People From Rome

"As soon as the funeral of Augustus was over, a temple and divine worship were forthwith decreed him. The Senate then turned their instant supplications to Tiberius, to fill his vacant place; but received an abstruse answer, touching the greatness of the Empire and his own distrust of himself; he said that "nothing but the divine genius of Augustus was equal to the mighty task: that for himself, who had been called by him into a participation of his cares, he had learnt by feeling them, what a daring, what a difficult toil was that of government, and how perpetually subject to the caprices of fortune: that in a State supported by so many illustrious patriots they ought not to cast the whole administration upon one; and more easy to be administered were the several offices of the Government by the united pains and sufficiency of many.""

"Quid scribam vobis, p[atres]. c[onscripti]., aut quo modo scribam, aut quid omnino non scribam hoc tempore, dii me deaeque peius perdant quam cotidie perire sentio, si scio."

"Dixi et nunc et saepe alias, p[atres]. c[onscripti]., bonum et salutarem principem, quem vos tanta et tam libera potestate instruxistis, senatui servire debere et universis civibus saepe et plerumque etiam singulis; neque id dixisse me paenitet, et bono et aequos et faventes vos habui dominos et adhuc habeo."

"Siquidem locutus aliter fuerit, dabo operam ut rationem factorum meorum dictorumque reddam; si perseveraverit, in vicem eum odero."

"In civitate libera linguam mentemque liberas esse debere (jactabat)."

"I am emperor. It is I who know what is best for Rome. Not you traitors. Now, let go of my horses!"

"Scholars have often viewed the failure of Elagabalus' reign as a clash of cultures between "Eastern" (Syrian) and "Western" (Roman), but this dichotomy is not very useful. The criticisms of the emperor's effeminacy and sexual behavior mirror those made of earlier emperors (such as Nero) and do not need to be explained through ethnic stereotypes. With regard to religion, the emperor's promotion of the cult of the Emesene sun-god was certainly ridiculed by contemporary observers, but this cult was popular among soldiers and would remain so. Moreover, the cult continued to be promoted by later emperors of non-Syrian ethnicity, calling the god The Unconquered Sun (Sol Invictus). Elagabalus is best understood as a teenager who was raised near the luxury of the imperial court and who then suffered a drastic change of fortune brought about by the sudden deaths — probably within one year — of his father, his grandfather and his cousin, the emperor Caracalla . Thrust upon the throne, Elagabalus lacked the required discipline. For a while, Romans may well have been amused by his "Merrie Monarch" behavior, but he ended up offending those he needed to inspire. His reign tragically demonstrated the difficulties of having a teenage emperor."

"[He was] delighted to be called the mistress, the wife, the Queen of Hierocles."

"The life of Elagabalus Antoninus, also called Varius,​ I should never have put in writing — hoping that it might not be known that he was emperor of the Romans — were it not that before him this same imperial office had had a Caligula, a Nero, and a Vitellius. But, just as the selfsame earth bears not only poisons but also grain and other helpful things, not only serpents but flocks as well, so the thoughtful reader may find himself some consolation for these monstrous tyrants by reading of Augustus, Trajan, Vespasian, Hadrian, Pius, Titus, and Marcus."

"Leave my mother alone!"

"He undertook to disparage my age when he himself had appointed his ten-year-old son."

"Qui cecidit, stabili non erat ille gradu."

"Ancient belief in a cosmos composed of spheres, producing music as angels guided them through the heavens, was still flourishing in Elizabethan times. …There is a good deal more to Pythagorean musical theory than celestial harmony. Besides the music of the celestial spheres (musica mundana), two other varieties of music were distinguished: the sound of instruments...(musica instrumentalis), and the continuous unheard music that emanated from the human body (musica humana), which arises from a resonance between the body and the soul. ...In the medieval world, the status of music is revealed by its position within the Quadrivium—the fourfold curriculum—alongside arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy. Medieval students... believed all forms of harmony to derive from a common source. Before Boethius' studies in the ninth century, the idea of musical harmony was not considered independently of wider matters of celestial or ethical harmony."

"Boethius is a singular figure. Throughout the Middle Ages he was read and admired, regarded always as a devout Christian and treated almost as if he had been one of the Fathers. Yet his Consolations of Philosophy, written in 524 while he was awaiting execution, is purely Platonic; it does not prove that he was not a Christian, but it does show that pagan philosophy had a much stronger hold on him than Christian theology. Some theological works, especially one on the Trinity, which are attributed to him, are by many authorities considered to be spurious; but it was probably owing to them that the Middle Ages were able to regard him as orthodox, and to imbibe from him much Platonism which would otherwise have been viewed with suspicion. . . . The tone of the book is more like that of Plato than that of Plotinus. There is no trace of the superstition or morbidness of the age, no obsession with sin, no excessive straining after the unattainable. There is perfect philosophic calm—so much that, if the book had been written in prosperity, it might almost have been called smug. Written when it was, in prison under sentence of death, it is as admirable as the last moments of the Platonic Socrates. One does not find a similar outlook until after Newton. . . . [Boethius’s] combination with great learning and zeal for the public good was unique in that age. During the two centuries before his time and the ten centuries after it, I cannot think of any European man of learning so free from superstition and fanaticism. Nor are his merits merely negative; his survey is lofty, disinterested, and sublime. He would have been remarkable in any age; in the age in which he lived, he is utterly amazing."

"Throughout his life Boethius had written on a wide range of subjects: his interests included mathematics, music, philosophy and theology. But he composed his most famous work in jail while awaiting execution for his crimes. The Consolation of Philosophy attempted to place earthly troubles in a divine context. Written in the form of a dialogue between Boethius and Lady Philosophy, it asked its readers to accept that there were higher powers at work behind the vicissitudes of man’s fleeting life. In the course of his musings, he turned to the notion of fortune’s wheel. ‘So now you have committed yourself to the rule of Fortune, you must acquiesce in her ways,’ he wrote. ‘If you are trying to stop her wheel form turning, you are of all men the most obtuse.’"

"While Boethius, oppressed with fetters, expected each moment the sentence or the stroke of death, he composed, in the tower of Pavia, the Consolation Of Philosophy; a golden volume not unworthy of the leisure of Plato or Tully, but which claims incomparable merit from the barbarism of the times and the situation of the author."

"Music is associated not only with speculation but with morality. When rhythms and modes reach an intellect through the ear, they doubtless affect and reshape that mind according to their particular character."

"For when every judgement is the act of hym that judgeth, it behoveth that every man performe hys worke and purpose, not by any forayne or straunge power or facultie, but by his owne proper power, and strength."

"Sic quae permissis fluitare videtur habenis Fors patitur frenos ipsaque lege meat."

"Quis enim cohercente in ordinem cuncta deo locus esse ullus temeritati reliquus potest?"

"Video, inquam, quae sit vel felicitas vel miseria in ipsis proborum atque improborum meritis constituta."

"Vis aptam meritis uicem referre: Dilige iure bonos et miseresce malis."

"Nam si uti corporum languor ita vitiositas quidam est quasi morbus animorum, cum aegros corpore minime dignos odio sed potius miseratione iudicemus, multo magis non insequendi sed miserandi sunt quorum mentes omni languore atrocior urguet improbitas."

"Videsne igitur quanto in caeno probra volvantur, qua probitas luce resplendeat? In quo perspicuum est numquam bonis praemia, numquam sua sceleribus deesse supplicia."

"Quis legem det amantibus? Maior lex amor est sibi."

"Tu quoque falsa tuens bona prius incipe colla iugo retrahere: Vera dehinc animum subierint."

"Qui serere ingenuum uolet agrum liberat arua prius fruticibus, falce rubos filicemque resecat, ut noua fruge grauis Ceres eat."

"O felix hominum genus, si uestros animos amor quo caelum regitur regat!"

"Quodsi putatis longius vitam trahi mortalis aura nominis, cum sera vobis rapiet hoc etiam dies iam vos secunda mors manet."

"Adeo nihil est miserum nisi cum putes, contraque beata sors omnis est aequanimitate tolerantis."

"Quis est enim tam compositae felicitatis ut non aliqua ex parte cum status sui qualitate rixetur?"

"Nam in omni adversitate fortunae infelicissimum est genus infortunii fuisse felicem."

"Nec speres aliquid nec extimescas, exarmaueris impotentis iram; at quisquis trepidus pauet uel optat, quod non sit stabilis suique iuris, abiecit clipeum locoque motus nectit qua ualeat trahi catenam."

"Unde haud iniuria tuorum quidam familiarium quaesiuit: 'si quidem deus', inquit, 'est, unde mala? Bona uero unde, si non est?"

"Si operam medicantis exspectas, oportet vulnus detegas."

"Quae ubi poeticas Musas uidit nostro assistentes toro fletibusque meis uerba dictantes, commota paulisper ac toruis inflammata luminibus: Quis, inquit, has scenicas meretriculas ad hunc aegrum permisit accedere, quae dolores eius non modo nullis remediis fouerent, uerum dulcibus insuper alerent uenenis? Hae sunt enim quae infructuosis affectuum spinis uberem fructibus rationis segetem necant hominumque mentes assuefaciunt morbo, non liberant."

"I forgive the many for the sake of the few, the living for the dead."

"How is this? Ought not the petitioner to speak first, and the conqueror to listen in silence?"

"He ought to have worked at the oar before steering the vessel."

"No friend ever served me, and no enemy ever wronged me, whom I have not repaid in full."

"Laudem virtutis necessitati damus."

"Adeo facilius est multa facere quam diu."

"Quamlibet multa egerimus, quodam tamen modo recentes sumus ad id quod incipimus. quis non obtundi potest, si per totum diem cuiuscunque artis unum magistrum ferat? mutatione recreabitur sicut in cibis, quorum diversitate reficitur stomachus et pluribus minore fastidio alitur."

"Atque eam natura ipsa videtur ad tolerandos facilius labores velut muneri nobis dedisse, si quidem et remigem cantus hortatur; nec solum in iis operibus in quibus plurium conatus praeeunte aliqua iucunda voce conspirat, sed etiam singulorum fatigatio quamlibet se rudi modulatione solatur."

"Falsa enim est querela, paucissimis hominibus vim percipiendi quae tradantur esse concessam, plerosque vero laborem ac tempora tarditate ingenii perdere. Nam contra plures reperias et faciles in excogitando et ad discendum promptos. Quippe id est homini naturale, ac sicut aves ad volatum, equi ad cursum, ad saevitiam ferae gignuntur, ita nobis propria est mentis agitatio atque sollertia."

"Vain hopes are often like the dreams of those who wake."

"Et hercule quantumlibet secreta studia contulerint, est tamen proprius quidam fori profectus, alia lux, alia veri discriminis facies, plusque, si separes, usus sine doctrina quam citra usum doctrina valeat."

"Videor mihi audire quosdam (neque enim deerunt umquam qui diserti esse quam boni malint) illa dicentis: "Quid ergo tantum est artis in eloquentia? cur tu de coloribus et difficilium causarum defensione, nonnihil etiam de confessione locutus es, nisi aliquando vis ac facultas dicendi expugnat ipsam veritatem? Bonus enim vir non agit nisi bonas causas, eas porro etiam sine doctrina satis per se tuetur veritas ipsa.""

"Neque enim tantum id dico, eum qui sit orator virum bonum esse oportere, sed ne futurum quidem oratorem nisi virum bonum. Nam certe neque intellegentiam concesseris iis qui proposita honestorum ac turpium via peiorem sequi malent, neque prudentiam, cum in gravissimas frequenter legum, semper vero malae conscientiae poenas a semet ipsis inproviso rerum exitu induantur."

"Mutos enim nasci et egere omni ratione satius fuisset quam providentiae munera in mutuam perniciem convertere."