Books: The Letters of Pliny the Younger

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Then I rose and said: "Conscript Fathers, I beg to withdraw my plea to
be excused as inadequate," and the House approved the modesty of the
remark and the reason. However, I was drawn to act as I did not only by
the applause of the Senate, though that had great weight with me, but by
a variety of other reasons, less in themselves, but all telling in the
account. I remembered that our forefathers used to voluntarily
undertake the championship of individual private friends who had been
wronged, and so I thought that it would be shameful for me to neglect
the claims of an entire people who were my friends. Moreover, when I
recollected what hazards I had run for the same people of Baetica in my
earlier championship of them, I thought I had better preserve their
gratitude for the old favour by granting them a new one. For it is a
law of nature that people soon forget an old benefit, unless you keep on
renewing it by later ones, for however often you oblige them, if you
refuse them one request, they only remember the refusal. Another motive
was that Classicus was dead, and so there was no fear of the odium of
endangering a senator, which in these cases is usually the most serious
objection. I saw, therefore, that if I undertook the case I should
obtain just as much kudos as if he were alive, and yet escape all odium.
In short, I reckoned that if I consented to appear a third time in a
brief of this kind, I should have an easier task to excuse myself if a
case turned up in which I felt I ought not to play the part of accuser.
For as there is a limit to the granting of all favours, the best method
of paving the way to obtain a right of refusal is by consenting to
previous requests. I have now told you my reasons for acting as I did,
and it is open to you to agree or dissent, but let me assure you that
frank dissent will be no less agreeable to me than the sanction of your
approval. Farewell.

3.V.--TO BAEBIUS MACER.

I was delighted to find that you are so zealous a student of my uncle's
books that you would like to possess copies of them all, and that you
ask me to give you a complete list of them. I will play the part of an
index for you, and tell you, moreover, the order in which they were
written, for this is a point that students are interested to know.
"Throwing the Javelin from Horseback," one volume; this was composed,
with considerable ingenuity and research, when he was on active service
as a cavalry lieutenant. "The Life of Pomponius Secundus," two
volumes;--Pomponius was remarkably attached to my uncle, who, so to
speak, composed this book to his friend's memory in payment of his debt
of gratitude. "The German Wars," twenty volumes;--this comprises an
account of all the wars we have waged with the German races. He
commenced it, while on service in Germany, in obedience to the warning
of a dream, for, while he was asleep, the shade of Drusus Nero, who had
won sweeping victories in that country and died there, appeared to him
and kept on entrusting his fame to my uncle, beseeching him to rescue
his name from ill-deserved oblivion. "The Student," three volumes,
afterwards split up into six on account of their length;--in this he
showed the proper training and equipment of an orator from his cradle
up. "Ambiguity in Language," in eight volumes, was written in the last
years of Nero's reign when tyranny had made it dangerous to write any
book, no matter the subject, in anything like a free and candid style.
"A Continuation of the History of Aufidius Bassus," in thirty-one books,
and a "Natural History," in thirty-seven books;--the latter is a
comprehensive and learned work, covering as wide a field as Nature
herself.

Does it surprise you that a busy man found time to finish so many
volumes, many of which deal with such minute details? You will wonder
the more when I tell you that he for many years pleaded in the law
courts, that he died in his fifty-seventh year, and that in the interval
his time was taken up and his studies were hindered by the important
offices he held and the duties arising out of his friendship with the
Emperors. But he possessed a keen intellect; he had a marvellous
capacity for work, and his powers of application were enormous. He used
to begin to study at night on the Festival of Vulcan, not for luck but
from his love of study, long before dawn; in winter he would commence at
the seventh hour or at the eighth at the very latest, and often at the
sixth. He could sleep at call, and it would come upon him and leave him
in the middle of his work. Before daybreak he would go to Vespasian--
for he too was a night-worker--and then set about his official duties.
On his return home he would again give to study any time that he had
free. Often in summer after taking a meal, which with him, as in the
old days, was always a simple and light one, he would lie in the sun if
he had any time to spare, and a book would be read aloud, from which he
would take notes and extracts. For he never read without taking
extracts, and used to say that there never was a book so bad that it was
not good in some passage or another. After his sun bath he usually
bathed in cold water, then he took a snack and a brief nap, and
subsequently, as though another day had begun, he would study till
dinner-time. After dinner a book would be read aloud, and he would take
notes in a cursory way. I remember that one of his friends, when the
reader pronounced a word wrongly, checked him and made him read it
again, and my uncle said to him, "Did you not catch the meaning?" When
his friend said "yes," he remarked, "Why then did you make him turn
back? We have lost more than ten lines through your interruption." So
jealous was he of every moment lost.

In summer he used to rise from the dinner-table while it was still
light; in winter always before the first hour had passed, as though
there was a law obliging him to do so. Such was his method of living
when up to the eyes in work and amid the bustle of Rome. When he was in
the country the only time snatched from his work was when he took his
bath, and when I say bath I refer to the actual bathing, for while he
was being scraped with the strigil or rubbed down, he used to listen to
a reader or dictate. When he was travelling he cut himself aloof from
every other thought and gave himself up to study alone. At his side he
kept a shorthand writer with a book and tablets, who wore mittens on his
hands in winter, so that not even the sharpness of the weather should
rob him of a moment, and for the same reason, when in Rome, he used to
be carried in a litter. I remember that once he rebuked me for walking,
saying, "If you were a student, you could not waste your hours like
that," for he considered that all time was wasted which was not devoted
to study.

Such was the application which enabled him to compile all those volumes
I have enumerated, and he left me one hundred and sixty commonplace
books, written on both sides of the scrolls, and in a very small
handwriting, which really makes the number of the volumes considerably
more. He used to say that when he was procurator in Spain he could have
sold these commonplace books to Largius Licinus for four hundred
thousand sestertia, and at that time they were much fewer in number. Do
you not feel when you think of his voluminous writing and reading that
he cannot have had any public duties to attend to, and that he cannot
have been an intimate friend of the Emperors? Again, when you hear what
an amount of work he put into his studies, does it not seem that he
neither wrote nor read as much as he might? For his other duties might
surely have prevented him from studying altogether, and a man with his
application might have accomplished even more than he did. So I often
smile when some of my friends call me a book-worm, for if I compare
myself with him I am but a shocking idler. Yet am I quite as bad as
that, considering the way I am distracted by my public and private
duties? Who is there of all those who devote their whole life to
literature, who, if compared with him, would not blush for himself as a
sleepy-head and a lazy fellow? I have let my pen run on, though I had
intended simply to answer your question and give you a list of my
uncle's works; but I trust that even my letter may give you as much
pleasure as his books, and that it will spur you on not only to read
them, but also to compose something worthy to be compared with them.
Farewell.

3.VI.--TO ANNIUS SEVERUS.

Out of a legacy which I have come in for I have just bought a Corinthian
bronze, small it is true, but a charming and sharply-cut piece of work,
so far as I have any knowledge of art, and that, as in everything else
perhaps, is very slight. But as for the statue in question even I can
appreciate its merits. For it is a nude, and neither conceals its
faults, if there are any, nor hides at all its strong points. It
represents an old man in a standing posture; the bones, muscles, nerves,
veins, and even the wrinkles appear quite life-like; the hair is thin
and scanty on the forehead; the brow is broad; the face wizened; the
neck thin; the shoulders are bowed; the breast is flat, and the belly
hollow. The back too gives the same impression of age, as far as a back
view can. The bronze itself, judging by the genuine colour, is old and
of great antiquity. In fact, in every respect it is a work calculated
to catch the eye of a connoisseur and to delight the eye of an amateur,
and this is what tempted me to purchase it, although I am the merest
novice. But I bought it not to keep it at home--for as yet I have no
Corinthian art work in my house--but that I might put it up in my native
country in some frequented place, and I specially had in mind the Temple
of Jupiter. For the statue seems to me to be worthy of the temple, and
the gift to be worthy of the god. So I hope that you will show me your
usual kindness when I give you a commission, and that you will undertake
the following for me. Will you order a pedestal to be made, of any
marble you like, to be inscribed with my name and titles, if you think
the latter ought to be mentioned? I will send you the statue as soon as
I can find any one who is not overburdened with luggage, or I will bring
myself along with it, as I dare say you would prefer me to do. For, if
only my duties allow me, I am intending to run down thither. You are
glad that I promise to come, but you will frown when I add that I can
only stay a few days. For the business which hitherto has kept me from
getting away will not allow of my being absent any longer. Farewell.

3.VII.--TO CANINIUS RUFUS.

News has just come that Silius Italicus has starved himself to death at
his villa near Naples. Ill-health was the cause assigned. He had an
incurable corn, which made him weary of life and resolved him to face
death with a determination that nothing could shake, yet to his last day
he was prosperous and happy, save that he lost the younger of his two
children. The elder and the better of the two still survives him in
prosperous circumstances and of consular rank. During Nero's reign
Silius had injured his reputation, for it was thought that he
voluntarily informed against people, but he had conducted himself with
prudence and courtesy as one of the friends of Vitellius; he had
returned from his governorship of Asia covered with glory, and he had
succeeded in obliterating the stains on his character, caused by his
activity in his young days, by the admirable use he made of his
retirement. He ranked among the leading men of the State, though he
held no official position and excited no man's envy. People paid their
respects to him and courted his society, and, though he spent much of
his time on his couch, his room was always full of company who were no
mere chance callers, and he passed his days in learned and scholarly
conversation, when he was not busy composing. He wrote verses which
show abundant pains rather than genius, and sometimes he submitted them
to general criticism by having them read in public.

At last he retired from the city, prompted thereto by his great age, and
settled in Campania, nor did he stir from the spot, even at the
accession of the new Emperor. A Caesar deserves great credit for
allowing a subject such liberty, and Italicus deserves the same for
venturing to avail himself of it. He was such a keen virtuoso that he
got the reputation of always itching to buy new things. He owned a
number of villas in the same neighbourhood, and used to neglect his old
ones through his passion for his recent purchases. In each he had any
quantity of books, statues and busts, which he not only kept by him but
even treated with a sort of veneration, especially the busts of Virgil,
whose birthday he kept up far more scrupulously than he did his own,
principally at Naples, where he used to approach the poet's monument as
though it were a temple. In these peaceful surroundings he completed
his seventy-fifth year, his health being delicate rather than weak, and
just as he was the last consul appointed by Nero, so too in him died the
sole survivor of all the consuls appointed by that Emperor. It is also
a curious fact that, besides his being the last of Nero's consuls, it
was in his term of office that Nero perished. When I think of this, I
feel a sort of compassion for the frailty of humanity. For what is so
circumscribed and so short as even the longest human life? Does it not
seem to you as if Nero were alive only the other day? Yet of all those
who held the consulship during his reign not one survives at the present
moment.

But, after all, what is there remarkable in that? Not so long ago
Lucius Piso, the father of the Piso who was must shamefully put to death
in Africa by Valerius Festus, used to say that he did not see a single
soul in the Senate of all those whom he had called upon to speak during
his consulship. Within such narrow limits are the powers of living of
even the mightiest throng confined that it seems to me the royal tears
are not only excusable but even praiseworthy. For the story goes that
when Xerxes cast his eyes over his enormous host, he wept to think of
the fate that in such brief space would lay so many thousands low. But
that is all the more reason why we should apply all the fleeting,
rushing moments at our disposal, if not to great achievements--for these
may be destined for other hands than ours--at least to study, and why,
as long life is denied us, we should leave behind us some memorial that
we have lived. I know that you need no spurring on, yet the affection I
have for you prompts me even to spur a willing horse, just as you do
with me. Well, it is a noble contention when friends exhort one another
to work and sharpen one another's desires to win an immortal name.
Farewell.

3.VIII.--TO SUETONIUS TRANQUILLUS.

It is just like your usual respectful regard for me that you beg me so
earnestly to transfer the tribuneship, which I obtained for you from
that noble man Neratius Marcellus, to your relative Caesennius Silvanus.
I should have been delighted to see you as tribune, but I shall be
equally pleased to see another take the post through your generosity,
for I do not think it would be becoming in me to grudge a man whom you
desire to advance in dignity the fame of family affection, which is a
greater distinction than any honorific titles. Besides, as it is a
splendid thing both to deserve benefits and to confer them, I see that
you will at one and the same time receive credit for both, now that you
bestow on another what your own merits have won. Moreover, I quite
understand that I too shall come in for some glory when it is known
through your generous deed that friends of mine can not only fill the
office of tribune, but can bestow it on others. For these reasons I bow
to the wishes which do you the greatest credit. No name has yet been
placed on the lists, and so we can quite well substitute that of
Silvanus for yours. I hope that he will show himself as grateful to you
as you have to me. Farewell.

3.IX.--TO CORNELIUS MINICIANUS.

I can now give you a full account of the enormous trouble entailed upon
me in the public trial brought by the Province of Baetica. It was a
complicated suit, and new issues kept constantly cropping up. Why this
variety, and why these different pleadings? you well ask. Well,
Caecilius Classicus--a low rascal who carries his villainy in his face--
had during his proconsulship in Baetica, in the same year that Marius
Priscus was Governor of Africa, behaved both with violence and rapacity.
Now, Priscus came from Baetica and Classicus from Africa, and so there
was a rather good saying among the people of Baetica, for even
resentment often inspires wit: "It is give and take between us." But
in the case of Marius only one city publicly impeached him besides
several private individuals, while the whole Province pressed the
charges home against Classicus. He forestalled their accusation by a
sudden death which may or may not have been self-inflicted, for there
was some doubt about his dishonourable end. Men thought that though it
was quite intelligible that he should have been willing to die as he had
no defence to offer, yet they could hardly understand why he had died
rather than undergo the shame of being condemned when he was not ashamed
to commit the crime which merited the condemnation. None the less, the
Province determined to go on with the accusation of the dead man.
Provision had been made for such cases by the laws, but the custom had
fallen into disuse and it was revived then for the first time after many
years. Another argument urged by the Baetici for continuing the suit
was that they had impeached not only Classicus, but his intimates and
tools, and had demanded leave to prosecute them by name.

I was acting for the Province, assisted by Lucceius Albinus, an eloquent
and ornate speaker, and though we have long been on terms of the closest
regard for one another, our association in this suit has made me feel
vastly more attached to him. As a rule, and especially in oratorical
efforts, people do not run well in double harness in their striving for
glory, but he and I were not in any sense rivals and there was no
jealousy between us, as we both did our level best, not for our own
hand, but for the common cause, which was of such a serious character
and of such public importance that it seemed to demand from us that we
should not over-elaborate each single pleading. We were afraid that
time would fail us, and that our voices and lungs would break down if we
tied up together so many charges and so many defendants into one bundle.
Again, we feared that the attention of the judges would not only be
wearied by the introduction of so many names and charges, but that they
would be confused thereby, that the sum-total of the influence of each
one of the accused might procure for each the strength of all, and
finally we were afraid lest the most influential of the accused should
make a scapegoat of the meanest among them, and so slip out of the hands
of justice at the expense of some one else--for favour and personal
interest are strongest when they can skulk behind some pretence of
severity. Moreover, we were advised by the well-known story of
Sertorius, who set two soldiers--one young and powerful, and the other
old and weak--to pull off the tail of a horse. You know how it
finishes. And so we too thought that we could get the better of even
such a long array of defendants, provided we took them one by one.

Our plan was first to prove the guilt of Classicus himself; then it was
a natural transition to his intimates and tools, because the latter
could never be condemned unless Classicus were guilty. Consequently, we
took two of them and closely connected them with Classicus, Baebius
Probus and Fabius Hispanus, both men of some influence, while Hispanus
possesses a strong gift of eloquence. To prove the guilt of Classicus
was an easy and simple task that did not take us long. He had left in
his own handwriting a document showing what profits he had made out of
each transaction and case, and he had even despatched a letter couched
in a boasting and impudent strain to one of his mistresses containing
the words, "Hurrah! hurrah! I am coming back to you with my hands free;
for I have already sold the interests of the Baetici to the tune of four
million sesterces." But we had to sweat to get a conviction against
Hispanus and Probus. Before I dealt with the charges against them, I
thought it necessary to establish the legal point that the execution of
an unjust sentence is an indictable offence, for if I had not done this
it would have been useless for me to prove that they had been the
henchmen of Classicus. Moreover, their line of defence was not a
denial. They pleaded that they could not help themselves and therefore
were to be pardoned, arguing that they were mere provincials and were
frightened into doing anything that a proconsul bade them do. Claudius
Restitutus, who replied to me, a practised and watchful speaker who is
equal to any emergency however suddenly sprung up upon him, is now going
about saying that he never was so dumbfounded and thrown off his balance
as when he discovered that the ground on which he placed full reliance
for his defence had been cut from under him and stolen away from him.

Well, the outcome of our line of attack was as follows: the Senate
decreed that the property owned by Classicus before he went to the
Province should be set apart from that which he subsequently acquired,
and that his daughter should receive the former and the rest be handed
over to the victims of his extortion. It was also decreed that the sums
which he had paid over to his creditors should be refunded. Hispanus
and Probus were banished for five years. Such was the serious view
taken of their conduct, about which at the outset there were doubts
whether it was legally criminal at all. A few days afterwards we
accused Claudius Fuscus, a son-in-law of Classicus, and Stilonius
Priscus, who had acted under him as tribune of a cohort. Here the
verdicts differed, for while Priscus was banished from Italy for two
years, Fuscus was acquitted.

In the third action, we thought our best course was to lump the
defendants together, fearing lest, if the trial were to be spun out to
undue length, those who were hearing the case would grow sick and tired
of it, and their zeal for strict justice and severity would abate.
Besides, the accused persons, who had been designedly kept over till
then, were all of comparatively little importance, except the wife of
Classicus, and, although suspicion against her was strong, the proofs
seemed rather weak. As for the daughter of Classicus, who was also
among the defendants, she had cleared herself even of suspicion.
Consequently, when I reached her name in the last trial--for there was
no fear then as there had been at the beginning that such an admission
would weaken the force of the prosecution--I thought the most honourable
course was to refrain from pressing the charge against an innocent
person, and I frankly said so, repeating the idea in various forms. For
example, I asked the deputation of the Baetici whether they had given me
definite instructions on any point which they felt confident they could
prove against her; I turned to the senators and inquired whether they
thought I ought to employ what eloquence I might possess against an
innocent person, and hold, as it were, the knife to her throat; and,
finally, I concluded the subject with these words: "Some one may say,
'You are presuming to act as judge.' No, I reply, I am not presuming to
be a judge, but I cannot forget that the judges appointed me to act as
counsel."

Well, the conclusion of this trial, with its crowd of defendants, was
that a certain few were acquitted, but the majority were condemned and
banished, some for a fixed term of years, and others for life. In the
same decree the Senate expressed in most handsome terms its appreciation
of our industry, loyalty, and perseverance, and this was the only
possible worthy and adequate reward for the trouble we had taken. You
can imagine how worn out we were, when you think how often we had to
plead, and answer the pleadings of our opponents, and how many witnesses
we had to cross-question, encourage, and refute. Besides, you know how
trying and vexatious it is to say "no" to the friends of the accused
when they come pleading with you in private, and to stoutly oppose them
when they confront you in open court. I will tell you one of the things
I said. When one of those who were acting as judges interrupted me on
behalf of one of the accused in whom he took a special interest, I
replied: "He will be none the less innocent, if he be innocent, when I
have had my full say." You can guess from this sample what opposition
we had to face, and how we could not avoid giving offence,--but that
only lasted a short time, for though at the moment a loyal conduct of a
case may offend those whom one is opposing, in the end it wins even
their admiration and respect.

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