Conspiracy of Catiline and the Jurgurthine War Part 10

[247] Parricides--See c. 14, 32.

[248] The course of events--_Dies_. "Id est, temporis momentum (_der veranderte Zeitpunkt_)." _Dietsch_. Things change, and that which is approved at one period, is blamed at another. _Tempus_ and _dies_ are sometimes joined (Liv., xxii. 39, ii. 45), as if not only time in general, but particular periods, as _from day to day_, were intended.

[249] All precedents productive of evil effects--_Omnia mala exempla_.

Examples of severe punishments are meant.

[250] Any new example of severity, etc.--_Novum illud exemplum ab dignis et idoneis ad indignos et non idoneos transferetur_. Gerlach, Kritzius, Dietsch, and Bernouf, agree to giving to this pa.s.sage the sense which is given in the translation. _Digni_ and _idonei_ are here used in a bad sense, for _digni et idonei qui poena afficiantur_, deserving and fit objects for punishment.

[251] When they had conquered the Athenians--At the conclusion of the Peloponnesian war.

[252] Damasippus--"He, in the consuls.h.i.+p of Caius Marius, the younger, and Cneius Carbo, was city praetor, and put to death some of the most eminent senators, a short time before the victory of Sylla. See Vell.

Paterc. ii. 26." _Bernouf_.

[253] Ensigns of authority--_Insignia magistratum_. "The fasces and axes of the twelve lictors, the robe adorned with purple, the curule chair, and the ivory scepter. For the Etrurians, as Dionysius Halicarna.s.sensis relates, having been subdued, in a nine years' war, by Tarquinius Priscus, and having obtained peace on condition of submitting to him as their sovereign, presented him with the _insignia_ of their own monarchs. See Strabo, lib. V.; Florus, i. 5,"

_Kuhnhardt_.

[254] Best able to bear the expense--_Maxime opibus valent_. Are possessed of most resources.

[255] LII. The rest briefly expressed their a.s.sent, etc.--_Caeteri verbo, alius alii, varie a.s.sentiebantur. Verbo a.s.sentiebantur_ signifies that they expressed their a.s.sent merely by a word or two, as _a.s.sentior Silano, a.s.sentior Tiberio Neroni, aut Caesari_, the three who had already spoken. _Varie_, "in support of their different proposals."

[256] My feelings, Conscript Fathers, are extremely different, etc.--_Longe mihi alia mens est, P. C._, etc. The commencement of Cato's speech is evidently copied from the beginning of the third Olynthiac of Demosthenes: [Greek: _Ouchi tauta paristatai moi ginoskein, o andres Athaenaioi, otan te eis ta pragmata apoblepso kai otan pros tous logous ous akouo tous men gar logous peri tou timoraesasthai Philippon oro gignomenous, ta de pragmata eis touto proaekonta oste opos mae peisometha autoi proteron kakos skepsasthai deon_.] "I am by no means affected in the same manner. Athenians, when I review the state of our affairs, and when I attend to those speakers who have now declared their sentiments. They insist that we should punish Philip; but our affairs, situated as they now appear, warn us to guard against the dangers with which we ourselves are threatened."

_Leland_.

[257] Their altars and their homes--_Aris atque focis suis._ "When _arae_ and _foci_ are joined, beware of supposing that they are to be distinguished as referring the one (_arae) to the public temples, and the other (_foci_) to private dwellings. Both are to be understood of private houses, in which the _ara_ belonged to the _Dii Penates_, and was placed in the _impluvium_ in the inner part of the house; the _focus_ was dedicated to the _lares_, and was in the hall."

Ernesti, Clav. Cic., sub. v. _Ara_. Of the commentators on Sall.u.s.t, Kritzius is, I believe, the only one who has concurred in this notion of Ernesti; Langins and Dietsch (with Cortius) adhere to the common opinion that _arae_ are the public altars. Dietsch refers, for a complete refutation of Ernesti, to G. A. B. Hertzberg _de Diis Romanorum Penatibus_, Halae, 1840, p. 64; a book which I have not seen. Certainly, in the observation of Cicero ad Att., vii. 11, "Non est respublica in parietibus, sed in aris et focis," _arae_ must be considered (as Schiller observes) to denote the public altars and national religion. See Schiller's Lex. v. _Ara_.

[258] In vain appeal to justice--_Frusta judicia implores. Judicia_, trials, to procure the inflictions of legal penalties.

[259] Could not easily pardon the misconduct, etc.--_Haud facile alterius lubidini malefacta condonabam_. "Could not easily forgive the licentiousness of another its evil deeds."

[260] Yet the republic remained secure; its own strength, etc.

--_Tamen respublica firma, opulentia neglegentiam tolerabat_. This is Cortius's reading; some editors, as Havercamp, Kritzius, and Dietsch, insert _erat_ after _firma_. Whether _opulentia_ is the nominative or ablative, is disputed. "_Opulentia_," says Allen, "casum s.e.xtum intellige, et repete _respublica_ (ad _tolerabat_)." "_Opulentia_,"

says Kritzius, "melius nominativo capiendum videtur; nam quae sequuntur verba novam enunciationem efficiunt." I have preferred to take it as a nominative.

[261] We have lost the real names of things, etc.--Imitated from Thucydides, iii. 32: [Greek: _Kai taen eiothuian axiosin ton onomaton es ta erga antaellaxan tae dikaiosei. Tolma men gar alogistos, andria philetairos enomisthae, mellasis te promaethaes, deilia euprepaes to de sophron. Tou anandrou proschaema, kai to pros apan syneton, epi pan argon_.] "The ordinary meaning of words was changed by them as they thought proper. For reckless daring was regarded as courage that was true to its friends; prudent delay, as specious cowardice; moderation, as a cloak for unmanliness; being intelligent in every thing, as being useful for nothing." _Dale's_ translation; Bohn's Cla.s.sical Library.

[262] Elegant language--_Composite_. See above, c. 51.

[263] In a most excellent condition--_Multo pulcherrumam._ See c. 36.

[264] For of allies and citizens, etc.--Imitated from Demosthenes, Philipp. III.4.

[265] I advise you to have mercy upon them--_Misereamini censeo, i.e._, censeo _ut_ misereanum, spoken ironically. Most translators have taken the words in the sense of "You would take pity on them, I suppose," or something similar.

[266] Unless this be the second time that he has made war upon his country--"Cethegus first made war on his country in conjunction with Marius." _Bernouf_. Whether Sall.u.s.t alludes to this, or intimates (as Gerlach thinks) that he was engaged in the first conspiracy, is doubtful.

[267] Is ready to devour us--_Faucibus urget_. Cortius, Kritzius, Gerlach, Burnouf, Allen, and Dietsch, are unanimous in interpreting this as a metaphorical expression, alluding to a wild beast with open jaws ready to spring upon its prey. They support this interpretation by Val. Max., v. 3: "Faucibus apprehensam rempublicam;" Cic. pro.

Cluent., 31: "Quum faucibus premetur;" and Plaut. Casin. v. 3,4, "Manifesto faucibus teneor." Some, editors have read _in faucibus_, and understood the words as referring to the jaws or narrow pa.s.ses of Etruria, where Catiline was with his army.

[268] LIII. All the senators of consular dignity, and a great part of the rest--_Consulares omnes, itemque senatus magna pars_. "As the consulars were senators, the reader would perhaps expect Sall.u.s.t to have said _reliqui senatus_ but _itemque_ is equivalent to _et praeter eos_." _Dietsch_.

[269] That they had carried on wars--_Bella gesta_. That wars had been carried on _by them_.

[270] As if the parent stock were exhausted--_Sicuti effoeta parentum_. This is the reading of Cortius, which he endeavors to explain thus: "Ac sicuti _effoeta parens_, inter parentes, _sese habere solet_, ut nullos amplius liberas proferat, sic Roma sese habuit, ubi multis tempestatibus nemo virtute magnus fuit." "_Est_,"

he adds, "or _solet esse_, or _sese habere solet_, may very well be understood from the _fuit_ which follows." But all this only serves to show what a critic may find to say in defense of a reading to which he is determined to adhere. All the MSS., indeed, have _parentum_, except one, which has _parente_. Dietsch thinks that some word has been lost between _effoeta_ and _parentum_, and proposes to read _sicuti effoeta aetate parentum, with the sense, _as if the age of the parents were too much exhausted to produce strong children_. Kritzius, from a suggestion of Cortius (or rather of his predecessor, Rupertus), reads _effoetae parentum_ (the effoetae agreeing with Romae which follows), considering the sense to be the same as as _effoetae parentis_--as _divina dearum_ for _divina dea_, etc. Gerlach retains the rending of Cortius, and adopts his explanation (4to. ed., 1827), but says that the _explicatio_ may seem _durior_, and that it is doubtful whether we ought not to have recourse to the _effoeta parente_ of the old critics.

a.s.suredly if we retain _parentum_, _effoetae_ is the only reading that we can well put with it. We may compare with it _loca nuda gignentium_, (Jug. c. 79), i.e. "places bare of objects producing any thing."

Gronovius know not what to do with the pa.s.sage, called it _locus intellectus nemini_, and at last decided on understanding _virtute_ with _effoetae parentum_, which, _pace tarti viri_, and although Allen has followed him, is little better than folly. The concurrence of the majority of ma.n.u.scripts in giving _parentum_ makes the scholar unwilling to set it aside. However, as no one has explained it satisfactorily even to himself, I have thought it better, with Dietsch, to regard it a _scriptura non ferenda_, and to acquiesce, with Glarea.n.u.s, Rivius, Burnouf, and the Bipont edition, in the reading _effoeta parente_.

[271] LIV. Though attained by different means--_Sed alia alii_.

"Alii alia _gloria_," for _altera alteri_. So Livy, i. 21: _Duo reges_, alius alia via.

[272] Simplicity--_Pudore_. The word here seems to mean the absence of display and ostentation.

[273] With the temperate--_c.u.m innocente_. "That is _c.u.m integro et abstinente_. For _innocentia_ is used for _abstinentia_, and opposed to _avaritia_. See Cic. pro Lego Manil., c. 13." _Burnouf_.

[274] LV. The triumvirs--_Triumviros_. The _triumviri capitales_, who had the charge of the prison and of the punishment of the condemned. They performed their office by deputy, Val. Max., v. 4. 7.

[275] The Tullian dungeon--_Tullianum_. "Tullianum" is an adjective, with which _robur_ must be understood, as it was originally constructed, wholly or partially, with oak. See Festus, sub voce _Rob.u.m_ or _Robur_: his words are _arcis robustis includebatur_, of which the sense is not very clear. The prison at Rome was built by Ancus Marcius, and enlarged by Servius Tullius, from whom this part of it had its name; Varro de L. L., iv. 33. It is now transformed into a subterranean chapel, beneath a small church erected over it, called _San Pietro in Carcere_. De Brosses and Eustace both visited it; See Eustace's Cla.s.sical Tour, vol. i. p. 260, in the _Family Library_. See also Wa.s.se's note on this pa.s.sage.

[276] A vaulted roof connected with stone arches--_Camera lapideis fornicibus vincta_. "That _camera_ was a roof curved in the form of a _testudo_, is generally admitted; see Vitruv. vii. 3; Varr., R. R. iii. 7, init." _Dietsch_. The roof is now arched in the usual way.

[277] Certain men, to whom orders had been given--_Quibus praeceptum erat_. The editions of Havercamp, Gerlach, Kritzius, and Dietsch, have _vindices rerum capitalium, quibus_, etc. Cortius ejected the first three words from his text, as an intruded gloss. If the words be genuine, we must consider these _vindices_ to have been the deputies, or lictors, of the "triumvirs" mentioned above.

[278] LVI. As far as his numbers would allow--_Pro numero militum_.

He formed his men into two bodies, which he called legions, and divided each legion, as was usual, into ten cohorts, putting into each cohort as many men as he could. The cohort of a full legion consisted of three maniples, or six hundred men; the legion would then be six thousand men. But the legions were seldom so large as this; they varied at different periods, from six thousand to three thousand; in the time of Polybius they were usually four thousand two hundred.

See Adam's Rom. Ant., and Lipsius de Mil. Rom Dial. iv.

[279] From his confederates--_Ex sociis_. "Understand, not only the leaders in the conspiracy, but those who, in c. 35, are said to have set out to join Catiline, though not at that time exactly implicated in the plot." _Kritzius_. It is necessary to notice this, because Cortius erroneously supposes "sociis" to mean the _allies of Rome_. Dahl, Longius, Muller, Burnouf, Gerlach, and Dietsch, all interpret in the same manner as Kritzius.

[280] Hoped himself shortly to find one--_Sperabat propediem sese habiturum_. Other editions, as those of Havercamp, Gerlach, Kritzius, Dietsch, and Burnouf, have the words _magnas copias_ before _sese_.

Cortius struck them out, observing that _copiae_ occurred too often in this chapter, and that in one MS. they were wanting. One ma.n.u.script, however, was insufficient authority for discarding them; and the phrase suits much better with what follows, _si Romae socii incepta patravissent_, if they are retained.

[281] Slaves--of whom vast numbers, etc.--_Servitia--cujus magnae copiae_. "_Cujus_," says Priscian (xvii. 20, vol. ii., p. 81, cd. Krehl), "is referred _ad rem_, that is _cujus rei servitiorum_." _Servorum_ or _hominum genus_, is, perhaps, rather what Sall.u.s.t had in his mind, as the subject of his relation. Gerlach adduces as an expression most nearly approaching to Sall.u.s.t's, Thucyd., iii. 92; [Greek: _Kai dorieis, hae maetropolis ton Lakedaimonion_].

[282] Impolitic--_Alienum suis rationibus_. Foreign to his views; inconsistent with his policy.

[283] LVII. In his hurried march into Gaul--_In Galliam properanti_.

These words Cortius inclosed in brackets, p.r.o.nouncing them as a useless gloss. But all editors have retained them as genuine, except the Bipont and Burnouf, who wholly omitted them.

[284] As he was pursuing, though with a large army, yet through plainer ground, and with fewer hinderances; the enemy in retreat--_Utpote qui magna exercitu, locis aequioribus, expeditus, in fuga sequeretur_. It would be tedious to notice all that has been written upon this pa.s.sage of Sall.u.s.t. All the editions, before that of Cortius, had _expeditos, in fugam_, some joining _expeditos_ with _locis aequioribus_, and some with _in fugam_. _Expeditos in fugam_ was first condemned by Wa.s.se, no negligent observer of phrases, who said that no expression parallel to it could be found in any Latin writer. Cortius, seeing that the _expedition_, of which Sall.u.s.t is speaking, is on the part of Antonius, not of Catiline, altered _expeditos_, though found in all the ma.n.u.scripts, into _expeditus_; and _in fugam_, at the same time, into _in fuga_; and in both these emendations he has been cordially followed by the subsequent editors, Gerlach, Kritzius, and Dietsch. I have translated _magno exercitu_, "_though_ with a large army," although, according to Dietsch and some others, we need not consider a large army as a cause of slowness, but may rather regard it as a cause of speed; since the more numerous were Metellus's forces, the less he would care how many he might leave behind through fatigue, or to guard the baggage; so that he might be the more _expeditus_, uninc.u.mbered. With _sequeretur_ we must understand _hostes_. The Bipont, Burnouf's, which often follows it, and Havercamp's, are now the only editions of any note that retain _expeditos in fugam_.

[285] LVIII. That a spiritless army can not be rendered active, etc.--_Neque ex ignavo strenuum, neque fortem ex timido exercitum oratione imperatoris fieri_. I have departed a little from the literal reading, for the sake of ease.

[286] That on your own right hands depend, etc.--_In dextris portare_. "That you carry in your right hands."

[287] Those same places--_Eadem illa_. "Coloniae atque municipia portas claudent." _Burnouf_.

[288] They contend for what but little concerns them--_Illis supervacaneum est pugnare_. It is but of little concern to the great body of them personally: they may fight, but others will have the advantages of their efforts.