{"id":72,"date":"2017-06-24T20:36:23","date_gmt":"2017-06-24T20:36:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/chapter\/satires-vii-viii\/"},"modified":"2017-06-24T20:36:23","modified_gmt":"2017-06-24T20:36:23","slug":"satires-vii-viii","status":"web-only","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/chapter\/satires-vii-viii\/","title":{"raw":"Satires VII & VIII","rendered":"Satires VII & VIII"},"content":{"raw":"Satire VII: Patronage<\/strong> \u00a0 SatVII:1-52 It\u2019s The Emperor Or Nothing\n\n\u00a0\n\nThe hopes, the whole business of letters depend on Caesar;\n\nHe\u2019s the only one who cares for the sad Muses, these days,\n\nWhen even famous and notable poets have begun applying\n\nFor a lease on a bathhouse at Gabii, or a bakery in Rome;\n\nWhen others no longer think it vile or shameful to act as public\n\nCriers, when Clio, the Muse, from starvation quits the valleys\n\nOf Helicon, Aganippe\u2019s spring, and flees to the market-place.\n\nBecause if you\u2019re offered never a farthing in the Pierian grove,\n\nYou\u2019re better off stealing Machaera\u2019s name and profession,\n\nSelling the crowd whatever\u2019s at stake in the auctions\u2019 tussles;\n\nWine jars, three-legged tables, bookcases, trunks, those books,\n\nPaccius\u2019s tragedy of Alcathoe<\/em>, Faustus\u2019s Thebes<\/em> and Tereus. <\/em>\n\nAfter all, it\u2019s better than being a paid witness, telling the judge\n\n\u2018I saw it\u2019 when you didn\u2019t; leave that to the knights of Asia,\n\nThe ones betrayed by a slave\u2019s fetter-mark, on a bare ankle.\n\nNow, however, no one needs to submit to labour unworthy\n\nOf their writings; no one, who weaves melodious measures\n\nIn an Eloquent voice; no one, who ever chewed on laurel.\n\nTo work, O young men! Our Leader views all with indulgence,\n\nHe\u2019s urging you on to find fit matter, to exercise your talents.\n\nTelesinus, if you\u2019re still seeking support for your income from\n\nAnyone else, if that\u2019s what makes you fill the yellow parchment,\n\nYou may as well gather firewood straight away, and offer your\n\nCompositions to Vulcan, husband of Venus, and god of fire,\n\nOr shut the sheets in the cupboard, let the bookworms gnaw them.\n\nBreak your stylus, you wretch, erase those battles you sat there\n\nPenning all night, scribbling sublime verse in your tiny attic,\n\nJust to win yourself the prize of an ivy-wreath, and meagre bust.\n\nDon\u2019t expect anything more; the miserly rich learned long ago\n\nTo offer the eloquent, admiration only; to offer them praise,\n\nAs boys do Juno\u2019s peacock. The years have flown by, in which\n\nYou might have toyed with the sail, the helmet, the hoe. Now\n\nBoredom invades the mind, it\u2019s now that experienced but naked\n\nOld age comes to hate itself, and Terpsichore, Muse of the lyre.\n\nLet me tell you the ruses he, you fawn on, adopts, to avoid\n\nAiding you: spurning the shrine of Apollo and the Muses.\n\nHe writes verse himself, and yields to Homer alone, due to\n\nHis thousand-year glory, but if you, fired by the sweetness\n\nOf fame, give a recitation, he\u2019ll lend you a down-at-heel room.\n\nHe\u2019ll order a far-off iron-barred hall placed at your service,\n\nThe doors of which echo the squealing of sows. He\u2019ll place\n\nHis freedmen in seats at the end of the rows, and knows how\n\nTo scatter his friends about, those with high-pitched voices.\n\nBut none of the nobles will give you the price of their seats,\n\nOr the price of the raised platforms held up by rented beams,\n\nOr those chairs in the front row, due to be given back later.\n\nStill we labour away, marking our furrows in the fine dust,\n\nTurning the sands of the shore with our ineffectual ploughs.\n\nTry to stop: the itch for writing holds you fast in ambition\u2019s\n\nNoose, grows old along with you in your sorrowful heart.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatVII: 53-97 What Room Is There For Genius?\n\n\u00a0\n\nYet the outstanding poet, with no ordinary vein of talent,\n\nWho\u2019s accustomed to weaving nothing that is vulgar,\n\nWho coins never a trivial song from the public mint,\n\nWhose like I cannot point out but can only imagine,\n\nHe\u2019s the result of a mind free from care, devoid of\n\nAll bitterness, full of longing for nature, fit to drink\n\nFrom the Muses\u2019 spring. Sad poverty, you see, cannot\n\nSing in the Pierian cave, or grasp the thyrsus, lacking\n\nThe means to live that the body needs, night and day.\n\nHorace had wealth enough, as he gave the Bacchic cry.\n\nWhat room is there for genius, unless your heart has\n\nOnly a single care, troubles itself over poetry alone,\n\nSwept away by Apollo of Cirrha, Dionysus of Nysa?\n\nA mighty soul is needed, not one terrified of buying a\n\nNew blanket, if you\u2019re to envisage chariots and horses,\n\nThe face of the god, and the Fury who crazed Turnus.\n\nIf Virgil had lacked a slave-boy and decent lodgings,\n\nAll the snakes would have slid from the Fury\u2019s hair,\n\nThere\u2019d have been no fierce blast from her war-trumpet.\n\nHow can we expect Rubrenus Lappa, to vie with ancient\n\nTragedians, if he\u2019s pawning Atreus<\/em> for a dish and a cloak?\n\nUnhappily, Numitor lacks the cash to help out a friend,\n\nYet he sends it to Quintilla, and was rich enough to buy\n\nA tame lion, that surely consumes vast piles of meat;\n\nAre we asked to believe the creature costs less to feed,\n\nWhile a poet\u2019s intestines possess a greater capacity?\n\nLucan may rest content with fame, in his marble-filled\n\nGardens, but what good does glory do Saleius Bassus\n\nOr starving Serranus, if it\u2019s glory and nothing else?\n\nWhen Statius made Rome happy, and fixed on a date,\n\nEveryone rushed to hear his fine voice, and the lines\n\nOf his dear Thebaid<\/em>: the crowd\u2019s hearts were captured\n\nBy the sweetness he affected, listening there, in ecstasy.\n\nAnd yet, when he\u2019d stunned the audience with his verses,\n\nHe\u2019d starve, unless he sold his virgin Agave<\/em> to Paris,\n\nThe actor who generously appointed to military office,\n\nAnd set the six-month gold ring on the fingers of poets.\n\nA dancer who gave what princes wouldn\u2019t. If you visited\n\nThe great halls of the noblemen, the Barea and Camerini,\n\nPelops<\/em> and Philomela<\/em> appointed the prefects and tribunes.\n\nBut don\u2019t go envying the poets such a theatre nourished.\n\nWho now will be your Maecenas, Fabius or Proculeius,\n\nWho\u2019ll prove your second Cotta, or be another Lentulus?\n\nThen reward matched genius, many found it worthwhile\n\nTo look pale, and go without wine, for all of December.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatVII: 98-149 Historians And Advocates Do No Better\n\n\u00a0\n\nIs your labour any more profitable, you writers of histories?\n\nThey too consume even more time, and more midnight oil.\n\nThere\u2019s no limit to them, indeed, the thousandth page tops\n\nThe growing pile, bankrupts you with that heap of papyrus,\n\nAs the vast number of facts, and the laws of the genre dictate.\n\nYet what\u2019s the harvest, what\u2019s the fruit of your ploughed soil?\n\nWho\u2019ll pay a historian what they pay him who reads the news?\n\n\u2018A lazy tribe,\u2019 they\u2019ll say, \u2018who love their couch in the shade.\u2019\n\nAnd tell me what advocates earn from their representations,\n\nAnd the huge bundle of briefs that accompany them to court.\n\nThey talk big, especially when a creditor might hear them,\n\nOr when one, more pressingly still, nudges them in the side,\n\nClutching his large account book, to claim some dubious debt.\n\nThat\u2019s when their mighty bellows breathe out immense lies,\n\nAnd they cover themselves with spit; but if you want to know\n\nTheir true harvest, the wealth of a hundred such advocates\n\nWeighs less than that of Lizard, the charioteer of the Reds.\n\nThe lords are seated, and you rise, a pale Ajax, to support\n\nYour client\u2019s contested liberty in front of a boorish judge.\n\nStrain and rupture your liver, you wretch, so, exhausted,\n\nYou can decorate your stairs with victory\u2019s green palm.\n\nWhat\u2019s the reward for your speech? A tiny dried-up leg\n\nOf pork, a jar of tunny fry, or ancient onions, a month\u2019s\n\nRation for a Moor, or wine brought down the Tiber, five\n\nFlasks for your four cases. If you come by one gold piece,\n\nPart of that vanishes, by your contract with the lawyers.\n\n\u2018Yet Aemilius names his fee, even when our work\u2019s better.\u2019\n\nThat\u2019s because a bronze chariot with four great horses sits\n\nIn his vestibule, his ancestor himself on a fierce charger,\n\nLooking menacing from the high saddle, with lowered\n\nSpear, a one-eyed statue contemplating battle. Thus\n\nPedo is embarrassed, and Matho fails, and it\u2019s the end\n\nFor Tongilius, who disturbs the baths with his filthy crew,\n\nAnd washes away with his great rhinoceros horn, weighs\n\nDown his young Maedians\u2019 long litter-poles on his way\n\nThrough the Forum to buy slave-boys, silver plate, agate\n\nVases or villas; and yet his efforts work. His purple and\n\nViolet robes sell advocacy; it pays him to live with a stir\n\nAnd appearance, that cost well beyond his true income,\n\nHis seaborne purple of Tyrian weave acts as guarantor.\n\nBut prodigal Rome sets no limits to your expenditure.\n\nIn eloquence our trust? No one these days would give\n\nCicero two hundred, unless a huge ring lit his finger.\n\nThe first thing a litigant looks for, is whether you run\n\nEight slaves, possess ten clients, a litter to follow you,\n\nTogas to walk in front. That\u2019s why Paulus for court hired\n\nA sardonyx ring, and earned a higher fee than Basilus, or\n\nGallus. Eloquence rarely appears dressed in flimsy rags.\n\nWhen is Basilus allowed to bring on a tearful mother?\n\nWho can stand Basilus however well he speaks? If you\n\nMake the decision to earn your living with your tongue,\n\nTry Gaul, or better still Africa, the nurturer of advocacy.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatVII: 150-215 Nor Do Teachers Of Rhetoric\n\n\u00a0\n\nDo you teach rhetoric? O Vettius, what a mind of iron,\n\nYou need, when a crowded class slays \u2018the cruel tyrant!\u2019\n\nFor, whatever they\u2019ve just read, sitting, each in turn\n\nGives standing, chants the same thing in identical lines.\n\nSuch stale greens are simply murder for the poor teacher.\n\nThey all want to know about style, what sort of cases,\n\nAnd the summing up, and the shots that are likely to be\n\nFired by the other side, but not a single one wants to pay.\n\n\u2018You\u2019re asking me to pay? But what have I learned?\u2019\n\n\u2018It\u2019s surely the teacher\u2019s fault, if our young dunce feels\n\nNothing stir in the left side of his chest, as he fills my\n\nPoor head for five days with his \u2018dreadful Hannibal\u2019.\n\nIt hardly matters what the set topic is: whether to march\n\nFrom Cannae to Rome, or after the thunder and lightning\n\nCautiously hold the troops back, drenched from the storm.\n\nJust state your price, you can have it now: what wouldn\u2019t\n\nI give to make the father hear him as often I must?\u2019 That\u2019s\n\nWhat six professors or more cry out with a single voice,\n\nAs they abandon \u2018the rapist\u2019 to take part in some real case;\n\nThe \u2018dosing with poison\u2019 is silent; the \u2018wicked ungrateful\n\nHusband\u2019; the pounding out of a \u2018cure for chronic blindness\u2019.\n\nSo whoever descends from the grove of rhetoric to compete\n\nIn the fight, lest he lose the he pitiful reward that purchases\n\nHis ticket for the handout, which after all is the most he can\n\nExpect, if he\u2019ll follow my advice, he should definitely retire\n\nAnd find himself an alternative path in life. If you discover\n\nThe tiny fee for which Chrysogonus or Pollio teach the sons\n\nOf the rich, you\u2019ll tear Theodorus\u2019s Rhetoric<\/em> in tiny pieces.\n\nBuilding the nobleman\u2019s baths costs him six thousand in gold,\n\nMore for the portico where he rides on rainy days. How can\n\nHe wait for blue skies, or spatter his equipage with fresh mud!\n\nIt\u2019s better here, the hooves of his mule stay bright and clean.\n\nAnd he\u2019ll raise a dining hall elsewhere, resting on tall pillars\n\nMade of Numidian marble, trapping sunshine when it\u2019s cold.\n\nHowever much the place costs, someone will still be there to\n\nArrange the dishes skilfully, someone there to spice the food.\n\nTwenty gold pieces, of all this show, will be fortune enough\n\nFor Quintilian: a son will cost his father less than nothing.\n\n\u2018So how come Quintilian owns so much land?\u2019 You have to\n\nMake an exception for freaks of fate. The fortunate man is\n\nHandsome and brave, wise and noble and generous as well,\n\nOn his black shoe is sewn the ivory crescent of the patrician.\n\nThe fortunate man is the greatest orator and javelin-thrower,\n\nAnd, unless he has a cold, sings beautifully. It makes a huge\n\nDifference you know what stars chance to greet you as you\n\nGive your first cries, red-faced from your mother\u2019s womb.\n\nIf Fortune wishes, she\u2019ll make a teacher of rhetoric, consul;\n\nIf she wishes, she\u2019ll make a consul a teacher of rhetoric too.\n\nWhat about Servius Tullius? Ventidius Bassus? What else\n\nWas that but the stars, the strange mysterious power of fate?\n\nFate makes kings of slaves, and grants prisoners triumphs.\n\nNevertheless the fortunate man is rarer than a white crow.\n\nMany teachers have regretted their idle and barren chairs\n\nOf Rhetoric, as Thrasymachus\u2019 suicide proves, and Carrinas\n\nSecundus\u2019: you saw his poverty, Athens, yet only chose\n\nTo offer him cold hemlock. May the gods make the earth\n\nOn our ancestor\u2019s graves weigh lightly, may they have\n\nFlowering crocuses, and everlasting spring, in the tomb.\n\nThey thought a teacher held the sacred role of a parent.\n\nWhen Achilles as a young man learnt music in his native\n\nHills, he went in fear of the cane, and was careful not to\n\nMock at the horse\u2019s tail of Chiron the Centaur, his teacher;\n\nBut now Rufus and the rest are beaten by their young pupils,\n\nRufus, so often called a Cicero, though only a Gallic one.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatVII: 216-243 Or Schoolmasters\n\n\u00a0\n\nWhen do Celadus, and learned Palaemon, pocket the rewards\n\nA schoolteacher\u2019s labour merits? Yet whatever it amounts to,\n\nAnd it\u2019s less than a teacher of rhetoric\u2019s pay, even from that\n\nThe pupil\u2019s unfeeling attendant nibbles a chunk for himself\n\nAs does the cashier who pays it. Yield to them, Palaemon,\n\nBe prepared to see some part of it vanish, as a pedlar does\n\nWhen he haggles over a mat and a snow-white quilt for winter.\n\nBut make sure you get something, for sitting from midnight\n\nOnwards where no blacksmith would sit, or a carder of wool\n\nUsed to drawing the staple out fine with a slant steel comb;\n\nMake sure you get something, for breathing in the stench\n\nOf as many lamps as boys, while your Horace grows wholly\n\nDiscoloured, and soot clings tight to your blackened Virgil.\n\nThough it\u2019s rare to get paid without a tribune\u2019s investigation.\n\nYet you parents lay down savage laws for the schoolmaster,\n\nDemand he should stick to the rules in his use of grammar,\n\nShould read the histories, and know all the authors as well\n\nAs he knows his fingernails. If by chance he\u2019s asked a question\n\nAs he heads for the warm baths or the freeman Phoebus\u2019s spa,\n\nHe must know the name of Anchises\u2019 nurse, of Anchemolus\u2019s\n\nStepmother, and her birthplace, how many years Acestes lived,\n\nAnd how many jars of Sicilian wine he handed to the Trojans.\n\nYou\u2019ll demand he forms tender characters under his thumb,\n\nAs if he were moulding faces from wax; you\u2019ll demand he acts\n\nLike a father to that crowd, forbids them to play dubious games,\n\nOr mutually indulge. It\u2019s no light thing to keep watch on all\n\nThose boys, with their hands and eyes quivering with purpose.\n\n\u2018That\u2019s your job,\u2019 the parents say, yet come the turn of the year\n\nYou\u2019ll get, in gold, what the crowd grants for one gladiatorial win.\nSatire VIII: Rely On Your Own Worth<\/strong> \u00a0 SatVIII:1-38 What\u2019s The Point Of A Pedigree?\n\n\u00a0\n\nWhat\u2019s the point of a pedigree, Ponticus? Where\u2019s the profit\n\nIn being judged by the length of your bloodline, of displaying\n\nPortraits in oils of your ancestors, the Aemiliani standing tall\n\nIn their chariots, the Curii half-height, a Corvinus devoid of\n\nA shoulder, or a Galba missing his ears and a nose; what\u2019s\n\nThe value in being able to boast a Censor in your extensive\n\nFamily-tree, or be connected through a tangle of branches\n\nWith a dictator, and sundry smoke-stained masters of horse,\n\nIf, beneath the shade of the Lepidi, life is hard? What\u2019s the use\n\nOf all those busts of warriors, if you spend your time gambling\n\nThe night away, staring at the Numantini, and don\u2019t sleep till\n\nVenus rises, under whom generals raise standards and camp?\n\nWhy should a Fabius, scion of Hercules, delight in that god\u2019s\n\nGreat altar, or the title Allobrogicus, when he himself is idle\n\nAnd greedy, and softer than the fleece of a Euganean lamb,\n\nWhen he shames his unpolished ancestors by having his loins\n\nSmoothed with Catanian pumice, while his dealing in poison\n\nDegrades his poor clan with a bust that should be shattered?\n\nYou may decorate your whole atrium with old wax portraits\n\nThroughout, but the one and only virtue\u2019s personal excellence.\n\nIn morality: be a Cossos Gaetulicus, a Paulus Macedonicus,\n\nA Claudius Drusus, put that before rows of ancestral statues,\n\nLet that take precedence over those consular rods of office.\n\nThe first debt you owe me is greatness of soul. Do you justify\n\nBeing regarded as sound, tenacious of justice in word and deed?\n\nI acknowledge a true prince, then; hail to you Gaetulicus, or\n\nSilanus: whatever the nobility of your race, hail to you, rare\n\nAnd illustrious citizen, be welcomed by a joyful country,\n\nLet the people cheer as they\u2019re wont to do when Osiris is found.\n\nWho would call a thing noble that\u2019s unworthy of its breeding,\n\nA thing distinguished by a glorious name, and nothing else?\n\nWe give the name \u2018Atlas\u2019 to someone\u2019s dwarf, we call their\n\nBlack Ethiopian slave, \u2018Swan\u2019, while some bent and deformed\n\nGirl\u2019s beautiful \u2018Europa\u2019; and a dull dog with chronic mange,\n\nThat spends its time licking at the rim of a dried-up lamp,\n\nIs called \u2018Tiger\u2019, \u2018Leopard\u2019, or \u2018Lion\u2019 or whatever else\n\nIn this world roars fiercely. So watch out, take care that\n\nIt\u2019s not for such reasons they call you Creticus, or Camerinus.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatVIII:39-70 I\u2019m Talking About You, Rubellius Blandus\n\n\u00a0\n\nWho am I warning, like this? I\u2019m talking about you, Rubellius\n\nBlandus. You\u2019re puffed up with pride over the exalted origins\n\nOf the Drusi, as if you\u2019d done something to make you noble,\n\nAs if it were due to you that your line\u2019s bright with Julian blood,\n\nNot that of a hired weaver from under the windy Embankment.\n\n\u2018You\u2019re all base\u2019 you say. \u2018You\u2019re the lowest of the low, not\n\nOne of you can even prove where his ancestors\u2019 came from,\n\nWhile I\u2019m descended from kings.\u2019 Long life to you, may you\n\nTake lasting joy in your origins. But from these plebeian depths\n\nCome your eloquent Romans, who take on cases to defend\n\nUneducated nobles; from this crowd of togas comes the man\n\nWho\u2019ll untie legal knots and solve the mysteries of justice;\n\nFrom here comes the diligent young soldier headed for the\n\nEuphrates, or a legion watching over the conquered Batavi.\n\nBut you, you\u2019re merely \u2018descended from kings\u2019, a broken Herm.\n\nIndeed the only thing distinguishing you from a Herm is this:\n\nThe Herm\u2019s head\u2019s made of marble, while your flesh is alive.\n\nTell me, you scion of Trojans, who would call a dumb animal\n\nNoble unless it was sound? That\u2019s what we praise a racehorse\n\nFor, its speed, its countless easy wins that create a furore in\n\nThe noisy Circus as it takes the prize; that\u2019s a noble horse,\n\nThe one, that whatever pasture nurtured it, gallops well clear\n\nOf the pack, and raises a cloud of dust in the lead, on the flat.\n\nThe rest, over whose harness Victory rarely hovers, are cattle\n\nFor sale, sired though they are by Hirpinus or Coryphaeus.\n\nThere\u2019s no respect for ancestors there, no regard for the\n\nShades; tardy offspring fit only for turning the millstone,\n\nAre obliged to find themselves fresh owners at knock-down\n\nPrices, and pull wagons around yoked to their weary necks.\n\nSo if you\u2019re to impress me, not your line, offer something\n\nPersonal that I might set against your name, besides those\n\nTitles we gave, and still give, to those to whom you owe all.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatVIII:71-141 Ponticus, Here\u2019s How To Behave\n\n\u00a0\n\nI\u2019ve addressed enough to a young man whom tradition records\n\nAs proud, and inflated, and full of his close connection to Nero.\n\nIt\u2019s rare enough to find human feeling in people of that class.\n\nBut Ponticus, I\u2019d not want you to be valued only for the praise\n\nYour family earned, or do nothing yourself to justify future\n\nPraise. It\u2019s wretched to have to rely on the fame of others, fear\n\nThe roof will collapse in ruins, if the pillars are taken away.\n\nThat trailing on the ground the vine will long for its lost elm.\n\nBe a fine soldier, and a fine guardian, and a sound judge too.\n\nIf you\u2019re summoned as witness in a confused and ambiguous\n\nCase, even if Phalaris, the Sicilian tyrant, orders you to lie,\n\nAnd spell out your perjuries, his Bronze Bull ready to torment\n\nYou at hand, it\u2019s a worse evil to prefer survival to dishonour,\n\nAnd for the sake of staying alive, lose the reason for living.\n\nSuch die deserving death, though dining on a hundred Lucrine\n\nOysters, bathed in a bronze tub filled with Cosmus\u2019s perfume.\n\nWhen, as governor, you\u2019re welcomed at last to your long-awaited\n\nProvince, take a bridle and curb to your anger, and your greed,\n\nDemonstrate some sympathy for the impoverished provincials:\n\nWhat you\u2019ll see are the marrow-bones of kings, sucked dry.\n\nKeep an eye on the law\u2019s restrictions, what the Senate command,\n\nThe copious rewards that await the virtuous, the righteous bolt\n\nOf Senatorial lightning, that condemnation that ruined Capito\n\nAnd Tutor, for stealing from the Cilicians. Though, why bother?\n\nLook round for an auctioneer, Chaerippus, to sell off your rags,\n\nSince Pansa is stealing whatever Natta left; and then be silent;\n\nIt would be madness to lose the fare for the ferryman as well.\n\nThe provinces never groaned like this, the pain of their losses\n\nWas never so great, when, soon after conquest, they flourished.\n\nThen their houses were bulging, there were vast piles of cash,\n\nMilitary cloaks from Sparta, purple Coan silks, besides\n\nPaintings by Parrhasius, statues signed by Myron, lifelike\n\nIvories by Phidias, no lack of endless works of Polyclitus,\n\nAnd scarcely a table about lacking Mentor\u2019s silverware.\n\nFrom the provinces, Dolabella, from there Antonius, and that\n\nTemple-robber Verres carried off loot concealed in tall\n\nShips, achieving greater triumphs in peacetime than war.\n\nThese days when some little farm is seized, the locals have\n\nOnly a few yoked oxen, a pitiful herd of mares, to be driven\n\nOff with the patriarch of the herd and the household gods\n\nThemselves, too, if any of their statues are worth the taking.\n\nPerhaps you despise the unwarlike Rhodians, and perfumed\n\nCorinth, and rightly so, what could a whole effeminate race\n\nOf youths, from there, with their depilated legs, do to you?\n\nIt\u2019s hairy Spain you should avoid, and the Gallic region,\n\nAnd the shores of Illyria; and beware of African reapers\n\nWho glut the idle City, freeing it for the races or the stage.\n\nHow great anyway are the rewards you\u2019d win from so\n\nDire a crime, since Marius Priscus stripped Africa bare?\n\nTake care above all to do no great injury to the wretched\n\nAnd the brave. Leave them their swords and shields,\n\nThough you take every last piece of their gold and silver.\n\nWhat I\u2019ve just written is not some mere maxim: it\u2019s truth;\n\nBelieve me I\u2019m reading aloud now from the Sibyl\u2019s leaves.\n\nIf your retinue of followers behave, if no long-haired\n\nApollo takes bribes for you; if your wife\u2019s free of guilt,\n\nNot set to use the courts in every town to snatch spoils\n\nWith her hooked talons, like that harpy Celaeno; then you\n\nMay spell out your forebears back to King Picus, and if\n\nIt\u2019s exalted names you treasure, include the Titans\u2019 whole\n\nBattle-line among them, including Prometheus himself.\n\nBut if you\u2019re driven, precipitately, by greed and ambition,\n\nIf you slake whips and break them on provincial backs,\n\nIf blunted axes, and weary executioners, thrill you,\n\nYour ancestral nobility will contrast with your baseness,\n\nAnd shine its light on actions that should shame you.\n\nEvery fault of character\u2019s the more open to reproach\n\nThe higher the rank is of the person who displays it.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatVIII:142-182 Not Like Lateranus!\n\n\u00a0\n\nWhat\u2019s so impressive about your custom of penning false\n\nWills, in temples your grandfather built, or while gazing\n\nAt your father\u2019s triumphal statue? That, as an adulterer\n\nBy night, a Gallic cowl from Saintonge hides your head?\n\nLateranus, the gross, muleteer consul, outdoes that: he flies\n\nBy his forebears\u2019 bones and ashes in his speedy carriage,\n\nThen shames them, by applying the brake himself: true\n\nHe does it at night, but the moon sees it, and the glaring\n\nStars bear witness. He drives himself! When his stint at\n\nThe office is over, Lateranus takes up a whip in broad\n\nDaylight, never worries about meeting an adult friend,\n\nIn fact he\u2019ll wave to him first, with the whip; he even\n\nShakes out bales of hay, pours feed for his weary team.\n\nAnd then, though he sacrifices sheep, or a red bullock,\n\nIn Numa\u2019s rites, he swears by the horse-goddess Epona\n\nAt Jove\u2019s altar, by the painted icons on his rank stable.\n\nAnd when he\u2019s off to enjoy a midnight eating-bout\n\nA Syrio-Phoenician, drenched in endless perfumes, runs\n\nTo greet him, some Syrian Jew from the Idumaean Gate,\n\nWith that host\u2019s welcome, \u2018My Lord and Master\u2019 while\n\nCyane, robe hiked to her thighs, offers the jar for sale.\n\nSome defender of his faults, will tell me: \u2018We too were\n\nLike that when young,\u2019 that\u2019s as maybe, but you ceased\n\nTo nurture those errors. What tempts disgrace should be\n\nTransient, a fault to be trimmed away with the first beard.\n\nGrant lads indulgence: but our Lateranus headed straight\n\nFor bathhouse wine jugs and painted awnings even when\n\nHe was old enough to fight, or guard the Syrian frontiers,\n\nOr Armenia, the Danube, the Rhine. Send him to Ostia,\n\nCaesar, when you\u2019ve found him in that vast eating-house.\n\nWhere he\u2019ll be reclining next to some assassin, mingling\n\nWith sailors, consorting with thieves, and fugitive slaves,\n\nDown there, among executioners, sat with coffin-makers,\n\nOr the drums, now fallen silent, of some priest of Cybele.\n\nThere\u2019s it\u2019s a free for all, a communal jar, there no one has\n\nSeparate couches, tables set apart. Ponticus, if you chanced\n\nTo own a slave you found there, what would you do? Surely,\n\nHe\u2019d be destined for some Lucanian or Tuscan slave-farm.\n\nBut you, you scions of Troy, you excuse it in yourselves.\n\nWhat shames the working man\u2019s fine for a Brutus, a Volesus.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatVIII:183-230 Aristocrats Indeed!\n\n\u00a0\n\nWere these examples we cited never so wretched, never\n\nSo shameful, are there not worse examples still to come?\n\nWhen you\u2019d spent your cash, Damasippus, you hired out\n\nYour voice to the stage, and acted Catullus\u2019 noisy \u2018Ghost\u2019.\n\nAgile Lentulus played the bandit Laureolus, rather well, I\n\nThought him worthy of his crucifixion. And let\u2019s not start\n\nExcusing the populace; there\u2019s a hard side to this audience,\n\nThat sits, and watches the triple follies of these aristocrats,\n\nListens to pantomime Fabii, laughs at the slapstick antics\n\nOf the Mamerci. What matter how well their drubbings pay?\n\nThey\u2019re selling themselves, without some Nero\u2019s coercion,\n\nCan\u2019t wait to sell, even when it\u2019s the noble praetor\u2019s games.\n\nBut consider: the stage over here, versus a violent death there;\n\nWhich is best? Is there anyone so scared to die, he\u2019d rather act\n\nThymele\u2019s jealous spouse, or play foil to Corinthus the clown?\n\nStill if an emperor could play the lyre, a noble in a pantomime\u2019s\n\nNo marvel. What could be worse, except the gladiatorial school?\n\nThere you may behold Rome\u2019s shame: one of the Gracchi fights,\n\nBut not in heavy armour, not with a shield or with a curved blade;\n\nHe rejects such things, you see: look, he\u2019s brandishing a trident.\n\nWhen he\u2019s flourished his right arm, and hurled his trailing net,\n\nWithout success, he\u2019ll raise his bare face to the spectators, and\n\nHaving ensured he\u2019s known throughout the whole arena, flees,\n\nDressed as a Salian priest, there\u2019s no mistake, his golden tunic\n\nTaut below his neck, the twisted cord swaying from his cap.\n\nSo the opponent ordered to fight this Gracchus, suffers a greater\n\nLoss of face than he would have done from any wound received.\n\nIf the masses were granted a free vote, who would be so foolish\n\nAs to hesitate about preferring Seneca to that Nero who deserved\n\nWorse punishment than the usual parricide, who should have been\n\nSewn with more than a snake and monkey in a sea-drowned sack.\n\nNero wrought Orestes\u2019 crime, but the motive was quite different.\n\nAgamemnon\u2019s son, with divine indulgence, avenged his father,\n\nMurdered at a banquet, you know, but never polluted himself by\n\nSlitting his sister Electra\u2019s jugular, or shedding his Spartan wife\n\nHermione\u2019s blood, he prepared no poisoned doses for relatives,\n\nHe never took to the stage, like Nero, to sing the part of Orestes,\n\nHe never wrote an epic of Troy. What actions more deserved\n\nPunishment, by Verginius and his army, by Galba and Vindex?\n\nSuch were the deeds and accomplishments of our noble emperor,\n\nWho loved to prostitute himself on a foreign stage, in vile song,\n\nWinning Greek garlands of dry celery leaves for his performance.\n\nSo grant your ancestors\u2019 statues the prizes won by your voice,\n\nLay your Thyestes\u2019 tragic robe with its long train, your mask of\n\nAntigone or of Melanippe, before the feet of your own Domitius,\n\nGo hang your lyre from your colossus, carved out of marble!\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatVIII:231-275 Let Us Celebrate Our Humble Origins\n\n\u00a0\n\nWhere is a more exalted ancestry to be found, than yours Catiline,\n\nOr yours Cethegus? Yet armed by night you connived to attack\n\nHomes and temples and set them alight, like those sons of Gaul\n\nIn breeches, like the scions of those Senones who sacked Rome,\n\nAn outrage punished by legal execution, in \u2018a coat of burning pitch\u2019.\n\nWhile Cicero the consul, alert, halts the advance of your banners.\n\nHe, a self-made man from Arpinum, of humble origin, a municipal\n\nKnight new to the City, posts helmeted troops everywhere to protect\n\nThe terrified people, labours away over all the seven hills of Rome.\n\nSo his toga, in time of peace, brought him as much titled distinction,\n\nWithout stepping outside the walls, as Octavius, his sword stained\n\nFrom continual slaughter, snatched for himself at Leucas, by Actium,\n\nOr Philippi, in the fields of Thessaly; moreover Rome was still free,\n\nWhen she named Cicero as parent and father of his native country.\n\nAnd Gaius Marius, also from Arpinum, toiled in the Volscian hills\n\nTo earn a living, labouring away behind another man\u2019s plough.\n\nAnd later felt the centurion\u2019s gnarled stick on his head, if he\n\nShowed reluctance as he dug the camp\u2019s moat with his tardy pick.\n\nAnd yet it is he who takes on the Cimbri at a moment of high risk\n\nTo his country, and it is he alone who defends a trembling Rome.\n\nAnd that\u2019s why when the crows fly down to feast on the mounds\n\nOf dead, never having fastened on mightier corpses, his fellow\n\nConsul, Catulus, though a nobleman, receives the lesser laurels.\n\nThe Decii were plebeian souls, and their names plebeian too,\n\nYet they were worth all the legions, all of their allies, and all\n\nThe youth of Latium, to Mother Earth and the gods below.\n\nServius Tullius, born to a slave-girl, won the robes and crowns\n\nAnd rods of Romulus, he the very last of the good kings of Rome.\n\nThe traitors who planned to unbar the gates to the exiled tyrants,\n\nWere the sons of the consul himself, though, the very citizens\n\nWho should have achieved great deeds on behalf of fragile liberty,\n\nDeeds that Gaius Mucius or Horatius Cocles might have admired,\n\nOr Cloelia, that girl who swam the Tiber, the frontier of our power.\n\nA slave, deserving to be mourned by Roman women, it was who\n\nRevealed the secret plot to the Senate, while the traitors got their just\n\nRewards, a flogging, then their newly-legal execution under the axe.\n\nI\u2019d rather you were fathered by Thersites, and behaved like Achilles,\n\nGrandson of Aeacus, brandishing the weapons forged by Hephaestus,\n\nThan that Achilles fathered you, only for you to behave like Thersites.\n\nThough you can unroll the family tree, and trace your name far back,\n\nIt still derives from that first melting-pot of Rome, that granted all\n\nAsylum; and whoever your first ancestor might have been, he was\n\nStill a herdsman, or performed some other task I\u2019d rather not mention.","rendered":"

Satire VII: Patronage<\/strong> \u00a0 SatVII:1-52 It\u2019s The Emperor Or Nothing<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The hopes, the whole business of letters depend on Caesar;<\/p>\n

He\u2019s the only one who cares for the sad Muses, these days,<\/p>\n

When even famous and notable poets have begun applying<\/p>\n

For a lease on a bathhouse at Gabii, or a bakery in Rome;<\/p>\n

When others no longer think it vile or shameful to act as public<\/p>\n

Criers, when Clio, the Muse, from starvation quits the valleys<\/p>\n

Of Helicon, Aganippe\u2019s spring, and flees to the market-place.<\/p>\n

Because if you\u2019re offered never a farthing in the Pierian grove,<\/p>\n

You\u2019re better off stealing Machaera\u2019s name and profession,<\/p>\n

Selling the crowd whatever\u2019s at stake in the auctions\u2019 tussles;<\/p>\n

Wine jars, three-legged tables, bookcases, trunks, those books,<\/p>\n

Paccius\u2019s tragedy of Alcathoe<\/em>, Faustus\u2019s Thebes<\/em> and Tereus. <\/em><\/p>\n

After all, it\u2019s better than being a paid witness, telling the judge<\/p>\n

\u2018I saw it\u2019 when you didn\u2019t; leave that to the knights of Asia,<\/p>\n

The ones betrayed by a slave\u2019s fetter-mark, on a bare ankle.<\/p>\n

Now, however, no one needs to submit to labour unworthy<\/p>\n

Of their writings; no one, who weaves melodious measures<\/p>\n

In an Eloquent voice; no one, who ever chewed on laurel.<\/p>\n

To work, O young men! Our Leader views all with indulgence,<\/p>\n

He\u2019s urging you on to find fit matter, to exercise your talents.<\/p>\n

Telesinus, if you\u2019re still seeking support for your income from<\/p>\n

Anyone else, if that\u2019s what makes you fill the yellow parchment,<\/p>\n

You may as well gather firewood straight away, and offer your<\/p>\n

Compositions to Vulcan, husband of Venus, and god of fire,<\/p>\n

Or shut the sheets in the cupboard, let the bookworms gnaw them.<\/p>\n

Break your stylus, you wretch, erase those battles you sat there<\/p>\n

Penning all night, scribbling sublime verse in your tiny attic,<\/p>\n

Just to win yourself the prize of an ivy-wreath, and meagre bust.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t expect anything more; the miserly rich learned long ago<\/p>\n

To offer the eloquent, admiration only; to offer them praise,<\/p>\n

As boys do Juno\u2019s peacock. The years have flown by, in which<\/p>\n

You might have toyed with the sail, the helmet, the hoe. Now<\/p>\n

Boredom invades the mind, it\u2019s now that experienced but naked<\/p>\n

Old age comes to hate itself, and Terpsichore, Muse of the lyre.<\/p>\n

Let me tell you the ruses he, you fawn on, adopts, to avoid<\/p>\n

Aiding you: spurning the shrine of Apollo and the Muses.<\/p>\n

He writes verse himself, and yields to Homer alone, due to<\/p>\n

His thousand-year glory, but if you, fired by the sweetness<\/p>\n

Of fame, give a recitation, he\u2019ll lend you a down-at-heel room.<\/p>\n

He\u2019ll order a far-off iron-barred hall placed at your service,<\/p>\n

The doors of which echo the squealing of sows. He\u2019ll place<\/p>\n

His freedmen in seats at the end of the rows, and knows how<\/p>\n

To scatter his friends about, those with high-pitched voices.<\/p>\n

But none of the nobles will give you the price of their seats,<\/p>\n

Or the price of the raised platforms held up by rented beams,<\/p>\n

Or those chairs in the front row, due to be given back later.<\/p>\n

Still we labour away, marking our furrows in the fine dust,<\/p>\n

Turning the sands of the shore with our ineffectual ploughs.<\/p>\n

Try to stop: the itch for writing holds you fast in ambition\u2019s<\/p>\n

Noose, grows old along with you in your sorrowful heart.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatVII: 53-97 What Room Is There For Genius?<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Yet the outstanding poet, with no ordinary vein of talent,<\/p>\n

Who\u2019s accustomed to weaving nothing that is vulgar,<\/p>\n

Who coins never a trivial song from the public mint,<\/p>\n

Whose like I cannot point out but can only imagine,<\/p>\n

He\u2019s the result of a mind free from care, devoid of<\/p>\n

All bitterness, full of longing for nature, fit to drink<\/p>\n

From the Muses\u2019 spring. Sad poverty, you see, cannot<\/p>\n

Sing in the Pierian cave, or grasp the thyrsus, lacking<\/p>\n

The means to live that the body needs, night and day.<\/p>\n

Horace had wealth enough, as he gave the Bacchic cry.<\/p>\n

What room is there for genius, unless your heart has<\/p>\n

Only a single care, troubles itself over poetry alone,<\/p>\n

Swept away by Apollo of Cirrha, Dionysus of Nysa?<\/p>\n

A mighty soul is needed, not one terrified of buying a<\/p>\n

New blanket, if you\u2019re to envisage chariots and horses,<\/p>\n

The face of the god, and the Fury who crazed Turnus.<\/p>\n

If Virgil had lacked a slave-boy and decent lodgings,<\/p>\n

All the snakes would have slid from the Fury\u2019s hair,<\/p>\n

There\u2019d have been no fierce blast from her war-trumpet.<\/p>\n

How can we expect Rubrenus Lappa, to vie with ancient<\/p>\n

Tragedians, if he\u2019s pawning Atreus<\/em> for a dish and a cloak?<\/p>\n

Unhappily, Numitor lacks the cash to help out a friend,<\/p>\n

Yet he sends it to Quintilla, and was rich enough to buy<\/p>\n

A tame lion, that surely consumes vast piles of meat;<\/p>\n

Are we asked to believe the creature costs less to feed,<\/p>\n

While a poet\u2019s intestines possess a greater capacity?<\/p>\n

Lucan may rest content with fame, in his marble-filled<\/p>\n

Gardens, but what good does glory do Saleius Bassus<\/p>\n

Or starving Serranus, if it\u2019s glory and nothing else?<\/p>\n

When Statius made Rome happy, and fixed on a date,<\/p>\n

Everyone rushed to hear his fine voice, and the lines<\/p>\n

Of his dear Thebaid<\/em>: the crowd\u2019s hearts were captured<\/p>\n

By the sweetness he affected, listening there, in ecstasy.<\/p>\n

And yet, when he\u2019d stunned the audience with his verses,<\/p>\n

He\u2019d starve, unless he sold his virgin Agave<\/em> to Paris,<\/p>\n

The actor who generously appointed to military office,<\/p>\n

And set the six-month gold ring on the fingers of poets.<\/p>\n

A dancer who gave what princes wouldn\u2019t. If you visited<\/p>\n

The great halls of the noblemen, the Barea and Camerini,<\/p>\n

Pelops<\/em> and Philomela<\/em> appointed the prefects and tribunes.<\/p>\n

But don\u2019t go envying the poets such a theatre nourished.<\/p>\n

Who now will be your Maecenas, Fabius or Proculeius,<\/p>\n

Who\u2019ll prove your second Cotta, or be another Lentulus?<\/p>\n

Then reward matched genius, many found it worthwhile<\/p>\n

To look pale, and go without wine, for all of December.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatVII: 98-149 Historians And Advocates Do No Better<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Is your labour any more profitable, you writers of histories?<\/p>\n

They too consume even more time, and more midnight oil.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no limit to them, indeed, the thousandth page tops<\/p>\n

The growing pile, bankrupts you with that heap of papyrus,<\/p>\n

As the vast number of facts, and the laws of the genre dictate.<\/p>\n

Yet what\u2019s the harvest, what\u2019s the fruit of your ploughed soil?<\/p>\n

Who\u2019ll pay a historian what they pay him who reads the news?<\/p>\n

\u2018A lazy tribe,\u2019 they\u2019ll say, \u2018who love their couch in the shade.\u2019<\/p>\n

And tell me what advocates earn from their representations,<\/p>\n

And the huge bundle of briefs that accompany them to court.<\/p>\n

They talk big, especially when a creditor might hear them,<\/p>\n

Or when one, more pressingly still, nudges them in the side,<\/p>\n

Clutching his large account book, to claim some dubious debt.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s when their mighty bellows breathe out immense lies,<\/p>\n

And they cover themselves with spit; but if you want to know<\/p>\n

Their true harvest, the wealth of a hundred such advocates<\/p>\n

Weighs less than that of Lizard, the charioteer of the Reds.<\/p>\n

The lords are seated, and you rise, a pale Ajax, to support<\/p>\n

Your client\u2019s contested liberty in front of a boorish judge.<\/p>\n

Strain and rupture your liver, you wretch, so, exhausted,<\/p>\n

You can decorate your stairs with victory\u2019s green palm.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the reward for your speech? A tiny dried-up leg<\/p>\n

Of pork, a jar of tunny fry, or ancient onions, a month\u2019s<\/p>\n

Ration for a Moor, or wine brought down the Tiber, five<\/p>\n

Flasks for your four cases. If you come by one gold piece,<\/p>\n

Part of that vanishes, by your contract with the lawyers.<\/p>\n

\u2018Yet Aemilius names his fee, even when our work\u2019s better.\u2019<\/p>\n

That\u2019s because a bronze chariot with four great horses sits<\/p>\n

In his vestibule, his ancestor himself on a fierce charger,<\/p>\n

Looking menacing from the high saddle, with lowered<\/p>\n

Spear, a one-eyed statue contemplating battle. Thus<\/p>\n

Pedo is embarrassed, and Matho fails, and it\u2019s the end<\/p>\n

For Tongilius, who disturbs the baths with his filthy crew,<\/p>\n

And washes away with his great rhinoceros horn, weighs<\/p>\n

Down his young Maedians\u2019 long litter-poles on his way<\/p>\n

Through the Forum to buy slave-boys, silver plate, agate<\/p>\n

Vases or villas; and yet his efforts work. His purple and<\/p>\n

Violet robes sell advocacy; it pays him to live with a stir<\/p>\n

And appearance, that cost well beyond his true income,<\/p>\n

His seaborne purple of Tyrian weave acts as guarantor.<\/p>\n

But prodigal Rome sets no limits to your expenditure.<\/p>\n

In eloquence our trust? No one these days would give<\/p>\n

Cicero two hundred, unless a huge ring lit his finger.<\/p>\n

The first thing a litigant looks for, is whether you run<\/p>\n

Eight slaves, possess ten clients, a litter to follow you,<\/p>\n

Togas to walk in front. That\u2019s why Paulus for court hired<\/p>\n

A sardonyx ring, and earned a higher fee than Basilus, or<\/p>\n

Gallus. Eloquence rarely appears dressed in flimsy rags.<\/p>\n

When is Basilus allowed to bring on a tearful mother?<\/p>\n

Who can stand Basilus however well he speaks? If you<\/p>\n

Make the decision to earn your living with your tongue,<\/p>\n

Try Gaul, or better still Africa, the nurturer of advocacy.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatVII: 150-215 Nor Do Teachers Of Rhetoric<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Do you teach rhetoric? O Vettius, what a mind of iron,<\/p>\n

You need, when a crowded class slays \u2018the cruel tyrant!\u2019<\/p>\n

For, whatever they\u2019ve just read, sitting, each in turn<\/p>\n

Gives standing, chants the same thing in identical lines.<\/p>\n

Such stale greens are simply murder for the poor teacher.<\/p>\n

They all want to know about style, what sort of cases,<\/p>\n

And the summing up, and the shots that are likely to be<\/p>\n

Fired by the other side, but not a single one wants to pay.<\/p>\n

\u2018You\u2019re asking me to pay? But what have I learned?\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018It\u2019s surely the teacher\u2019s fault, if our young dunce feels<\/p>\n

Nothing stir in the left side of his chest, as he fills my<\/p>\n

Poor head for five days with his \u2018dreadful Hannibal\u2019.<\/p>\n

It hardly matters what the set topic is: whether to march<\/p>\n

From Cannae to Rome, or after the thunder and lightning<\/p>\n

Cautiously hold the troops back, drenched from the storm.<\/p>\n

Just state your price, you can have it now: what wouldn\u2019t<\/p>\n

I give to make the father hear him as often I must?\u2019 That\u2019s<\/p>\n

What six professors or more cry out with a single voice,<\/p>\n

As they abandon \u2018the rapist\u2019 to take part in some real case;<\/p>\n

The \u2018dosing with poison\u2019 is silent; the \u2018wicked ungrateful<\/p>\n

Husband\u2019; the pounding out of a \u2018cure for chronic blindness\u2019.<\/p>\n

So whoever descends from the grove of rhetoric to compete<\/p>\n

In the fight, lest he lose the he pitiful reward that purchases<\/p>\n

His ticket for the handout, which after all is the most he can<\/p>\n

Expect, if he\u2019ll follow my advice, he should definitely retire<\/p>\n

And find himself an alternative path in life. If you discover<\/p>\n

The tiny fee for which Chrysogonus or Pollio teach the sons<\/p>\n

Of the rich, you\u2019ll tear Theodorus\u2019s Rhetoric<\/em> in tiny pieces.<\/p>\n

Building the nobleman\u2019s baths costs him six thousand in gold,<\/p>\n

More for the portico where he rides on rainy days. How can<\/p>\n

He wait for blue skies, or spatter his equipage with fresh mud!<\/p>\n

It\u2019s better here, the hooves of his mule stay bright and clean.<\/p>\n

And he\u2019ll raise a dining hall elsewhere, resting on tall pillars<\/p>\n

Made of Numidian marble, trapping sunshine when it\u2019s cold.<\/p>\n

However much the place costs, someone will still be there to<\/p>\n

Arrange the dishes skilfully, someone there to spice the food.<\/p>\n

Twenty gold pieces, of all this show, will be fortune enough<\/p>\n

For Quintilian: a son will cost his father less than nothing.<\/p>\n

\u2018So how come Quintilian owns so much land?\u2019 You have to<\/p>\n

Make an exception for freaks of fate. The fortunate man is<\/p>\n

Handsome and brave, wise and noble and generous as well,<\/p>\n

On his black shoe is sewn the ivory crescent of the patrician.<\/p>\n

The fortunate man is the greatest orator and javelin-thrower,<\/p>\n

And, unless he has a cold, sings beautifully. It makes a huge<\/p>\n

Difference you know what stars chance to greet you as you<\/p>\n

Give your first cries, red-faced from your mother\u2019s womb.<\/p>\n

If Fortune wishes, she\u2019ll make a teacher of rhetoric, consul;<\/p>\n

If she wishes, she\u2019ll make a consul a teacher of rhetoric too.<\/p>\n

What about Servius Tullius? Ventidius Bassus? What else<\/p>\n

Was that but the stars, the strange mysterious power of fate?<\/p>\n

Fate makes kings of slaves, and grants prisoners triumphs.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless the fortunate man is rarer than a white crow.<\/p>\n

Many teachers have regretted their idle and barren chairs<\/p>\n

Of Rhetoric, as Thrasymachus\u2019 suicide proves, and Carrinas<\/p>\n

Secundus\u2019: you saw his poverty, Athens, yet only chose<\/p>\n

To offer him cold hemlock. May the gods make the earth<\/p>\n

On our ancestor\u2019s graves weigh lightly, may they have<\/p>\n

Flowering crocuses, and everlasting spring, in the tomb.<\/p>\n

They thought a teacher held the sacred role of a parent.<\/p>\n

When Achilles as a young man learnt music in his native<\/p>\n

Hills, he went in fear of the cane, and was careful not to<\/p>\n

Mock at the horse\u2019s tail of Chiron the Centaur, his teacher;<\/p>\n

But now Rufus and the rest are beaten by their young pupils,<\/p>\n

Rufus, so often called a Cicero, though only a Gallic one.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatVII: 216-243 Or Schoolmasters<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

When do Celadus, and learned Palaemon, pocket the rewards<\/p>\n

A schoolteacher\u2019s labour merits? Yet whatever it amounts to,<\/p>\n

And it\u2019s less than a teacher of rhetoric\u2019s pay, even from that<\/p>\n

The pupil\u2019s unfeeling attendant nibbles a chunk for himself<\/p>\n

As does the cashier who pays it. Yield to them, Palaemon,<\/p>\n

Be prepared to see some part of it vanish, as a pedlar does<\/p>\n

When he haggles over a mat and a snow-white quilt for winter.<\/p>\n

But make sure you get something, for sitting from midnight<\/p>\n

Onwards where no blacksmith would sit, or a carder of wool<\/p>\n

Used to drawing the staple out fine with a slant steel comb;<\/p>\n

Make sure you get something, for breathing in the stench<\/p>\n

Of as many lamps as boys, while your Horace grows wholly<\/p>\n

Discoloured, and soot clings tight to your blackened Virgil.<\/p>\n

Though it\u2019s rare to get paid without a tribune\u2019s investigation.<\/p>\n

Yet you parents lay down savage laws for the schoolmaster,<\/p>\n

Demand he should stick to the rules in his use of grammar,<\/p>\n

Should read the histories, and know all the authors as well<\/p>\n

As he knows his fingernails. If by chance he\u2019s asked a question<\/p>\n

As he heads for the warm baths or the freeman Phoebus\u2019s spa,<\/p>\n

He must know the name of Anchises\u2019 nurse, of Anchemolus\u2019s<\/p>\n

Stepmother, and her birthplace, how many years Acestes lived,<\/p>\n

And how many jars of Sicilian wine he handed to the Trojans.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll demand he forms tender characters under his thumb,<\/p>\n

As if he were moulding faces from wax; you\u2019ll demand he acts<\/p>\n

Like a father to that crowd, forbids them to play dubious games,<\/p>\n

Or mutually indulge. It\u2019s no light thing to keep watch on all<\/p>\n

Those boys, with their hands and eyes quivering with purpose.<\/p>\n

\u2018That\u2019s your job,\u2019 the parents say, yet come the turn of the year<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll get, in gold, what the crowd grants for one gladiatorial win.
\nSatire VIII: Rely On Your Own Worth<\/strong> \u00a0 SatVIII:1-38 What\u2019s The Point Of A Pedigree?<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the point of a pedigree, Ponticus? Where\u2019s the profit<\/p>\n

In being judged by the length of your bloodline, of displaying<\/p>\n

Portraits in oils of your ancestors, the Aemiliani standing tall<\/p>\n

In their chariots, the Curii half-height, a Corvinus devoid of<\/p>\n

A shoulder, or a Galba missing his ears and a nose; what\u2019s<\/p>\n

The value in being able to boast a Censor in your extensive<\/p>\n

Family-tree, or be connected through a tangle of branches<\/p>\n

With a dictator, and sundry smoke-stained masters of horse,<\/p>\n

If, beneath the shade of the Lepidi, life is hard? What\u2019s the use<\/p>\n

Of all those busts of warriors, if you spend your time gambling<\/p>\n

The night away, staring at the Numantini, and don\u2019t sleep till<\/p>\n

Venus rises, under whom generals raise standards and camp?<\/p>\n

Why should a Fabius, scion of Hercules, delight in that god\u2019s<\/p>\n

Great altar, or the title Allobrogicus, when he himself is idle<\/p>\n

And greedy, and softer than the fleece of a Euganean lamb,<\/p>\n

When he shames his unpolished ancestors by having his loins<\/p>\n

Smoothed with Catanian pumice, while his dealing in poison<\/p>\n

Degrades his poor clan with a bust that should be shattered?<\/p>\n

You may decorate your whole atrium with old wax portraits<\/p>\n

Throughout, but the one and only virtue\u2019s personal excellence.<\/p>\n

In morality: be a Cossos Gaetulicus, a Paulus Macedonicus,<\/p>\n

A Claudius Drusus, put that before rows of ancestral statues,<\/p>\n

Let that take precedence over those consular rods of office.<\/p>\n

The first debt you owe me is greatness of soul. Do you justify<\/p>\n

Being regarded as sound, tenacious of justice in word and deed?<\/p>\n

I acknowledge a true prince, then; hail to you Gaetulicus, or<\/p>\n

Silanus: whatever the nobility of your race, hail to you, rare<\/p>\n

And illustrious citizen, be welcomed by a joyful country,<\/p>\n

Let the people cheer as they\u2019re wont to do when Osiris is found.<\/p>\n

Who would call a thing noble that\u2019s unworthy of its breeding,<\/p>\n

A thing distinguished by a glorious name, and nothing else?<\/p>\n

We give the name \u2018Atlas\u2019 to someone\u2019s dwarf, we call their<\/p>\n

Black Ethiopian slave, \u2018Swan\u2019, while some bent and deformed<\/p>\n

Girl\u2019s beautiful \u2018Europa\u2019; and a dull dog with chronic mange,<\/p>\n

That spends its time licking at the rim of a dried-up lamp,<\/p>\n

Is called \u2018Tiger\u2019, \u2018Leopard\u2019, or \u2018Lion\u2019 or whatever else<\/p>\n

In this world roars fiercely. So watch out, take care that<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not for such reasons they call you Creticus, or Camerinus.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatVIII:39-70 I\u2019m Talking About You, Rubellius Blandus<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Who am I warning, like this? I\u2019m talking about you, Rubellius<\/p>\n

Blandus. You\u2019re puffed up with pride over the exalted origins<\/p>\n

Of the Drusi, as if you\u2019d done something to make you noble,<\/p>\n

As if it were due to you that your line\u2019s bright with Julian blood,<\/p>\n

Not that of a hired weaver from under the windy Embankment.<\/p>\n

\u2018You\u2019re all base\u2019 you say. \u2018You\u2019re the lowest of the low, not<\/p>\n

One of you can even prove where his ancestors\u2019 came from,<\/p>\n

While I\u2019m descended from kings.\u2019 Long life to you, may you<\/p>\n

Take lasting joy in your origins. But from these plebeian depths<\/p>\n

Come your eloquent Romans, who take on cases to defend<\/p>\n

Uneducated nobles; from this crowd of togas comes the man<\/p>\n

Who\u2019ll untie legal knots and solve the mysteries of justice;<\/p>\n

From here comes the diligent young soldier headed for the<\/p>\n

Euphrates, or a legion watching over the conquered Batavi.<\/p>\n

But you, you\u2019re merely \u2018descended from kings\u2019, a broken Herm.<\/p>\n

Indeed the only thing distinguishing you from a Herm is this:<\/p>\n

The Herm\u2019s head\u2019s made of marble, while your flesh is alive.<\/p>\n

Tell me, you scion of Trojans, who would call a dumb animal<\/p>\n

Noble unless it was sound? That\u2019s what we praise a racehorse<\/p>\n

For, its speed, its countless easy wins that create a furore in<\/p>\n

The noisy Circus as it takes the prize; that\u2019s a noble horse,<\/p>\n

The one, that whatever pasture nurtured it, gallops well clear<\/p>\n

Of the pack, and raises a cloud of dust in the lead, on the flat.<\/p>\n

The rest, over whose harness Victory rarely hovers, are cattle<\/p>\n

For sale, sired though they are by Hirpinus or Coryphaeus.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no respect for ancestors there, no regard for the<\/p>\n

Shades; tardy offspring fit only for turning the millstone,<\/p>\n

Are obliged to find themselves fresh owners at knock-down<\/p>\n

Prices, and pull wagons around yoked to their weary necks.<\/p>\n

So if you\u2019re to impress me, not your line, offer something<\/p>\n

Personal that I might set against your name, besides those<\/p>\n

Titles we gave, and still give, to those to whom you owe all.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatVIII:71-141 Ponticus, Here\u2019s How To Behave<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve addressed enough to a young man whom tradition records<\/p>\n

As proud, and inflated, and full of his close connection to Nero.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s rare enough to find human feeling in people of that class.<\/p>\n

But Ponticus, I\u2019d not want you to be valued only for the praise<\/p>\n

Your family earned, or do nothing yourself to justify future<\/p>\n

Praise. It\u2019s wretched to have to rely on the fame of others, fear<\/p>\n

The roof will collapse in ruins, if the pillars are taken away.<\/p>\n

That trailing on the ground the vine will long for its lost elm.<\/p>\n

Be a fine soldier, and a fine guardian, and a sound judge too.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re summoned as witness in a confused and ambiguous<\/p>\n

Case, even if Phalaris, the Sicilian tyrant, orders you to lie,<\/p>\n

And spell out your perjuries, his Bronze Bull ready to torment<\/p>\n

You at hand, it\u2019s a worse evil to prefer survival to dishonour,<\/p>\n

And for the sake of staying alive, lose the reason for living.<\/p>\n

Such die deserving death, though dining on a hundred Lucrine<\/p>\n

Oysters, bathed in a bronze tub filled with Cosmus\u2019s perfume.<\/p>\n

When, as governor, you\u2019re welcomed at last to your long-awaited<\/p>\n

Province, take a bridle and curb to your anger, and your greed,<\/p>\n

Demonstrate some sympathy for the impoverished provincials:<\/p>\n

What you\u2019ll see are the marrow-bones of kings, sucked dry.<\/p>\n

Keep an eye on the law\u2019s restrictions, what the Senate command,<\/p>\n

The copious rewards that await the virtuous, the righteous bolt<\/p>\n

Of Senatorial lightning, that condemnation that ruined Capito<\/p>\n

And Tutor, for stealing from the Cilicians. Though, why bother?<\/p>\n

Look round for an auctioneer, Chaerippus, to sell off your rags,<\/p>\n

Since Pansa is stealing whatever Natta left; and then be silent;<\/p>\n

It would be madness to lose the fare for the ferryman as well.<\/p>\n

The provinces never groaned like this, the pain of their losses<\/p>\n

Was never so great, when, soon after conquest, they flourished.<\/p>\n

Then their houses were bulging, there were vast piles of cash,<\/p>\n

Military cloaks from Sparta, purple Coan silks, besides<\/p>\n

Paintings by Parrhasius, statues signed by Myron, lifelike<\/p>\n

Ivories by Phidias, no lack of endless works of Polyclitus,<\/p>\n

And scarcely a table about lacking Mentor\u2019s silverware.<\/p>\n

From the provinces, Dolabella, from there Antonius, and that<\/p>\n

Temple-robber Verres carried off loot concealed in tall<\/p>\n

Ships, achieving greater triumphs in peacetime than war.<\/p>\n

These days when some little farm is seized, the locals have<\/p>\n

Only a few yoked oxen, a pitiful herd of mares, to be driven<\/p>\n

Off with the patriarch of the herd and the household gods<\/p>\n

Themselves, too, if any of their statues are worth the taking.<\/p>\n

Perhaps you despise the unwarlike Rhodians, and perfumed<\/p>\n

Corinth, and rightly so, what could a whole effeminate race<\/p>\n

Of youths, from there, with their depilated legs, do to you?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hairy Spain you should avoid, and the Gallic region,<\/p>\n

And the shores of Illyria; and beware of African reapers<\/p>\n

Who glut the idle City, freeing it for the races or the stage.<\/p>\n

How great anyway are the rewards you\u2019d win from so<\/p>\n

Dire a crime, since Marius Priscus stripped Africa bare?<\/p>\n

Take care above all to do no great injury to the wretched<\/p>\n

And the brave. Leave them their swords and shields,<\/p>\n

Though you take every last piece of their gold and silver.<\/p>\n

What I\u2019ve just written is not some mere maxim: it\u2019s truth;<\/p>\n

Believe me I\u2019m reading aloud now from the Sibyl\u2019s leaves.<\/p>\n

If your retinue of followers behave, if no long-haired<\/p>\n

Apollo takes bribes for you; if your wife\u2019s free of guilt,<\/p>\n

Not set to use the courts in every town to snatch spoils<\/p>\n

With her hooked talons, like that harpy Celaeno; then you<\/p>\n

May spell out your forebears back to King Picus, and if<\/p>\n

It\u2019s exalted names you treasure, include the Titans\u2019 whole<\/p>\n

Battle-line among them, including Prometheus himself.<\/p>\n

But if you\u2019re driven, precipitately, by greed and ambition,<\/p>\n

If you slake whips and break them on provincial backs,<\/p>\n

If blunted axes, and weary executioners, thrill you,<\/p>\n

Your ancestral nobility will contrast with your baseness,<\/p>\n

And shine its light on actions that should shame you.<\/p>\n

Every fault of character\u2019s the more open to reproach<\/p>\n

The higher the rank is of the person who displays it.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatVIII:142-182 Not Like Lateranus!<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

What\u2019s so impressive about your custom of penning false<\/p>\n

Wills, in temples your grandfather built, or while gazing<\/p>\n

At your father\u2019s triumphal statue? That, as an adulterer<\/p>\n

By night, a Gallic cowl from Saintonge hides your head?<\/p>\n

Lateranus, the gross, muleteer consul, outdoes that: he flies<\/p>\n

By his forebears\u2019 bones and ashes in his speedy carriage,<\/p>\n

Then shames them, by applying the brake himself: true<\/p>\n

He does it at night, but the moon sees it, and the glaring<\/p>\n

Stars bear witness. He drives himself! When his stint at<\/p>\n

The office is over, Lateranus takes up a whip in broad<\/p>\n

Daylight, never worries about meeting an adult friend,<\/p>\n

In fact he\u2019ll wave to him first, with the whip; he even<\/p>\n

Shakes out bales of hay, pours feed for his weary team.<\/p>\n

And then, though he sacrifices sheep, or a red bullock,<\/p>\n

In Numa\u2019s rites, he swears by the horse-goddess Epona<\/p>\n

At Jove\u2019s altar, by the painted icons on his rank stable.<\/p>\n

And when he\u2019s off to enjoy a midnight eating-bout<\/p>\n

A Syrio-Phoenician, drenched in endless perfumes, runs<\/p>\n

To greet him, some Syrian Jew from the Idumaean Gate,<\/p>\n

With that host\u2019s welcome, \u2018My Lord and Master\u2019 while<\/p>\n

Cyane, robe hiked to her thighs, offers the jar for sale.<\/p>\n

Some defender of his faults, will tell me: \u2018We too were<\/p>\n

Like that when young,\u2019 that\u2019s as maybe, but you ceased<\/p>\n

To nurture those errors. What tempts disgrace should be<\/p>\n

Transient, a fault to be trimmed away with the first beard.<\/p>\n

Grant lads indulgence: but our Lateranus headed straight<\/p>\n

For bathhouse wine jugs and painted awnings even when<\/p>\n

He was old enough to fight, or guard the Syrian frontiers,<\/p>\n

Or Armenia, the Danube, the Rhine. Send him to Ostia,<\/p>\n

Caesar, when you\u2019ve found him in that vast eating-house.<\/p>\n

Where he\u2019ll be reclining next to some assassin, mingling<\/p>\n

With sailors, consorting with thieves, and fugitive slaves,<\/p>\n

Down there, among executioners, sat with coffin-makers,<\/p>\n

Or the drums, now fallen silent, of some priest of Cybele.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s it\u2019s a free for all, a communal jar, there no one has<\/p>\n

Separate couches, tables set apart. Ponticus, if you chanced<\/p>\n

To own a slave you found there, what would you do? Surely,<\/p>\n

He\u2019d be destined for some Lucanian or Tuscan slave-farm.<\/p>\n

But you, you scions of Troy, you excuse it in yourselves.<\/p>\n

What shames the working man\u2019s fine for a Brutus, a Volesus.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatVIII:183-230 Aristocrats Indeed!<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Were these examples we cited never so wretched, never<\/p>\n

So shameful, are there not worse examples still to come?<\/p>\n

When you\u2019d spent your cash, Damasippus, you hired out<\/p>\n

Your voice to the stage, and acted Catullus\u2019 noisy \u2018Ghost\u2019.<\/p>\n

Agile Lentulus played the bandit Laureolus, rather well, I<\/p>\n

Thought him worthy of his crucifixion. And let\u2019s not start<\/p>\n

Excusing the populace; there\u2019s a hard side to this audience,<\/p>\n

That sits, and watches the triple follies of these aristocrats,<\/p>\n

Listens to pantomime Fabii, laughs at the slapstick antics<\/p>\n

Of the Mamerci. What matter how well their drubbings pay?<\/p>\n

They\u2019re selling themselves, without some Nero\u2019s coercion,<\/p>\n

Can\u2019t wait to sell, even when it\u2019s the noble praetor\u2019s games.<\/p>\n

But consider: the stage over here, versus a violent death there;<\/p>\n

Which is best? Is there anyone so scared to die, he\u2019d rather act<\/p>\n

Thymele\u2019s jealous spouse, or play foil to Corinthus the clown?<\/p>\n

Still if an emperor could play the lyre, a noble in a pantomime\u2019s<\/p>\n

No marvel. What could be worse, except the gladiatorial school?<\/p>\n

There you may behold Rome\u2019s shame: one of the Gracchi fights,<\/p>\n

But not in heavy armour, not with a shield or with a curved blade;<\/p>\n

He rejects such things, you see: look, he\u2019s brandishing a trident.<\/p>\n

When he\u2019s flourished his right arm, and hurled his trailing net,<\/p>\n

Without success, he\u2019ll raise his bare face to the spectators, and<\/p>\n

Having ensured he\u2019s known throughout the whole arena, flees,<\/p>\n

Dressed as a Salian priest, there\u2019s no mistake, his golden tunic<\/p>\n

Taut below his neck, the twisted cord swaying from his cap.<\/p>\n

So the opponent ordered to fight this Gracchus, suffers a greater<\/p>\n

Loss of face than he would have done from any wound received.<\/p>\n

If the masses were granted a free vote, who would be so foolish<\/p>\n

As to hesitate about preferring Seneca to that Nero who deserved<\/p>\n

Worse punishment than the usual parricide, who should have been<\/p>\n

Sewn with more than a snake and monkey in a sea-drowned sack.<\/p>\n

Nero wrought Orestes\u2019 crime, but the motive was quite different.<\/p>\n

Agamemnon\u2019s son, with divine indulgence, avenged his father,<\/p>\n

Murdered at a banquet, you know, but never polluted himself by<\/p>\n

Slitting his sister Electra\u2019s jugular, or shedding his Spartan wife<\/p>\n

Hermione\u2019s blood, he prepared no poisoned doses for relatives,<\/p>\n

He never took to the stage, like Nero, to sing the part of Orestes,<\/p>\n

He never wrote an epic of Troy. What actions more deserved<\/p>\n

Punishment, by Verginius and his army, by Galba and Vindex?<\/p>\n

Such were the deeds and accomplishments of our noble emperor,<\/p>\n

Who loved to prostitute himself on a foreign stage, in vile song,<\/p>\n

Winning Greek garlands of dry celery leaves for his performance.<\/p>\n

So grant your ancestors\u2019 statues the prizes won by your voice,<\/p>\n

Lay your Thyestes\u2019 tragic robe with its long train, your mask of<\/p>\n

Antigone or of Melanippe, before the feet of your own Domitius,<\/p>\n

Go hang your lyre from your colossus, carved out of marble!<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatVIII:231-275 Let Us Celebrate Our Humble Origins<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Where is a more exalted ancestry to be found, than yours Catiline,<\/p>\n

Or yours Cethegus? Yet armed by night you connived to attack<\/p>\n

Homes and temples and set them alight, like those sons of Gaul<\/p>\n

In breeches, like the scions of those Senones who sacked Rome,<\/p>\n

An outrage punished by legal execution, in \u2018a coat of burning pitch\u2019.<\/p>\n

While Cicero the consul, alert, halts the advance of your banners.<\/p>\n

He, a self-made man from Arpinum, of humble origin, a municipal<\/p>\n

Knight new to the City, posts helmeted troops everywhere to protect<\/p>\n

The terrified people, labours away over all the seven hills of Rome.<\/p>\n

So his toga, in time of peace, brought him as much titled distinction,<\/p>\n

Without stepping outside the walls, as Octavius, his sword stained<\/p>\n

From continual slaughter, snatched for himself at Leucas, by Actium,<\/p>\n

Or Philippi, in the fields of Thessaly; moreover Rome was still free,<\/p>\n

When she named Cicero as parent and father of his native country.<\/p>\n

And Gaius Marius, also from Arpinum, toiled in the Volscian hills<\/p>\n

To earn a living, labouring away behind another man\u2019s plough.<\/p>\n

And later felt the centurion\u2019s gnarled stick on his head, if he<\/p>\n

Showed reluctance as he dug the camp\u2019s moat with his tardy pick.<\/p>\n

And yet it is he who takes on the Cimbri at a moment of high risk<\/p>\n

To his country, and it is he alone who defends a trembling Rome.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s why when the crows fly down to feast on the mounds<\/p>\n

Of dead, never having fastened on mightier corpses, his fellow<\/p>\n

Consul, Catulus, though a nobleman, receives the lesser laurels.<\/p>\n

The Decii were plebeian souls, and their names plebeian too,<\/p>\n

Yet they were worth all the legions, all of their allies, and all<\/p>\n

The youth of Latium, to Mother Earth and the gods below.<\/p>\n

Servius Tullius, born to a slave-girl, won the robes and crowns<\/p>\n

And rods of Romulus, he the very last of the good kings of Rome.<\/p>\n

The traitors who planned to unbar the gates to the exiled tyrants,<\/p>\n

Were the sons of the consul himself, though, the very citizens<\/p>\n

Who should have achieved great deeds on behalf of fragile liberty,<\/p>\n

Deeds that Gaius Mucius or Horatius Cocles might have admired,<\/p>\n

Or Cloelia, that girl who swam the Tiber, the frontier of our power.<\/p>\n

A slave, deserving to be mourned by Roman women, it was who<\/p>\n

Revealed the secret plot to the Senate, while the traitors got their just<\/p>\n

Rewards, a flogging, then their newly-legal execution under the axe.<\/p>\n

I\u2019d rather you were fathered by Thersites, and behaved like Achilles,<\/p>\n

Grandson of Aeacus, brandishing the weapons forged by Hephaestus,<\/p>\n

Than that Achilles fathered you, only for you to behave like Thersites.<\/p>\n

Though you can unroll the family tree, and trace your name far back,<\/p>\n

It still derives from that first melting-pot of Rome, that granted all<\/p>\n

Asylum; and whoever your first ancestor might have been, he was<\/p>\n

Still a herdsman, or performed some other task I\u2019d rather not mention.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"menu_order":4,"template":"","meta":{"_candela_citation":"[]","CANDELA_OUTCOMES_GUID":"","pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-72","chapter","type-chapter","status-web-only","hentry"],"part":68,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/72","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/72\/revisions"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/68"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/72\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=72"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=72"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=72"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}