step-father but a Prince adopted you into his family the same minde made divine Nerva to become your father that made him father of us all nor ought a sonne to be otherwise assumed that is assumed by a Prince Were you to transferre the Armyes Provinces and Confederates of Rome would you choose a successour out of your wives bosome and only look for an adoptive heire to the supreme power on earth within the wals of your owne house would you not cast your eyes upon the City esteem him your nearest Kinsman him your dearest friend whom you found best and likest to the Gods He that must be chosen to command all ought to be chosen out of all For you are not then to give your servants a master that you must leave them to your a There are in the Imperiall Law three sorts of heires The extraneus et voluntarius who being a stranger may accept or refuse to be heir The Servant who is necessarius et involuntarius for he hath not the liberty of refusing And the sonne in potestate patris who is necessarius et suus bound to be Heir by Law but if he appeale to the Praetour may free himselfe in Equity necessary Heire But you an Emperour are to bequeath a Prince to Rome It were Pride and Tyranny to adopt any but one who you know must governe if you had not adopted him This Nerva did conceiving no difference betwixt generation and election if children should be chosen with no more judgement then they are begotten save onely that the people with more patience suffer the unhappy issue then the ill choice of Princes He therefore carefully declined this errour nor men onely but even the Gods likewise were of counsell with him not therefore in the b Where Livia and Agrippina had wrought their second husbands Augustus and Claudius to adopt their first husbands sons Tiberius and Nero. bed-chamber but in the Temple not before the Geniall pillow but before the cushion of Jupiter the Best Greatest was the Election past whereon at length not our servitude but our liberty and preservation and security is founded For the Gods challenge to themselves this glory it was their worke it was their command Nerva was but their Minister both as well he that elected as you that were elected shewed your obedience A c Letters of Trajan's victory over the Pannonians or Hungarians it being the Roman custome to stick Laurell in Pacquets containing newes of conquest and feathers in such as mentioned overthrowes as I have noted in the end of the 4. Sat. of Iuven. Lawrell was brought out of Pannonia the Gods intending to honour the Inauguration of our invincible Emperour with a marke of his owne victory This the Emperour Nerva stuck in Jupiters bosome when on the suddaine there being a greater and more reverend assembly then usuall both of men and Gods he assumed you for his sonne that is for the support of his ruinous Empire From thenceforth with what securitie with what glory did he enjoy himselfe having laid downe his Soveraignty For what difference whether Soveraignty be laid downe or divided onely this is the more difficult Then leaning as it were upon you with your shoulders he supported himselfe and Rome with your youth with your strength he recovered his immediately the tumult ceased which was not the worke of the adoption but of the adopted and therefore Nerva had done rashly had he pitched on any other Do we forget that lately after an adoption the sedition ended not but began It had beene a provocation to their fury a firebrand to the tumult unlesse it had fallen on you Who knowes not that Emperour cannot give away his Empire that hath lost his reverence This was effected by your authority upon whom it was bestowed You were made a Sonne Caesar Emperour and Collegue of the Tribunitian power all these together which not long since a reall d Vespasian who is here called reall to distinguish him from an adoptive father father conferred by parcells only upon e Titus who only was admitted by his father Vesp and that at severall times to triumph with him to be his Collegue in seven Consulships his fellow Censour and Tribune and to signe letters and edicts with his name yet Vespasian had another sonne such as he was Domitian one of his owne sonnes A mighty argument it was of your moderation that you did not only please when you were a successour but when you were a sharer companion in the Empire for you must have been his successor whether you would or not but his companion not unlesse you pleased Will posterity beleive that one who had a Patrician Consular and Triumphall f How Trajan's father merited his Triumph Consulship see the Preface father being himselfe Generall of a strong mighty affectionate Armie was not by that Army created Emperour To whom when he commanded in chiefe our German Legions the name of g Conquerour of the Germanes This Inscription in Trajan's coine Iuvenal commemorates Sat. 6. in the Brides first night 's present when shining in rich plate she must behold Dacian and German Caesar cut in gold How the other stile of Dacicus was decreed him see the preface Germanicus was sent from hence he doing nothing to make himselfe Emperour but onely that he deserved and obeyed for Caesar you obeyed and came to your Soveraignty by duty you never did any thing more with the mind of a Subject then when you became a Prince Now you are made Caesar now Emperour now Germanicus in your absence without your knowledge and after all these titles in what concernes your selfe a private man It would seeme strange if I should say you knew not you should be an Emperour you were an Emperour and knew it not When the Messenger of your Fortune came you had rather have continued what you were but it was not in your power ought not a Subject to obey his Prince a Lieutenant his Generall a sonne his father or else where were discipline where the precedents shewed us by our Progenitors of undergoing contentedly whatsoever their Generals enjoyned What if he had commanded you from Province to Province from warre to warre Do you thinke he cannot use the same authority to recall you to the Empire that he used when he sent you to the Armies no difference whether he command you to go forth the Emperours Lieutenant Generall or to returne Emperour save onely that the glory of his obedience is the more who does a thing against his will It increased the authority of the Commander that his authority had beene so dangerously disputed and it made you more h Good subjects the more they see others faile in their obedience the more do they their duty inclinable to obedience because you sawe others so averse Besides you heard the consent of the Senate and the People That election was not onely Nerva's Judgement for wheresoever there
them forth all together as the Sun and Day whose light appeares not in part but in whole nor to one or two but to all the world in common What a blessing is it to behold the treasury silent and quiet and such as it was before there were Informers Now the God is truely there now it is a Temple not the spoliarie of the Citizens and receptacle of cruell and bloody plunder In the whole orbe of the earth there is yet one place where under a good Prince the good are too hard for the wicked Yet still the honour of the Law remaines nothing is taken off from the publique benefit nor the penalty remitted to any one but our revenge is added and herein the change consists that now not the Informers but the Lawes are feared But peradventure you restraine not your Exchequer with the same severitie as you doe our Treasury yes so much the more as you beleeve you may take a farther liberty in what concernes your selfe than in what concernes the publique 'T is said to your m Actor and Procuratour were Officers of the Exchequer as this place imports and the Procurator the greater who was the Advocate or Judge Fiscall and the Actor as I suppose the Emperour's Attourney generall Actor and likewise to your Procurator come into the Court appeare at the Tribunall for a Tribunall is now set up that vexeth them equall with others more if you measure their torments by the greatnesse of their qualities The lot and n Lots inscribed with names were put into an Urne for the choyce of Roman Magistrats in imitation whereof at this day the Venetians have balls urne assigne a judge to the Chequer-chamber 't is lawfull to reject him 't is lawfull to cry I will have none of this hee is a timerous man and understands not well the goodnesse of the times I will have none of him because hee too passionately loves Caesar principality and liberty use the same Lawe And which is your chiefe glory the Exchequer is often foiled whose cause is never ill but under a good Prince A mighty merit this but that farre greater that you have those Procurators as commonly your Subjects desire no other Judges though it be free for any that disputes his title to say I will have another Judge for you annex no necessity to your gifts as knowing the highest grace of Princes favors is if wee likewise may not use them The burdens of government compell decrees of divers Taxes which as they are a benefit to the generality so they are an injury to particulars Among these the o When Augustus had taken an account of the multitude of Roman Armies finding much money requisite for the maintenance of all those foote and horse he ordained that all inheritances or Legacies left by will to any save to the neerest of blood to the poore should pay the twentieth part as if hee had found this tribute written in Caesar's Commentaries Dion twentieth part was pitched upon a tribute only tolerable and easie to p Strangers that had no relation of blood extraneous heires but a grievance to domestick Upon them it is therefore q Ausonius mentions some of the twentieth part to be retained by Trajan and tells us tha◠Gratian remitted the whole imposed unto those remitted For as much as it was manifest with how much griefe men would suffer or rather men would not suffer any thing to be pared and shaved off from those goods which by descent and sacred affinitie they had deserved and which they never accounted as other mens estates and as fortunes to be hoped for but as their owne as things ever possessed and still to be transmitted to the next of blood This courtesie of the Law was reserved only for the old denizons of Rome but the new ones whether they came in by the right of r jus Latij the right of Latium priviledged those Aliens that obtained it from taxes Paulus de censibus F. l. and likewise put them into a capacity of being Magistrates Latium or by the favour of the Prince unlesse they had therewith granted to them the right of kindred the Law looked upon them as greatest strangers where they were most neare of kinne Thus the greatest right was turned into the greatest injury and the City of Rome was like to hatred discord and privation of children since by it the nearest alliances notwithstanding their pietie were disjoyned yet some were found to beare so great affection to our name that they held the twentith part the losse of their affinities fully recompensed with the title of Citizens of Rome but it ought freeliest to have been conferr'd upon those by whom it was so highly valued It was therefore Decreed by your Father that what out of the mothers goods came to the children out of the childrens to the mother though they had not received the right of ſ It appeares plainly that the stranger notwithstanding his Indenization was not freed from Augustus his Edict for the twentieth part unlesse hee had sued forth the right of kindred till Nerva dispensed with it cognation when they were made Citizens of Rome should not be liable to pay the twentieth part the same immunity he granted to the sonne in the goods of his Father in case he were reduced into his fathers t A sonne was reduced into his fathers power two waies eith erif being freed emancipated by his Father he did returne of his owne accord or jure postliminij if being taken prisoner by the enemy he came back to his Country for that set him instatuquo and his father might be his heyre as before h s emancipation power thinking it unhonest and insolent almost impious to put taxes vpon these relations nor that without a kinde of sacriledg these holy tyes could be cut in sunder by the interposition of the twentith part And that no necessary tax ought to be so pressed as to make Fathers and Children strangers Thus farr he perhaps more sparingly then became the best Prince but not more sparingly then became the best Father that being to adopt the Best in this likewise as a most indulgent parent was content to beginne or rather but to shew the way reservinge for his sonne a large and almost untouched matter of well-doing Immediately therefore to his bounty your liberality added that as the sonne in the fathers so the father should be priviledged in the sonnes inheritance nor in the same mōent that he ceased to be a Father should he lose his having beene one You haue done excellently Caesar not to suffer the fathers teares to be tributary The father possesses his sonnes goods without diminution nor hath he a partner in his inheritance that hath no partner in his sorrow None calls to account the fresh bleeding and astonishing losse of Children compelling the Father to set forth what the sonne left Our Prince's guift appeares greater when I shew
this reason for his bounty For it may be accounted ambition vaine glory and profusenesse and any thing rather then liberality that is not consonant to reason It was worthy therefore your compassion Caesar to lessen the affliction of parents now growne childlesse nor to suffer any that hath lost his sonne to be stricken with another greife because t' is misery enough for a father to be sole heyre to his sonne what if he haue a Coheyre not of his sonnes naming Besides when divine Nerva had decreed that for their fathers estates the children should be free from payment of the twentith part it was congruous and fit that the same freedome should be granted to parents in their sonnes estates for why should children receive more honour then Progenitours and why should not the same equity ascend You Caesar haue taken away that exception in case the sonne be in his fathers power having an eye as I conceive to the force and law of nature that ordereth children to be for ever in the power of parents nor giveth among men as among beasts the power and command to the stronger Neither was our Prince content to priviledge the first degree of blood from the twentith part he likewise exempts the second with a proviso that the brother in his sisters goods and the sister in her brothers that the vncle and aunt in their nephewes and neices estates and contrarily should remaine untaxable And to those that by the Right of Latium were free of Rome he graunted the same privilege and rejoyned the rights of kindreds according to the course of nature For which favours former Princes put particular persons to petition not so much with intention to grant as to deny them Whence we may understand how great an act of bounty and noblenesse it was to collect and bind vp our scattered and as I may call them dilacerated familyes to regraft and bid them as it were to spring a fresh freely to offer what had beene denyed and give to all at once what often severally they could not obteyn Lastly to barre himselfe of so many occasions of doing favour and such a copious subject for obligation to the thankfull and imputation to the ingratefull I conceive he thought it unfitting for men to aske what the Gods had given You are sisters and brothers grandfathers and grandchildren why should you because you are so be impoverished with a tax your relations are your privileges The Emperour according to the rest of his princely moderation thinks it a matter of no lesse envy to grant vpoÌ„ petition your own inheritances to you then to take theÌ„ from you With alacrity therefore stand for honour sue for office let this blocke of lopt-off kindred ly in no mans way all shall enjoy the same proximity of blood they did before but in a better manner The remotest degree of late-ceasing affinity shall not be compelled to pay in the least quantity of the twentith part For our common v Trajan the father of his Country parent hath set downe a summe that is able to beare a tax The twentith part shall not lye heavie upon a small and weake estate nay if the gratefull heyre so please he may reserve it all for the sepulchre all for the funeralls no assistant no superintendent to oversee him For whatsoever consideration his legacy was left him he may securely injoy and quietly * For that purpose to bestow it upon the Funeralls of the bequeather possesse the mony The law of the twentith part is now so penned that there is no coming within compasse of it but by a great estate injustice is turned into joy and an injury into a longing the heyre wishes the honour of paying the twentith part It is likewise enacted by the same Edict that they who owe and have not payed the twentith part should not bring it in Truly the time past the Gods themselves cannot help yet you have helped it and provided that now they should cease to owe what they should not owe hereafter You have done that puts us into such a Condition as if we never had suffered under evill Princes and how willingly if it were possible would the same goodnesse of your nature to so many ruined and murthered men restore their blood and fortunes You have forbid the exaction of what begunne not to be due in your owne reigne Another to shew his fury against the contumacious would have punished slownesse of payment with a double nay a quadruple fine You esteeme it equall injustice either to exact what is unjust or to decree it You take upon you Caesar the Consul's care and solicitude for when I consider that you alone have remitted our asseissments given the donative offered the Congiary banished Informers mitigated our taxes methinks I should put the question to you have you sufficiently cast up the revenues of the Empire or is there such vertue in the frugality of a Prince as that alone can be sufficient for so much expense so much munificence for what can be the reason why other Princes when they catched at all we had and having caught retained it as if they had got nothing wanted all things you when you bestow so much and take away nothing yet have all things in aboundance Princes yet never wanted those that with sowre lookes and supercilious gravitie were peremptory for the profits of the Exchequer Even Princes themselves of their owne inclinations were sufficiently Coveteous rapacious needed no instructours Yet still they learned many things of us against our selves But your eares as they are obstructed to all insinuations so cheifly avaritious flattery can have no accesse Therefore Informers are silent and quiet and after there is none to be perswaded there is none that offers to perswade Thus are we infinitely obliged to you both for your goodnesse and our owne The x The Voconian Law forbad a woman though an only daughter as S. Aug. 3. de Civ Det. to be heyre to an estate that Iulian Law which he meant for there were many forbad adultery upon paine of death and w s revived by Domitian that lived in Incest see Iuv. Sat. 2. Voconian and Iulian lawes did not so much inrich the Treasury and Exchequer as that one and only crime of high treason in the y Domitian to inrich his coffers found many upon strange Impeachments guilty of high treason some meerly because th y had gathered excâ—ssive wealth which begot disdaine made them hold their heads high and be disobedient to the Lawes one because in his publike prayers for Domitian he did not stile him Sonne to Pallas another because he went into an Island as if he had killed his Fathe Philostratus l. 7. innocent The fright whereof you have absolutely taken away not being jealous of your greatnesse which none hath wanted more then they that made majesty a terrour Fidelity is returned to freinds piety to children duty to servants they feare and obey
Charles by the grace of God Prince of Wales Duke of Cornwell etc. G G PLINY'S Panegyricke A Speech in Senate Wherein publike thankes are presented to the EMPEROUR TRAIAN By C. Plinius Caecilius 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 OXFORD Printed in the yeare 1644. TO THE HIGH AND MIGHTIE PRINCE CHARLES PRINCE OF GREAT BRITAINE DVKE OF CORNWALL AND ALBANY c. SIR MY duty that moves alwaies to your presence as the flame to heaven is now more imboldned because in the present eruption of Licentious Pamphlets I conceive it seasonable to publish a modest worke and necessary to intitle it to inviolable protection Humbly therefore I consecrate to your Highnesse Pliny's Panegyricke which hath lived many Ages with constant approbation in his Dialect and even in my rude expressions being cherished with your gracious smile may have the honour to out-live all those abortives of the Presse that like their compeeres the vipers are curst into fruitfulnesse Such as his Booke such was the Author universally approved of for what merit appeares by his advancement in those times when merit onely was preferr'd his prudence erudition and integrity of life advancing him to the Consulship of Rome and yet higher to the impartiall estimation of his Prince for whose favours gratefull Pliny to this day payes tribute For now when Trajan's Annals lye in fragments when those imperiall Statues and Triumphall Arches that should have immortalized him have confessed their owne mortality behold in this Panegyricke that best of Caesars from his Ashes reascends his Throne where he still governes the world as an example But Sir you have and long may you have a living example the absolute paterne of all virtues His Sacred Majestie whose Heroicall and Divine Principles we know are written in your heart because we read them in your actions From hence flowes your particular regard to the deserving from hence your generall affability and which in your Spring of yeares we behold with greatest admiration your love to Iustice equalls your love to Men and both these Affections are steered by Iudgement great as your Birth and Spirit What fitter wish can I make to so much goodnesse then that of the Romane Senate to their Emperours May you be * Eutropius Vsque ad nostrā aetatem non aliter in Senatu Principibus acclametur nisi foelicior Augusto melior Trajano happier then Augustus better then Trajan to whom you are now so just a Parallel that I present his Character as a marke of your owne height in honour whereon if your Highnesse please sometimes to cast your eye you may discerne how you out-grow him in those perfections vvhich render you the Modell of your Excellent Parents and the joy of all their Loyall Subjects among the faithfullest whereof as my study so my hope is ever to be number'd SIR Your Highnesse's most obedient and most faithfull servant ROBERT STAPYLTON The Preface to the READER THat the Booke may present lesse distraction from the margent when you carry the subject in your memory give me leave to prepare you with a short view as well of Trajan's private condition and the publique state of the Empire when he was elected as of his Conquest of the King of Dacia justly occasioned by this Panegyricke Vespasian Caesar had now declared the Jewes Rebels and accordingly denounced warre against them when he sent L. Trajan father to Trajan the Emperour then Tribune of the tenth Legion with two thousand Foote and a thousand Horse against Aphaca in Galilee a City naturally strong and fortified with a double wall The Galilaeans draw into the field the Tribune gives them battaile beats them within their first wall and falls in pellmell with them The City fearing he would do the like at the second wall locke out their owne men who were by the Romanes all put to the sword to the number of twelve thousand Trajan hearing no more of the Garrison and presently apprehending that either none remained or such as durst make no resistance reserves the honour of taking Aphaca for the Emperour himselfe Titus is sent who commanding the right wing and Trajan the left the Towne is Stormed and the Tribune afterwards honoured with Triumphall ornaments and made Consul of Rome This was the first eminent Rise of Trajan's Family Nor did the Fathers happy Starre finish its course in him but came to a higher elevation in his sonne whom he trained under his command as the Eagle breeds his Eaglet first to looke up at heaven and then to governe as Vice-Roy to the Deity Spaine was young Trajan's Country warre his cradle when he was yet a youth he commanded in chiefe against the Parthians nor did Vespasian imploy the father with a truer intention to remunerate his service then Domitian imployed the sonne onely to speed his death upon the bed of honour which was made for him in severall and farre distant climates Trajan being still sent away where new danger threatned Domitian who was carefull to pay the last hazard of his Generall 's life with a fresh occasion of a more desperate engagement but in vaine he laboured it for a higher power both preserved and retributed Trajan not like his father with a Consulship but with that very Empire under which he so long and so injuriously had suffered For Nerva succeeding Domitian and M. Trajan now Generall of the German Legions being at Colein there happen'd in the Pretorian Campe near Rome a dangerous mutiny which shaking the Imperiall Crowne on Nerva's head made him settle it upon Trajan The cause of the insurrection was this The Pretorians the Emperours Life-guard which were at first quartered scatteringly in Rome had beene drawne out into a standing Campe when Sejanus was their Prefect who possessed the Emperour Tiberius that living in Towne debauched the Souldiers whereas fixt in a body they would better observe discipline and be readier for any present service What this cunning allegation meant subtiller Tiberius soon found out Sejanus as soon felt in his own destruction Yet still the Pretorians continued in a Campe and howsoever the designe failed in the Individuall yet it tooke in the generall for though they made not Sejanus Emperour yet they made Emperours afterward at their pleasure At this very time they were sensible of the greatnesse of their power and therefore expected answerable Donatives from Princes which Domitian poured into their hands But Nerva was more provident for the publike then to empty the Treasury to fill private purses and the loyalty of the Pretorians more weake then to stand firme without a golden buttresse The ill humour now stirred in them by their aged Emperours frugality was fomented by their Prefect Aelianus Casperius made their Captaine by Domitian and not removed by Nerva who likewise missing his owne covetous hopes quickened their
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
and once againe have masters for now not our servants but we our selves are the Princes friends Nor doth the Father of his Country more indeare himselfe to and put more confidence in others slaves then his owne subjects You have freed us all from our domestick accusers and giving the word as I may say of publike safety you have put an end unto this z He compares the private bandying of servants informing against their masters to the publike warre of slaves against Rome begunne in Sicily by Ennus the Syrian serville warr whereby you have not more obliged the masters then the servants for you have made those secure these honest Will you not be yet commended well put the case these were not commendable sure they are pleasing to them who remember a a Domitian who incouraged servants to sweare against their Lords and then the just remarkable reward of Traytours from those hands that should pay them for their service they like Tarpeia received their fatall blow Prince that incouraged servants to swear away their masters lifes and pointed them out the crime whereof they should informe that he might punish it a great inevitable and still experienced Evill as oft as any had servants like the Prince 'T is to be placed in the same ranke rhat our last Wills and Testaments are now b Which had beene invaded by former Emperours Tiberius broke the heart of the rich Augur Lentulus because he durst not leave his estate to any but the Emp. The Primipilarij or chiefe Centurions that dyed in the reigne of Tiberius and made not him heyre Caius called ungratefull and Nero ordained that the Testaments of the ungratefull should be confiscated secure nor do you carry away all because you were once nominated an heyre You are intituled to no false no unjust Will no ones anger no ones impiety no ones fury flies to you for refuge nor are you named because another hath offended but because you have merited Your friends put you in strangers leave you out no difference betwixt your being a private person and a Prince but that now you are beloved of many more because you love many more This course Caesar you hold and experience shewes whether it be not more beneficiall to a Prince not only in prayse but profit that to make him their heyre men should be rather desirous then compelled Many donations in this kinde your c Nerva who restored the rapines of Domitian was bount full to the poore even out of his owne Estate and so free to his freinds that Philostratus sayes when Atticus father to Herod the Rhetoritian writt to Nerva that he had digged vp a great Treasure and desired to know how he pleased it should be disposed of he writt back Vse it Atticus answered his letter that 't was too great for a private condition Nerva replyed then abuse it Father and you have granted dyed he out of favour yet dying so he leaves them that injoy his estate and you have nothing out of it but glory For a gratefull debter makes bountie sweeter an ingratefull more conspicuous But who untill your time preferred this prayse before that profit What Prince but thought so much of our patrimony his owne as had been gotten under him as our Tyrants so likewise our Princes bountyes were they not like hookes bayted with food like nets cover'd over with prey till being swallowed laden with private mens fortunes they drew backe with the whatsoever touched them How beneficiall it is to come to prosperity through adversity You have lived with us beene in danger with us in feare which was the life of the innocent You know have experience how much Princes detest evill mē though they themselves do make them such You remēber your old wishes with us your old greivances for in the bosome of a Prince you beare the judgemēt of a private man Nay you are better then you wished another Prince should be You have so accustomed us that whereas before our highest ambitiō was a Prince better thē the worst now none will content us but the best No man therefore is so ignorant of you or of himselfe as to desire that place after you It is easier for one to be your successour then to This was no prophesy of Adrian for he wished it and by the favour of Plotina wife to Trajan Adrian succeeded him in the Empire wish it for who willingly would undergoe your weight of care who will not feare to be compared to you even you your selfe found how burthensome it is to succeed a good Prince and therefore would have beene excused from your adoption Is it an ordinary Patterne easy to be matcht that no man redeemes his safety with turpitude all are secured both of life and the dignity of life Nor is he now considerate and wise that obscures himselfe and lives in darkenesse for virtue hath the same encouragements under our Prince which it had in our liberty nor is well doing onely rewarded by the Conscience but farther recompenced You love the constancy of your Subjects and their lively and erected spirits you doe not like others deject and depresse but cherish and raise Honesty preferres men that thinke it enough and more if it hurt them not To these you offer Honours Preisthoods Provinces these flourish by your freindship by your esteeme and Judgement They are quickened by the price that is set upon Integrity and industry The like and the unlike are attracted for it is the reward of good and evill that makes men good or bad There are naturally few by whom foule or faire ends are not proposed or avoided as they make for or against their benefit The rest when they see the wages of labour paid to sloth of vigilance to drowsinesse of frugality to luxury they aime at the same rewards by the same e Tacitus l. 16. saith that C. Petronius spent the day in sleep the night in waiting and wanton offices and as industry raised others so sloath advanced him who applying himselfe to vices or the imitation of vices got to be one of that small Juncto that were in Nero's favour arts wherewith they perceive others have attained them such as those are such these desire to appeare what they would only seeme they doe really become And our former Princes your Father excepted and one or f He meanes Augustus and Titus whowere good but Dion sayes the Romanes would scarce have thought them so if Augustus had died sooner or Titus lived longer For the troublesōe beginning of his Reigne made Augustus more cruell who when things were setled proved gracious and noble But Titus at first stiled the delight of mankind afterward did some barbarous acts as when he caused Aulus Caecinna whom he invited to supper to be murthered in his Dining roome two I feare I have over numbred them rather delighted in the vices then the virtues of their Subjects First because every one
loves to see his owne nature in another then those whom they found more patient of bondage those whom it would not have become to be any thing but g Such was the Aegyptian slave Crispinus onely beloved by Domitian for the sympathy of his vices you have his graphike Character Juv. Sat. 4. servants in their bosomes they heaped all their bounties but the good that in a long vacation of employment were hidden and as it were buried them they never brought forth to the light and day unlesse by informations and with danger You choose your freinds out of the best and truly it is just they should be most in favour with a good Prince that were most frowned upon by a bad You know that as tyranny and Soveraignty are of different natures so none love a Prince better then they that most disaffect a Tyrant These therefore you advance and give us proofe and example what course of life what kinde of men you are best pleased withall Therefore you have not as yet accepted of the Censourship or Superintendency of manners because you like better to worke upon our dispositions by benefits then by remedies besides I know not if a Prince contribute more to manners that suffers men to be good or that h This touches the perpetuall Censourships of Domitian who being himselfe most vitious compelled others to doe well thus as Censour he put Caecilius Rufinus from his place in Senate because he used to dance and though Claudius Pacatus was de facto a Centurion yet proofe being brought that he was de jure a Slave Domitian by his Censour's power restored him to his Lord Dion compells them We are all flexible and ductile where the Prince drawes us and follow him where he leades for we are ambitious to be indeared to and approved of him which those that are not like him have hoped for in vaine and by continuation of obsequiousnesse we are come to that passe that almost all live according to the precedent of one mans manners Besides we are not so ill natured that we which can be imitatours of a bad Prince cannot imitate a good Doe you Caesar but goe forwards and your designes and actions shall have the force and effect of a Censourship For the life of a Prince is a Censourship and that perpetuall by that we are directed upon that our eyes are fixed nor have we so much need of precept as example because feare is an unfaithfull guide to virtue men are better instructed by examples which primarily have in them this good that they shew what is commanded may be done And what terrour could effect that which respect to you hath brought about some one got the people to suffer the spectacle of i The Pantomimes were such as our fooles in plaies or the Italian Pantalounes Imitatours of all garbes postures and tones how wanton soever Pantomimes to be taken away but yet he got it not as he desired you entreated what another inforced and that became a favour which had beene necessity Nor were you lesse unanimously petitioned to take them away then your Father was to restore them And both your acts were well for they ought to be restored that were taken away by an evill Prince and when they were restored to be taken away againe For in what ill men doe well this course is to be held that it may appeare the author is displeasing not the action The same people therefore that were sometimes spectatours and applauders of a mimicke Caesar now dislike the Pantomimes and condemne effeminate arts and studies misbecoming the Times From which premisses we may conclude the discipline of Princes takes with the very vulgar since if he alone doe a severe act they all will doe the like Increase this glory Caesar wonne by your gravity And what formerly was called compulsion and command shall be now stiled manners Their owne vices are corrected by them that ought themselves to be corrected and those very men are the reformers that should have beene reformed None therefore complaynes of your severity yet all have freedome to complayne But notwithstanding that men do not lesse complayne of any Prince then of him that allowes them greatest freedome yet so farre we are from cause of complaint that there is nothing in your times that causeth not a generall rejoycing The good are advanced the evill which is the calmest condition of an Empire neither k For they know the good will not be Informers and they themselve dare not feare nor are feared You cure our errours but wee our selves beseech you those whom you make good you do it with this honour to your selfe that it appeareth you have not compelled them What the life what the manners of our youth how prince-like do you forme them what honour do you to l Such as Pliny's tutor Quintilian who publikely taught Rhetorike in Trajan's reign Rhetoricke Masters what advancement do you give m As that noble Philosopher Plutarch Trajans Tutor Philosophyers insomuch as under you our studyes have found n Domitian condemning Rusticus Arulinus meerely because he was a philosopher writt the life of Thraseas Herennius Senecio for writing the life of Helvidius Priscus and Pompusian for hanging up a Mappe of the world in his chamber and reading the Kings speeches in Livy and other learned Professours he banished from Rome Dion life spirit and their native Country which the barbarity of former Ages punished with exile when the Prince conscious of a world of his owne vices banished vice-persecuting arts not so much for hate as feare but you have those very arts in your o Iuv. 7. Sat. Caesar is both our studyes cause and end For he alone is the sad Muses freind embraces in your eye and in your eare For you do whatsoever they enjoyne and p Iuvenal Sat. Youthâ—s study Caesar's bounty spurrs you on That seekes but matter it may worke upon love them as much as you are approved of by them Doth not every professor in humanity admiring all things in you especially extoll your facility in giving of accesse With a great soule your father over the Palace gates set up the title of publike buildings but vainly unlesse he had adopted one that might live as in publike How well do your manners suite with that inscription although indeed it lookes as if no other had ingraven the title For what Court of Iustice what temple is so open not the Capitoll the very place of your adoption is more publike more every bodyes no bolts no degrees of contumely and having passed a thousand dores yet to meet with an affront and be lockt out A great stilnesse is before and behind you but the greatest is about your person and every where such silence such Civility that the Princes Court may be a patterne of modesty and tranquillity to narrow Lares and private dwellings But you your selfe how you receive us all how you stay among us so
betweene Lords on the one part and Vassals on the other You Sir have repealed this banished virtue You have freinds because you are one Nor can love like other commands be enjoined to subjects for there is no affection more free more noble more impatient of dominion and that more requires equality Perhaps a Prince may be unjustly hated nay hated by some although he hate not them but beloved he cannot be unlesse he love we therefore know you love because you are beloved and which is in both most princely the whole glory is your owne who being superiour in dignity notwithstanding do descend to all offices of freindship and from an Emperour stoope to be a freind and then are most an Emperour when you lay aside this Title for the other And since a Princes fortune stands in neede of many freinds it is a Prince's cheifest businesse to provide himselfe store of freinds May this opinion ever please you and as to your other virtues so to this be constant nor let any thing perswade you that a Prince can fall below himselfe unlesse he hate To be beloved is the sweetest of all humane blessings nor is it lesse sweete to love both which you so enjoy that whereas you most passionately love yet you are more passionately beloved First for that 't is easier to love one then many then because you have so great a power and faculty of obligeing that none but an ingratefull man can chuse but love you best 'T is worth our industry to relate what torments you put your selfe unto that you might deny nothing to your freind You parted with a most excellent Å¿ L. Licinius Sura the aforementioned Captaine of the Guards to whom Trajan's affection is here at large described man most deare in your esteeme unwillingly and sadly and as if you could not tell how much you loved him you tryed it by absence with much paine and distraction yeilding to be seperated A thing never till this present heard of the Prince and the Prince's freind desire contradictories and the freind's desire carries it O memorable freindship worthy an immortall History to chuse the praefect of the Praetorians not out of those that sought places but that declined them and to restore the same man to that Rest which he so passionately t How Sura doated on a retired life appeares by parting w th so great so affectionate and so unalterable a freind as Trajan was to him but it s especially manifest by that inscription which after his 7. yeares private life he caused to be graven on his monument Here lies one aged many yeares that lived but seaven of them doates upon and when you your selfe are overburdened with the cares of Empire not to envy another the glory of his quiet We understand how much we owe you Caesar for your owne laborious and restlesse stations since you granted this petitioner a writt of Ease as the highest favour What confusion did they tell me you were in when you brought him on his way for you could not forbeare going with him to the Sea side where at his very takeing boate you imbraced and kissed him on the shore Upon that vantage ground of friendshippe Caesar stood wishing him a safe voyage and if he so pleased a quick returne Nor could hee leave him thus but many leagues followed him with his prayers and teares I say nothing of his munificence because no bounty can equall this care and patience of a Prince whereby you have deserved that he should condemne himselfe as too pertinacious too hard-hearted And doubtlesse he repented and was readie to bid the Pilot tack about had he not conceived there might bee almost as much happinesse as in the Prince's societie to desire the Prince And truely as he enjoyes that greatest good hee aymed at so he attaines a greater glorie in the resignation of his place to which when you consented you declared that you would tye no man to your service longer then he pleases This was Princely and well became our publique Parent to compell nothing but alwaies to remember that so great a power or place cannot be given to any but he may before that power or place preferre his freedome Caesar you are worthy to conferre offices on such as shall wish to resigne them and when they make it a suite against your will indeede but yet to grant it you are worthy not to conceive your selfe abandoned by your friends that beg leave to retire themselves but still to finde those you may call from and those you may restore to Rest You likewise my Lords on whom our Parent daignes to cast a gracious and familiar eye improve his opinion of you this is now your businesse for the Prince having given us proofe that hee can love is to be excused if he love others in a lesse degree But who can observe a moderation in loving him for as much as his love must not receive but give the Law This man would be affected present and that absent either shall have his owne desire None by presence shall growe cheape none by absence be forgotten every one holds the place he merits and he may easier blot the face of the absent out of his memory then cancell from his heart the affection which he beareth him Many Princes when they were Tyrants over their Subjects were yet their freed-men's u As Domitian was to Crispinus and to the player Paris of whom Juv. Sat. 7. Many to honour in the warres hee brings With summer annulets and winter rings He binds the Poets fingers what there lives No Lord that will bestow a Player gives bondmen governed by their counsells by their wills and pleasures Through these they saw through these they spake through these mens hands went Praetorshippes Priesthoods Consulshippes Nay unto them were made all addresses of that nature Your freed-men are indeede much honoured by you but still as freed-men and you beleeve it may aboundantly suffice them if they be accounted honest and carefull servants For you know 't is a demonstrative argument of no great Prince to have great freed-men And in the first place you admit none of them to be neere your person unlesse you your selfe doe or your father or some good Prince did affect him And these very men you daily so mould and forme as that they measure themselves not according to your condition but their owne So much more cause we have to respect them because we are not tyed to doe it Have not the Senate and People of Rome upon just ground conferred on you the Surname of the Best It is true it was a title * Ready indeed for Suetonius saies that Caius tooke the Title of Best Greatest but Pliny here implies that Caeius only arrogated that stile of Best whereas Trajan won it by his merit ready for you wherewith our tongues were formerly acquainted yet a new title we may be sure no other Prince deserved it for else
it had beene x Not taken given him as it was to you without praemeditation Was y The Style of Sylla Happy a stile comparable to it which was bestowed upon the fortune not the virtue Or z The Surname of Pompey Great which had in it more of envy then of glory An excellent Prince adopted you into his owne name the Senate into the name of Best and 't is as proper to you as your paternall Sirname nor doth he more distinguish you that calls you Trajan then he that calls you Best So antiently frugalitie denominated the a Piso was Surnamed the frugall not because he was a good husband only for himselfe but because he was frugall that he might be beneficiall to others Piso's wisedome the b C. Lalius Serpio's friend who intending to reforme the Lex Agraria the Law for division of Lands proportionable to the qualities and conditions of men finding himselfe opposed by a strong faction of the richer sort he desisted and was therfore surnamed the Wise Plutarch Laelij pietie the c Metellus was surnamed the Pious for rescuing the Palladium or wooden Image of Pallas when her Temple was on fire in which service the well-meaning man lost his eyes Metelli all which Names are comprehended in this one Nor can he be Best that excells not every person in a peculiar way of merit Deservedlie therefore after all your other apellations this was added as most great For 't is lesse to be Emperour Caesar and Augustus then of all Emperours Caesar's and Augustuse's the Best Therefore that parent both of Gods and men is first adored by the name of Best and then of Greatest The more glorious still your praise that are known to be no lesse Best then Greatest you have obtained a name that never can descend or be transferred to another for in a good Prince it will appeare borrowed in a bad Prince usurped which should all your successours assume it must ever be acknowledged yours For as the title of Augustus mindes us of him to whom it was first consecrated so this of Best man's memorie never shall reflect upon without remembring you As often as posterity shall be compelled to stile another best so oft they shall remember him that merited that title Divine Nerva how much is now thy joy in heaven to see that he is Best and so intituled whom thou didst elect as Best how it rejoyceth thee that compared with thy sonne thou art transcended for in nothing more didst thou declare the greatnesse of thy soule then that being excellent thy selfe thou didst not feare to choose a better And thou likewise d L. Trajan of whom in the Praeface Trajan the father for though not among the starres yet thou hast attained the next place to them what pleasure takest thou to behold this thy Tribune this thy Souldier so great a Generall so great a Prince nay thou hast a friendly contention with the spirit of his adoptive father whether be more noble to have begot or elected such a sonne Both of you have infinitely merited of the Common-wealth on which you have conferred so great a good who though his filiall pietie can but give triumphall ornaments to the one yet to the other he gives heaven Nor is your praise the lesse that you deserve them by your sonne then if the merit were your owne My Lords I know all Romanes but especially the Consuls ought to be so affected as to esteeme themselves rather publiquely then privatelie oblieged For as it is better and more noble to distaste ill Princes for common then particular injuries so the good are more generously beloved for their favours done to mankinde then to men But forasmuch as 't is growne into a custome that the Consuls having presented the publique thanks should likewise acknowledge in their owne names the greatnesse of their private obligations give me leave to discharge this part of my dutie not with more respect to my selfe then to Cornutus Tertullus my Collegue and formerly a Consular person For why should I not likewise give thanks for him that am equally obliged on his behalfe especially since our most gracious Soveraigne hath done that for both which if one of us only had received yet both had beene obliged that pillager e Domitian murtherer of every virtuous man had blasted both of us by the slaughter of friends so neere us fell the thunderbolt for we gloried in the same friends and for the same lost men we mourned as now our joy and hope so then our griefe feare was common This honour to our sufferings divine Nerva did that he would f Nerva making Pliny Cornutus Tertullus Praefects of the Treasury advance us though peradventure lesse worthie to let the World see them flourish that before his reigne only wish't they might slide out of the Princes memory We had not beene two yeares compleate in that most painefull and great Office when you best of Princes valiantest of Generals offered us the Consulship that to the highest honour the glory of celeritie might be added So much you differ from those Princes who conceived that difficulty set a value on their favours and that honours would be more welcome to men if first despaire and dancing of attendance and a delay resembling a deniall had affronted and set a marke of disgrace upon them Modestie forbids me to repeate the testimonie wherewith you honoured us both making us both in our love of truth and love of the Republique equall to those antient Consuls whether deservedly or no I dare not determine for it would be unseemly to contradict what you affirme and insolent to owne the character you gave us being so magnifique But you are worthy to create such Consuls of whom you may report such Miracles Pardon it Sir that among your favours we acknowledg this the highest that you have pleased to make us once againe Colleagues 't was the ambition of our mutuall love of the agreeable method of our life of one and the same end of our endeavours the power whereof is so great that our similitude of disposition takes from us the glory of our friendshippe and it were no lesse a wonder should one of us dissent from his Collegue then from himselfe Therefore 't is no new or temporary thing that each of us as much rejoyces in the Consulshippe of his Collegue as if his owne were againe to be renewed only they who are twice made Consuls have a obligations but at severall times we have each of us received two Consulships together we discharge them together joyntly in the union of our soules yet severally and by Collegueshippe But how rare it was that while we were Praefects of the Treasury you gave us the Consulshippe before you named our Successours One dignity grew into another nor was the honour continued but doubled and as if it had beene a meane favour to give us another office when this was ended you