Part 8 (1/2)

Neonymphon 616 Neron, idian maeter apekteinen

Orestes and Alcaeon-Nero too, The lustful Nero, worst of all the crew, Fresh froet Aeneae na de stirpe Neronem?

Sustulit hicfroenerate?

Safe through the flames, one bore his sire; the other, To save hi mother

Dum tendit citharam noster, dum cornua Parthus, Noster erit Paean, ille Ekataebeletaes

His lyre to hars; His arrows o'er the plain the Parthian wings: Ours call the tuneful Paean,-famed in war, The other Phoebus name, the God who shoots afar 618

Rorate, Quirites, Si non et Vejos occupat ista domus

All Rome will be one house: to Veii fly, Should it not stretch to Veii, by and by 619 (370) But he neither made any inquiry after the authors, nor when inforainst some of them, would he allow a severe sentence to be passed Isidorus, the Cynic philosopher, said to hi the misfortunes of Nauplius well, but behave badly yourself” And Datus, a co these words in the piece, ”Farewell, father! Farewelland swirippina: and on uttering the last clause, Orcus vobis ducit pedes; You stand this moment on the brink of Orcus; he plainly intimated his application of it to the precarious position of the senate Yet Nero only banished the player and philosopher from the city and Italy; either because he was insensible to shame, or from apprehension that if he discovered his vexation, still keener things ht be said of hi such an eth forsook hioverned the province as pro-praetor, being the first to revolt Nero had been forers, that it would be his fortune to be at last deserted by all the world; and this occasioned that celebrated saying of his, ”An artist can live in any country;” by which he meant to offer as an excuse for his practice of music, that it was not only his aht be his support when reduced to a private station Yet soers promised him, in his forlorn state, the rule of the East, and soreater part of the restored to his forBritain and Arh all the misfortunes which the fates had decreed hi the oracle of Apollo at Delphi, he was advised to beware of the seventy-third year, as if he were not to die till then, never thinking of Galba's age, he conceived such hopes, not only of living to advanced years, but of constant and singular good fortune, that having lost soreat value by shi+pwreck, he scrupled not to say a them back to him” At Naples he heard of the insurrection in Gaul, on the anniversary of the day on which he killed his mother, and bore it with so lad of it, since he had now a fair opportunity of plundering those wealthy provinces by the right of war Iyreatest delight Being interrupted at supper with letters which brought yet worse news, he expressed no greater resentether, he never atteive any orders, but buried the whole affair in profound silence

XLI Being roused at last by nu him with reproaches and contee his wrongs and those of the republic; desiring the in the senate-house, because he had got cold But nothing so alled him, as to find himself railed at as a pitiful harper, and, instead of Nero, styled Aenobarbus: which being his family name, since he was upbraided with it, he declared that he would resume it, and lay aside the na by the other accusations as wholly groundless, he earnestly refuted that of his want of skill in an art upon which he had bestowed so much pains, and in which he had arrived at such perfection; asking frequently those about him, ”if they knew any one as a ers after reat consternation to Ro the frivolous oed by the hair by a Roht, which was sculptured on a monument; so that he leaped for joy, and adored the heavens Even then he ether so men at his own house, he held a hasty consultation upon the present state of affairs, and then, during the remainder of the day, carried them about with him to view some musical instruments, of a new invention, which were played by water 620 (372) exhibiting all the parts, and discoursing upon the principles and difficulties of the contrivance; which, he told theive hience that Galba and the Spaniards had declared against hi time speechless, apparently dead As soon as recovered from this state stupefaction he tore his clothes, and beat his head, crying out, ”It is all over withhis had happened to other princes before him, he replied, ”I am beyond all example wretched, for I have lost an e” He, nevertheless, abated nothing of his luxury and inattention to business Nay, on the arrival of good news fro with an air of merriment, some jovial verses upon the leaders of the revolt, which were estures Being carried privately to the theatre, he sent word to an actor as applauded by the spectators, ”that he had it all his oay, now that he hie”

XLIII At the first breaking out of these troubles, it is believed that he had forh conforh to his natural disposition These were to send new governors and commanders to the provinces and the arovernors and coainst him; to massacre the exiles in every quarter, and all the Gaulish population in Rome; the former lest they should join the insurrection; the latter as privy to the designs of their countrymen, and ready to support (373) them; to abandon Gaul itself, to be wasted and plundered by his armies; to poison the whole senate at a feast; to fire the city, and then let loose the wild beasts upon the people, in order to i deterred frons not soable to effect the an expedition into Gaul necessary, he removed the consuls from their office, before the time of its expiration was arrived; and in their rooue, as if the fates had decreed that Gaul should not be conquered, but by a consul Upon assu the fasces, after an entertain on the arms of some of his friends, he declared, that as soon as he arrived in the province, he would st the troops, unarht the mutineers to repentance, he would, the next day, in the public rejoicings, sing songs of triumph, which he must noithout loss of ti for this expedition, his first care was to provide carriages for his e; to have the hair of the concubines he carried with him dressed in the fashi+on of men; and to supply them with battle-axes, and Amazonian bucklers He summoned the city-tribes to enlist; but no qualified persons appearing, he ordered all masters to send a certain nu their stewards and secretaries He co in a fixed proportion of their estates, as they stood in the censor's books; all tenants of houses and mansions to pay one year's rent forthwith into the exchequer; and, with unheard-of strictness, would receive only new coin of the purest silver and the finest gold; inso out unanie theeneral odiureat scarcity of corn, and an occurrence connected with it For, as it happened just at that time, there arrived frohted (374) with dust for the wrestlers belonging to the ee, that he was treated with the utmost abuse and scurrility Upon the top of one of his statues was placed the figure of a chariot with a Greek inscription, that ”Now indeed he had a race to run; let hi was tied about another, with a ticket containing these words; ”What could I do?”-”Truly thou hast merited the sack” 622 Some person likerote on the pillars in the foru” Andto find fault with their servants, frequently called for a Vindex 624 XLVI He was also terrified withfrom dreams, auspices, and omens He had never been used to dream before the murder of his mother After that event, he fancied in his sleep that he was steering a shi+p, and that the rudder was forced froiously dark place; and was at one tied ants, and at another, surrounded by the national ies which were set up near Po farther; that a Spanish jennet he was fond of, had his hinder parts so changed, as to rese his head only left unaltered, neighed very har open of the on hiarlands on the calends (the first) of January, fell down during the preparations for sacrificing to the (375) the o, the stone of which had carved upon it the Rape of Proserpine When a great multitude of the several orders was asse vows to the Gods, it was a long time before the keys of the Capitol could be found And when, in a speech of his to the senate against Vindex, these words were read, ”that the miscreants should be punished and soon make the end they ustus” It was likewise re, was Oedipus in Exile, and that he fell as he was repeating this verse: Thanein amos, maetaer, pataer

Wife, mother, father, force me to my end

XLVII Meanwhile, on the arrival of the news, that the rest of the arainst him, he tore to pieces the letters which were delivered to hiainst the ground two favourite cups, which he called Homer's, because so froolden box, he went into the Servilian gardens, and thence dispatching a trusty freedman to Ostia, with orders to make ready a fleet, he endeavoured to prevail with souards to attend hireat inclination to co out aloud, Usque adeoneto die? 625 he was in great perplexity whether he should submit himself to Galba, or apply to the Parthians for protection, or else appear before the people dressed in , and, upon the rostra, in thepardon for his past misderant hiypt A speech to this purpose was afterwards found in his writing-case But it is conjectured that he durst not venture upon this project, for fear of being torn to pieces, before he could get to the Foru, therefore, his resolution until the next (376) day, he awoke about uards withdrawn, he leaped out of bed, and sent round for his friends But none of thee in reply, he ith a few attendants to their houses The doors being every where shut, and no one giving him any answer, he returned to his bed-chae of it had all now eloped; so off with the and box of poison He then endeavoured to find Spicillus, the gladiator, or so able to procure any one, ”What!” said he, ”have I then neither friend nor foe?” and immediately ran out, as if he would throw himself into the Tiber

XLVIII But this furious i, he wished for sohts; and his freed him his country-house, between the Salarian 626 and Nomentan 627 roads, about four miles from the city, he mounted a horse, barefoot as he was, and in his tunic, only slipping over it an old soiled cloak; with his head muffled up, and an handkerchief before his face, and four persons only to attend him, of whom Sporus was one He was suddenly struck with horror by an earthquake, and by a flash of lightning which darted full in his face, and heard fro ca his destruction, and prosperity to Galba He also heard a traveller they met on the road, say, ”They are (377) in pursuit of Nero:” and another ask, ”Is there any news in the city about Nero?” Uncovering his face when his horse was started by the scent of a carcase which lay in the road, he was recognized and saluted by an old soldier who had been discharged frouards When they came to the lane which turned up to the house, they quitted their horses, and witha track through a bed of rushes, over which they spread their cloaks for hi reached a wall at the back of the villa, Phaon advised him to hide hio under-ground alive” Staying there so him privately into the villa, he took up so tank in his hand, to drink, saying, ”This is Nero's distilled water” 629 Then his cloak having been torn by the brambles, he pulled out the thorns which stuck in it At last, being adh a hole made for him in the wall, he lay down in the first closet he came to, upon a miserable pallet, with an old coverlet thrown over it; and being both hungry and thirsty, though he refused soht him, he drank a little ater

XLIX All who surrounded hinities which were ready to befall him, he ordered a pit to be sunk before his eyes, of the size of his body, and the bottoether, if any could be found about the house; and water and wood 630, to be got ready for i that was done, and frequently saying, ”What an artist is now about to perish!+” Meanwhile, letters being brought in by a servant belonging to Phaon, he snatched them out of his hand, and there read, ”That he had been declared an ene for hi to the ancient custom of the Romans” He then inquired what kind of punish told, that the (378) practice was to strip the crie him to death, while his neck was fastened within a forked stake, he was so terrified that he took up two daggers which he had brought with hiain, saying, ”The fatal hour is not yet coin to wail and lament; another while, he entreated that one of theain, he condemned his oant of resolution in these words: ”I yet live tofor Nero: it is not becoood heart: Coe,hi the house As soon as he heard the verse, Hippon m' okupodon amphi ktupos ouata ballei; 632 The noise of swift-heel'd steeds assailsassisted in the act by Epaphroditus, his secretary A centurion bursting in just as he was half-dead, and applying his cloak to the wound, pretending that he was come to his assistance, he made no other reply but this, ”'Tis too late;” and ”Is this your loyalty?” I these words, he expired, with his eyes fixed and starting out of his head, to the terror of all who beheld him He had requested of his attendants, as the most essential favour, that they would let no one have his head, but that by all ht be burnt entire And this, Icelus, Galba's freeded from the prison into which he had been throhen the disturbances first broke out

L The expenses of his funeral amounted to two hundred thousand sesterces; the bed upon which his body was carried to the pile and burnt, being covered with the white robes, interwoven with gold, which he had worn upon the calends of January preceding His nurses, Ecloge and Alexandra, with his concubine Acte, deposited his re (379) to the family of the Domitii, which stands upon the top of the Hill of the Gardens 633, and is to be seen from the Campus Martius In that monument, a coffin of porphyry, with an altar of marble of Luna over it, is enclosed by a wall built of stone brought from Thasos 634 LI In stature he was a little below the coht; his skin was foul and spotted; his hair inclined to yellow; his features were agreeable, rather than handsorey and dull, his neck was thick, his belly pros very slender, his constitution sound For, though excessively luxurious in his , he had, in the course of fourteen years, only three fits of sickness; which were so slight, that he neither forbore the use of wine, nor made any alteration in his usual diet In his dress, and the care of his person, he was so careless, that he had his hair cut in rings, one above another; and when in Achaia, he let it grow long behind; and he generally appeared in public in the loose dress which he used at table, with a handkerchief about his neck, and without either a girdle or shoes

LII He was instructed, when a boy, in the rudiments of almost all the liberal sciences; but his mother diverted him from the study of philosophy, as unsuited to one destined to be an eed hier secure his devotion to hi a turn for poetry, (380) he composed verses both with pleasure and ease; nor did he, as some think, publish those of other writers as his own Several little pocket-books and loose sheets have cone into my possession, which contain some well-known verses in his own hand, and written in such aand interlining, that they had not been transcribed from a copy, nor dictated by another, but ritten by the coreat taste for drawing and painting, as well as for s, hethe rival of everyhe did It was the general belief, that, after the crowns he won by his perfore, he would the next lustrua that art; nor did he witness the gy upon the ground in the stadium, as the umpires do And if a pair of wrestlers happened to break the bounds, he would with his own hands drag theht to equal Apollo in , he resolved also to imitate the achieveot ready for hi, in view of the people in the amphitheatre; which he was to perform naked

LIV Towards the end of his life, he publicly vowed, that if his power in the state was securely re-established, he would, in the spectacles which he intended to exhibit in honour of his success, include a perforpipes, and, on the last day of the games, would act in the play, and take the part of Turnus, as we find it in Virgil And there are soerous rival

LV He had an insatiable desire to immortalize his nah all succeeding ages; but it was capriciously directed He therefore (381) took froave them new names derived froned changing the name of Roious rites in contempt, except those of the Syrian Goddess 636; but at last he paid her so little reverence, that he ed in another superstition, in which only he obstinately persisted For having received froirl, as a preservative against plots, and discovering a conspiracy iinary protectress as the greatest a to her three sacrifices daily He was also desirous to have it supposed that he had, by revelations froe of future events A fewto the Etruscan rites, but the omens were not favourable

LVII He died in the thirty-second year of his age 637, upon the same day on which he had forreat upon the occasion, that the common people ran about the city with caps upon their heads So ti and sue upon the rostra, dressed in robes of state; at another, they published proclamations in his name, as if he were still alive, and would shortly return to Ro of the Parthians, when he sent ambassadors to the senate to renew his alliance with the Roman people, earnestly requested that due honour should be paid to the memory of Nero; and, to conclude, when, twenty years afterwards, at which tiave himself out for Nero, that name secured him so favourable a reception (382) from the Parthians, that he was very zealously supported, and it ith ive hi the trans it by lineal descent was implied in the practice of adoption By the rule of hereditary succession, Britannicus, the son of Claudius, was the natural heir to the throne; but he was supplanted by the artifices of his stepmother, who had the address to procure it for her own son, Nero Froustus it had been the custon in such a manner as tended to acquire popularity, however innings Whether this proceeded entirely from policy, or that nature was not yet vitiated by the intoxication of uncontrolled power, is uncertain; but such were the excesses into which they afterwards plunged, that we can scarcely exempt any of thereat original depravity The vicious temper of Tiberius was known to his own ula had been obvious to those about him froer tendency to weakness than to vice; but the inherent wickedness of Nero was discovered at an early period by his preceptor, Seneca Yet even this en in a manner which procured hined, he seeate favourites, who flattered his follies and vices, to prorandiseellinus, who met at last with the fate which he had so ans froustus present us with uncommon scenes of cruelty and horror; but it was reserved for that of Nero to exhibit to the world the atrocious act of an e the death of his hter of Germanicus, and married Domitius Aenobarbus, by whom she had Nero At the death of Messalina she was a ; and Claudius, her uncle, entertaining a design of entering again into the married state, she aspired to an incestuous alliance with him, in coue, who had been ly supported by their (383) respective parties; but Agrippina, by her superior interest with the emperor's favourites, and the faave her a claim, obtained the preference; and the portentous nuptials of the emperor and his niece were publicly solerant indecency by personal a the succession to the empire for her son, is uncertain; but there re removed Claudius by poison, with a view to the object now mentioned Besides Claudius, she projected the death of L Silanus, and she accomplished that of his brother, Junius Silanus, by means likewise of poison She appears to have been richly endoith the gifts of nature, but in her disposition intriguing, violent, imperious, and ready to sacrifice every principle of virtue, in the pursuit of supreratification As she resembled Livia in the aed it, so she ratitude of an unnatural son and a parricide She is said to have left behind her some memoirs, of which Tacitus availed hin, the conquest of the Britons still continued to be the principal object of military enterprise, and Suetonius Paulinus was invested with the command of the Roman army employed in the reduction of that people The island of Mona, now Anglesey, being the chief seat of the Druids, he resolved to co a place which was the centre of superstition, and to which the vanquished Britons retreated as the last asylum of liberty The inhabitants endeavoured, both by force of ar on this sacred island The women and Druids assembled pro about in wild disorder, with fla forth the most hideous exclamations, they struck the Ro his troops, they boldly attacked the inhabitants, routed them in the field, and burned the Druids in the same fires which had been prepared by those priests for the catastrophe of the invaders, destroying at the saroves and altars in the island Suetonius having thus triuion of the Britons, flattered hi the reduction of the people But they, encouraged by his absence, had taken arms, and under the conduct of Boadicea, queen of the Iceni, who had been treated in the nominious manner by the Roman tribunes, had already driven the hateful invaders from their several settlements Suetonius hastened to (384) the protection of London, which was by this ti Roman colony; but he found upon his arrival, that any atteer to the army London therefore was reduced to ashes; and the Roers, to the number of seventy thousand, were put to the sithout distinction, the Britons see determined to convince the enemy that they would acquiesce in no other terms than a total evacuation of the island This ed by Suetonius in a decisive engagehty thousand of the Britons are said to have been killed; after which, Boadicea, to avoid falling into the hands of the insolent conquerors, put a period to her own life by ed unadvisable that Suetonius should any longer conduct the war against a people whom he had exasperated by his severity, he was recalled, and Petronius Turpilianus appointed in his rooiven successively to Trebellius Maxienerals was only to retain, by a conciliatory administration, the parts of the island which had already sub these transactions in Britain, Nero hi, in Roance as al the lists ast the co for victory with the co in open day in the company of the ht, co depredations on the peaceful inhabitants of the capital; polluting with detestable lust, or drenching with human blood, the streets, the palace, and the habitations of private fa fire to Ro the dreadful conflagration In vain would history be ransacked for a parallel to this emperor, who united the ant vanity, the est but most preposterous ambition; and the whole of whose life was one continued scene of lewdness, sensuality, rapine, cruelty, and folly It is emphatically observed by Tacitus, ”that Nero, after the es,virtue itself”

An, are to be ainst the Christians in various parts of the empire, in which inhuman transactions the natural barbarity of the emperor was inflaan priesthood

(385) The tyrant scrupled not to charge theainst thees as are unexampled in history They were covered with the skins of wild beasts, and torn by dogs; were crucified, and set on fire, that they ardens for this spectacle, and exhibited the games of the Circus by this dreadful illumination Sometimes they were covered ax and other combustible materials, after which a sharp stake was put under their chin, to ive light to the spectators

In the person of Nero, it is observed by Suetonius, the race of the Caesars became extinct; a race rendered illustrious by the first and second eraced The despotishty and iustus, if we exclude a few instances of vindictive severity towards individuals, was ula, and Nero (for we except Claudius from part of the censure), while discriminated from each other by sorant acts of licentiousness and perverted authority The ant luxury, the most shameful rapaciousness, and the eneral characteristics of those capricious and detestable tyrants Repeated experience now clearly refuted the opinion of Augustus, that he had introduced aovernment: but while we make this observation, it is proper to remark, that, had he even restored the republic, there is reason to believe that the nation would again have been soon distracted with internal divisions, and a perpetual succession of civil wars The manners of the people were become too dissolute to be restrained by the authority of elective and te to that fatal period when general and great corruption, with its attendant debility, would render then invaders

But the odious governrievance under which the people laboured in those disastrous times: patrician avarice concurred with is of the nation The senators, even during the commonwealth, had become openly corrupt in the dispensation of public justice; and under the governreater extent That class being now, equally with other Ron power, their sentiraded by the loss of their forovernments of provinces, to which they had annually succeeded by an elective rotation in the times of the republic, they endeavoured to compensate the reduction of their emoluments by an unbounded venality in the judicial decisions of the forum Every source of national happiness and prosperity was by this means destroyed The possession of property became precarious; industry, in all its branches, was effectually discouraged, and the a principle of the nation, was aluished

It is a circuularity of the present reign, that, of the feriters who flourished in it, and whose works have been transmitted to posterity, two ended their days by the order of the enation at his conduct These unfortunate victims were Seneca, Petronius Arbiter, and Lucan