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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	desire_v	excellent_a	great_a	117	3	2.1041	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A90783	Pliny's panegyricke: a speech in Senate: wherein publike thankes are presented to the Emperour Traian, / by C. Plinius Cæcilius Secundus Consul of Rome. Translated out of the originall Latin, illustrated with annotations, and dedicated to the prince, by Sr Rob. Stapylton Knight, Gent. in Ordinary of the Privy Chamber to His Highnesse.; Panegyricus. English	Pliny, the Younger.; Stapylton, Robert, Sir, d. 1669.	1645 (1645)	Wing P2579; Thomason E283_5; ESTC R200055	90,710	86

teaches them to know that he understands what hee gives that they may likewise know what they receive Therefore with more justice the Senate beseeches and commands you to accept of the fourth Consulshippe 't is the suite of the Empire not of flatterie credit your former obedience that a greater favour the Senate neither can desire nor you bestow For as in others so in Princes that are Gods life is short and fraile therefore it behoves every excellent man to endeavour and strive to serve the Republique after death by leaving behinde him the monuments of justice and moderation which a Consul may best erect This indeed is your intention to repeale and reduce libertie What honor therfore should you more affect or what title oftner assume then that which by recovered f After the expulsion of the Tarquins the Romanes agreed upon two yearly Officers first called Praetors then Judges lastly Consuls Rosinus Ant. Rom. l. 7. c. 9. libertie was first invented 'T is not more noble to be both Prince and Consul then Consul only You likewise have regard to the modestie of your Colleagues your Colleagues I say for so you your selfe doe intitle them and it is your pleasure that we doe so too the memorie of their owne third Consulship would have oppressed them untill they had seene your fourth for it cannot be but too much for a private man which a Prince thinks enough You Caesar condescend and according to the greatnesse of your power you still grant us our praiers as the Gods grant yours Perhaps with your third Consulshippe you could rest contented but we so much the lesse it makes us repeate and redouble our requests that you will againe be Consul We should be more cold in our suite if we knew not how you would prove It had beene better to have denied us the experience of you then the use Shall we once more be so happy as to see him Consul Shall he againe heare and speake the same and give as much joy as he receives Shall he commaund in chiefe the Publique Jubily whereof he is the cause and end Shall he as formerly endeavour to restraine our affections nor have power to doe it Betwixt the Senate's pietie and the Princes modestie the combat is glorious which so ever conquers or is conquered Truely I conceive there will be yet an unknown joy for who hath so weake a fancy but he must imagine him by how much the oftner by so much the better Consul Another if he had not given himselfe over to sloath and pleasure would yet have refreshed his labours with rest and idlenesse This when he was respited from his Consular resumed his Princely cares so regardfull of just temper that neither the Consul's Office enterfeired with the Princes nor this check't the Consul's We see how he satisfies the desires of the Provinces with recruiting their Garrisons and securing every particular City No difficulty in giving audience no delay in returning answeres They are immediatly admitted immediatly dismissed and at length the Princes doores are not besieged with crowdes of wayting Petitioners What his whole comportment how gentle his severity how judicious his mercy You sate not to inrich the Exchequer nor had your sentence any end but Justice Those that dispute their rights and titles stand before you not so carefull to preserve their fortunes as your estimation nor so much fearing your censure of their cause as of their manners How like a Prince it is how like a Consul to reconcile emulous Cities and to calme swelling nations not so much by command as reason To cure the iniquitie of Magistrates and to undoe things that ought not to have beene done In short like the swiftest of the Planets to see all things heare all things and wheresoever invocated instantly like a God to be present and assistant Such Orders I beleeve are given by the creator of the world when he pleaseth to cast his eyes upon the earth and to number among his divine works the actions of mortall creatures a care you now discharge while he disposes the heaven having to the race of men appointed you for his Vicegerent And you are such a Vicegerent as best pleases your great master since every day ends with our greatest benefit and your praise But when at any time you make even with influent businesses you esteeme the change of Labour a kinde of recreation For what is your recreation but to ride abroad to rowse wilde beasts out of their dennes to climbe up mighty mountaines and to set foot on horrid rocks without the helpe either of the hand or track of man and as occasion presents it selfe religiously to visit the g Woods were accounted sacred places by the Romans who had scarce any Temple without an adjoyning grove where they beleived the Deities would give meetings to their favorites as Aegeria had done to their King Numa woods and there to reverence the deities This was of old the experience of our youth this was their pleasure in these h Of hunting Xenophon sayes that by unting health is preserved men's bodies excellently trained for the wars and that hence they come to be both good Souldiers and Generalls The most famous Huntsmen were Cephalus Aesculapius Melanion Nestor Theseus Hippolitus Palamed Vlisses Mnestheus Diomed Castor Pollux Adonis Machaon Podalirius Antilo●hus Achilles Aeneas exercises were our future Generalls trained up to contend in speed with the swiftest beast in strength with the fiercest in stratagem with the subtilest Nor was it accounted a meane ornament of peace to cleare the fields from the irruptions of wild beasts and to relieve the Husbandman's besieged labours This glory likewise was usurped by those Princes that could not attaine it and so usurped that the beasts were dislodged to their hands as artificially as if they had forced them from their trenches being turned loose to the triumph of a fained victory Our Prince sweates as much in hunting as in killing them and takes great but pleasing paines to find them out And if sometimes he hath pleased to carry the same strength on Shipboard he followes not the streaming sailes with his eyes or hands but now sits at the helme now contends with the ablest of his mates to breake the waves to tame the strugling winds and to cut through the opposition of the sea How different was i Domitian he that could not brooke the stillnesse of the Alban k It was no mervaile he intimated formerly that Domitian feared to passe a ford in Danubius or the Rhene with his Army when it seemes he durst not trust himselfe in a boate to the smoothest of his owne country waters Lake nor the tranquillity and silence of the Port at Baiae not being able to indure the least shake or sound of oares but at every stroake they made trembling with sordid feare therefore all noise removed with sailes furled and sleeping oares himselfe not so much as moving he was carried like

inclination to rebellion giving them for a pious pretext the specious colour of doing justice upon the conspiratours against Domitian not including Nerva in the number for they knew him innocent but only requiring the lives of all that were actors in their masters death to whom Nerva had given a Prince's word for the indemnity of their persons which surely is a sufficient 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet to take away all Scruple which might breed jealousies and consequently cause disturbances of the publicke peace he had likewise past his oath to an Act of Oblivion in Senate But the Prince's Act shall not binde them against their Captaines Protestation Casperius is their Legislator and according to his Fundamentalls they oppose the knowne Law and clamour to have Domitian's murtherers brought to condigne punishment that is they declare themselves judges of the matter of fact and in the same moment appeare as executioners and were a great deale fitter for this office Nerva withstands them and when he sees no perswasion can prevaile offers his owne bosome naked to their fury that death might free him of his promise But this was no part of their instructions by which they punctually proceed and execute all the men their Prefect had mark't out for slaughter Nerva now finding that old-age rendred him contemptible to the souldier not having an heire of his owne considers only that which Electours ought only to consider merit and having pitcht upon the man that already ruled in all mens hearts he went to the Temple of Jupiter Capitolin and in the presence of a great multitude that followed him uttered these words Bona fortuna Senatûs Populique Romani mei ipsius Marcum Ulpium Trajanum Nervam adopto May it be happy to the Senate and People of Rome and to my selfe I adopt Marcus Ulpius Trajan Nerva Thus giving Trajan his name and adopting him for his sonne in the Capitol he immediately transferred his Soveraignty and declared him Emperour in Senate Nothing now wanted to perfect the reestablishment of the late endangered Empire but only to provide that an example of rebellion so destructive to government might not with impunity be past over by his sonnes calmer temper I should wrong Nerva to conceive that his revenge could have any end but the publicke good for had he beene vindicative he had not suffered Crassus with the other Conspirators against his owne life to escape unpunished whom be was so farre from hindring in their intentions towards him that as they sate with him beholding the shewes presented in the Circus he made swords be brought them and sayd Inspicite si acuti sint Looke if they be sharpe plainely signifying as Dion observes that he cared not how soone they would dispatch him Without controversie therefore it was the Empire not himselfe he sought revenge for writing with his owne hand to Trajan these words of Chrysis Apollo's preist In Homer praying to his God against the barbarous Greekes that denyed him his daughter's freedome upon ransome tendered Iliad 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let thy shafts make the Greekes repent my teares Every line in Homer was then by the Romans accounted sacred I am sure this proved propheticall for Trajan after his Father Nerva's decease sent for Aelianus and his Praetorians who came expecting great imployment which they deserved not and found the ignominious death which they deserved Nor did the Emperour Trajan only do exemplary justice upon rebellious Subjects but likewise punished a revolted Prince Decebalus Kings of Dacia who had formerly by his Embassadours sued for Peace and himselfe in Person prostrate at Trajan's feete accepted such conditions as he pleased to give viz. to lay downe armes to yeild up his Engins and Engineeres to deliver Fugitives to slight all workes to demolish all Fortifications to depart from the lands he had intrenched upon to esteeme those freinds or Enemies that were so accounted by the Romans In pursuance hereof after Trajan's returne to Italy the Dacian Embassadours come to Rome and are admitted into the Senate where yeilding up their armes and joyning their hands after the manner of servants they supplicate in few words and so the peace being confirmed their armes are returned them this done Trajan triumphes for his conquest over the Dacians and is stiled Dacicus But Decebalus cannot sit quiet nature custode potentior omni struggles to shake off the Roman fetters to which he lately had submitted for he being as Dion delivers him ingenious and of great experience in the warre nimble to invade or to retreate if need required one that knew excellently how to lay ambushes and to give battaile to use a victory to his best advantage and moderately to beare an overthrow and having so often fought with the Romans and evaded even their victories by his stratagems relying upon his owne abilities and conceiving that Trajan whose person he more feared then his armies being now warme in the pleasures of Rome would hardly venture backe into the Dacian frost and snow he breakes all the articles of peace takes up armes entertaines fugitives fortifies by his Embassadours sollicits his neighbours to revolt and allready had possessed himselfe of some of the country of the Jaziges now the territory of Sibenburghen This newes the Senate had when the Consul Pliny made this Oration to Trajan whose spirits he so inflamed against that King for his contempt of the Empire that he would not substitute any Generall but undertooke the warre against Decebalus in person and to accelerate the worke caused a stupendious bridge to be built over Danubius in such a part of the river where the torrent was so strong that there was no turning of the water the Bridge consisted of 20 piles or pillars of squared stone every piller not reckoning the foundations being 150 foote long 60 foote broad distant from one another 170 foot and arched above Passing his army at this bridge he fought securely with incredible celerity and at last with much difficulty conquered Decebalus seeing his palaces and Kingdome possessed by the enemy and fearing his owne turne would be next slew himselfe and though he had according to his usuall subtlety turned a river to hide his wealth and drawne backe the streame againe for more security causing the servants he had imployed in it to be put to death yet all that vast treasure came to Trajan's hands being confessed by Bicilis after the fate of his great freind Decebalus whose head was brought to Rome and Dacia by Trajan made a Roman Colony Secondly Because Pliny through the whole frame of his Panegyrick illustrates Trajan's virtues by comparing them with Domitian's vices lest you suspect him to be a flatterer for praising a good Prince eloquently or thinke him a detractour for no lesse eloquently dispraising a bad I shall give you the characters of both those Emperours as I finde them in the most authenticke Histories and first of the first in priority of time Domitian was a bold

seedes in a soft bosome and restore them multiplyed not that we demand interest yet let them thinke themselves bound to pay it and let the defrauded expectation of one yeare for all future yeares and ages excuse it selfe so much the more because we exact it not The necessity of your subjects and allies being provided for you make us spectators of no weake no idle b Trajan set forth showes that continued 123 dayes wherein sometimes were slain 1000 beastes wilde tame sometimes ten thousand likewise ten thousand Gladiators fought together Dion Shew that may effeminate mens mindes but such as may beget a love of handsome wounds and a contempt of death when they behold a desire of prayse and ambition of victory even in the bodies of slaves and men condemned to die In setting forth this Show how great your bounty and your justice eyther untouched or above the power of passion We obtayned what we asked nay that was offered us we asked not and he himselfe was earnest with us to preferre our desires but so likewise we had many sudden and unexpected sights Then how free was the beholders liking how secure their favor no impiety as formerly objected unto any that he hated a sword-player no spectator made a c Made a Bestiarius so they called them that fought with wilde beasts or forced to be a Gladiator as Proculus whom they say because he was very handsome C. Caligula cōmanded him to bee taken from the sword-play which hee sate beholding and compelled him ' th lists first to fight with a Thracian then with one armed at all peeces and Proculus having conquered both Domitian made him be stript bound put into rags shewed to the Ladies and then executed spectacle payed for his miserable pleasure dragged by the hooke unto the fier d Domitian Hee was a mad man and ignorant of true honour that gathered up high treason from the sand within the lists interpreting that his Deity was despised and contemned unlesse we adored his gladiators and that malignants in them blasphemed his power and divinity accounting himselfe the same with the Gods and his gladiators the same with himselfe But you Caesar how faire a shew have you made us in stead of that execrable one We see judgement passed upon informers such as upon out-lawes such as upon theeves They lately were scattered not in e As in Juv. Sat. 4. For such a Turbut who durst sell or buy So many Inquisitors and Informers nigh These Sea-weeds scattered on the shore unfrequented places but in the f The Temple of Saturne thought the fittest place for the publique Treasury sayes Alex. Neop because Saturn first invented brazen money but with relation to the in egrity of the Golden Age when Saturne reigned sayth Plutarch Temple and the Courts of justice then no Testament would stand good no condition be secure neither the childlesse nor the parent The avarice of Princes added to this evill you tooke notice of it and as before to the Feilds so you now restored peace to the g The Forum Romanum containing the Temple of Saturne with the Comitium or Justice-hall the Rostra or pulpits for Oration c. Forum you cut off this civill gangrene and by provident severity tooke order that the Citie established by law should not by Law be ruin'd Notwithstanding therfore that aswell your fortune as your bounty hath bestowed and still bestowes upon us now mighty bodies of men with equall spirits now the hugenesse of wilde beasts now their tamenesse never known before now those h Hoorded by Domitian bestowed on the publique and upon the Gods by Trajan Martial l. 12. What in th' Atcadian Palace shin'd is to our eyes and Gods assign'd And now with Jove we all are blest But late alas when 't is confest Into our cheekes 't will blushes call We with poore Jove were beggers all hidden and secret treasures first under you made publique yet nothing is more pleasing to us nothing more worthy of the age then what is added to these shews the sight of Informers dragged through the streets with supine faces and necks wryed about we saw and joyed when as Sacrifices to expiate the solitude they had caused they were drawne along with slowe and grieuous tortures They were crowded aboard ships pressed upon the suddain and delivered over to the Tempests that should send them away and tosse them from the continent wasted and made desolate by their informations and if the stormes and billowes should reserve any for the rocks he should inhabit the naked stones and the inhospitable shore and live hardly and painfully tormented with the remembrance of his being put out of the common protection of mankinde A memorable sight the Informers fleete exposed to all windes constreined to spread their sayles to embrace Tempests and to goe along with the angry waves till they dashed them on a Rock Oh t was a gallant prospect from the Port to see that navy scattered and in the very Sea thanking the Prince that preserving his clemencie had commended the revenge of the earth men unto the sea-gods How much diversitie of times could doe is now especially known when to the same i In the Islands of the Cyclades to which the Roman Emperors banished many noble persons Juv. Sat. 13. Or to the Aegaean rocks that entertaine great exiles Rocks where formerly every innocent person now only the guilty are confined and all those desert Islands which late were filled with Senators are now planted with Informers which you have not only taken away for the present but suppressed for ever making them lyable to a thousand penalties Doe any goe about to cheate others of their money they must lose their owne would they out us from our houses they must from theirs be outed Nor as formerly doe they hold forth that bloodlesse and brazen forehead to bee marked with a cold k Pointing to the act of Domitian who grievously puished the Informers of the Chequer but incouraged thē notwithstanding iron laughing and never hurt when they are stigmatized but they see dammages paid answereable to the gayn that was expected so as they cannot have greater hopes then terrors nor bee feared more then they feare With a noble soule did the divine Titus looke upon our security and revenge and we therefore deified him but how much more a long time hence will you be worthy heaven that have added so many things to those for which we have made him a God and it was so much the harder because the Emperor l Who banished Informers from the City Dion Nerva most worthy to have you for his son you for his successor by making so many superstructures to Titus his Edict against Informers seem'd to leave nothing for you to doe who have so much enlarged it as if nothing had been done before The dispensation of each particular whereof how gracious would it have shewed you but you poured

flourishing You merit highly Caesar not onely of men but even of houses to arrest ruine to expell solitude and vindicate great workes from destruction with the same gallant soule wherewith they first were built Even those mute and senselesse creatures seeme to have a sense of joy that they are neate that they are frequented that at last they belong to a Lord not to a servant d Traian Caesar authorizes a vast Inventory of those goods to be exposed to sale that were the detested avarice of him e Domit●an that coveted so much when he had so much superfluous Then it was f Rich men as I have formerly noted being sentenced onely for being rich and consequently dangerous to the S●ate death to have a larger house a fairer Villa Now the Prince himselfe seekes out and brings Lords into the selfe same houses Those sometimes g N ro's Gardens gardens of a mighty Emperour that no bodies but Caesars h He understands not the very Suburbs of Rome but the Towne of Alba distant from the City 140 furlongs where Domitan usually kept his Court. suburbs we bargaine for buy and people it So great is the Princes goodnesse so great the security of the times that he thinkes us worthy of imperiall possessions and we feare not to be thought so Nor doe you onely grant your Subjects leave to purchase but you give bestow upon them many handsome and beneficiall things those very things I meane to which you were chosen to which you were adopted you transferre what was judiciously made over to you and you beleive nothing to be more your owne then what you enjoy by the proxy of your freinds You your selfe are as thrifty in building as carefull in preserving Therefore the City is not with the carriages i Juv. paints out these carriages exactly Sta. 3. Now meets he car●s where the tall firre-trees quake Now some that pine-trees at the people shake Suppose the axel-tree should breake that beares Ligurian stones if pour'd about his eares That mountaine should thy shiver'd slave intombe What think'st thou of his carcasse would become Where any limbe lyes who can find the hole His body sure would vanish l ke h s soule of monstrous stones as formerly put into an earthquake our houses now stand safe nor are our temples feaverish It seemes you thinke that which you received as successour to a most frugall Prince to be enough and too much for you that you can part with some of that he left as necessary Besides your Father when he debarred himselfe of what the fortune of the Empire gave him did it safely because he was k Yours that would have provided for your father Nerva if he had given away all as he did a great part of his possessions your Father But how magnificent are you towards the publicke Here Ports there Temples are dispatched with that secret speed as one would thinke them not built but repaired onely here those vast flankers of the l In their great Show-place the Circus the Romanes beheld horse-matches coach-races sword-play with all kinds of presentments It was at first flanked with pent-houses for the Spectatours then galleried about with 30 distinct Fori by Tarquinius Priscus and now beautified and inlarged with five thousand benches by Traian with this Inscription vt populo Romano sufficeret Dion Circus that compare in beauty with the temples It is now a show-place worthy the Conquerours of the world it selfe being a sight no lesse rare then what from thence is seene But to behold the Architecture shewes not fairer then to behold the Princes and peoples benches of the selfe same modell since there is now in the whole fabricke but one face all even and equall Nor is Caesars seat more his owne then the spectatours seates are theirs You therefore and your Subjects freely view one another They have not the honour now to see the Princes private box but to see the Prince himselfe sitting among his people his people on whom he hath bestowed the addition of five thousand benches for you have here increased their number as you did in the Congiary and have thus likewise encouraged them to multiply themselves hereafter confident of your Magnificence If one of these Princely gifts had been vouchsafed by another he had long since worne a glory on his head circled about with sun beames his throne of gold or Ivory had beene set among the Gods and invocation made unto him on higher altars and with greater sacrifices You come not into the Temple but to pray the honours you let your Statues have is to waite without the Temple to stand centrie for the Gods and to bee preferred before the marble pillars So the Gods with greatest reverence are adored by men since you have not aspired to be a God Therefore in the porch of Jupiter the best and greatest we see one or two of your Statues and those brasse but not long agoe every doore every steppe the whole pavement of the Temple shined or rather was polluted with gold and silver when the Images of the Gods were grown sordid by mixing with the statues of an m Domitian who as I have noted lived in incest with his Niece Julia. incestuous Prince Therefore your brazen ones and those but few remaine and shall remaine so long as the Temple it selfe continues but their golden ones and those innumerable are ruin'd and dyed Sacrifices to the publique joy 'T was gallant sport to knock the ground and those proud heads together to pick holes in them with swords to hew them with hatchets as if at every stroake blood and paine had beene to follow None at the too late arrivall of his comforts was so modest in his joy but he thought it a kind of revenge to see their torne limbes their dismembred joynts Lastly their cruell and horrid Images cast into the flame and n This melting of Statues for use Juv. describes Sat. 10. Their Chariot-wheeles groane under th'Axes stroke And ev'n their Innocent horses legs are broke The fire to crackling flames the bellowes turnes The head adored by the people burnes The great Sejanus melts and of the face Which of the whole world had the second place Basins and Ewres Pots Frying-pans are made melted their terrour and threatning changed and fitted for man's use and pleasure With like reverence to the Deity you Caesar will not suffer us to give thanks for your goodnesse to your Genius in your o As Domitian commanded who caused a woman to be put to death for undressing her selfe before his Statues Dion who saies he filled the world with his silver and golden statues but concludes as Pliny here that they were broke and sold and a vast sum of money raysed out of their conflation statues but to the divinity of Jupiter the best and greatest what we are indebted to you we pay to him and acknowledge your well doing to be his gift that