Lucius Seneca - Yale Required Reading - Collected Works (Vol. 2)

Petreius, when he found that Catiline, contrary to his expectations, exerted himself with great vigour, brought up the prætorian cohort against his main body, broke their ranks, and made great slaughter of them, as he did likewise of the others who maintained their ground elsewhere. Then he fell on both the wings at once. Manlius and the other office from Fæsulæ were both killed, fighting in the foremost rank. Catiline, when he saw his forces routed, and himself left with a few only, mindful of his birth and former dignity, rushed headlong into the thickest of the enemy, where he fell covered with wounds, and fighting to the last.

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When the engagement was ended, it evidently appeared with what undaunted spirit and resolution Catiline’s army was fired: for the body of every one was found on that very spot which, during the battle, he had occupied; those only excepted who were forced from their posts by the prætorian cohort; and even they, though they fell a little out of their ranks, were all wounded before. Catiline himself was found far from his own men, amid the dead bodies of the enemy, breathing a little, with an air of that fierceness still in his face which he had when alive. Finally, in all his army there was not so much as one free citizen taken prisoner, either in the engagement or in the flight; for they spared their own lives as little as those of the enemy. The army of the republic obtained the victory indeed; but it was neither a cheap nor a joyful one; for their bravest men were either slain in battle or dangerously wounded. As there were many, too, who went to view the field, either out of curiosity or a desire of plunder, in turning over the dead bodies, some found a friend, some a relation, and some a guest; others there were likewise who discovered their enemies: so that through the whole army there appeared a mixture of gladness and sorrow, joy and mourning.

1The Abbé Thyvon and M. Beauzée contend that by the word virtus, in the original, the historian obviously meant “genius, ability, distinguished talents.”

2“He alone,” says Seneca, “can be truly said to live, who devotes himself to some purpose of usefulness and activity. The man who indulges in apathy, and sinks into forgetfulness, renders his house like a sepulchre, in which he is virtually entombed.”

3The house of the Sergii, and not from that of the Cornelii, as stated by some authors.

4Cicero describes him as the most striking compound of contrary qualities; horribly depraved, but wonderfully versatile; and, if not actually possessed of virtue, yet ingenious, on every occasion, to assume its semblance, to seduce its adherents, and to turn the arts by which it is displayed to the most flagitious purposes.

5Pericles, according to Thucydides, ascribes a similar conduct to the Athenians; and the historian then adds the following reflection: “He who confers an obligation on another is ever the surest to continue steady in his friendship. The same benevolent temper which prompted him to serve his friend will generate a wish to continue the kindness, and secure his attachment. But the man who labours under the weight of an obligation experiences a feeling of far less alacrity: gratitude, with him, is not an effort of generosity, but the repayment of a debt.”

6The first senate at Rome consisted of one hundred members, chosen from among the nobles, and was called the Perpetual Council of the State.

7The profligate conduct of Sextus Tarquinius towards Lucretia, the wife of Collatinus, occasioned this revolution. The wrongs of Lucretia were avenged by the people; and her character has descended to posterity as an example of female chastity and virtue.

8When they had completed their seventeenth year, and sometimes earlier, according to Vegetius.

9The Romans bestowed the brightest rewards and the most honourable distinctions to promote valour in the field; hence they were never surpassed in acts of heroism.

10During the first five centuries they were averse to the cultivation of eloquence or literature, which, as Cicero observes, are incompatible with war and tumult, with the caprice of tyranny, or the changefulness of revolutions.

11Polybius attributes the success of the Romans to their military discipline; he says, the man who served from his rank in the day of battle was uniformly punished with death.

12Horace complains, that such was the number of princely palaces which rose at the command of the rich and great, that they threatened to abridge the labours of the husbandman; and even the fish of the sea felt their element contracted by the piles of building which were raised in it.

13The Roman laws against bribery and corruption, instituted to secure the freedom of elections, were very severe: by that of Cicero, delinquents were rendered liable to banishment for ten years.

14The particulars of Catiline’s discourse, of which it is difficult to conceive how the historian acquired any very certain information, are well imagined, and agree with Cicero’s account of the proceeding.

15Florus, Plutarch, and others seem to credit the authenticity of this circumstance.

16M. T. Cicero was the first of his family who attained to the honours of the state: he was one of the most eminent statesmen, and certainly the greatest orator, philosopher, and critic, that Rome ever produced. He was born at Arpinum, which had formerly been the birthplace of Caius Marius. This inconsiderable town may be truly said to have boasted of men who exemplified the character given by the younger Pliny of true glory, “by doing what deserved to be written, or by writing what deserved to be read.”

17Singing and dancing were not disreputable among the ancient Romans: they were practised, not only at festivals, but in religious ceremonies. The historian must therefore be understood to apply this remark to Sempronia’s want of modesty.

18Within the city, even military officers were not, by law, permitted to carry arms: the conspirators must therefore have concealed their poniards or daggers.

19One of the most eminent and virtuous patriots of this period, who greatly assisted Cicero in putting down the conspiracy.

20About 807 l. 5 s. 10 d. sterling.

21The gladiators were men selected from among condemned malefactors, captives, unmanageable slaves, and other ruffians, who were trained to fight for the entertainment of the people. These combats were first exhibited by the sons of Brutus, at the funeral of their father; and the custom seems to have originated in the superstitious notion that the manes of the deceased were appeased, and rendered propitious, by the spilling of human blood. As the Romans were delighted with such exhibitions, they were not long confined to funerals, but restored to on almost every public occasion; and a taste for these bloody spectacles continued to prevail down to the time of Constantine, when it yielded, at length, to the mild spirit of Christianity. But shows of gladiators were not completely suppressed until the reign of Honorius.

22This was the first of his celebrated orations against Catiline, which was pronounced without premeditation, and gives a high idea of the readiness and genius of the great orator. The feelings of Cicero were, with good reason, strongly excited: the state of the city; his own personal danger; the daring attack on his house, made but the morning before; the presence of some of the conspirators; all conspired to raise his indignation to the highest pitch.

23Plutarch confirms the account given by Sallust of the manner in which Catiline received this tremendous attack; and adds, that when he entered the senate, and took his seat, none of the members remained on that side of the house.