her mother Jocasta.
Creon becomes king
of Thebes; he forbids burial of the
Argive warriors and banishes
Oedipus to Cithaeron.
In the 12th book the Thebans bury their dead with splendid
pyres for Menoeceus and Eteocles.
Upset by Creon's denial of Argive
funerals, the widows march
from Argos to Thebes but are turned
away from the battlefield.
They go to Athens and petition Theseus,
while Argia and
Antigone disregard Creon's law and sneak onto
the battlefield.
Argia feels responsible for instigating the war.
So the wife and sister of Polynices wash his body and
place it on the burning embers of his brother's pyre.
The war has achieved
nothing.
The two women are arrested and insist on going before
King Creon, while Juno leads the suppliant Argive women
with olive
branches from the temple of compassion in Athens.
They do not
complain the men were killed according to the
chances of war;
but they argue that
they should be treated as human souls.
Although
death has smothered their rage,
they vow the Argives must have
pyres
or Thebes will have war again.
This struggle is between
the gods of the underworld
and the vengeance of Creon.
Argia and
Antigone are ready to die for their cause;
but Theseus arrives
with his Athenian army
to defeat and kill Creon.
Finally the two
armies join in peace.
Theseus is welcomed as a guest,
and the
funerals can take place.
In this violent epic even the gods and goddesses are
portrayed as fighting for petty reasons, thus providing
poor examples for
ethical behavior.
Clearly both brothers are in the wrong to go
to war
for their selfish ambitions—Eteocles for not giving up
the throne after his term and Polynices for attacking
his own
city with a foreign power.
Tragically the single combat came only
after so many had been killed.
Only in the last book does a humanitarian
spirit arise
as the women nonviolently insist on mutual respect.
Marcus Fabius Quintilianus was born about 35 CE
at Calagurris
in northern Spain.
His father was a successful rhetorician at
Rome, and Quintilian
was educated there by the famous grammaticus
Remmius
Palaemon and the renowned rhetorician Domitius Afer.
He
apparently returned to Spain to teach
until he was brought to
Rome by Galba in 68.
Quintilian is considered the first rhetorician
to receive
a salary from the state for teaching.
His pupils included
the younger Pliny
and two of Domitian's grand-nephews.
He also
pleaded cases in the courts, married, and had two sons.
He retired
about 88 and published his Institutio Oratoria
shortly
before his death, which occurred
soon after Domitian's demise
in 96.
The first book of the twelve in the Institutio discusses
education prior to training in rhetoric.
Quintilian indicated
that after twenty years of teaching
he gained leisure to study
and write on the art of speaking.
He found that most children
are quick to reason
and ready to learn, that reasoning comes as
naturally
to humans as flying to birds.
Because of our natural
mental activity and wisdom
it is believed the soul comes from
heaven.
First, the child's nurse should speak correctly
and be
of good character.
Studies can be made amusing.
The children must
be questioned and praised so that
they rejoice when they have
done well.
Quintilian acknowledged that schools sometimes corrupt
morals;
but he noted that morals may be corrupted at home too.
Too large a class is unsuitable for correcting faults
or for explaining;
a good teacher will not take on
more students than can be managed.
One should be on friendly and intimate terms,
making teaching
not a duty but a labor of love.
Students learn from having merits
praised and faults corrected.
Hearing the laziness of a comrade
criticized
or one's diligence commended may inspire emulation.
Quintilian approved of play in the young and considered it
a sign of a lively disposition.
However, excessive indulgence
can lead to idleness.
Games reveal character in a natural way,
and no child
is too young to distinguish between right and wrong.
Character can best be molded when it is innocent of deceit
and
most susceptible to instruction.
Once a bad habit is formed,
it
cannot bend and must be broken.
Quintilian disapproved of flogging
although it was a popular custom.
He argued that it is a disgraceful
punishment fit only for slaves.
It is an insult, especially at
a later age.
A boy insensible to instruction and reproof
is likely
to become hardened by blows.
If the master is a thorough disciplinarian,
such punishment is unnecessary.
Although a child may be compelled
with blows,
young men are no longer amenable to such threats.
In addition when children are beaten,
pain and fear can bring
very unpleasant results.
The shame of this can depress the mind.
Quintilian noted that helpless children can be easily victimized,
and he believed that no one should be given
unlimited power over
them.
Once a child can read and write, Quintilian suggested
a grammaticus,
or teacher of literature.
Good style in language requires
correctness,
lucidity, and elegance.
Quintilian recommended pupils learn to
paraphrase
Aesop's fables, as the natural successors
to fairy
tales of the nursery.
Students should also write aphorisms, moral
essays,
and delineations of character after the teacher gives
the
general plan from themes in literature.
Quintilian included
formal logic and found that geometry
sharpened the mind and perception,
developing reasoning
skill by arriving at conclusions from definite
premises.
Acting can help orators develop their
gestures and facial
expressions.
Gymnastics and dance in moderation can also be useful.
Quintilian observed that variety can restore the mind,
because
it is harder to work on
one subject without intermission.
For
a teacher the highest pleasure can be a child of virtue.
In the second book of his Education of an Orator
Quintilian
turned to the study of rhetoric.
To the usual declaiming of themes
and commonplaces
Quintilian added controversies over real or imaginary
causes, eulogies, and denunciations.
In finding a teacher of rhetoric
his first concern was good character.
The purity of the teacher
should preserve the young from
corruption, while one's authority
can keep
the bolder from breaking out into license.
The teacher
should set an example of self-control and be able
to govern pupil
behavior with strict discipline.
The teacher may adopt a parental
attitude as representing them.
The teacher should be free of vice
and refuse to tolerate it.
Quintilian hoped the teacher would
be strict but not austere,
genial but not too familiar.
Above
all, a father should not neglect choosing
a teacher free from
obvious immorality.
The very best teachers ought to be selected,
because an
incompetent one is likely to approve faulty work
in
teaching both how to behave and how to speak.
Rhetoricians may study historical narratives
that are both
forceful and true.
Narratives may be refuted or confirmed.
Commonplaces
may denounce vices
such as adultery, gambling, or profligacy.
Theses usually involve comparisons.
Laws may be praised or denounced.
A good teacher is able to differentiate the abilities of students
and know their natural tendencies.
Yet natural talent is not enough,
or education would not be needed.
Innate qualities should not
be neglected; but defects should
be corrected, and weaknesses
strengthened.
Quintilian agreed with Plato
that true rhetoric is only possible
for the just and good, and
it requires a knowledge of justice.
Quintilian defined rhetoric
as the art or science of speaking well.
More specifically he wrote,
"Rhetoric is the science of correct conception,
arrangement
and utterance, coupled with a retentive memory
and a dignified
delivery."16
Its material includes any subject that might
come up.
Most authorities believed rhetoric consists of invention,
arrangement,
expression, memory, and delivery.
The parts of rhetoric as defined
by Aristotle are
panegyric,
deliberative, and forensic.
Quintilian did not limit panegyric
to laudatory subjects
concerned with honor nor deliberative to
what is expedient
nor forensic to what is just,
because they are
usually intermingled.
He agreed with Cicero
that deliberative should be more
concerned with what is honorable
than with the expedient alone.
Quintilian wrote that the three
aims of rhetoric are
to instruct, move, and charm listeners.
The
five parts of a forensic speech usually are the exordium,
the statement of facts, the proof,
the refutation, and the peroration.
The purpose of the exordium is to prepare the audience
by making them well disposed, attentive,
and ready to receive
instruction.
While being modest, a speaker has the strongest influence
if the audience believes the speaker to be a good person.
The
statement of facts is usually followed by verification.
The proof
is the only indispensable part of a forensic speech.
Quintilian distinguished more violent emotions he called pathos
from the gentler moral ones called ethos.
The emotions
disturb and carry one away temporarily.
The moral feelings persuade
and induce goodwill;
they are usually more continuous.
Quintilian
observed that that the passion for abuse
usually does more harm
than good.
A more effective speaker makes opponents unpopular
rather than abusing them,
for the latter tends to make the speaker
disliked.
He also found sarcasm to be injudicious as is anything
that
excites enmity and requires apologies later.
Skilled debaters
must control their anger, or it can lead to
insulting language
and even attacks on the judges.
The speaker must identify with
the persons who have suffered
unmerited misfortune and plead their
case while one is
feeling their suffering as though it is one's
own.
Quintilian recommended reading the best writers and listening
to the best speakers to learn the most appropriate words.
The
character of people is revealed by the words they use.
Meaner
vices using words are flattery, buffoonery, immodesty,
obscenity,
and disregarding all authorities.
Such faults usually are found
in those
who are too anxious to please or amuse.
Quintilian agreed with Marcus Cato that the orator is
a good
person skilled in speaking.
He believed there is nothing worse
than using
the powers of eloquence to lend arms to crime.
Nature's
greatest gift to humans would be betrayed if it is used
as an
accomplice to crime, a foe to the innocent,
and an enemy of truth.
It would be better for humans to be dumb and without reason
than
to turn these gifts to mutual destruction.
Thus for Quintilian
no one can be a good orator
without first being a good person.
As philosophers hold that a bad person can only be a fool,
Quintilian
argued that a fool can never be an orator.
Intelligence devoted
to oratory must be free
of the distractions of vice.
The criminal
mind is inevitably tormented with
anxiety, remorse, and fear of
punishment.
To expect the pursuit of virtue among these passions
is like
looking for fruit among thorns and brambles.
Study requires
a simple lifestyle, not the lust of luxury.
How can an unjust
person speak
on what is just and honorable?
Thus the orator must
devote attention to forming moral
character and acquiring a complete
knowledge of
what is just, true, and good.
Quintilian's orator
must also be a philosopher
with the courage to speak.
The orator
should also know civil law
and the customs of one's state.
The historian Tacitus also wrote a dialog on oratory
set in
the
year 75 CE, although it was probably written years later.
His motive was a question from a friend as to why their age
was
so destitute of the glory of eloquence.
Tacitus recorded a conversation
he had with orators
comparing the rhetoric of their time with
that of
the republican era of Cato
and Cicero.
Aper argued for
the status quo, saying that oratory can safely
bring aid to friends,
strangers, and the imperiled,
while to foes it brings fear and
terror.
Then Messala replied to the question of Maternus as to
why
there was a falling off of eloquence after the death of Cicero.
Cicero's erudition overflowed from universal knowledge
he gained
from studying philosophy and law, concentrating on
good and evil,
human nature, the power of virtue,
and the depravity of vice.
He understood emotions such as anger, pity, envy, sorrow,
and
fear, and he adapted his style
to different mental conditions.
Ancient orators were educated with grammar, music,
and geometry,
and they gained knowledge of civil law.
The best orator must be
equipped with every accomplishment
of learning; but this is neglected
by contemporary speakers,
who are ignorant of the laws and the
Senate's decrees,
scoff at civil laws, and dread the study of
philosophy
and the opinions of the learned.
Oratory has been reduced
like one of the meanest handicrafts.
Did not Demosthenes
listen to Plato?
Cicero
said he gained his eloquence
not from rhetoricians but from the
Academy.
Messala also noted that during the republic laws were learned
by daily hearing in the courts and popular assemblies,
where men
like Licinius Crassus, Caesar,
and Cato
began speaking
while young men.
Maternus noted that Pompey
and Marcus Crassus rose
to
eminence more by speaking than with the might of arms.
In those
days no one could acquire much influence
without some eloquence.
He contrasted the technical points in current criminal cases
with
the broader issues of bribery in elections,
plundering of allies,
and the massacre of citizens.
Although current courts may be more
favorable to truth,
the forum offered better training for eloquence
when there
were no time limits first imposed by Pompey.
The "Emperor's perfect discipline" has restrained
eloquence
as well as everything else.
No longer could one have the privilege
of attacking
the most influential men such as Scipio, Sulla,
and Pompey.
Orators
get much less practice when conventional morality
and a willing
obedience to authority prevail.
The main source for the life of Apollonius of Tyana
is the
biography by Philostratus.
The work was requested by Empress Julia
Domna,
wife of Septimius Severus, but it was not completed
until
after her death in 217.
Philostratus used the letters of Apollonius,
some of which
survive, but his main source was the now lost memoirs
by
Damis of Nineveh, a devoted companion of Apollonius.
Because
of some historical inconsistencies, some scholars
consider the
adventurous travels to be
more historical novel than biography.
This is debatable, but the ethical teachings come across
either
way, though with more power to those believing
in the authenticity
of the inspired Pythagorean
philosopher's experiences.
During his life-time the sage was accused
by the rival sophist
Euphrates of being a charlatan or a wizard
using evil magic.
Philostratus stated that he ignored the lost
work by
Moeragenes which also criticized Apollonius,
because he
was ignorant of many circumstances in his life.
Philostratus wrote
that the many letters of Apollonius dealt
with the gods, customs,
moral principles, and laws
and that in all those areas he corrected
the errors into which humans had fallen.
Philostratus described how his spirit announced he was the
Egyptian god Proteus before his birth and that Apollonius
was born in a meadow of flowers surrounded
by swans in Tyana of Cappadocia.
Since Philostratus wrote that Apollonius died in the reign
of Nerva (96-98), if he lived to be a hundred as some said,
it is
likely he was born about the same time
as Jesus or some years
after.
As a child Apollonius moved to Aegae to live in the
temple of Asclepius so that he could get a more
peaceful and philosophic
education.
He studied with the Pythagorean Euxenus,
but this man
lived more like an Epicurean.
Apollonius renounced the eating
of flesh
and the drinking of wine,
because they muddied the mind
and the ether in the soul.
Also he wore linen clothing instead
of animal products.
He believed in praying to the gods for what
he deserved
rather than presuming to tell the godhead what is
best.
When his father died, he buried his body next to
his mother's and gave away most of his property
to his brother and other relatives.
He asked his older brother to advise him and cure him
of his faults,
and he would also teach his brother,
who had led a riotous life.
Apollonius decided not to wed
nor have any connection with
women.
He said his hardest work was the five years he spent in
silence.
Yet the young man could reproach others with a gesture
or by a look, and his presence would often stop quarrels.
He ended
a famine at Aspendus by reprimanding grain-dealers
for pretending
the earth was not the mother of all.
When he began speaking again,
his words were concise and powerful.
Asked at Antioch how a sage
should converse,
Apollonius replied, "Like a law-giver, for
it is the duty of the
law-giver to deliver to the many the instructions
of whose truth he has persuaded himself."17
When he told
his seven followers he was going to Babylon,
only a shorthand
writer and a calligraphist accompanied him.
However, at Nineveh
he met and was joined by Damis.
Apollonius could understand all
languages,
even those of animals.
When crossing the Euphrates
he was asked what he brought,
and Apollonius said he had temperance,
justice,
virtue, continence, valor, and discipline.
The feminine
nouns were taken for slaves,
but Apollonius said they are ladies
of quality.
On the frontier of Babylon a satrap asked him
why he was trespassing,
but Apollonius said all the earth is his.
Nearing the king, they
asked him if he thought
the king lacked the virtues he brought.
Apollonius answered no, but he would teach him
to practice them
if he had them.
Apollonius declined expensive gifts, holding to
his prayer
to have little and want nothing.
He pointed out to
Damis that eunuchs did not have chastity,
which consists of not
yielding to passion when the impulse is felt.
He explained that
greed combined all the vices,
because money was needed for various
desires.
The Babylonian king offered him ten gifts.
Apollonius
asked that the Eretrians be allowed to cultivate
the earth, and
the king ended his enmity
and made them his friends.
When a eunuch
was caught loving a lady, Apollonius
urged the
king to let him
live, for that would be
a greater punishment than death.
Asked
about governing, he advised
respecting many while confiding in
few.
In regard to Roman villages in his territory, Apollonius
said it was a mistake to go to war even over large issues,
and
this one was paltry.
Apollonius was not impressed by the king's
great wealth
and suggested that he spend it.
Upon leaving, Apollonius
hoped to bring back
the gift of having become a better man.
At Taxila in India Apollonius
met a
philosophic king who lived simply.
Apollonius commended
him for rating his friends more highly
than gold and silver because
of the blessings that result.
The king told him he also shared
his wealth with his enemies
on his borders so that they protect
his frontiers from invaders.
Apollonius explained to Damis why
drinking wine is damaging to divination.
The king provided them
with fresh camels
and guides for their journey.
Further in India Apollonius
met a group of sages led by Iarchas.
Apollonius considered their
lore more profound
than his and came to learn.
Observing that
they knew everything, Apollonius asked them
if they knew themselves
also.
They replied that they know everything, because they begin
by knowing themselves.
They considered themselves gods, because
they are good men.
Then they discussed the transmigration of souls
and the
Achaeans ruining Troy, though they felt talking so much
about this war was the ruin of the Greeks.
Iarchas noted that
the Greeks seemed to think that abstaining
from injustice constitutes
justice,
like Romans who do not sell justice or slaves that do
not steal.
He pointed out that Minos cruelly enslaved many people
but is considered a judge in the underworld,
while Tantalus suffers
for having shared with his friends
his immortality given him by
the gods.
Before returning to Ionia
Apollonius healed a demoniac
and others.
Back in Ephesus, Apollonius discussed sharing things in
common by people supporting each other, like the sparrow
that tells his
friends about the spilled grain.
He taught that people ought to
do what they understand best
and what they best can do.
He helped
the people of Smyrna get rid of their demon plague.
At Athens
he criticized the lascivious dancing
at the festival of Dionysus,
and he refused
to watch the gladiator shows.
At Olympia Apollonius
discussed virtues such as
wisdom, courage, and temperance.
Although
Musonius of Babylon was arrested in Rome
because Nero suspected
him of using magic,
Apollonius went to Rome anyway.
Some of his
followers refused to go;
he did not consider them cowards, though
he hailed as
philosophers those who rose above such fears.
Apollonius
taught the consul Telesinus.
When asked what he prayed for, Apollonius
replied that
he prayed that the laws not be broken, that the wise
may
continue to be poor, but that others may be rich
so long as
they are so without fraud.
Apollonius taught in public; he did
not hover around the rich
and powerful, though he welcomed talking
to them
just as much as he did to the common people.
Seeing a
bridegroom mourning his bride,
Apollonius touched her and whispered
to her;
immediately she woke up from what seemed death and spoke.
Apollonius found the tales of Aesop more conducive to
wisdom than poetry relating stories of outlandish passion,
incestuous
marriages, calumnies of the gods committing
crimes and quarreling
that lead jealous
and ambitious people to imitate them.
Aesop
made use of humble stories that are
clearly fictitious to teach
great truths.
Seeing the Colossus at Rhodes, Apollonius still
believed that
a person who loves wisdom in a sound
and innocent
spirit is much greater.
At Alexandria Apollonius met Vespasian,
though he refused
to goto Judea to see him, believing that land
during the war
was polluted both by what the inhabitants did
and
by what they suffered.
Apollonius told Vespasian that in praying
for a king that is just,
temperate, and wise with legitimate sons
he was praying for him.
Vespasian explained why he felt justified
in taking the throne
from the drunkard Vitellius.
Euphrates and
Dion gave speeches saying that Vespasian
should restore the republic;
but Apollonius argued that a
monarchical policy was a foregone
conclusion and that
Vespasian could rule with generosity and self-restraint,
that his sons commanding the armies should not be made hostile,
and that a government by a single man who is the best,
providing
welfare for all the people, is popular government.
Vespasian agreed with Apollonius and asked him to instruct
him.
Apollonius advised him to use his wealth to help the poor
while making the wealth of the rich secure.
He should be governed
by law himself too
by respecting the laws, and he should reverence
the gods.
He should discipline his two sons by threatening not
to
bequeath the throne to them so they will regard it
as a reward
rather than a heritage.
He should use moderation and gradual change
in suppressing
pleasures, because it is not easy to convert an
entire people
suddenly to wisdom and temperance.
Apollonius suggested
limiting the pride and luxury of the
freedmen and slaves assigned
to the Emperor.
Governors should be selected by merit rather than
by lot,
making sure they speak the language
and have affinity
with the people they rule.
Later Apollonius wrote to Vespasian
criticizing him for
seriously enslaving the Greeks when even Nero
playfully had respected their liberties.
Apollonius visited Ethiopia and expressed the wish that it
would
be splendid if wealth were held in less honor,
and equality
flourished a little more.
He cited Aristides as an example of
a just person,
for he fixed the tribute to Athens on a fair basis
and returned
home in his same poor clothes; but after his death
excessive
valuations and heavy tributes imposed on the islands
led to the Peloponnesian War.
After Domitian put to death three
vestal virgins for
breaking their oaths, Apollonius publicly criticized
the Emperor
by praying for the purification of the unjust murders.
At Smyrna knowing that Nerva would soon become sovereign,
Apollonius
explained that tyrants cannot force destiny
even by killing their
adversaries.
Even though Domitian was persecuting philosophers,
Apollonius went to Rome to face his charges
so that he could share
the dangers of his friends.
He believed that conscience is the
perpetual companion
of the sage who knows oneself, and thus
he
did not cower before what frightens many.
Domitian ordered Apollonius
arrested
and brought into his presence.
Apollonius consoled the
other prisoners and defended
Nerva before Domitian, declaring
he was willing to endure
all that he could inflict against his
vile body
while he pleaded the causes of those persons.
Apollonius accused Domitian of wronging philosophy, saying
that philosophy is concerned about the Emperor
if he does wrong.
The indictment was reduced to four charges,
and Apollonius answered
them this way:
1) he wore peculiar clothes,
because he does not
like to bother poor animals;
2) he is thought to be a god,
because
people so honor persons thought to be good;
3) he predicted the
plague in Ephesus, because having
a lighter diet he was the first
to sense the danger; and
4) the charge that he sacrificed a boy
for Nerva was easily
refuted for lack of evidence and because
Apollonius never even sacrificed animals.
Domitian acquitted Apollonius
of the charges.
Apollonius told the Emperor that his miscreants
were causing
ruin in the cities, exiles in the islands, lamentation
on the
mainland, cowardice in his armies, and suspicion in the
Senate.
Then Apollonius vanished from the court and soon
appeared to Demetrius and Damis at Dicaearchia.
Apollonius believed that God created all things
with the motive
of goodness.
In a letter he asked those who professed to be his
disciples
to remain within their houses, abstain from bathing,
kill no living creature nor eat flesh, and be exempt from the
feelings of jealousy, spite, hatred, slander,
and enmity in order
to bear the names of free people.
To Democrates he wrote that
to show excessive anger over
small offenses prevents offenders
from distinguishing
when they have offended in greater things.
To others he wrote that a quick temper may blossom
into madness,
and anger not restrained and cured by
social intercourse may become
a physical disease.
To his brothers he wrote that they must not
feel envious,
because the good deserve what they have,
and the
bad even if they are prosperous live badly.
He criticized orators
and lawyers
for promoting hatred and feuds.
While speaking at
Ephesus, Apollonius clairvoyantly perceived
the murder of Domitian
and announced it to the people
at the time it happened before
news confirmed it.
Nerva became Emperor and sent for Apollonius
to gain his advice; but the sage sent a letter to the new
Emperor
with Damis so that he could die alone.
This sage had lived through
a decadent era
and taught wisdom until a better Emperor appeared.
1. Tacitus, Annals 11:26 tr. Michael Grant.
2. Ibid., 14:15.
3. Dio Cassius, Roman History 62: 18 tr. Earnest Cary.
4. Octavia 982-983 tr. E. F. Watling.
5. Seneca, On Anger 1:17:7 tr. John W. Basore.
6. Seneca, Letters 2:5 tr. Robin Campbell, p. 49.
7. Ibid., 48:2, p. 96.
8. Tacitus, The Histories, 4:74 tr. Kenneth Wellesley.
9. Petronius, The Satyricon tr. William Arrowsmith, p.
23.
10. Persius, Satires 2:72-75 tr. Niall Rudd.
11. Martial, Epigrams 8:12.
12. Lucan, Civil War 7:548-554 tr. Susan H. Braund.
13. Ibid., 7:632-646.
14. Ibid., 9:573-576.
15. Statius, Thebaid 3:631-632 tr. A. D. Melville.
16. Quintilian, Institutio Oratoria 5:10:54 tr. H. E. Butler.
17. Philostratus, Life of Apollonius of Tyana 1:17 tr.
F. C. Conybeare.
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