To his friend Herenius
A. D. 468
[1] THE patrician Ricimer well married, and the wealth of both empires blown to the winds in the process, the |22 community has at last resumed its sober senses and opened door and field again to business. Even before this happened I had already been made welcome to the home of the prefectorian Paul, and enjoyed the friendliest and most hospitable treatment in a house no less respectable for piety than learning. I do not know the man more eminent in every kind of accomplishment than my host. I am amazed when I think of the subtleties which he propounds, the figures of rhetoric adorning his judgements, the polish of his verses, the wonders which his fingers can perform. And over and above this encyclopaedic knowledge, he has a still better possession, a conscience superior even to all this science. Naturally, my first inquiries as to possible avenues to court-favour were addressed to him; with him I discuss the likeliest patrons for the advancement of our hopes. [2] There is, however, little need to hesitate; the number of those whose influence merits our consideration is so small. There are, indeed, many senators of wealth and birth, ripe in experience, helpful in counsel, all of the highest rank, and equal in real consideration. But without disparagement to others, we found two consulars, Gennadius Avienus and Caecina Basilius, in enjoyment of a peculiar eminence, and conspicuous above the rest; if you leave out of the account the great military officers, these two members of the exalted order easily come next to the emperor himself. We found them both deserving of the highest admiration; but their characters were very different; what resemblance there was rested rather on inborn than acquired qualities. Let me give you a short description of the pair. [3] Avienus reached the consulate |23 by luck, Basilius by merit. It was observed that the former attained his dignities with enviable rapidity, but that although the latter was slower, he won the greater number of distinctions in the end. If either chanced to leave his house, a whole populace of clients was afoot to escort him, and pressed about him like a human tide. But though the two were in so far on a level, the spirits and expectations of their friends were very far from equal. Avienus would do all that in him lay for the advancement of his sons, or sons-in-law, or brothers, but was so absorbed in family candidates that his energy in the interest of outside aspirants was proportionately impaired. [4] There was a further reason for preferring the Decian to the Corvinian family. What Avienus could only obtain for his own connexions while in office, Basilius obtained for strangers while he was in a private station. Avienus opened his mind freely, and at' once, but little came of it; Basilius rarely and not for some time, but to the petitioner's advantage. Neither of the two was inaccessible or costly of approach; but in the one case cultivation reaped mere affability, in the other, solid gain. [5] After long balancing of alternatives, we finally compromised in this sense; we would preserve all due respect for the older consular, whose house we were duly frequenting, but devote our real attention to the habitué's of Basilius' house. Now while, with the assistance of this right honourable friend, I was considering how best to advance the matter of our Arvernian petition,the Kalends of January came round, on which day the emperor's name was to be enrolled in the Fasti as consul for a second year. [6] 'The very thing,' cried my |24 patron. 'My dear Sollius, I well know that you are engaged in an exacting duty, but I do wish you would bring out your Muse again in honour of the new consul; let her sing something appropriate to the occasion, in whatever haste composed. I will obtain you an audience, be there to encourage you before you begin to recite, and guarantee you a good reception when you have done. I have some experience in these matters; trust me when I say that serious advantage may accrue from this little scheme.' I took the hint; he did not withdraw from the suggested plan, but gave me the support of an invincible ally in the act of homage imposed upon me, and managed so to influence my new consul, that I was incontinently named president of his senate. [7] But I expect you are tired to death of this prolix letter, and would much rather peruse my little work itself at your leisure. Indeed, I am sure you would, so the eloquent pages bear you the verses herewith, and must do duty for me until I come to speak for myself a few days hence. If my lines win the suffrage of your critical judgement, I shall be just as delighted as if a speech of mine in the assembly or from the rostra called forth the 'bravos' not of senators alone but of all the citizens. I warn you, nay, I insist with you, not to think of setting this slight piece of mine on the same plane as the hexameters of your own Muse, for by the side of yours my lines will suggest the triviality of epitaph-mongers rather than the grandeur of heroic verse. [8] Rejoice, all the same, with the panegyrist; he cannot claim the credit of a fine performance, but at least he has the reward of one. And so, if gay may enliven grave, I will imitate |25 the Pyrgopolinices of Plautus, and conclude in a robustious and Thrasonical vein. And since, by Christ's aid, I have got the prefecture by a lucky pen, I bid you treat me as my new state demands; pile up all conceivable felicitations and exalt to the stars my eloquence or my luck, according as I please, or fail to please, your judgement. I can imagine your smile when you see your friend carrying it off in this style with the braggart airs of the old stage-soldier. Farewell.
X.
To his friend Campanianus
A. D. 468
[1] THE Intendant of Supplies has personally presented the letter in which you commend him as your old friend to my new judgement. I am greatly indebted to him, but most of all to yourself for this evidence of your resolve to assume my friendship certain and proof against all suspicion. I welcome, I eagerly embrace this opportunity of acquaintance, and of intimacy, since my desire to oblige you cannot but draw closer the bonds which already unite us. [2] But please commend me in my turn to his vigilant care, commend, that is, my cause and my repute. For I rather fear that there may be an uproar in the theatres if the supplies of grain run short, and that the hunger of all the Romans will be laid to my account. I am on the point of dispatching him immediately to the harbour in person, because news is to hand that five ships from Brindisi have put in at Ostia laden with wheat and honey. |26 A stroke of energy on his part, and we should have these cargoes ready in no time for the expectant crowds; he would win my favour, I the people's, and he and I together yours. Farewell.
XI.
To his friend Montius
About A. D. 461-7
[1] ON the eve of your departure to visit your people of Franche-Comté, most eloquent of friends, you ask me for a copy of a certain satire, assuming it really of my composition. I must say the request surprises me; it is not nice to jump to a false conclusion about a friend's conduct in this manner. It is so likely----is it not?----that at my then age and with my total lack of leisure, I should devote my energies to a kind of literature which it would have been presumptuous in a young man doing his service to compose, and assuredly perilous to publish. Why, a mere nodding acquaintance with a grammarian would suffice to recall the advice of the Calabrian:
'Against the libellous poet, is there not remedy of law and sentence?'
[2] To prevent any more credulity of this sort as regards your old friend, I will set forth at some length, and from the beginning, the events which brought on my head the sound and smoke of public odium. In the reign of Majorian, an anonymous but very mordant satire in verse was circulated at court; gross in its invective, it took advantage of unprotected names, |27 though it lashed vice, its attack was above all personal.The inhabitants of Aries (that city was the scene of these events) were much excited; they wanted to know on which of our poets the weight of public indignation was to fall; at their head were the men whom the invisible author had most visibly branded. [3] It chanced that the illustrious Catullinus arrived at this juncture from Clermont; always a close friend of mine, he was then nearer to me than ever, as we had just served together; a common duty away from home brings (you know how) fellow citizens nearer. Well, Paeonius and Bigerrus set a trap for the unsuspecting visitor: they took him off his guard, and asked him, before numerous witnesses, whether he was familiar with the new poem. 'Let me hear some of it,' said Catullinus. But when they went on jestingly to quote various passages from the satire, he burst out laughing, and asseverated, rather inopportunely, perhaps, that such verses deserved to be immortalized, and set up in letters of gold on the rostra or the Capitol. [4] At this Paeonius flamed out, for he was the man whom the fiery tooth of the satirist had most sharply bitten. 'Ha!' he cried to the crowd attracted to the spot, 'I have found out the author of this public outrage. Just look at Catullinus half dead with laughter there; obviously he knew all the points beforehand. How could he thus anticipate, and conclude from a mere part, unless he were already acquainted with the whole? We know that Sidonius is in Auvergne. It is easy to infer that he wrote the thing and that Catullinus was the first to hear it from his lips.' Now I was not only absent, but ignorant and innocent as a babe; that did not prevent a tempest of fury and |28 abuse against me; they cast to the winds loyalty, fair play, and fair inquiry; [5] such power had this popular favourite to draw the fickle crowd whither he would. As you know, Paeonius was a demagogue well versed in the tribune's art of troubling the waters of faction. But if you asked 'whence his descent and where his home?' 'tis known he was nothing more than a plain citizen, whom the eminence of his stepfather more than any distinction of his own house first brought to public notice. He was bent on rising, and more than once let it be seen that he would stick at nothing to attain his end; though mean by nature he would spend freely for his own advancement. For example, when the engagement of his daughter (against whom I would not breathe a word) brought him the alliance of a family above his own, our Chremes, if rumour does not lie, announced to his Pamphilus a dower magnificently beyond the strict civic standard. [6] Again, when the Marcellian conspiracy to seize the diadem was brewing, what did our friend do? A novus homo, and in his grey hairs, he must needs constitute himself the leader of the young nobility until in the fullness of time the efforts of a lucky audacity were rewarded, for the interregnum, like a rift in clouds, threw a flash of splendour on the obscurity of his birth. The throne was vacant, the State in confusion; but he, and only he, had the face, without waiting for credentials, to assume the fasces as prefect in Gaul, and for months together climb, in the sight of gods and men, the tribunal distinguished by so many illustrious magistrates. Like a public accountant or advocate promoted to honours at the close of a professional career, he |29 just managed to get recognition at the very end of his official term. [7] A prefect and senator in such wise that only my respect for the character of his son-in-law prevents me from exposing him as utterly as he deserves, behold him unashamed to fan the odium of good and bad alike against one still nominally his friend, as if I were the only man of my epoch competent to string a verse or two together. I came to Aries suspecting nothing ----how should I?----though my enemies were good enough to believe I dared not venture. The next day I paid my duty to the emperor, and went down to the forum, as I always do. As soon as I appeared, the conspiracy was at once confounded, being of the sort which, as Lucan says, dares put nothing to the touch. Some fell cringing at my knees, abasing themselves beyond propriety; others hid behind statues or columns to avoid the necessity of salutation; others, again, with looks of affected sorrow, walked closely at my sides. [8] I was wondering all the time what might be the meaning of this excess, first in insolence and now in abasement, but was determined not to ask, when one of the gang, put up, no doubt, to play the part, came forward to exchange greeting. We talked, and incidentally he remarked: 'You see these people?' 'I do indeed,' I answered, 'and I may say that their proceedings astonish me as much as they impress me little.' To which my kind interpreter rejoined: 'It is in your quality of satirist that they show this fear or detestation of you.' 'How so,' I cried, 'on what grounds? when did I give them the excuse? who detected the offence? who brought the charge and who the proof?' Then, with a smile, I continued thus: 'My dear sir, if you |30 don't mind, oblige me by asking these excited persons from me, whether it was a professed informer or spy who got up this imaginative story about my writing a satire. If they have to make the inevitable apology later, it will be better for them to give up this outrageous behaviour at once.' [9] No sooner had he conveyed the message, than they all came to offer their hands and salutations, not man by man, and with decorum, but the whole herd with a rush. Our Curio was left all alone to breathe imprecations on the base deserters, until at fall of evening he was hurried off home on the shoulders of bearers gloomier than mutes. [10] The next day the emperor commanded my presence at the banquet he was giving on the occasion of the Games. At the left end of the couch was Severinus, the consul of the year, who managed to trim his sails to a wind of even favour throughout our vast dynastic changes and all the uneven fortunes of the State. Next him was the ex-prefect Magnus, who had just laid down the consul's office, and by virtue of these two dignities was no unworthy neighbour. Beyond Magnus was his nephew Camillus, who had also held two offices, and by his conduct of them added equal lustre to his father's proconsular rank and his uncle's consulship. Next to him was Paeonius, and then Athenius, a man versed in every turn of controversy and vicissitude of the times. After them came Gratianensis, a character not to be mentioned in the same breath with evil; and though lower in rank than Severinus, above him in the imperial estimation. I was last, upon the left side of the emperor, who lay at the right extremity of the table. [11] When the dinner was well advanced, the prince |31 addressed a few short remarks to the consul. He then turned to the ex-consul, with whom he talked several times, the subjects being literary. At an early opportunity he addressed himself to Camillus, with the remark: 'My dear Camillus, you have so admirable an uncle that I pride myself on having conferred a consulship on your family.' Camillus, who coveted a like promotion, saw his chance, and replied: 'A consulship, Sire! you surely mean a first? ' Even the emperor's presence did not check the loud applause which greeted this rejoinder. [12] By accident, or of set purpose, I cannot say which, the prince now passed over Paeonius, and addressed some question or other to Athenius. Paeonius had the bad manners to take the oversight ill, and made matters worse by answering before the other had time to speak. The emperor only laughed; it was his way to be very genial in society so long as his own dignity was observed. To Athenius the laugh came as compensation for the slight he had suffered. That craftiest of all the elders had been boiling with suppressed resentment all the time because Paeonius had been placed above him, but he calmed himself enough to say: 'It no longer surprises me, Sire, that he should try to push himself into my place, when he has now pushed into your Majesty's conversation.' [13] The illustrious Gratianensis here remarked that the episode opened a wide field to a satirist. On this, the emperor turned round to me and said: 'It is news to me, Count Sidonius,that you are a writer of satires.' 'Sire,' I answered, 'it is news to me too.' 'Anyhow,' he replied with a laugh, 'I beg you to be merciful to me.' 'I shall |32 spare myself also,' I rejoined, 'by refraining from illegality.' Thereupon the emperor said: 'What shall we do, then, to the people who have provoked you?' 'This, Sire,' I answered. ' Whoever my accuser be, let him come out into the open. If I am proved guilty, let me abide the penalty. But if, as will probably be the case, I rebut the charge, I ask of your clemency permission to write anything I choose about my assailant, provided I observe the law.' [14] The emperor looked at Paeonius, who was hesitating, and made a sign of inquiry whether he accepted the conditions. But he had not a word to answer, and the prince spared his embarrassment; at last, however, he managed to say: 'I agree to your conditions, if you can put them in verse on the spot.' 'Very well,' I said; and turning back, as if to call for water for my hands, I remained in that attitude the time occupied by a quick servant in going round the table. I then resumed my former position, and the emperor said: 'Your undertaking was to ask in an impromptu our sanction for writing satire.' I replied:
'O mightiest prince, I pray that this be thy decree: let him who calls me libeller or prove his charge, or fear.'
[15] I do not want to seem conceited, but the applause which followed was equal to that which had greeted Camillus; though it was earned, of course, less by the merit of the verse than by the speed with which I had composed. Then the emperor cried: 'I call God and the common weal to witness that in future I give you licence to write what you please; the charge brought against you was not susceptible of proof. It would be most unjust if the imperial decision allowed such latitude to private quarrels that evident malice might imperil |33 by obscure charges nobles whom conscious innocence puts wholly off their guard.' At this pronouncement I modestly bent my head and thanked him; the face of my opponent, which had previously shown successive signs of rage and vexation, now grew pale. Indeed, it was almost frozen with terror, as if he had received the order to present his neck to the executioner's drawn sword. [16] Little more was said before we rose from the table. We had withdrawn a short distance from the imperial presence, and were in the act of putting on our mantles, when the consul fell upon my bosom, the ex-prefects seized my hands, and my guilty friend abased himself so often and so profoundly, that he aroused universal pity, and bade fair to place me in a more invidious position by his entreaties than he had ever done by his insinuations. Urged to speak by the throng of nobles round me, I closed the episode by telling him that he might set his mind at rest; I should write no satire on his base intrigue so long as he abstained henceforward from the misrepresentation of my actions. It should be punishment enough for him to know that his ascription of the lampoon to me had added to my credit and brought nothing but discredit on himself. [17] In fine, honoured lord, the man whom I thus confounded had not been loudest in calumny; he was a mere whisperer. But since, by his offence, I had the satisfaction of being so warmly greeted by so many men of the highest influence and position, I confess that it was almost worth while to have borne the scandal of the exordium for the sake of so triumphant a conclusion. Farewell.
This text was transcribed by Roger Pearse, 2003. All material on this page is in the public domain - copy freely.
Greek text is rendered using the Scholars Press SPIonic font, free from here .