And Macro, being ignorant of the dishonour done to his marriage-bed and to his family, and looking upon her flattery as a proof of her sincere good will and affection for him, was deceived, and without being aware of it was.led, by her intrigues, to embrace his bitterest enemies as his best friends.
VII. Therefore, as he knew that he had preserved him ten thousand times, when he was in the most imminent danger of being put to death, he used to offer him undisguised, sincere, ON THE VIRTUES AND OFFICE OF AMBASSADORS. 109 and honest admonitions and advice, with perfect freedom of speech; for, like a good workman, he was desirous that what he looked upon as his own work should remain uninjured and indestructible, without being put an end to, either by himself or by any one else; therefore, whenever he saw him sleeping at any entertainment he would go round and awaken him, having, at the same time, a regard for what was becoming and also for his safety, for a man who is asleep is a good object for treachery; and whenever he beheld him looking with an excited eye at any dancers, or even sometimes dancing with them, or not smiling with dignity upon actors of farcical and laughable spectacles, but rather grinning like a boy, or wholly carried away by the tunes of some harp-player or chorus, so as on some occasions even to join in their song, he would, if he was sitting or going near him, give him a nudge, and en- deavour to check him.
And very often, when he was reclining near him, he would whisper in his ear, and admonish him gently and quietly, so that no one else might hear what was said, saying, " You ought not only not to be like any one else here, but like no one else whatever, neither at any spectacle, or at anything that is to be heard, or in anything else that ever affects the out- ward senses, but you ought rather to surpass all other men in every action of your life, as much as you surpass them in your good fortune, for it is unreasonable for the ruler of all the earth and of all the sea to bo subdued by a song or by an ex- hibition of dancing, or by any ridiculous jest or piece of acting, or by anything else of that kind; and not on every occasion, and in every place, to remember his position as emperor, like a shepherd and protector of the flock, availing himself of everything that can tend to any kind of amelioration* from every word, and from every action, of every description what- ever." - Then again he would add, " When you are present at any theatrical contest, or at any gymnastic games, or at any of the contests in the hippodrome, do not consider the pursuits them- selves so much as the behaving correctly in all such pursuits, and entertain thoughts of this nature: if some men labour in this manner to bring to perfection things that can in no respect benefit human life, but which only afford pleasure and amusement to the spectators, in such a way as to be praised 110 FHILO JTTDMTJfi.
and admired, and to receive rewards, and honours, and crowns, and to have their names proclaimed as conquerors; what ought that man to do who is skilful in the most sublime and most important of all arts? Now the greatest and most excel- lent of all sciences is the science of government, by means of which every country which is good and fertile, whether it be champaign or mountainous, is cultivated, and every sea is na- vigated without danger by heavily-laden merchant-vessels, to communicate to the different countries the useful productions of each, out of a natural desire for participation and associa- tion, so that each land receives what it stands in need of, and sends abroad in requital those good things of which it has a superfluity; for envy has never obtained a dominion over the whole of the habitable world, nor even over those great divisions of it, the whole of Europe or the whole of Asia, but it lurks in holes like a venomous reptile, creeping out in small districts to attack an individual man, or a single family, or, if it is very violent and powerful, perhaps one city; but it never attacks a larger circle of a whole nation or a whole country, especially ever since your august family has really begun to rule over all men in every part of the world.
" For your house has discovered and brought to light every- thing that is good, even in the midst of evils, and has banished all evils to the extremities of the earth, and beyond its borders to the very depths of Tartarus, and has brought back, from the most distant borders of the earth and sea, those profitable and beneficial things which were in a manner banished into the habitable world around us; and now all these things are en- trusted to your power, to be governed by your authority.
" Accordingly you, having been conducted by nature to the supreme helm of the world, and having the government of everything placed in your hand, must guide the universal ship of all mankind in a safe and salutary manner, rejoicing and delighting in nothing more than in doing good to your sub- jects; for different people have different contributions to bestow, which individuals necessarily offer in their several cities. But the most suitable gift for a ruler to give is to adopt wise counsels with respect to those who are subject to his authority, and to execute intentions which have been rightly formed, and to bestow on them good things without any limita- tion, with a liberal hand and mind, except such as it may be ON THE VIRTUES AND OFFICE OF AMBASSADORS. 1 i 1 better to keep in reserve from a prudent foreknowledge of the uncertainty of the future."
VIII. The unhappy man kept dinning suggestions of this kind into his ears in the hope of improving Caius; but he, being a contentious and quarrelsome person, turned his mind in the directly opposite direction, as if he were exhorted to do exactly the contrary, and he conceived a most determined dis- gust for his monitor, so as never to behold him with a cheerful countenance; and sometimes when he saw him at a distance he would speak as follows to those near him: " Here comes the teacher of one who has no longer any right to be looked upon as a pupil; — here comes the pedagogue of one who is no longer a child, the monitor of one who is wiser than himself, the man who thinks it proper that the emperor should obey his subject, who sets himself up as a man deeply versed by experience in the science of government, and as a teacher of it, though from whom he has learnt the principles of sovereign government I know not; for from the moment that I left my cradle, I have had ten thousand instructors, fathers, brothers, uncles, cousins, and grandfathers, up to the very founders of my family, in fact every one related to me either on my father's or my mother's side, who had acquired absolute power for themselves, even without taking into consideration the fact that, by their being the authors of my being, they had im- planted in me some degree of royal power and some natural aptitude for government. For as similitudes of both body and soul exist both in the form, and position, and motions of men, and also as the inclinations, and dispositions, and actions of men are preserved in some degree of similitude through the principles of descent, so also is it probable that the very same principles should convey an outline of similitude in respect of one's aptitude for government. Shall any one, then, who is ignorant dare to instruct me who am the reverse of ignorant? me who, even before my birth, while I was yet in my mother's womb, was fashioned as an emperor in the workshop of nature? For how can it be possible for persons, who but a short time before were private individuals, to contemplate as they should the intentions of an imperial soul? But some persons in their shameless audacity dare to put themselves forward as inter- preters and perfecters of the principles of government, when 112 PHILO JUMUS.
in reality they scarcely ought to be enrolled among those who have any understanding whatever of the matter."
And as he thus diligently laboured to alienate himself from Macro, he began also to invent false but plausible and specious grounds for blaming and accusing him; for passionate and irritable natures, especially when belonging to powerful men, are very ingenious at weaving plausibilities. Now, the pretexts which he made use of against him were of the follow- ing natures. He said Macro thought thus: " Caius is my work; the work of Macro. I am more truly, or at all events not less truly, his father than his own parents. He would have been destroyed,- over and over again, by Tiberius, who thirsted for his blood, if it had not been for me and for my powers of persuasion. And moreover, when Tiberius was dead, I, who had under my command the whole force of the army, immediately placed him in the position which Tiberius had occupied, teaching him that the state had indeed sustained a loss of one man, but that the imperial authority continued unaltered, as entire as ever."
And many people have given credit to these assertions of of his as if they were true, not being acquainted with the false and crafty disposition of the speaker; for hitherto the dis- honest and designing character of his disposition was not made manifest. But a few days afterwards the miserable man was put to death, with his wife, receiving the extremity of punish- ment as a reward for his exceeding good will towards his slayer. This is the consequence of doing kindnesses to un- grateful people; for in return for the benefits which they have received, they inflict the greatest of injuries on those from whom they have received them. Accordingly, Macro, who had done everything in sincerity with the most earnest eager- ness and zeal for the good of Caius, in the first place in order to save him from death, and afterwards in order that he by himself might succeed to the imperial authority, received for his reward the fate which I have mentioned.
For it is said that the wretched man was compelled to kill himself with his own hand; and his wife, too, experienced the same misery, even though she indeed had at one time been believed to be on the most intimate terms of familiarity with Caius; but they say that none of the allurements of love are ON THE VIRTUES AND OFFICE OF AMBASSADORS. 113 stable and trustworthy because it is a passion which quickly breeds satiety.
IX. But after Macro and all his house had been sacrificed, Cains then began to design a third more grievous piece of treachery still. His father-in-law had been Marcus Silanus, a man full of wisdom, and very illustrious by birth. He, after his daughter had died by an early death, still was very atten- tive and affectionate to Caius, showing all imaginable regard for him, not so much like a father-in-law as like an actual father, and he hoped that he should find that Caius also enter- tained equal good will towards him, transforming himself according to the principles of equality from a son-in-law into a son; but he was, without knowing it, cherishing mistaken opinions, and deluding himself, for he was continually uttering affectionate speeches, keeping back nothing which could tend to the amelioration and improvement of Caius's disposition and way of life and mode of government, speaking with all freedom, and looking upon his own surpassing nobility of birth and nearness of connexion by marriage as circumstances which gave him grounds for great familiarity and openness, for his daughter had been dead only a very short time, so that the laws and bonds which bind such kinsmen were scarcely destroyed, and one may almost say were still quivering with life, some relics of the breath of vitality being still left, as it were, and remaining warm in the body. But Caius, looking upon every admonition as an insult, because he fancied that he himself was the wisest and most virtuous of all men, and more- over the most valorous and the most just, hated all who ventured to offer him instruction more than even his avowed enemies.
Therefore, looking on Silanus as a bore, who only wished to check the impetuosity and indulgence of his appetites, and dis- carding all recollection of and regard for his deceased wife, he treacherously put her father to death, who was also his own father-in-law.
X. And by this time the matter began to be widely talked about in consequence of the continual deaths of so many eminent men, so that now these things began to be spoken of in every mouth as intolerable infamy and wickedness; not indeed openly, from fear, but gently and under the breath, in whispers; and then again, by a sudden change (for the multi- VOL. IV I 114 PHILO JUIMBUS.
tude is very unstable in everything, in intentions, and words, and actions), men, disbelieving that one who but a little while before was merciful and humane could have become altered so entirely, for Caius had been looked upon as affable, and sociable! and friendly, began to seek for excuses for him, and after some search they found such, saying with regard to his cousin and co-heir in the kingdom things such as these: " The unchangeable law of nature has ordained that there should be no partnership in sovereign power, and it has established by its own unalterable principles what this man must inevitably have suffered at the hands of his more powerful co-heir. The one who was the more powerful has chastised the other. This is not murder. Perhaps, indeed, the putting that youth to death was done providentially for the advantage of the whole human race, since if one portion had been assigned as subjects to the one, and another portion to the other, there would have arisen troubles and confusion, and civil and foreign war. And what is better than peace? and peace is caused by good government on sound principles. And no government can be good but that which is free from all contentions and from all disputes, and then everything else is made right by it."
it."
And in reference to the case of Macro, they said, " The man was puffed up with pride in an immoderate degree; he had no idea of that great lesson which came from Delphi, ' know thy- self. And they say that knowledge is the cause of happiness, and that ignorance is the parent of unhappiness. What could have possessed him to make such an alteration and change in their relative positions as to thrust himself, who was a subject, into the rauk of a governor, and to depress Caius, who was the emperor, into the place of a subject? For it is the part of a ruler to command, and that was what Macro did; but it is the duty of a subject to obey, and that was what he considered that Caius was to submit to."
For these inconsiderate men, without giving themselves the trouble of inquiring into the truth, called the recommenda- tions of Macro commands, and called him who gave advice a governor, out of ignorance and insensibility, or else out of flattery, suppressing the truth and giving a false colouring to the nature of both names and things.
And in reference to Silanus they said, " Silanus was a most ON THE VIRTUES AND OFFICE OF AMBASSADORS. 115 ridiculous person when he took it into his head that a father- in-law would have as much influence with his son-in-law as a real father has with a son. And yet even real fathers who are in a private station submit to their sons when they are in great offices and in places of high authority, being quite con- tent with the second place; but this foolish man, even when he was no longer his father-in-law, kept on claiming privileges which did not belong to him, without perceiving that with the death of his daughter the connexion which had originated in the marriage of Caius with her had also died, for intermar- riages are the bonds which unite families between which there is no kindred, changing alienation into near connexion; but when that bond is dissolved, then the union is dissolved like- wise, especially when it is dissolved by a circumstance which cannot be altered or remedied, namely, by the death of the woman who was given in marriage into another family."
Such conversations as these were held in every company, the speakers being wholly influenced by their wish that the emperor should not appear to be cruel; for as they had hoped that such humanity and gentleness was seated in the soul of Caius as had not existed in either of the previous emperors, they thought it would be a most strange thing if he now made so great and so sudden a change to an entirely contrary dis- position.
XI. Having now, then, entirely accomplished the three undertakings above-mentioned, with reference to three most important divisions, two of them belonging to the country, one to the class of counsellors and the other to the knights, and the third affecting his own relations, and considering that now that he had thus put down the mightiest and most powerful of his foes, he must have struck all the rest with the utmost terror, alarming the counsellors by the death of Silanus (for he was inferior to no one in the senate), and the knights by the execution of Macro (for he, like the leader of a chorus, had long been considered the very first man of the knights for reputation and glory), and all his blood relations by the slaughter of his cousin and joint inheritor of the kingdom, he no longer chose to remain fettered by the ordinary limits of human nature, but aspired to raise himself above them, and desired to be looked upon as a god.
And at the beginning of this insane desire they sav that he I Q was influenced by such a train of reasoning as the following: for as the curators of the herds of other animals, namely cow- herds, and goatherds, and shepherds, are neither oxen nor goats,' nor sheep, but men who have received a more excellent portion, and a more admirable formation of mind and body; so in the same manner, said he, is it fitting that I who am the leader of the most excellent of all herds, namely, the race of mankind, should be considered as a being of a superior nature, and not merely human, but as one who has received a greater and more holy portion. Accordingly, having impressed this idea on his mind, like a vain and foolish man as he was, he bore about in himself a fallacious fable and invention as if it had been a most undeniable truth; and after he had once carried his boldness and audacity to such a pitch as to compel the multitude to admit of his most impious deification, he attempted to do other things consistent with and conformable to it, and in this way he advanced up to the highest point by slow degrees as if he were ascending up steps.
For he began at first to liken himself to those beings who are called demigods, such as Bacchus, and Hercules, and the twins of Lacediemon; turning into utter ridicule Trophonius, and Amphiaraus, and Amphilochus, and others of the same kind, with all their oracles and secret ceremonies, in comparison of his own power. In the next place, like an actor in a theatre, he was continually wearing different dresses at different times, taking at one time a lion's skin and a club, both gilded over; being then dressed in the character of Hercules; at another time he would wear a felt hat upon his head, when he was disguised in imitation of the Spartan twins, Castor and Pollux; sometimes he also adorned himself with ivy, and a thyrsus, and skins of fawns, so as to appear in the guise of Bacchus.
And he looked upon himself as being in this respect supe- rior to all of these beings, because each of them while he had his own peculiar honours had no claim to those which belonged to the others, but he in his envious ambition appropriated all the honours of the whole body of demigods at once, or I should rather say, appropriated the demigods themselves; transforming himself not into the triple-bodied Geryon, so as to attract all beholders by the multitude of his bodies; but; what was the most extraordinary thing of all, changing and trans- forming the essence of one body into every variety of form and ON THE VIRTUES AND OFFICE OF AMBASSADORS. 117 figure, like the Egyptian Proteus, whom Homer has repre- sented as being susceptible of every variety of transformation, into all the elements, and into the animals, and plants, which belong to the different elements.* And yet why, O Caius! did you think yourself in need of spurious honours, such as the temples and statues of the beings above-mentioned are often filled with? You ought rather to have imitated their virtues. Hercules purified both the earth and the sea, performing labours of the greatest possible im- portance and of the highest benefit to all mankind, in order to eradicate all that was mischievous and calculated to injure the nature of each of the elements. Bacchus rendered the vine susceptible of cultivation, and extracted a most delicious drink from it, which is at the same time most beneficial to the souls and bodies of men, leading the first to cheerfulness, working in them a forgetfulness of evils and a hope of blessings, and making the latter more healthy, and vigorous, and active, and supple. And individually it renders each man better, and alters populous families and households, leading them from a squalid and laborious life of vexation to a course of relaxation and cheerful happiness, and causing to every city on earth, both Grecian and barbarian, incessant festivity, and mirth, and • The passage in Homer is to be found at Odyssey iv. 363. It ia imitated more concisely by Virgil, who makes Cyrene tell Aristaeus — Verum ubi correptum manibus vinclisque tenebis Turn variae eludent species atque ora ferarum; Fiet enim subito sus horridus atraque tigris Squamosusque draco et fulva cervice leaena Aut acrem flammge sonitum dabit, atque ita vinclis Excidet, aut in aquas tenues dilapsus abibit. — Georg. iv. 410. Which is thus translated by Pope — " Instant he wears, elusive of the rape, The mimic force of every savage shape: Or glides with liquid lapse a murm'ring stream, Or wrapt in flame, he glows at every limb. Yet still retentive, with redoubled might Thro' each vain passive form constrains his flight. But when, his native shape resumed, he stands Patient of conquest, and your cause demands; The cause that urg'd the bold attempt declare, And soothe the vanquish'd with a victor's prayer. The bands relaxed, implore the seer to say What godhead interdicts the wat'ry way."
118 PHILO JUD^US.
entertainment, and revelry; for of all these things is good wine the cause.
Again, it is said that the twin sons of Jupiter, Castor and Pollux, are partakers of immortality. For since the one was mortal and the other immortal, the one who had had the more excellent portion assigned to him did not choose to behave in a selfish manner, but rather to display his good will and affection towards his brother; for having acquired the idea that eternity was never-ending, and considering that he was to live for ever, and that his brother was to be dead for ever, and that in con- junction with his own immortality he should likewise be en- during an undying sorrow on account of his brother, he conceived and carried out a most marvellous system of counter- balancing, mingling mortality with himself and immortality with his brother, and thus he modified inequality, which is the beginning of all injustice, by equality, which is the fountain of justice.
XII. All these beings, 0 Caius! were admired on account of the benefits which they had conferred on mankind, and they are admired for them even up to the present time, and they were deservedly thought worthy of veneration and of the very highest honours. But come now, and tell us yourself in what achievement of yours do you pride yourself and boast yourself as being in the least similar to their actions? Have you imi- tated the twin sons of Jupiter in their brotherly affection, that I may begin with that point? Did you not rather, 0 hard- hearted and most pitiless of men! inhumanly slaughter your brother, the joint inheritor of the kingdom with you, even before he had arrived at the full vigour of manhood, when he was still in early youth. Did you not afterwards banish your sisters, lest they also should cause you any reasonable appre- hension of the deprivation and loss of your imperial power?
Have you imitated Bacchus in any respect? Have you been an inventor of any new blessings to mankind? Have you filled the whole of the habitable world with joy as he did? Are all Asia and Europe inadequate to contain the gifts which have been showered upon mankind by you? No doubt you have invented new arts and sciences, like a common pest and murderer of your kind, by which you have changed all pleasant and acceptable things into vexation and sorrow, and have made life miserable and intolerable to all men everywhere, appro- ON THE VIRTUES AND OFFICE OF AMBASSADORS. 119 priating to yourself in your intolerable and insatiable greedi- ness all the good and beautiful things which belonged to every one else, whether from the east or from any other country of the universe, carrying off everything from the south, every- thing from the north, and in requital giving to and pouring down upon those whom you had plundered every sort of mis- chievous and injurious things from your own bitter spirit, everything which is ever engendered in cruel, and destructive, and envenomed dispositions; these are the reasons why you appeared to us as a new Bacchus.