Book 6

1.1. Those who succeeded to the consular office in the following year, Aulus Sempronius Atratinus and Marcus Minucius, in the seventy-first Olympiad—the one in which Tisicrates of Croton won the foot-race, Hipparchus being archon at Athens—accomplished nothing in their term that was worthy of record, whether in war or in domestic affairs. For the truce with the Latins afforded the city much respite from foreign wars, and the suspension of the recovery of debts, which the senate had decreed should hold until the expected war reached a safe conclusion, put an end to the disturbances within the walls that the poor were stirring up by demanding that their debts be publicly cancelled.

1.2. They also ratified a most equitable decree of the senate: that, if any women of Roman stock happened to be living as wives with Latin men, or Latin women with Romans, they should be their own mistresses, free either to remain with their husbands or, if they did not wish to, to return to their native cities; that of their offspring the males should remain with their fathers, while the females, so long as they were still unmarried, should follow their mothers. Now it chanced that very many women had been given in marriage into one another's cities, both through kinship and through friendship; and these, having received the freedom granted them by the decree, showed how great a longing they had to live in Rome.

1.3. For almost all the Roman women in the Latin cities left their husbands and returned to their fathers, and of the Latin women married to Romans all but two, scorning their native cities, remained with their husbands—a happy omen that the city was destined to prevail in the war.

1.4. It was in the term of these consuls, they say, that the temple was dedicated to Saturn beside the ascent leading from the Forum up to the Capitol, and that festivals and sacrifices at public expense were instituted to the god each year. Before this, they say, an altar had been set up on the same spot, built by Hercules, on which those who received the sacred rites from him offered the first-fruits by fire in the Greek manner. As to the beginning of the temple's foundation, some relate that Titus Larcius, who had been consul the year before, undertook it, while others say it was even King Tarquinius, the one who was driven from power; but the dedication of the temple, they agree, was performed by Postumus Cominius in accordance with a decree of the senate. To these consuls, then, it fell, as I have said, to enjoy a profound peace.

2.1. After them Aulus Postumius and Titus Verginius succeeded to the office. In their term the year's truce with the Latins had run out, and great preparations for war were being made on both sides. The whole body of the Romans was willing and advanced upon the contest with much eagerness, whereas the greater part of the Latins was reluctant and constrained by necessity—nearly all the men of power in their cities having been corrupted by gifts and promises from Tarquinius and Mamilius, while the common people, who did not wish for the war, were debarred from any concern in public affairs.

2.2. For no voice was any longer granted to those who wished to speak. Many therefore, chafing at this, were forced to abandon their cities and desert to the Romans; for those who had made the cities their own personal property did not think fit to prevent it, but knew much gratitude was owed by their rivals for this voluntary exile. The Romans, receiving them, enrolled those who came with their wives and children in the armies within the walls, mingling them with the citizen centuries; the rest they sent off to the forts around the city and distributed among the colonies, keeping them under guard lest they attempt any revolution.

2.3. When all had reached the same conviction—that the conduct of affairs must once more be entrusted to a single magistracy, irresponsible and free to administer everything by its own judgment—Aulus Postumius, the younger of the consuls, was appointed dictator by his colleague Verginius. He himself chose as his Master of the Horse, in the same manner as the former dictator had done, Titus Aebutius Elva. Having within a short time enrolled all the Romans of military age and divided the force into four parts, he himself led one division, appointed his colleague Verginius to command another, Aebutius the Master of the Horse the third, and over the fourth he left Aulus Sempronius as prefect, to whom he committed the guarding of the city.

3.1. When he had prepared everything needful for the war, his scouts came reporting that the Latins had marched out in full force; and again others made it known that a strong place called Corbio had been taken by them at the first assault, in which a small Roman garrison had been quartered. Having destroyed it entirely and seized the place itself, they made it a base for the war. But they captured no slaves or cattle in the fields, except those caught in Corbio, since the farmers had long since carried off to the nearest strongholds whatever each was able to bear and drive away; their houses, left empty, the enemy burned, and they ravaged the land.

3.2. There came to the Latins, when they had already taken the field, from Antium—the most distinguished city of the Volscian nation—a considerable army, together with arms, grain, and whatever else they needed for the war. Greatly emboldened by this, they were in good hope, expecting that the rest of the Volscians too would join in the war once the city of the Antiates had made a beginning.

3.3. Learning of this, Postumius marched out with all speed before all the enemy could assemble; and leading his army by night in a forced march, he came near to the Latins, who were encamped beside a lake called Regillus in a strong position, and he pitched his camp directly above the enemy on a high and difficult hill, where by holding his ground he was likely to gain many advantages.

4.1. The Latin commanders, Octavius of Tusculum, son-in-law of King Tarquinius (or, as some write, the son of his son-in-law), and Sextus Tarquinius—for at that time they happened to be encamped apart from one another—brought their forces together into one place, and taking with them their tribunes and centurions, considered what the conduct of the war should be.

4.2. Many opinions were expressed. Some thought best to march at once against those who had with the dictator seized the mountain, while they were still formidable, holding that the occupation of strong positions was a sign not of safety but of cowardice. Others advised hemming them in with some small guard by entrenchment, while taking the rest of the force on against Rome, which would be easy to capture now that the flower of its youth had marched out. Still others advised waiting for the help of the Volscians and the other allies, choosing the safer course over the bolder: for the Romans, they said, would gain nothing from the lapse of time, whereas for themselves delay would make their affairs the stronger.

4.3. While they were still deliberating, the other of the consuls, Titus Verginius, arrived from Rome with the force he had with him, appearing suddenly after completing the march in the preceding night, and he encamped apart from the dictator on another ridge, very mountainous and strong; so that on both sides the Latins were cut off from their sorties into the enemy's country, the consul sitting before the parts on the left and the dictator before those on the right.

4.4. And as still greater confusion gripped the commanders—who had chosen nothing beyond what was safe—and fear that, by delaying, they would be forced to consume their own resources, which were not abundant, Postumius, perceiving how great was their inexperience in generalship, sent the Master of the Horse, Titus Aebutius, leading the freshest of the cavalry and light-armed troops, ordering him to seize a certain mountain well placed on the route by which provisions were being conveyed to the Latins from home. And the force sent with the Master of the Horse, marching by night and passing through trackless woodland, gained possession of the height before the enemy could perceive it.

5.1. When the enemy's generals learned that the positions in their rear were being seized and that they no longer had good hopes that their provisions from home would be safely conveyed to them, they resolved to dislodge the Romans from the hill before they should strengthen it with rampart and ditch.

5.2. Taking the cavalry, one of them, Sextus, drove it forward at full speed, expecting that the Roman horse would not withstand him. But the Roman cavalry nobly received the assault, and for a while he held out, wheeling and charging again. But when the nature of the ground gave great advantages to those who already held the heights, while to those attacking from below it brought nothing but very many blows and fruitless toil; and when, moreover, another force of picked men from the infantry phalanx had come up to support the Romans, which Postumius had sent at their heels—then, being able to accomplish nothing further, he led the cavalry back to the camp; and the Romans, securely holding the place, openly strengthened their guard there.

5.3. After this action it seemed best to Mamilius and Sextus not to let much time pass in between, but to decide matters by a swift battle. As for the dictator of the Romans, who at the outset had been so disposed in his purpose as to hope to end the war without a battle—and to do so above all through the inexperience of the opposing generals—it then seemed best to him to advance to the contest. For certain messengers had been captured by the cavalry guarding the roads, bearing letters from the Volscians to the Latin generals, declaring that many forces would come to their aid in about three days, and again others from the Hernicans.

5.4. These were the things that imposed upon their commanders a swift necessity of giving battle, which they had till then not chosen. When the signals for battle had been raised on both sides, both armies advanced into the space between and arrayed their forces thus: Sextus Tarquinius was posted on the left wing of the Latins, Octavius Mamilius on the right, and the centre was held by the other of Tarquinius' sons, Titus, where also the Roman deserters and exiles were stationed. The cavalry, divided into three, were assigned to both wings and to those drawn up in the centre,

5.5. the phalanx. Of the Roman army, the left wing was held by the Master of the Horse, Titus Aebutius, opposite Octavius Mamilius; the right by Titus Verginius the consul, holding a position opposite Sextus Tarquinius; while the centre of the phalanx the dictator Postumius himself filled, intending to engage Titus Tarquinius and the exiles about him. The number of the force that came together for the battle from each army was: of the Romans, foot soldiers three hundred short of twenty-four thousand, and a thousand cavalry; of the Latins, with their allies, about forty thousand foot and three thousand horse.

6.1. As they were about to come to grips, the Latin generals called their men together and rehearsed many appeals to valour and long exhortations to the soldiers; and the Roman, seeing his own men afraid because they were about to engage a multitude far exceeding their own, and wishing to remove the fear from their minds, summoned them to an assembly. Setting beside him the eldest and most honoured of the senatorial council, he spoke as follows:

6.2. "The gods, by omens and victims and the other forms of divination, promise us that they will grant freedom to the city and a fortunate victory, rendering us good returns in exchange for our having continued throughout our life to revere them and to practise justice, and being justly indignant at our enemies—who, though they have received many great benefits from us, being our kinsmen and friends and having sworn to hold the same men enemies and friends, have despised all this and bring an unjust war against us, not over rule and dominion, as to which of us should rather possess it—for that would be the less terrible—but on behalf of the tyranny of the Tarquins, that they may make the city their slave instead of free.

6.3. "You too, men, both centurions and soldiers, must learn that you have the gods as allies—those who always preserve the city—and prove yourselves brave men in this contest, knowing that the help of the gods comes to those who fight nobly and bring everything in their power eagerly to the winning, not to those who flee from dangers, but to those willing to toil on their own behalf. We have many other advantages prepared by fortune for victory, but three are the fairest and most manifest of all.

7.1. "First, mutual loyalty, of which those who mean to overcome their enemies have most need. For you do not need to begin today to be steadfast friends and faithful comrades to one another; your country has long since prepared this good thing for you all. For you were reared together and shared a common upbringing, you sacrificed to the gods at the same altars, you have enjoyed many blessings and have undergone many hardships in common—from which strong and indissoluble friendships are by nature compounded among all men. Next, the contest concerning the greatest things is common to all.

7.2. "For if you fall into the enemy's power, it will not be that some of you will suffer nothing terrible while others suffer the worst; rather, all alike will have lost their dignity, their leadership, and their freedom; and you will enjoy neither wives nor children nor property nor any other of the goods you possess, while those who lead the city and administer the public affairs will die the most pitiable death amid torture and torment.

7.3. "For when men who have suffered no evil from us, neither great nor small, have committed many and various outrages against you all, what must we expect them to do should they now prevail in arms, remembering with rancour that you expelled them from the city, took away their property, and do not even

7.4. "permit them to set foot on their fathers' land? Last of all the advantages I have mentioned—and you would say it is no less than any other, if you consider rightly—is that the enemy have not turned out for us such as we supposed, but far inferior to their reputation. For apart from the help of the Antiates, you see no others present sharing the war with them; whereas we supposed that all the Volscians would come as their allies, and many of the Sabines and Hernicans, and we fashioned for ourselves countless other fears in vain. But all these were Latin dreams, holding empty promises and unfulfilled hopes. For some have abandoned their aid out of contempt for the generals at the levy; others will delay rather than help, wearing away the time in hopes; and others, now in the midst of their preparations, having come too late for the battle, will be of no further use to them.

8.1. "But if any of you think these things are rightly said, yet are afraid of the multitude of the enemy, let them learn by a brief lesson—or rather a reminder—not to fear what is not to be feared. First, let them reflect that the larger part among the enemy is that which has been compelled to take up arms against us, as has been shown to us by many deeds and words, while the part fighting willingly and eagerly on behalf of the tyrants is very small—indeed but a tiny fraction of our own. Next, that all wars are won not by those greater in numbers but by those superior in valour.

8.2. "It would be a long task to bring forward examples—how many barbarian and Greek armies, far surpassing in numbers, very small forces have overcome, so that the accounts of them are not even credible to most men. I pass over the rest; but you yourselves—how many wars have you brought to a good issue with a smaller force than you now have, arrayed against enemies with preparations greater than these? Come, are you formidable to all the others whom you have conquered in battle, yet to these Latins and their Volscian allies contemptible, because they have never made trial of your fighting? But you all know that our fathers conquered both these nations in many battles.

8.3. "Is it reasonable, then, that the affairs of the conquered should, after such disasters, be the stronger, and those of the conquerors, after such great successes, the weaker? And who in his right mind would say this? I should be amazed if any of you dreads the multitude of the enemy, in which there is little of the noble, yet despises his own force, which is so large and good, than which never in any war before this has a force superior in valour or greater in number been brought against us.

9.1. "And this too, citizens, is the greatest encouragement neither to fear nor to shun dangers: that all the foremost men of the senatorial council are present, as you see, to share with you the fortunes of the war—men whom from military service both their age

9.2. "and the law have released. Is it not, then, shameful that you, who are in your prime, should flee dangers, while these men beyond the age pursue them; that the eagerness of the old, since it cannot kill any of the enemy, at least is willing to die for the country, while your vigorous strength—you who, if fortunate, may save both and conquer in safety, or if not, may, along with doing some noble deed, also suffer—should neither make trial of fortune nor leave behind a reputation for valour?

9.3. "Is it not for you, men of Rome, that, while many wondrous deeds belong to others, whom no speech will worthily celebrate, your race should reap many famous deeds of its own, if you bring this war too to a good issue? But that the noble conduct of those of you who have resolved on the best things may not go unrewarded, and that the cowardice of those who fear danger beyond what is fitting may not go unpunished, before we come to this, hear from me what shall befall each of the two sorts.

9.4. "To whoever, having done some fair or noble deed in the battle, those who witnessed his deeds bear testimony, I will at once render the other honours which it is each man's right to receive by ancestral custom, and I will add besides a portion of land out of what the state possesses, enough to ensure he lacks none of the necessaries; but on whomever his evil and god-stricken mind casts a longing for shameful flight, on him I will set near at hand the very death he flees. For such a citizen, by dying, would be better both for himself and for the others; and it shall be the lot of those who so die to share in neither burial nor the other customary rites, but, unenvied and unwept, to be torn by birds and beasts.

9.5. "Knowing this beforehand, then, advance eagerly, all of you, to the contest, taking as leaders of noble deeds your noble hopes—since in this single danger, should it reach the best and most longed-for issue for all, you will gain the greatest goods: freeing yourselves from the fear of tyrants, repaying to the city that bore you the just thanks she demands for your rearing, not allowing your children, those of you who still have infants, and your wedded wives to suffer irreparable harm at the hands of enemies, and making your aged fathers live their little remaining time most pleasantly.

9.6. "O blessed are those to whom it shall be granted to lead home the triumph from this war, with children and wives and fathers welcoming you; and glorious and enviable for their valour are those who shall give their bodies for the country. For to die is owed by all men, both bad and good; but to die nobly and gloriously belongs to the good alone."

10.1. While he was still speaking the words urging them to valour, a kind of divine boldness fell upon the army, and as if from a single soul they all cried out together: "Have courage, and lead on." And Postumius, praising their eagerness and vowing to the gods that, if a fortunate and noble issue should follow the battle, he would perform great sacrifices at much cost and establish costly games, which the Roman people would hold every

10.2. year, dismissed them to their posts. When they had received the watchword from the commanders and the trumpets sounded the calls to battle, they advanced with a war-cry to the encounter, first the light-armed troops and cavalry from both sides, then the foot phalanxes, which had like arms and like formations; and a fierce contest arose with all fighting mingled together, the whole battle hand to hand.

10.3. The result was much contrary to the expectation of both. For neither side had hoped to need a battle, but each supposed it would terrify the enemy at the first onset—the Latins trusting in the multitude of their cavalry, of which not even the noise, they thought, would the Roman horse endure; the Romans, that by advancing boldly and recklessly upon dangers they would strike panic into the enemy. Having each conceived this of the other, they saw at the outset the contrary come to pass. And no longer reckoning the fear of their opponents, but their own boldness, the cause of their safety and victory, both sides showed themselves good fighters, even beyond their strength. And the fortunes of the contest about them were varied and quickly shifting.

11.1. First, then, the Romans posted in the centre of the phalanx, where the dictator Postumius was with picked cavalry about him, himself fighting among the foremost, thrust back the part opposite them, when one of the sons of Tarquinius, Titus, was wounded in the right shoulder by a javelin and could no longer

11.2. use his arm. For Licinius and Gellius, having examined neither what was probable nor what was possible, bring in King Tarquinius himself fighting on horseback and being wounded—a man approaching ninety years of age. When Titus had fallen, those about him fought a short while and, taking up his body still living, did nothing further of note, but retreated step by step before the advancing Romans; then again they made a stand and came to grips, when the other of Tarquinius' sons, Sextus, came to their aid with the exiles from Rome and the other picked cavalry.

11.3. These, then, rallying again, fought; while the commanders of each phalanx, Titus Aebutius and Mamilius Octavius, fighting most brilliantly of all, routing those who withstood them wherever they advanced and replacing the disordered among their own, came to grips on a challenge; and clashing together they dealt one another mighty blows, though not mortal—the Master of the Horse driving his spear-point into the breast of Mamilius through his cuirass, and Mamilius piercing through the middle of the other's right arm. And they fell from their horses.

12.1. When both had been carried out of the battle, Marcus Valerius, the legate next appointed, having taken over the command of the Master of the Horse, took his stand with the cavalry about him against those opposite, and after holding out a short while was quickly thrust far back from his position; and to these too came aid from the exiles from Rome, both cavalry and light-armed; and Mamilius, having recovered from his wound, was now again present, leading a strong body of cavalry and infantry. In this contest the legate Marcus Valerius—the man who first led home the triumph over the Sabines and raised up the city's spirit, humbled by the Tyrrhenian defeat—was struck by a spear and fell, and about him many other brave Romans.

12.2. Over his fall a fierce contest arose, Publius and Marcus, the sons of Publicola, shielding their uncle. Him they raised up, unspoiled of his arms and still a little breathing, and gave to the shield-bearers to carry to the camp; while they themselves, thrusting into the midst of the enemy through resolve and eagerness, and receiving many wounds, when the exiles poured around them in a body, died together.

12.3. After this disaster the Roman phalanx was thrust back far from the left and was breaking apart as far as the centre. Then the dictator, learning of the rout of his men, hastened to the rescue, leading the cavalry about him. Ordering the other legate, Titus Herminius, to take a squadron of cavalry and pass behind his own phalanx and turn back the fugitives—and if they would not obey, to kill them—he himself, with the bravest, thrust against the throng; and when he came near the enemy he was the first to drive his horse in with the reins let loose.

12.4. The charge being made in a mass and terrifying, the enemy did not withstand its frenzy and ferocity, but were routed and fell in numbers. Meanwhile the legate Herminius, having rallied those who had taken fright at the rout of their own, led them against the men formed about Mamilius; and falling upon Mamilius—who was the greatest of stature and in strength the best of all men of his time—he killed him, and himself, while stripping the corpse, was struck through the flank by someone's sword and died.

12.5. Sextus Tarquinius, commanding the left wing of the Latins, still held out against the perils and was thrusting those on the right wing of the Romans from their position; but when he saw Postumius bearing down with the picked cavalry, despairing of all hope he flung himself into their midst. There, encircled by the Roman cavalry and infantry and pelted from every side like a wild beast, he died, not without killing many of those who came to grips. When the commanders had fallen, an immediate general flight of all the Latins ensued, and their camp, left deserted by its guards, was captured—whence the Romans took many fine spoils.

12.6. This was the greatest disaster that befell the Latins, by which they were most grievously crippled, and a destruction of lives such as had never been before. For of forty thousand foot and three thousand horse, as I have said, fewer than ten thousand survived to come safe to their homes.

13.1. In this battle, it is said, there appeared to the dictator Postumius and those drawn up about him two horsemen, far surpassing in beauty and stature those whom our nature brings forth, just beginning to grow their beards, leading the Roman horse and striking with their spears the Latins who came to grips and driving them headlong. And after the rout of the Latins and the capture of their camp, the battle having ended toward late evening, in the Roman Forum there appeared in the same manner, it is said, two young men, clothed in warlike garb, tallest and most beautiful and of the same age, themselves preserving on their faces, as of men come from battle, the look of contest, and leading horses dripping with sweat.

13.2. Having watered each of the horses and washed them at the spring which rises beside the temple of Vesta, making a small deep pool, when many gathered round them and asked to learn whether they brought any public news from the camp, they told them of the battle, how it had gone and that they were victorious; and when they had withdrawn from the Forum, they were, it is said, seen by no one further, though the magistrate left in charge of the city made

13.3. much search for them. When on the following day those in charge of public affairs received the letters from the dictator and, along with all the other events of the battle, learned also of the epiphany of the divinities, they concluded, as was likely, that both apparitions were of the same gods, and were persuaded that the figures were of the Dioscuri.

13.4. Of this marvellous and astonishing epiphany of the divinities there are many tokens in Rome: the temple of the Dioscuri which the city built in the Forum, where the figures were seen, and the fountain beside it, which to this day is called by the name of these gods and is considered sacred; and the costly sacrifices which the people perform each year through the chief priests in the month called Quintilis, on the so-called Ides, the day on which they brought this war to a good issue; and above all these, the procession performed after the sacrifice by those who hold the public horse, who, arranged by tribes and centuries, ride in rank upon their horses, all proceeding as if come from battle, crowned with sprays of olive and clad in purple togas bordered with scarlet, called trabeae, beginning from a certain temple of Mars outside the city and passing through the rest of the city and through the Forum past the temple of the Dioscuri—sometimes as many as five thousand men, bearing all the awards of valour they received from their commanders in the battles: a fair sight worthy of the greatness of the empire. These, then, were the things said and done by the Romans concerning the epiphany of the Dioscuri that I have learned;

13.5. from which one might infer, along with many other great proofs, how dear to the gods the men of that time were.

14.1. Postumius encamped that night in the plain, and on the next day, having crowned those who had distinguished themselves in the battle and distributed the prisoners to be guarded, he sacrificed the thank-offerings for victory to the gods. While the crown was still upon him and he was placing the burnt first-fruits upon the altars, certain scouts ran down from the heights and announced that an enemy army was marching against them. It was a chosen body of the prime of the Volscian nation, sent as an ally to the Latins before their battle had been fought.

14.2. When he learned this, he ordered all to go to arms and to remain in the camp, each man by his own standard, keeping silence and order until he himself should command what must be done. The Volscian commanders, having pitched camp within view of the Romans, when they saw the plain full of corpses, both camps standing, and no one coming forth from the strongholds, neither enemy nor friend, for a while marvelled and were at a loss to conjecture what fortune had befallen the affairs. When from those escaping the rout they had learned all about the contest, they considered with the other commanders

14.3. what was to be done. To the boldest of them it seemed best to march at once against the Roman camp, while many were spent with wounds, all were exhausted with toil, and the arms of most were useless—some blunted at the edge, others broken—and while no fresh aid from home was yet present to them, whereas their own force, being large and good and well armed, experienced in war, and present unexpectedly to men who did not look for it, would seem formidable even to the most daring.

15.1. But to the most prudent the venture seemed unsafe: for brave men, lately having overthrown so great a force of the Latins, to be about to come to grips without allies, and to undertake the contest concerning the greatest things in a foreign land, where, if any reverse should occur, they would have no safe refuge. These men thought it better rather to provide quickly for their safe return home, and to reckon it great gain if they should reap no evil from the expedition.

15.2. To others it seemed best to do neither of these, declaring the readiness for the contest to be rash and the strangeness of flight homeward shameful, since the enemy would take, just as they wished, whichever of the two they did. The opinion of these men was: for the present to strengthen their camp and make ready for the contest, and, sending to the rest of the Volscians, to demand one of two things—either to send another sufficient force against the Romans,

15.3. or even to recall the one already sent. But the counsel that seemed most persuasive to the majority and was ratified by those in authority advised this: to send some men into the Roman camp as spies under the name of envoys, that they might have safety; these would greet the commander and say that, as allies of the Romans come from the Volscian commonwealth, they were vexed at having come too late for the battle, since they would carry off little or no thanks for their zeal, but rejoiced at the fortune of the Romans, who had won a great contest without allies. Having deceived them by the kindly tone of their words and made them trust them as friends, they would observe everything and on their return report the number of the enemy, their armament, their preparations, and whether they had any plans in mind. And when these things were accurately made clear to them, then they should propose deliberation, whether it were better to attack them, having summoned another force, or to lead away the present one.

16.1. When they had adopted this opinion and the envoys chosen by them came to the dictator and were brought before the assembly and rehearsed their deceiving words, Postumius, after waiting a short while, said to them: "You have come, O Volscians, having clothed wicked counsels in honest words; and, doing the deeds of enemies, you wish to carry off the reputation of friends.

16.2. "For you were sent by your commonwealth to aid the Latins against us; but since you have come too late for the battle and see them defeated, you wish to deceive us by saying the contrary of what you intended to do. And neither the kindliness of your words, which you feign for the present occasion, nor the pretext of your coming hither is sound, but it is full of guile and deceit. For you were sent forth not to rejoice in our good fortune, but to spy out how matters stand with us as to weakness or strength; and you are envoys in word, but spies in deed."

16.3. When the men denied everything, he said he would soon furnish them proof; and at once he produced their letters, which he had captured before the battle being carried to the Latin commanders, in which they promised to send them aid, and he brought forward those who bore them. When the letters had been read and the prisoners had related the instructions they had received, the multitude rushed to pelt the Volscians with stones as spies caught in the very act; but Postumius did not think the good ought to become like the bad, saying it was better and more magnanimous to keep one's anger for those who sent them than for those sent, and, on account of the open name of the embassy, to release the men, rather than, on account of the hidden work of spying, to destroy them—that they might neither give the Volscians a specious pretext for war by alleging that the persons of envoys had been killed contrary to the law of all men, nor furnish the others a ground of enmity, even if false, yet not unreasonable nor incredible.

17.1. Having restrained the impulse of the multitude, he ordered the men to depart without looking back, handing them over to a guard of cavalry, who escorted them to the Volscian camp. Having thrust out the spies, he charged the soldiers to make ready for battle, as he would draw up his line on the following day. But he had no need of battle: for the Volscian commanders, while it was still deep night, roused their army and went off to

17.2. their homes. When all had succeeded for him according to his prayer, having buried his own dead and purified the army, he returned to the city, distinguished by a magnificent triumph, conveying a heap of arms on many wagons and bringing in abundant stores of military goods, and leading those captured in the battle, five hundred short of six thousand. From the spoils he set apart the tithes and held games and sacrifices to the gods at a cost of forty talents, and let out by contract the building of temples to Demeter, Dionysus, and Cora,

17.3. according to his vow. For provisions for the war had run short at the beginning and caused them much fear of failing, both because the land had become barren and because the foreign supply was no longer being conveyed in on account of the war. On account of this fear he ordered the keepers of the Sibylline books to consult them; and when he learned that the oracles bade them propitiate these gods, he made vows to them, as he was about to lead out the army, that, if there should be good seasons throughout the city during his magistracy, such as there had been before, he would dedicate temples to them and institute

17.4. sacrifices each year. And they, hearkening, caused the land to yield rich crops, not only the arable but also the tree-bearing, and made all the imported supplies flow in more abundantly than before. Seeing this, Postumius himself decreed the building of these temples. The Romans, then, having repelled the tyrannic war by the goodwill of the gods, occupied themselves in festivals and sacrifices.

18.1. A few days later envoys came to them from the Latin commonwealth, chosen out of all the cities—those who held the opposing opinion concerning the war—holding before them suppliant boughs and fillets. These, being brought before the senate, declared that the men of power in the cities were the cause of the war's beginning; the common people, they said, had erred in this one thing only, that they had been persuaded by wicked demagogues who had contrived private gains.

18.2. For this deceit, in which the greater part was due to necessity, they said each city had paid no slight penalty, the flower of its youth being destroyed, so that it was not easy to find a house clear of mourning; and they begged the Romans to receive them, who came neither still contending over rule nor striving for equality, but ready to be allies and subjects for all the remaining time, and to add to the good fortune of the Romans all that the divinity had taken from the dignity of the Latins.

18.3. At the close of their speech they appealed to kinship, reminded them of alliances once made without pretext, and bewailed the disasters about to overtake those who had done no wrong, who were far more numerous than the wrongdoers; lamenting at every point and clasping the knees of the whole senate and placing their suppliant boughs at the feet of Postumius—so that the whole council was moved at their tears and entreaties.

19.1. When they had withdrawn from the senate-house and speech was given to those accustomed to declare their opinions, Titus Larcius, who had been the first appointed dictator the year before, advised them to husband their fortune, saying that the greatest praise of a whole city, as of a single man, is if it be not corrupted by prosperity, but bears its good things graciously and with moderation.

19.2. For all good fortunes are envied, he said, especially those to which is joined insolence and harshness toward the humbled and those who have come into one's power; and he urged them not to trust fortune, having often had experience of her in their own evils and goods, how unstable and quick-shifting she is; nor to impose upon their adversaries the necessity of the uttermost dangers, on account of which men become daring even beyond their judgment and fighters

19.3. beyond their strength. He said he feared lest they draw upon themselves the common hatred of all whom they thought fit to rule, if they exact bitter and inexorable penalties from the wrongdoers, as having departed from their accustomed practices—through which they rose to eminence—forgetting them, and having made their rule a tyranny rather than, as before, a leadership and protectorate. The faults, he said, were moderate and not deserving of indignation, if certain cities, clinging to freedom and having once learned to rule, do not let go their ancient claim. But if those who reach for the highest things are to be punished irremediably should they fail of their hope, there would be nothing to prevent all men from being destroyed by one another; for the longing for freedom is innate in all.

19.4. And he declared that rule is much better and more secure which wishes to prevail over its subjects by benefits, not by punishments; for the one is followed by goodwill, the other by fear, and it is a necessity of nature that all things terrible be most hated. At the close of his speech he urged them to use as examples the best deeds of their forefathers, for which those men were praised, recounting how many cities taken by storm they, not razing them nor slaying the men of military age nor enslaving them, but making them colonies of Rome and granting citizenship to those of the conquered who wished to dwell among them, made the city great out of small. The sum of his opinion was to renew the treaty with the Latin commonwealth which they had made before, and to bear no rancour against any city for any of its offences.

20.1. Servius Sulpicius made no objection concerning the peace and the renewal of the treaty; but, since it was the Latins who had first broken the treaties—and not now for the first time, so that some pardon were owed them as men putting forward necessity and deceit, but many times already before, so that they needed correction—he advised that impunity and freedom be conceded to all on account of kinship, but that half their land be taken from them and Roman colonists be sent to it, who should both cultivate it and

20.2. ensure that the men attempt no further revolution. But Spurius Cassius advised destroying their cities, saying he marvelled at the simplicity of those who advised letting their offences go unpunished—if indeed they could not perceive that, on account of the innate and unremovable envy which they bear toward the city's growth, they contrive war after war and will never of their own will cease from their treacherous purpose so long as this wretched passion dwells in their souls; men who in the end attempted to make their kindred city subject to a tyrant, the most savage of all beasts, overturning all their covenants made before the gods, stirred by no other hopes than this: that if the war should not go as they wished, they would suffer no penalty, or

20.3. a very small one. He too thought fit to use as examples the deeds of their forefathers, who, when they perceived that the city of the Albans—from which they themselves and all the Latin cities had been colonised—envied their good fortune, and had made the impunity it had obtained for its first offences a starting-point for greater treachery, resolved to destroy it in a single day; judging that to pity none of those who err moderately is on a par with punishing none of those who do the greatest and

20.4. irreparable wrongs. And it is a work of great folly and insensibility—not of humanity nor of moderation—when they had not endured to suffer the envy of those who colonised them, since it seemed harsh and unbearable beyond what was fitting, to endure that of their own race; and when they had punished by the loss of their city enemies convicted in lesser trials, to exact no penalty from those who had often shown an implacable hatred.

20.5. Having said this and enumerated all the revolts of the Latins, and reminded them how great was the number of Romans destroyed in the wars with them, he urged them to deal with these in the same manner in which they had dealt with the Albans before: to destroy their cities and add their territory to that of the Romans; of the men, to make those who had shown any goodwill toward them, keeping their own possessions, citizens, but to put to death as traitors the authors of the revolt, by whom the treaties had been broken; and to reckon as slaves whatever of the people was poor, idle, and useless.

21.1. These, then, were the things said by the leading men of the senate. But since the dictator chose the opinion of Larcius and no one further spoke to the contrary, the envoys were called in and brought before the council to receive their answers. And Postumius, reproaching them with their wickedness, which could never be brought to its senses, said: "It would be just that you should suffer the worst, seeing that you yourselves were about to do the same, had you succeeded in the courses you often took against us. Yet the Romans do not prefer their rights to fair dealing, reckoning that you are kinsmen and have fled for refuge to the mercy of the wronged; but even these offences they release to you unpunished, both for the sake of the kindred gods and of inscrutable fortune, from which they obtained their power.

21.2. "Now, then," he said, "freed from all fear, depart; and if you release the prisoners and hand over to us the deserters and drive out the exiles, then send to us envoys to treat of friendship and alliance, as men who will fail of nothing reasonable." The envoys departed with these answers, and after a few days came having freed the prisoners, leading in bonds the deserters they had caught, and having driven the exiles with Tarquinius out of the cities. In return they obtained from the senate their ancient friendship and alliance, and the oaths once made concerning these were renewed through the fetial priests. Thus the war that had arisen against the tyrants, lasting fourteen years from their expulsion, reached such an end.

21.3. Tarquinius the king—for he alone of the family was still left—being now about ninety years old at this time, having lost his children and the house of his kinsmen, and dragging out a pitiable old age among enemies, since neither the Latins received him any longer in their cities, nor the Tyrrhenians, nor the Sabines, nor any other neighbouring free city, went off to Campanian Cumae, to Aristodemus surnamed the Effeminate, who was then tyrant of the Cumaeans; with whom, after living a small number of days, he died and was buried by him. Of the exiles with him, some remained in Cumae, and others, scattered among various cities, ended their lives in a foreign land.

22.1. When the Romans had brought their open wars to an end, civil strife rose up again. The senate had voted to seat the courts and that the disputes which had been deferred on account of the war should be tried according to the laws. But the disputes concerning contracts had advanced to great storms and dreadful absurdities and shamelessness, the commoners pretending an inability to discharge their debts—their land having been ravaged in the long war, their cattle destroyed, their slaves grown scarce through desertions and raids, and their property in the city consumed by the expenses of the campaign—while the creditors said these disasters had befallen all alike, and not the debtors only, and thought it intolerable that they should lose not only what they had been deprived of by the enemy through the war, but also what they had lent in peace to citizens in need.

22.2. With the creditors refusing to submit to anything moderate and the debtors refusing to do anything just—the one not even remitting the interest, the others not even discharging the principal of the contracts—from this there were now gatherings in bands of those in like fortunes, and counter-musters in the Forum, and at times even brawls; and the whole civic order was thrown into confusion.

22.3. Seeing this, Postumius resolved, while he still held equal honour from all, to slip out gracefully from the civic storms, as from a grievous war; and before fulfilling the last term of his autocratic office, he abjured the dictatorship and, appointing a day for the elections, together with his colleague restored the ancestral magistracies.

23.1. So the consuls again took up the annual and lawful office, Appius Claudius Sabinus and Publius Servilius Priscus, who rightly saw the highest expedient—that the tumult within the walls must be diverted to wars abroad—and prepared to lead out one of them with an army against the Volscian nation, both wishing to punish them for the alliance sent against the Romans to the Latins, and to forestall their preparations while these were still small. For those people too were reported to be enrolling forces already with all zeal and sending embassies to the neighbouring nations inviting them to alliance, having learned that the commoners had separated from the patricians and judging it no hard task to take a city sick with internal war.

23.2. Having resolved to lead out an army against these, and it seeming to all the councillors that they had resolved rightly, they proclaimed that all of military age should present themselves, fixing a time at which they meant to make the enrolment of the soldiers. But when the commoners, though often summoned to the military oath, did not obey, the two consuls no longer held the same opinion, but, beginning from this, they were at variance and continued to act contrary to one another throughout the whole term of their office.

23.3. For it seemed best to Servilius to take the more lenient road, joining the opinion of Manius Valerius, the most popular of men, who thought the magistracy would best heal the strife by voting either a cancellation or a reduction of the debts; or, failing that, at least a present prohibition of the seizure of those past due; and by leading the poor to the military oath by exhortation rather than compulsion, and by not making the punishments against the disobedient harsh and inexorable, as in a city of one mind, but moderate and lenient. For there was danger, he said, lest men compelled to serve at their own charges, in want of their daily necessities, should turn to desperation when gathered together.

24.1. At the same time new treaties also were made, with oaths, with all the cities of the Latins for peace and friendship, since they had attempted no disturbance in the strife and were plainly rejoicing in the return of the people, and seemed ready to share in the war against the seceders.

24.2. What was written in the treaties was as follows: "Let there be peace between the Romans and all the cities of the Latins toward one another, so long as heaven and earth keep the same station; and let them neither make war on one another, nor bring in wars from elsewhere, nor furnish safe roads to those who bring war; and let them help with all their power those who are warred upon; and of the spoils and booty from common wars let each side obtain an equal share; and let the judgments of private contracts be made within ten days, in whatever place the contract was made. To these treaties let it be permitted neither to add anything nor to take anything from them, save what shall seem good to the Romans and all the Latins."

24.3. These things, then, the Romans and the Latins agreed with one another, swearing over sacrifices. And the senate voted also to render thank-offerings to the gods for the reconciliation with the people, adding one day to the so-called Latin Festivals, which were two: the first having been consecrated by King Tarquinius, at the time when he conquered the Tyrrhenians; the other added by the people, when, having expelled the kings, it made the city free; to which the third was then assigned for the sake of the return of the seceders.

25.1. Much time being wasted on these things, the other of the consuls, Servilius—for the campaign fell to him by lot—having by much entreaty and courtship prepared the commoners to share in the war, with a force not compelled by levy but voluntary, as the occasion invited, set out for the war while the Volscians were still preparing and neither expecting the Romans to come against them with an army, governed as they were so factiously and at enmity with one another, nor thinking they would come to grips with assailants—supposing that they themselves had full liberty to begin the war whenever they

25.2. wished. But when they perceived that they must fight, being themselves attacked, then, stricken with dismay at the swiftness of the Romans, the eldest men came forth from the cities bearing suppliant boughs, entrusting to Servilius to deal with them as wrongdoers in whatever way he wished. He, taking provisions for the army from them and garments, and choosing three hundred sons from the most distinguished houses as hostages, departed, supposing the war ended.

25.3. But this was no ending, only a delay and an occasion of preparation for those forestalled by the unexpectedness of the assault; and when the Roman army had withdrawn, the Volscians kindled the war again, fortifying their cities and holding under stronger guard any other place suited to give them safety. Joined with them in the danger were openly the Hernicans and Sabines, and secretly many others. The Latins, when an embassy came to them from the Volscians seeking alliance, bound the men and brought them to Rome.

25.4. To these the senate, rendering thanks for their steadfast loyalty and still more for their zeal toward the contest—for they were ready to make war willingly—granted what it thought they most wished but were ashamed to ask: it presented to them, free of charge, those of their men captured in the wars, a little short of six thousand, and, that the gift might take on the adornment befitting their kinship, clothed them all in garments suited to free persons. As for the alliance, the senate said it needed none from the Latins, declaring that Rome's own forces were sufficient to repel the rebels. Having given these answers, it voted the war against the Volscians.

26.1. While the senate was still sitting in the senate-house and considering what forces were to march out, there appeared in the Forum an elderly man clad in rags, with a long beard let down and unkempt hair, crying out and calling for the help of his fellow men. When the nearby crowd had run together, standing where he would be conspicuous to many, he said: "Born free, having served the campaigns of my youth, having fought in twenty-eight battles and often received prizes of valour from the wars, when the times came that drove the city into the utmost straits, I was forced to take a loan to discharge the taxes exacted of me, since the enemy had overrun my farm and the famines in the city had consumed my goods; and having no means to pay my debt, I was led off as a slave by my creditor together with my two sons; and when my master ordered some hard work and I objected to him, I received very many blows of the whip."

26.2. Having said this, he threw off his rags and showed his breast full of wounds and his back covered with blood from the blows. When an outcry and lamentation arose from those present, the senate broke up, and throughout the whole city there was a running of the poor bewailing their own fortune and calling on their neighbours to help; and from their houses those enslaved for debt rushed out with long hair, most of them in chains and fetters, no one daring to lay hold of them—and if anyone but touched one, he was torn apart by force of hands.

26.3. So great a frenzy held the people at that time; and not long after, the Forum was full of those who had escaped their bonds. Appius, then, fearing the rush of the multitude against himself, since he was the author of the evils and these things were thought to have happened on his account, fled from the Forum and went away. But Servilius, casting off his purple-bordered robe and rolling before each of the commoners with tears, with difficulty persuaded them to refrain that day and to come on the next, since the senate would take some care for them. Having said this and ordered the herald to proclaim that no creditor should be permitted to lead off the person of a citizen for a private debt until the senate had decided about them, and that those present might depart wherever they wished without fear, he dispersed the tumult.

27.1. That day, then, they departed from the Forum; but on the next there was present not only the city crowd, but also the commons from the neighbouring fields, and from early morning the Forum was full. When the senate was convened to deliberate what should be done about these matters, Appius called his colleague a demagogue and a leader of the desperation of the poor, while Servilius called him austere, stubborn, and the cause of the present evils to the city; but no end came of the speeches.

27.2. Meanwhile Latin horsemen, driving their horses in haste, arrived in the Forum announcing that the enemy had marched out with a great army and were already upon their borders. While they reported this, the patricians and the body of the knights and all the rest who had wealth or ancestral renown, as men in danger over great things, armed themselves with speed;

27.3. but those of them who were poor, and especially those oppressed by debts, neither touched their arms nor otherwise furnished any aid to the common cause, but, rejoicing and receiving the foreign war as a thing prayed for, as one that would free them from their present evils, showed their chains and fetters to those who begged them to defend the state, and mockingly asked whether it were worth their while to fight for the safety of these blessings. Many even dared to say that it was better to be slaves to the Volscians than to endure the insults of the patricians; and the city was filled with lamentation and tumult and all manner of women's wailings.

28.1. Seeing this, the senators begged the other of the consuls, Servilius, who at the moment seemed the more persuasive to the many, to come to the aid of the country. He, summoning the people to the Forum, set before them the necessity of the present crisis, which no longer admitted of civic rivalries, and thought fit that now they should advance against the enemy with one mind and not look on while their country was made desolate—wherein each had his ancestral gods and the tombs of his forefathers, the most honoured of all things among men; and that they should take pity on their parents, who would not be able to defend themselves through old age, and have compassion on their wives, who would presently be forced to endure dreadful and unbearable outrages, and most of all pity the cruel maimings and merciless insults of their infant children, not reared for such hopes;

28.2. and that, when all of them with equal zeal had repelled the present danger, then they should consider in what way they might establish a polity equal and common and saving for all, neither the poor plotting against the property of the rich nor the rich insulting those humbler in fortune; for these things were least befitting a state. But there would be some civic relief for the poor, and some moderate help for those who advanced the loans—at least for the wronged—and that best of human goods, which keeps all cities in concord, faith in contracts, would not be utterly and forever abolished from the Roman city alone.

28.3. Having gone through these things and whatever else was fitting to be said on such an occasion, he ended by speaking in defence of his own goodwill, which he continued to hold toward the people, and begged them to share in this campaign with him, in return for his zeal toward them—the care of the city falling to his colleague, and the command of the wars assigned to himself; for the lot had so apportioned these duties. He said the senate had promised him that it would confirm whatever he should agree upon with the multitude, and he had promised the senate that he would persuade the commoners not to betray their country to the enemy.

29.1. Having said this, he ordered the herald to proclaim that, of those Romans who should march out to the war against the enemy, no one might either sell or pledge their houses, or lead off any of their kin for any contract, or prevent whoever wished from sharing in the campaign; but that against those who stayed behind from the campaign the creditors should have their suits, on the terms on which each had lent. When the poor heard this, they at once consented and all rushed to the war with great zeal—some led on by hopes of profit, others by gratitude to the general, but most fleeing from Appius and the insults of those in the city against those who remained.

29.2. Servilius, taking over the army, marched with great speed, leaving no time idle, that he might engage the enemy before they invaded Roman territory; and finding them encamped near the place called Pomentine and plundering the Latin country, because the Latins would not join them in the war though invited, toward late evening he pitched his camp beside a certain hill about twenty stades from their encampment. By night the Volscians attacked them, thinking them few and, as men come from a long march, wearied and lacking in zeal on account of the disturbances of the poor over debts, which were thought to be at their height.

29.3. But Servilius, fighting from the camp while it was still night, when light came and he learned that the enemy were plundering in disorder, ordered many small gates to be opened secretly from the camp, and at a single signal launched the army upon them. The peril falling suddenly and unexpectedly upon the Volscians, a few who made a stand, fighting near the rampart, were cut down; the rest, fleeing headlong and losing many of their own, most of them wounded and having lost their arms, made their way safe to their camp.

29.4. The Romans following close at their heels and surrounding the camp, after defending it a short while they surrendered the rampart, full of many slaves and cattle and arms and the equipment for war. Many free persons were captured, some of the Volscians themselves, some of the nations that fought with them, and money and gold and silver and clothing in great abundance, as when a most prosperous city is taken. Servilius gave these to the soldiers, that each might enrich himself, and, ordering them to divide it among themselves and bring nothing to the public treasury, set fire to the camp and led his forces against the nearest city, Suessa Pometia. For in the size of its circuit and the number of its inhabitants, and besides in reputation and wealth, it seemed far to surpass the cities thereabouts, and was, as it were, the leader of the nation.

29.5. Having invested it and recalling the army neither by day nor by night, that the enemy might have no time to rest, taking neither sleep nor any pause from war, by famine and helplessness and lack of allies he wore them down and took them in no long time, and slaughtered all of military age. And committing all the money there to the soldiers to carry and drive away, he led his force against the other cities, no one of the Volscians being any longer able to ward off anything.

30.1. When the affairs of the Volscians had been humbled by the Romans, the other of the consuls, Appius Claudius, brought their hostages into the Forum—three hundred men—that those who had given their pledge of hostages to him might be wary of breaking faith, and in the sight of all he scourged them and ordered their necks to be struck off.

30.2. When his colleague returned from the campaign not many days later and thought fit to receive the triumph customarily granted by the senate to generals who had fought a brilliant contest, Appius opposed it, calling him a factious man and a lover of a wicked polity, but accusing him most of all because he had brought no portion of the war's spoils into the public treasury but had bestowed it as gifts on whomever he wished; and he persuaded the senate not to grant the man the triumph. But Servilius, thinking himself insulted by the council, turned to an arrogance unusual among the Romans: for, summoning the people to an assembly in the plain before the city and recounting what had been done in the war, and narrating the envy of his colleague and the insult of the senate, he said that from his own deeds and from the army that had fought with him he had the authority to celebrate a triumph over fair and fortunate achievements.

30.3. Having said this, he ordered the fasces to be wreathed, and, himself wreathed and wearing the triumphal robe, advanced into the city escorted by the whole people, until he went up to the Capitol and paid his vows and dedicated the spoils. From this he drew upon himself still greater envy from the patricians, but made the commons devoted to himself.

31.1. While the city was in such disorder, a kind of truce arose in the interval on account of the ancestral sacrifices, and brilliant festivals coming on with their splendid expenditures checked for the present the dissension of the multitude. While they were holding festival, the Sabines, who had watched for this time from afar, attacked them with a great force, making the assault while it was still early night, that they might fall upon the city before those within perceived it; and they would very easily have overpowered them, had not some of the light-armed, breaking away from the phalanx and falling upon the steadings for plunder, caused an uproar.

31.2. For a cry at once arose and a running of the farmers to the wall, before the enemy came to the gates. When those watching the games in the city learned of their approach, even in the midst of it and with their garlands upon them, they left the contests and rushed to arms; and a sufficient force, self-summoned, was gathered for Servilius, which he, keeping it in formation, hurled upon the enemy, who were worn out by sleeplessness and toil and did not expect the Romans' attack.

31.3. When they came to grips, the battle was, on account of the haste of both sides, robbed of order and arrangement; but as if by chance, phalanx fell upon phalanx, or company upon company, or man upon man, and cavalry and infantry fought together confusedly. Helpers came to both sides not long after, since the cities were near, who, cheering on the failing, made them hold out long against their hardships. Then the Romans, when their cavalry came up, again conquered the Sabines, and having killed many returned to the city leading very many prisoners. And those of the Sabines within the city, who had come under pretext of seeing the games and were to seize beforehand the strongholds of the city for the attackers, as had been arranged with them, they searched out and cast into the prisons. And the sacrifices which the war had interrupted they decreed should be doubled from the former, and were again at their feasting.

32.1. While they were still keeping festival, envoys came from the nation of the Aurunci, who held the fairest plains of the Campanian land. These, presenting themselves before the senate, demanded that the territory of the Volscians called Ecetrans—which the Romans, having taken it from the Ecetrans, had distributed among colonists sent out to guard the nation—be restored to them and the garrison withdrawn from it; and if they would not do so, they should expect the Aurunci to come against Roman territory within a short time and exact penalties for all the evils they had wrought upon their neighbours.

32.2. The Romans gave them this answer: "Report, O envoys, to the Aurunci that we Romans hold it just that whatever a man acquires by valour, taking it from enemies, this he should hand down to his descendants as his own. We fear no war from the Aurunci, neither as our first nor as our most terrible; rather, it is our custom to fight all men for the leadership, and, seeing it to be a contest of valour, we shall receive it undismayed."

32.3. After this, the Aurunci, setting out from their own land with a great army, and the Romans with their native forces under the command of Servilius, met one another near the city of Aricia, which is distant a hundred and twenty stades from Rome; and each encamped on strong hills, a little apart from one another. When they had strengthened their camps, they advanced into the plain to fight, and joining battle from early morning till midday they held out, so that there was much slaughter on both sides. For the nation of the Aurunci was warlike, and in stature, strength, and the terror of an aspect that had much of the bestial, most formidable.

33.1. In this war the Roman cavalry are said to have proved the best, and their commander Aulus Postumius Albus, who had held the dictatorship the year before. For the place where the battle was fought was least suited to cavalry, having rocky knolls and deep ravines, so that the horse could be of no use to either side.

33.2. But Postumius, ordering those about him to dismount from their horses, and forming a body of six hundred men, joined battle with the enemy where the Roman phalanx was most distressed, being thrust down a steep place, and at once steadied their ranks. When once the barbarians were checked, courage fell upon the Romans, and a rivalry between the foot and the horse; and both together, tower-like in a single mass, thrust the right wing of the enemy back to the hill; and some, following the fugitives toward the camp, killed many, while others fell upon the rear of those still fighting.

33.3. Having routed these too into a difficult and slow retreat toward broken ground, they pursued them, cutting the tendons of their feet and severing their hams with sideways sword-strokes, until they came to their camp. Forcing the guards of this also, who were not many, they took the camp and plundered it; yet they found no great spoils, save arms and horses and any other warlike gear. These things, then, the consuls Servilius and Appius accomplished.

34.1. After this, Aulus Verginius Caelimontanus and Titus Veturius Geminus succeeded to the consular office, Themistocles being archon at Athens, in the two hundred and sixtieth year after the founding, the seventy-second Olympiad—in which Tisicrates of Croton won a second victory—being about to begin. In their term the Sabines again prepared to lead out a greater army against the Romans, and the Medullini, revolting from the Romans, made oaths of alliance with the Sabine nation.

34.2. Learning of their intention, the patricians prepared to march out quickly in full force; but the commons would not obey them, remembering with rancour the promise often broken to them concerning the poor who needed aid, those who voted on their behalf carrying the contrary. Gathering in small groups, they bound one another by oaths no longer to share in any war with the patricians, while each of the poor was being overpowered singly, but to help in common those they met. And the conspiracy showed itself in many places in skirmishes of words and deeds, but most of all it became clear to the consuls when those summoned did not come to the levy.

34.3. For when the consuls ordered someone of the people to be seized, the poor, gathering in a body, took away the man being led off, and themselves, striking the consuls' attendants who would not release him, drove them off; and they refrained not from striking even the knights and patricians, as many as were present and thought fit to prevent what was happening. And in a short time the whole city was full of disorder and tumult. Together with the strife within the city growing, the preparations of the enemy for a raid also took a greater increase. The Volscians having again resolved on revolt, and the people called the Aequians, an embassy came from all the subjects of the Romans begging them to aid them, lying as they did in the path of the war.

34.4. For the Latins said the Aequians, having invaded their country, were plundering their fields and had already sacked some cities; the garrison in Crustumerium declared the Sabines were near and warring on the fort with much zeal; others announced some other evil that had happened or was about to happen, and came to beg help speedily. Envoys also came before the council from the Volscians, demanding to recover the territory of which they had been deprived, before the war should begin.

35.1. When the senate was convened concerning this, Titus Larcius, called first by the consuls, being thought to surpass in dignity and most competent to judge what was needful, came forward and said: "To me, senators, the things which others think terrible and needing swift aid seem neither terrible nor very pressing—namely, how we should help our allies or in what manner ward off the enemy; but the things they neither reckon the greatest of evils nor necessary at present, but, neglecting them as if they would do us no harm, have set aside—these seem to me most terrible, and, unless we quickly attend to them, the causes of the utmost overthrow and confusion of public affairs: the disobedience of the commoners, who refuse to do what is ordered by the consuls, and our own harshness toward their disobedience and their love of liberty.

35.2. "I think we ought to consider nothing at present but how this shall be removed from the city, and how we may all govern with one mind, preferring the common good to private interests. For the city's power, when of one mind, will be sufficient both to afford safety to friends and fear to enemies; but in faction, as now, it could accomplish neither. I should marvel if it did not even destroy itself and grant the mastery to its enemies without effort; which—by Jupiter and the other gods—I think will not be long in coming, if you govern in such fashion.

36.1. "For we are divided, as you see, and have two cities, the one ruled by poverty and necessity, the other by satiety and insolence. But modesty, order, and justice, by which every civic fellowship is preserved, remain in neither of the cities. Therefore we already take justice from one another by force, and place the highest right in the stronger, like wild beasts, wishing to destroy our adversary along with our own hurt, rather than to keep our own safety along with the

36.2. common preservation of our rival. I think fit that you take much forethought for these very things, sitting in council about them, when you have dismissed the embassies. But what I have to advise you to answer the embassies for the present is this: since the Volscians demand of us what we hold, having conquered them in arms, and threaten war if we do not obey, let us say this: that we Romans hold those possessions fairest and most just which we keep, having won them in war according to law, and that we will not endure foolishly to obliterate our valour; for if we surrender these to those who lost them—possessions we shall ever fight to share with our children and to leave to those born of them—we shall be deprived of what we now have, and shall harm ourselves as much as enemies could.

36.3. "As for the Latins, let us praise their goodwill and reassure their fear that we shall not abandon them, so long as they keep faith, when on our account they come into any danger, but shall send a sufficient force to defend them before long. These I judge will be the best and most just answers. When the embassies have departed, I say we must give our first council to the disturbances within the city, and that not after long delay, but on the very next day."

37.1. When Larcius had declared this opinion and all had approved it, the embassies, receiving the answers stated, departed; and on the next day the consuls, convening the senate, set before them the consideration of remedying the civic disturbances. First, then, being asked his opinion, Publius Verginius, a popular man, taking the middle road, said: "Since the body of the commons in the past year showed the greatest zeal in the contests for the city, opposing along with us the Volscians and Aurunci who came against us with a great army, I think we ought to release those who then joined with us and shared in these wars, and that none of them should have either his person or his property held by the creditors; and that the same right belong to their parents up to grandfathers, and to their children down to grandchildren; but that the rest be liable to seizure by the creditors, on the terms each had lent."

37.2. After this Titus Larcius said: "To me, senators, it seems best to release from their contracts not only those who proved brave in the wars, but also all the rest of the people. For only thus could we make the whole city of one mind." Third, coming forward, Appius Claudius, who had held the consulship the year before, said:

38.1. "Always, senators, as often as a speech has been proposed about these matters, I am of the same opinion: to grant the people nothing of what they claim that is neither lawful nor honourable, nor to lessen the spirit of the city; and not even now do I change any of the views that seemed right to me from the first—or I should be the most senseless of all men, if last year, when I was consul, with my colleague opposing me and stirring up the people, I held firm and remained by my resolutions, turned aside neither by fear nor entreaty nor yielding to favours, but now, being a private man, should fling myself away and betray my freedom of speech;

38.2. "whether any of you wishes to call the freedom of my soul noble or stubborn, as long as I live I shall not depart from what has been rightly resolved, and I shall never, to gratify the wicked, introduce cancellations of debts; nay, against those who introduce them I shall, using all zeal, come to grips, reckoning that all vice and corruption and, in a word, the overthrow of a city begins from the cancelling of debts.

38.3. "And whether anyone thinks I say these things from prudence or from some madness—since I deem it right to look not to my own safety but to the city's—or in whatever way he supposes them to be said, I grant him to think as he wishes; but to the utmost I shall oppose those who would introduce other than ancestral measures. But since the times demand not the debts but great aid, I will tell what alone shall be the remedy of the dissension at present: choose a dictator quickly, who, using irresponsible power, will compel both senate and people to think the best things for the commonwealth; for there will be no other release of so great an evil."

39.1. When Appius had said this and the young men applauded him as proposing what was needful, Servilius rose to speak against him, and certain others of the elders; but they were overborne by the younger men, who came of set purpose and used much violence,

39.2. and in the end the opinion of Appius prevailed. After this the consuls, taking common counsel—since most thought Appius would be appointed dictator, as alone able to prevail in the protectorate—rejected him, and appointed Manius Valerius, brother of Publius Valerius the first consul, who was thought likely to be most popular and a man advanced in years; thinking that the mere terror of the power would suffice, but that the affairs needed a man wholly equitable, lest he work some innovation.

40.1. Valerius, taking up the office and choosing as Master of the Horse Quintus Servilius, brother of the Servilius who had been consul with Appius, summoned the people to an assembly. When a great crowd had gathered—then for the first time since Servilius had laid down his office and the people, led off to the campaigns, had turned to open desperation—coming forward to the platform he said: "Citizens, we well know that it is always your wish that some of the Valerian family rule over you, by whom you were freed from a grievous tyranny, and that you would perhaps consent to fail of none of the moderate things, entrusting yourselves to those who seem and are the most popular of all.

40.2. "So that there is no need for words to teach you that we shall confirm freedom to the people—we who from the first granted it—but only of moderate exhortation, that you may trust us to fulfil whatever we promise. For we have reached the completion of an age that least admits of trickery, and we have a dignity that carries the least part of knavery, and we mean to live the time that remains nowhere but among you, ready to pay the penalty for whatever we may seem to deceive you in.

40.3. "These things, then, as I said, I will pass over, as needing no long words to those who know. But what you seem to me, having suffered at the hands of others, reasonably to suspect of all—seeing always some one of the consuls who summons you to the wars promising to obtain from the senate whatever you need, yet bringing none of the agreements to fulfilment—that you would not justly suspect this of me too, I would prove especially by these two things: that the senate would not have used me for this service, when there were others more suited, the one thought most devoted to the people; and that it would not have adorned me with autocratic power, by which I shall be able to ratify what seems best to me even without it.

41.1. "For surely you do not suppose that I, knowing the deceit, have purposed to deceive you along with it and to do mischief together with it. For if these things enter your minds about me, as the most knavish of all men—use me as you wish; but free your souls of this suspicion by trusting me, and transfer your anger from your friends to the enemy, who come to take your city from you and to make you slaves instead of free, and who, hastening to inflict all the things accounted dreadful among men, are reported to be not far from our territory.

41.2. "Eagerly, then, clear yourselves of these slanders, and show them that even in faction the power of the Romans is stronger than another's at concord; for either they will not withstand you advancing with one accord, or they will pay penalties worthy of their daring. For consider that it is Volscians and Sabines, whom you have often conquered in battle, who bring war upon you, having now gained neither greater bodies nor braver souls than before, but, despising you as men at enmity with one another. And when you have punished the enemy, I pledge you that the senate will, worthily of the valour you display in the war, arbitrate both the rivalries over debts and whatever else you ask of it that is moderate.

41.3. "Meanwhile let every property, every person, every right of a Roman citizen be free from seizure for debt and every other contract. And to those who fight eagerly, the fairest crown shall be this city that bore you standing upright; fair too the praise of their fellows; and the adornment from us shall be enough to set right a household with money and make a family illustrious with honours. And I think fit that my own readiness for dangers be an example to you; for I will fight in the forefront as the mightiest of you."

42.1. When he had said this, the whole people, hearing it gladly, as men no longer to be deceived, promised to share in the war; and ten military legions were formed, each of four thousand men. Of these each of the consuls took three, with as many cavalry as were apportioned to each; the four others and the rest of the cavalry the dictator took. And at once, having made ready, they marched out with speed—Titus Veturius against the Aequians, Aulus Verginius against the Volscians, and the dictator Valerius himself against the Sabines; while Titus Larcius guarded the city with the elders and a small force of men in their prime.

42.2. The Volscian war reached a swift decision. For thinking they greatly surpassed in numbers and remembering their former misfortunes, having become fighters quicker rather than wiser by necessity, they rushed first upon the Romans, when they were seen encamped within view. A fierce battle ensuing, after doing many noble deeds but suffering more dreadful ones, they were turned to flight; their camp was taken, and a notable city was reduced by siege—Velitrae

42.3. was its name. In like manner the spirit of the Sabines too was humbled in a very short time, by a single pitched battle in which both wished to prevail. Then the country was plundered and certain small towns were taken, from which the soldiers got much both of persons and goods. The Aequians, suspecting their own weakness when they learned that their allies' affairs were at an end, sat down in strong places and did not come forth to battle, making their retreats, where they could, secretly through mountains or thickets; and they protracted the war for a while, dragging it out. Yet they could not bring their army off unharmed, since the Romans attacked them boldly in precipitous places and took their camp by storm. Then there was a flight of them from the Latin land and surrenders of the cities they happened to have seized at the first assault, and there were captures of citadels not abandoned out of obstinacy.

43.1. Valerius, the war having gone according to his mind, after leading home the customary triumph for the victory, dismissed the people from the campaign—though the senate did not yet think it the time, lest the poor demand the promises; and into the conquered land, which they had taken from the Volscians, he sent colonists, chosen from among the poor, who were both to garrison the enemy country and to leave behind less of the factious element in the city.

43.2. Having arranged these things, he asked the senate to confirm to him the promises, since it had received the eagerness of the multitude in the contests. But when it gave no heed to him, but—as before it had opposed him—the young and violent, gathering themselves and prevailing in number over the others, then too acted against him and made much outcry, declaring his house a fawner upon the people and the author of wicked laws, and blaming on that policy of the courts, in which the men most gloried in the assembly, the destruction of all the power of the patricians, Valerius, indignant at much and reproaching the people as suffering injustice in being slandered by them, and bewailing the fortune about to seize them for resolving such things, and, as is likely in such an evil, partly from passion and partly from understanding more than the many, prophesying, went away from the senate-house; and summoning the people to an assembly, he said:

43.3. "Owing you much gratitude, citizens, both for the zeal you showed me in joining willingly in the war and still more for the valour you displayed in the contests, I was making great effort to requite you both in other ways and by not falsifying the promises which I made to you on behalf of the senate, and by at last establishing your strife in concord, becoming counsellor and arbiter to both. But I am prevented from doing this by those who choose not the best things for the commonwealth, but what is for the moment pleasing to themselves, who, prevailing in number over the others and in the strength which youth furnishes them rather than the affairs, are emboldened.

43.4. "But I am old, as you see, and have others like me for allies, whose strength, lying in judgment, is unable to follow it up in deed; and our seeming care for the commonwealth has turned into what appears a private hatred toward each party. For by the senate I am blamed as courting your multitude, and to you I am slandered as showing my goodwill rather to it.

44.1. "If, then, the people, having been well treated, had failed of the promises made through me to the senate, I should have had this defence: that you broke faith, and there was no knavery in me; but since the things agreed by the senate have not been fulfilled to you, my speech now becomes necessary to the people: that you have not suffered with my consent, but that we both alike have been deceived and overreached—and I more than you, who am not only wronged in what I have been deceived in common with all, but also in the things I have heard ill of privately—as that I gave the spoils taken from the enemy to your poor without the common consent of the council, wishing to win private favour, and that I think fit to confiscate the property of citizens, though it forbade me and bade me not transgress the law, and that I dismissed the army against the will of the senators, when I ought to have kept you amid the bivouacs and wanderings

44.2. in the enemy's country. I have also been reproached with the sending of the colonists to the Volscians, because I bestowed much good land not on the patricians nor the knights, but distributed it among your poor; and—what gave me the most indignation—because more than four hundred men from the people were enrolled among the knights at the levy, having grown wealthy.

44.3. "If, then, these things had befallen me while my body was in its prime, I should have made clear in deed to my enemies what manner of man they insulted; but since I am over seventy years of age and no longer able to defend myself, and I see that your strife would not even now be ended by me, I lay down my office and give my body to whoever wishes, if any think they have been deceived by me, to use as they judge just."

45.1. Having said this, he drew the whole commons to sympathy, and they escorted him as he departed from the Forum; but the senate he made still harsher toward himself. Straightway after this these things happened: the poor, no longer secretly nor by night as before, but now openly assembling, deliberated about a secession from the patricians; and the senate, purposing to prevent it, ordered the consuls not yet to disband the armies. For each was still master of three legions, the men being held by the military oaths and no one thinking fit to leave the standards—so great was the fear of the oaths in each man. A pretext for the campaign was contrived, that the Aequians and Sabines had joined together for the war against the Romans.

45.2. When the consuls had advanced outside the city with their forces and pitched their camps not far from one another, the soldiers, gathering all into one, being masters of arms and standards, at the instigation of one Sicinius Bellutus, seceded from the consuls, seizing the standards—for these the Romans hold most precious on campaign and consider sacred, like the shrines of the gods—and appointing other centurions and Sicinius commander over all, they seized a hill near the river Anio, not far from Rome, which from this is now called the Sacred Mount.

45.3. When the consuls and centurions recalled them with entreaty and lamentation and many promises, Sicinius answered: "With what intent, patricians, do you now recall those whom you drove from their country and made slaves instead of free? With what pledge will you confirm the promises to us which you are proved to have often falsified? But since you think fit to hold the city alone, depart, troubled no more by the poor and humble; for us, any land in which we have our freedom, whatever it be, will suffice to be reckoned our country."

46.1. When this was reported to those in the city, there was much tumult and lamentation and running through the streets, the people preparing to leave the city and the patricians thinking fit to turn them back and apply force to the unwilling; and there was an outcry about the gates and much wailing, and hostile words against one another, and the deeds of enemies, no one any longer distinguishing age or comradeship or worth of valour.

46.2. When those appointed by the senate to guard the exits—for they were few and no longer able to hold out—being forced out by the people, abandoned their watch, then at once the commons poured out in numbers, and the calamity was like the capture of a city, lamentation arising among those who remained and mutual reproaches as they saw the city being emptied. After this there were many councils and accusations of the authors of the secession. At the same time the enemy nations attacked them, plundering the land up to the city. The seceders, however, taking the necessary provisions from the nearby fields but doing no other harm to the country, remained in the open, and received those who came to them from the city and the surrounding forts, who were now becoming numerous.

46.3. For not only those who wished to escape debts and judgments and the expected necessities flocked to them, but also of the others, all whose life was idle or slack, or unable to supply their desires, or who were emulators of wicked practices, or envious of others' good fortune, or, through some other misfortune or cause, ill-disposed toward the established polity.

47.1. Upon the patricians at the moment fell much confusion and dismay, and fear lest the seceders, along with the foreign enemies, would presently come against the city. Then, as at a single command, snatching up their arms, each with his own clients, some went to the roads by which they thought the enemy would come, others marched out to the forts to guard the strongholds, and others encamped in the plains before the city; while those who through old age were unable to do any of these things were posted on the walls.

47.2. But when they learned that the seceders neither joined the enemy nor ravaged the country nor did any harm worth mentioning, they ceased from their fear; and changing their minds, they considered on what terms they should be reconciled with them. And speeches of all kinds, and most differing from one another, were made by the leaders of the council; but the most moderate and most fitting to the present fortunes were those which their eldest spoke, teaching that the people had made the secession from them through no wickedness, but partly forced by their unavoidable misfortunes, partly deceived by their counsellors, judging their interests by anger rather than reason, as is wont to happen among an ignorant multitude; and that most of them were conscious of having taken bad counsel and were seeking specious pretexts to undo their errors; for their very deeds were those of men already repentant, and, if they got good hope for the future, the senate having voted them impunity and made a seemly reconciliation, they would gladly accept their own.

47.3. And those who gave this advice thought fit that the better men should not prove worse in anger than the worse, nor put off the reconciliation to that time when either the senseless would be forced to come to their senses, or the lesser evil would be cured by the greater—when their freedom would be taken away by themselves through the surrender of arms and the giving up of their persons; for this was near to impossible. Rather, by using moderation, the patricians should become the authors of expedient counsels and go first to the reconciliation, considering that to rule and govern belonged to the patricians,

47.4. but of friendship and peace ... to the good. And they declared that the dignity of the senate would be lessened not most in that wherein, bearing their unavoidable misfortunes nobly, they would govern in safety, but in that wherein, dealing ill-temperedly with their fortunes, they would overthrow the commonwealth. It was a work of folly, they said, to disregard safety while reaching for what was seemly; for it was desirable to attain both, but if one were debarred from either, the saving things must be reckoned more necessary than the more seemly. The conclusion of those who gave this advice was to send envoys to treat with the seceders about friendship, on the ground that they had committed no irreparable wrong.

48.1. These things seemed good to the senate; and after this, having chosen the most suitable men, it sent them to those in the camp, charging them to learn from them what they wanted and on what just terms they thought fit to return to the city; for if any of their demands were moderate and possible, the senate would not oppose them. For the present, then, if they laid down their arms and came down to the city, impunity for their offences would be theirs, and amnesty for the time to come; and if they took the best counsels for the commonwealth and risked themselves eagerly for their country, fair and

48.2. profitable returns. The envoys, having received these instructions, delivered them to those in the camp and discoursed accordingly. But the seceders did not accept the proposals; rather, with disdain and harshness and much irony they reproached the patricians for pretending not to know what the people wanted and on account of what necessities they had seceded from them, while granting them impunity from suffering any penalty for the secession, as though they were still masters—when they themselves needed the citizens' help, men who before long would have to face the foreign wars which would come against them in full force, against whom they could not even lift a hand, men who did not reckon their own safety their own good, but the good fortune of those who would fight alongside them. Finally they added this argument, that the patricians, now learning better the straits that gripped the city, would know against what kind of adversaries the contest would be for them; and they uttered many harsh threats.

48.3. The envoys, making no further reply to this, departed and reported to the patricians the answer of the seceders. The city, when it received these answers, fell into far greater confusion and fear than before; and the senate was able to find neither a remedy nor a delay, but, hearing for many days the abuse and accusations which its leaders made against one another, was dissolved. Nor was the body of the commons, however much still remained from goodwill toward the patricians or compelled by longing for their country, of the same mind, but a great part of it too, openly and secretly, was draining away, and nothing of what remained seemed secure. These things having happened, the consuls—for the time still left them of their office was short—appointed a day for the elections.

49.1. The people, when the time came in which the magistracies had to be ratified by an assembly gathered in the plain, since no one either sought the consulship or, when it was offered, would accept it, themselves appointed consuls from among those who had already held this office, men acceptable both to the people and to the aristocracy—Postumus Cominius and Spurius Cassius, by whom the Sabines had been defeated and made to renounce their leadership—in the seventy-second Olympiad, in which Tisicrates of Croton won the foot-race, Diognetus being archon at Athens.

49.2. These, taking up office on the Kalends of September, sooner than had been the custom of their predecessors, before transacting anything else convened the senate to discuss the return of the commoners, and asked to declare his opinion first a man who was then in the prime of his age and thought to surpass the others in understanding, and most of all praised for the choice of his policies—because he was of the middle order, neither magnifying the arrogance of the aristocrats nor permitting the people to do whatever they wished—Agrippa Menenius; who urged the senate to the reconciliation, speaking thus:

49.3. "If, senators, it had happened that all present held the same opinion, and no one was likely to be an obstacle to the reconciliation with the people, but it lay before us only to consider on what terms—whether just or not—we should be reconciled with them, I would have shown you in few words what I think.

49.4. "But since some think this very point still needs deliberation—whether it is better for us to come to terms with the seceders or to make war—I do not think it easy for me by a short statement to advise what should be done, but I must by a longer speech teach those of you who are ill-disposed toward the reconciliation that they urge the contrary of what is good; or, if they mean to frighten you, that they reckless of the greatest and most incurable evils stand in dread of the slightest of difficult things, which admit of easy remedy. And they have come to this through nothing else than that they judge their interest not by reason but by passion and madness.

49.5. "For how could those be said to foresee with their minds anything useful or possible, who suppose that so great a city, now mistress of so many affairs and become an object of envy and grievance to its neighbours, could either, without the commons, easily hold and preserve the nations under it, or could bring in another people in place of the worse, a better one, which would fight for its empire on its behalf and govern with it in much tranquillity, showing itself moderate both in peace and in war? For they could say nothing else, trusting in which they would think fit to bid you not accept the reconciliation.

50.1. "How full of simplicity each of these alternatives is, I would beg you to consider from the very facts, reflecting that, when the humbler sort have fallen into strife with you on account of those who used their misfortunes neither in a civic nor moderate spirit, and have withdrawn from the city, but do and intend you no further harm, but only consider how they may be reconciled without disgrace—many of those ill-disposed toward you, gladly accepting what fortune brought, have been roused in spirit, and think this longed-for opportunity is at hand, in which they

50.2. will overthrow your empire. The Aequians and Volscians, the Sabines and the nation of the Hernicans, besides having made no truce in their war against us, and chafing at their recent evils, are plundering our fields. And of Campania and Tyrrhenia, all that remains doubtfully detached from us—some openly revolts, some secretly prepares to. It seems too that the Latin kinship no longer remains securely friendly to us when put to the test, but a great part of it is reported to be sick with a longing—which all crave—for change;

50.3. and we, who once encamped against others, now sit hemmed within our walls, having left our land unsown and seeing our steadings plundered, our booty driven off and our servants deserting, with no remedy for our ills. And, suffering these things, do we still hope that the commons will be reconciled with us, knowing that it lies in our power to end the strife by a single decree?

51.1. "With our affairs in the field so ill, the dangers within the walls are no less terrible. For we have not for a long while prepared our allied forces as men about to be besieged, nor are we ourselves sufficient in number against so many enemy nations; and of the small and unworthy garrison, the greater part is of the commons—labourers, clients, and artisans, not at all sure guardians of a shaken aristocracy. And the continual desertions of these to the seceders that now occur

51.2. have made the whole suspect. Above all these, the gathering of provisions, being impossible while the land is held by the enemy, already threatens famine, and when we come into straits will threaten still more; and besides these, there is the war that lets us be at no time secure in mind. But all the terrors are surpassed by the women of the seceders and their infant children and their aged parents, who in pitiable garments and mourning attire wander to ruin through the Forum and the streets, weeping, supplicating, clasping each man's right hand and knees, bewailing the desolation that holds them and will hold them still more—a dreadful and unendurable sight.

51.3. "There is no one so savage in disposition that he is not overturned in soul at seeing these things, and feels something at the fortunes of men. So that, if we mean to be irreconcilable toward the commons, we must rid ourselves of these persons too—the one sort as useless for a siege, the others as not likely to remain firmly friendly. But if these too are driven out, what force will be left to guard the city? Or in what aid shall we trust to dare endure the dangers? Our own refuge and only sure hope, the flower of the patricians, is small, as you see, and not worth being proud of. Why, then, do those who advise enduring the war babble and deceive us, rather than openly advise surrendering the city now to the enemy without blood and without toil?

52.1. "But perhaps I am deluded in saying these things and think fit to fear what is not terrible; and the city now risks nothing but a change, no hard thing, and we could with much ease receive into it a labouring and client multitude from every nation and place. For this is what many of those who oppose the commons keep harping on—and, by Jupiter, not the basest of them.

52.2. "For some have come to such simplicity as to propose not saving counsels but impossible prayers; whom I would gladly ask, what surplus of time will be given us, engaged in such affairs, with the enemy so near the city? What pardon will there be for the delay and tarrying of the allies who are to come, in dangers that neither tarry nor delay? What man or god will furnish us safety and gather at leisure from every place and convey hither the aid? And further, who will those be who leave their own countries and migrate to us? Will it be those who have homes and hearths and livelihoods and the honour they enjoy among their fellow citizens through ancestral distinction or the fame of their own valour? And who would endure to leave behind his own goods to share scantily in others' evils? For they will not come hither to share in peace and luxury, but in dangers and war, of which the outcome is uncertain

52.3. whether it will be brought to a good issue. Or shall we bring in a multitude that is plebeian and homeless, such as was that which was driven from here—clearly through debts and judgments and like misfortunes—glad to settle wherever it may chance? Such a one, even if it should be otherwise good and moderate (that we may grant it this too), would on this very account—that it would be neither native nor of the same way of life, nor acquainted with the customs and laws and breeding among us—be far and altogether worse than the one we have.

53.1. "For the native man has here as hostages his children and wives and parents and many other persons of his own kin, and—by Jupiter—the longing for the very soil that reared him, which is necessary to all and not to be removed; but this summoned and intrusive multitude, if it became our fellow-dweller, having none of these things here, for what good would it think fit to risk itself, unless someone should promise to give it portions of land and a share of the city, however great, taking it from the present owners—a thing we do not think fit to share even with our citizens who have often fought for it? And perhaps it would not even be content with these alone if given, but would think fit to share equally with the patricians in honours and offices and the other goods.

53.2. "Therefore, if we shall not grant each of their demands, shall we have as enemies those who fail of them? But if we should concede, our country will be gone and our polity overthrown by ourselves. And I do not add here that in the present we need bodies fit for war, not farmers or labourers or merchants or those occupied in mechanical crafts, who would at the same time have to learn warfare and give proof of it; and hard is the trial of those unaccustomed; and necessarily such would be the rabble migrating from every nation.

53.3. "For I see no military alliance established for us, nor, should one appear unexpectedly, would I advise you to receive it readily within the walls, knowing many other cities enslaved by the armies brought in for their guard.

54.1. "Reflecting, then, on these things and on whatever else has been said by us before, and recalling moreover, in answer to those who summon us to the reconciliation, that not among us alone or first has poverty striven against wealth and lowliness against eminence, but in nearly all cities, both small and great, the lesser is for the most part set against the greater as an enemy—in which the leaders of the commonwealth, by using moderation, have saved their countries, but by using arrogance have, along with the other goods, destroyed themselves as well;

54.2. and that everything compounded of many parts is by nature liable to sicken in some one of its members; and besides these, that one must neither always cut off the ailing part of the human body—for the appearance of what is left would be ugly and its nature not long-enduring—nor expel the diseased portion of a civic fellowship; for the whole would not be long in perishing through its own parts in time; and considering how great is the power of necessity, to which alone even the gods yield, do not chafe against your fortunes, nor fill yourselves with arrogance and folly as if all would be according to our prayer, but bend and yield, using as examples of good counsel not foreign deeds, but our own.

55.1. "For both a single man and a whole city ought to take pride in the noblest of their own deeds, and to see that the rest will be in keeping with these. You, then, having already taken into your power many enemies by whom you had been most grievously wronged, were willing neither to destroy them nor to cast them from their own, but gave them back their houses and lands, allowed them to dwell in the countries they sprang from, and to some of them you have even granted to be of equal vote and your fellow citizens.

55.2. "And I have a deed of yours still more wonderful than this to tell: that even of your own citizens, many who had greatly wronged you, you released from punishment, casting your anger on the authors alone—among whom were those who colonised Antemnae and Crustumerium and Medullia and Fidenae, and many others. For why need I now enumerate all whom you, when conquered by siege, admonished with moderation and in civic fashion? And in no way did either danger or blame on this account befall the city; rather, your fairness is praised, and nothing of your safety has been diminished.

55.3. "Then will you who spare your enemies make war on your friends, and you who let go unpunished those who came into your power will punish those who helped you win your empire? And, while offering your own city as a safe refuge to all who need it, will you endure to drive from it the native-born, with whom you were reared and educated and shared many evils and goods in peace and in war? No—not if you wish to do what is just and befitting your own customs, and to judge the expedient without anger.

56.1. "But that the strife must be ended, one might say, we have recognised no less than you, and have shown much zeal; only try to say how we may end it. For you see how great is the arrogance about the people, who neither send to us about a settlement, though they are in the wrong, nor give to those sent by us civic and humane answers, but are haughty and threaten, and it is not easy to conjecture what they want. To these things what I advise be done

56.2. now, hear from me. I think the people are neither irreconcilable toward us nor will do any of the things they threaten, judging that their deeds are not like their words, but I think they are far more eager than we for a settlement. For we both dwell in our most honoured country and have our livelihoods and houses and families and all things of most worth in our own power; but they are without city and without hearth, deprived of the persons most necessary to them, and have no easy supply for their daily living.

56.3. "For what reason, then, if anyone should ask me, does the people not accept our proposals, though itself suffering ill, and yet send no embassy to us?—Because, by Jupiter, I would say, up to now it hears words from the senate, but sees no deed coming from them either humane or moderate, and thinks it has often been deceived by us, who always promise to take some forethought for it, but take none. And it does not endure to send an embassy, both fearing those here accustomed to accuse it, and dreading lest it fail of any of its demands.

56.4. "Perhaps too there may be in it some passion of foolish pride; and that is no marvel, since even among ourselves there are some in whom is this quarrelsomeness and contentiousness, who think fit, both privately and publicly, not to be worsted by their adversary, but ever seek by every means to prevail, and not first to grant any favour until they get the one to be benefited into their power. Reflecting, then, on these things, I think an embassy should be sent to the commoners from those most trusted by them;

56.5. "and I advise that the men to be sent be invested with full powers to settle the strife on whatever terms they themselves think just, referring nothing further to the senate; for they will know this. And those who now seem arrogant and harsh, when they learn that you truly are zealous for concord, will come down to more equitable terms, demanding nothing either shameful or impossible. For everything that is provoked, especially if it be humble, is wont to grow savage toward those who scorn it, but to be tamed toward those who court it."

57.1. When Menenius had said this, a great murmur fell upon the senate, and they talked among themselves in groups—those well disposed toward the commoners urging one another to bring all zeal that they might lead the people back to their country, since they had now gained as leader of that opinion the most distinguished of the aristocratic men; while the aristocrats, wishing above all that the polity should not be moved from the ancestral order, were at a loss what to do with the present circumstances, not thinking fit to change their purposes, yet unable to remain by their resolutions; and the uncommitted, who took the side of neither faction, wished to keep the peace and to consider how they should not be besieged.

57.2. When silence fell, the elder of the consuls, having praised Menenius for his nobility and thought fit that the rest should prove guardians like him, speaking what they thought with frankness and doing without hesitation what was resolved, called next, in the same manner, by name, asking him to declare his opinion, Manius Valerius, brother of him who had helped free the city from the kings, a man more devoted to the people than any of the aristocrats whatsoever.

58.1. He, rising, first reminded the senate of his own policies, and that, though he had often foretold the evils that would befall, they had treated his words with neglect; then he thought fit that those opposed to the reconciliation should not now seek moderate things, but, since they had not let the strife be removed when the city's differences were still small, at least now consider how it might quickly cease and not, advancing further, escape notice and become perhaps incurable, or, if not, hard to cure and the cause of many evils to them. And he declared that the demand of the commoners would no longer be the same as before, nor did he conjecture that the people would come to terms asking only release from debts, but would perhaps need some safeguard by which it might continue secure for the future;

58.2. for, since the office of dictator had come in, the law guarding their freedom had been abolished—the law which neither allowed the consuls to put to death any citizen untried, nor that the commoners worsted in trial by the patricians should be handed over to those who had condemned them, but gave to those who wished the right to transfer the judgments from the patricians to the people, and that whatever the people decided should be valid. And almost all the rest of the power of the commoners, of which in former times they had been masters, had been taken away—seeing that not even the triumph from the wars could be obtained from the senate for a man more deserving of this honour than any other, Publius Servilius

58.3. Priscus. At these things, suffering naturally, the many were dispirited and had wretched hopes for their safety, since neither consul nor dictator who wished to care for them had been able to, but one of them had even reaped insult and dishonour for his zeal and forethought on behalf of the many. And these things, he said, had been wrought by a conspiracy not of the most gracious of the patricians, but of certain insolent and grasping men, terribly eager for unjust gain, who, having enslaved many citizens for a great difference and at high interest, and applying to them cruel and arrogant compulsions, made the whole commons estranged from the aristocracy; and having formed a faction and proclaimed as its leader Appius Claudius, a man hating the people and oligarchic, through him confound all the city's affairs. And unless the sound part of the senate stood in their way, the city was in danger of some enslavement and overthrow. At the end he declared that he agreed to use the opinion of Menenius, and thought fit to send the embassy quickly; and that the men, when they came, should try to settle the strife as they wished, but, if no one should grant them what they wanted, should accept what was given.

59.1. After him rose, when called, Appius Claudius, the leader of the faction opposed to the people, a man thinking much of himself, and that not without just cause; for his daily private life was temperate and grave, and the choice of his policies was noble and preserved the dignity of the aristocracy. He, taking occasion from the harangue of Valerius, used such words as these:

59.2. "Valerius would have been less to blame, had he declared only his own opinion and not accused those who held the contrary; for he might have heard none of the evils that belong to him. But since it did not suffice him to advise such things as will make us slaves to none but the basest of the citizens, but he both laid hold of those who opposed him and made hostile mention of me, I see much necessity that I too should speak on these matters, and first clear myself of the slanders against me. For he has reproached me with a practice neither civic nor seemly—that I have chosen to make money from every source, and have deprived many of the poor of their freedom, and that the secession of the people has come about not least on my account—none of which it is easy for you to learn is either true or sound.

59.3. "Come, then, say, O Valerius, who are those whom I enslaved for debt? Whom of the citizens did I hold, or do I now hold, in bonds? Which of the seceders is deprived of his country through my cruelty or love of money? But you could not say. For so far am I from having enslaved any citizen for debt, that, having given out my own to very many, I made none of those who defrauded me liable to seizure or dishonour, but all are free, and all owe me thanks and are counted among my friends and clients in matters most necessary. And I say this not to accuse those who have not done the like with me, nor do I think those wrong who did some act allowed by law; but I am clearing myself of the slanders against me.

60.1. "As for what he reproached me with as to harshness and the patronage of wicked men, calling me a hater of the people and oligarchic because I cling to the aristocracy—these are common accusations against all of you, as many as think fit, being the better, not to be ruled by the worse, nor to have the polity you inherited from your forefathers taken away by the basest of all polities among men, democracy.

60.2. "For let not this man give the name of oligarchy to the leadership of the best, as though the thing, slandered by the name, would thereby be obliterated; but we might far more justly and truly bring the reproach of demagogy and a longing for tyrannic deeds. For it is unclear to no one that every tyrant springs from a fawner upon the people, and that the road is swift for those who wish to enslave cities which leads through the basest citizens to despotic power; whom this man has continued to court and

60.3. does not even now cease. For know well that the base and humble would not have dared to commit so great offences, had they not been roused by this grave and patriotic man, on the ground that the deed would be without danger to them, and that, besides paying no penalty, they would have a better lot than before. And you would learn that I speak the truth, recalling that, while frightening you about war and declaring the reconciliation necessary, he at the same time said that the poor would not be content to be released from their debts, but would need some safeguard too, and would no longer endure to be ruled by you as before; and at the end he thought fit that you should be content with the present and concede whatever the people should think right to take on its return, not distinguishing the base from the noble nor the unjust from the just.

60.4. "To such arrogance, then, has this man—an elder and one who has reaped all the honours from you—filled the folly of the city. Was it worth your while, Valerius, to utter against others reproaches that do not belong to them, when you are yourself liable to such accusations?

61.1. "Against the slanders uttered by this man, what has been said suffices. But concerning the matters about which you have assembled to deliberate, I think it both just and worthy of the city and expedient for you—not only what I declared at the first, but, persisting in the same opinion now too, I declare—not to confound the order of the polity, nor to disturb the unalterable customs of our fathers, nor to abolish from among men faith, a sacred thing, with which every city is safely governed, nor to yield to a people senseless and craving unjust and unlawful deeds.

61.2. "And so far am I from bowing any part of my opinion through fear of those at variance with us—who, banding against me the commons in the city, try to frighten me—that I am far more strongly fixed in my anger than before, and am doubly indignant at the demands of the people; and I have marvelled, senators, at the strangeness of your opinion, that, having not granted it cancellations of debts and release from condemnations when it was not yet plainly an enemy and asked for them, now, when it is in arms and does the deeds of enemies, you deliberate whether you will concede these things—and whatever else may seem good to it; and it will think fit, doubtless, and will make this the first of its demands, to be of equal honour and to share

61.3. the same things with us. Will not affairs, then, come round to a democracy, the most ignorant, as I said, of polities among men, and disadvantageous to you who think fit to rule others? Not if you are wise. Or you would be the most senseless of all, if, having deemed it intolerable to be ruled by one tyrannic man, you now hand yourselves over to a many-headed tyranny, the people, and grant it these things not as it persuades you with favours, but overpowered by necessity and as men yielding against their will, since it is not possible now to do otherwise.

61.4. "But when folly, instead of being punished for its offences, gains honour for them too, how arrogant and haughty, think you, will it be? For do not be lifted up by this hope, that the people will be moderate in its demands, if it become plain to it that you have all so voted.

62.1. "But most of all in this Menenius has been deceived in his judgment—a temperate man, who from his own ways conjectures good of others. For it will press upon you grievously beyond what is fitting, through the arrogance which is wont always to attend on power, and through the folly, of which the multitude shares the greatest part; and if not at the first, at least in time afterward, and at each thing it asks and fails to obtain, it will take up arms and set upon you haughtily in the same way. So that if you concede the first things, thinking them expedient, you will at once be commanded something worse, and again another thing harder than this, since you obeyed the first too through fear, until in the end they cast you from the city—as in many other places, and most recently in Syracuse, the landholders were driven out by their clients.

62.2. "But if you mean to be indignant at those things and oppose their demands, why do you not begin straightway to have free spirits? For it is better, setting out from a lesser cause, before you have been harmed at all, to display your nobility, than, having endured many things, then to be indignant about what has happened and not to entrust the rest, and late to begin to have sense. Let no one of you be frightened either by the agitation of the seceders or by the war of the foreigners; nor condemn your own force as not sufficient to save the city.

62.3. "For the strength of the exiles is small and will not hold out long, remaining, as now, in the open under huts in the wintry season, and unable to provide its necessities—not by plunder, when it has consumed what it has, nor by buying and importing from elsewhere, through poverty, men who have no money either privately or in common; and wars for the most part hold out by surpluses of money; and anarchy, as is likely, and the faction arising from anarchy, falling upon them, will quickly dissolve and break up their counsels.

62.4. "For surely they will not think fit, having surrendered themselves to Sabines or Tyrrhenians or any other foreigners, to be slaves to those whose freedom they themselves once took away along with you; and least of all will they be trusted by them—men who eagerly sought to destroy their own country basely and shamefully—not to do the like to the city that receives them. And all the nations round about you are governed by aristocracy, and in no city does the populace lay claim to equality; so that surely the leading men in each city, who do not allow their own crowd to make disturbance, will not receive this intrusive and factious one into their own country, lest, not having shared like rights themselves, they be in time deprived of equality.

62.5. "But if indeed I err in judgment and some city should receive them, there they will be recognised as enemies and will suffer the lot of enemies. And we have as hostages their fathers and wedded wives and the rest of their kin, than which we could not, even praying, ask better of the gods; whom, setting them in sight of their kinsmen, we will destroy, if they dare to come to grips, as men about to use them with the uttermost outrages. And themselves, if they learn this, know well, you will get supplicating, lamenting, surrendering themselves to us without their arms, enduring everything. For such necessities are dreadful and able to break and cast to nothing all arrogant calculations.

63.1. "These are the reasons why I think the war from the exiles is not to be feared. As for the terrors from the foreigners, it is not now first that they will be tested and found to be such only in word; before too, as often as they gave us trial of themselves, they appeared less than their reputation. And those who think the city's own force not sufficient, and on this account most dread the war, let them learn that they have not adequately perceived it.

63.2. "Against the seceders among the citizens we shall have a counterbalancing force, if we wish, by choosing the most vigorous of our servants and freeing them. For it is better to grant freedom to these than to be deprived of our empire by those; and they have sufficient experience of war, having often been present with us on the campaigns.

63.3. "Against the foreign enemies let us go ourselves with all zeal, and bring all our clients and what is left of the commons. And that this last may be eager for the contests, let us grant it release from debts—not in common, but man by man. For if we must yield to the times and use moderation, let this moderation not be toward our enemy citizens, but toward our friends, to whom we shall seem to give favours not under compulsion but of persuasion. And if there be need of yet other help, this not sufficing, let us summon those from the forts and recall those in the colonies.

63.4. "How great a multitude this is, it would be easy to learn from the most recent census. There are a hundred and thirty thousand Romans of military age registered, of whom the exile element would not be a seventh part. And I do not count the thirty cities of the Latins, which would with much prayer welcome the contests on our behalf, on account of kinship, if you should but vote them equal citizenship, which they continually keep asking for.

64.1. "And that which is the strongest of all in wars, which you yourselves have not yet considered, nor any of the counsellors mentions—this I will add and then cease. There is nothing of which those who would have a fortunate issue of their contests have such need as of good generals. Of these our city is rich, but those of our adversaries are poor.

64.2. "For numerous forces, when they get commanders who do not know how to rule, behave unseemly and are for the most part tripped up by their own size, and suffer the more, the greater toil they have; but good generals, even if they get small forces, quickly make them great. So that, so long as we have men able to lead, we shall not lack those willing to be ruled.

64.3. "Reflecting, then, on these things and remembering the city's deeds, vote nothing humble or ignoble or unworthy of yourselves. What, then, if someone should ask me, do I advise you to do? For perhaps you have long been eager to know this. Neither to send any embassy to the seceders, nor to vote a cancellation of debts, nor to do anything else that might seem a token of fear and helplessness; but if, laying down their arms, they come down to the city and put it in your power to deliberate about them, then, examining at leisure, to use moderation toward them, knowing that all that is senseless—especially if it be a crowd—is wont to grow arrogant toward the humble, but to be humbled toward the arrogant."

65.1. When Claudius had ceased, a great clamour and extraordinary tumult held the council for a long while. For those who seemed aristocratic and thought it right to look to the more just before the unjust attached themselves to the opinion of Claudius and urged the consuls, best of all, to join the stronger party, considering that they held a kingly, not a popular, magisterial power; or, failing that, to keep themselves neutral and let neither faction prevail, and, having counted the opinions of the councillors, to side with the more numerous opinions.

65.2. But if, disregarding both of these, they should make themselves masters of the settlements, they said they would not permit them, but would oppose them with all zeal, with words while they could, and with arms when it became necessary. And this was a strong body, and almost the whole youth of the patricians held to this purpose.

65.3. But those who desired peace attached themselves to the opinion of Menenius and Valerius, and especially the advanced in age, reflecting on the disasters that befall cities from civil wars. Being overborne by the shouting and disorder of the young men, and suspecting their ambition, and fearing the violence they were making against the consuls—that it would come not far short of blows, unless someone yielded to them—they ended by turning to tears and entreaties of their opponents.

66.1. When the tumult had abated and silence came, after a while the consuls, having conferred a little among themselves, brought forth this as the conclusion of their opinion: "We, senators, thought it best of all that all of you should be of one mind, especially in deliberating about the common safety; but, failing that, that the younger should yield to the elder among you and not contend, reflecting that to them too, when they reach this age, it will fall to receive equal honour from their descendants. But since we see you fallen into a most destructive strife—the deadliest of human diseases—and much arrogance attending your young men, for now, since little of the day is left and your resolutions could not reach an end in it, depart from the council; and at the next assembly you will come more moderate and with better opinions.

66.2. "But if your contentiousness remains, we will use the young no longer as judges or counsellors of what is expedient, but for the future will check their disorder by fixing by law the number of years which those who deliberate must have; and giving the word again to the elder, if they agree on nothing in their opinions, we will end their contention by a quick road, which it is better for you to hear and learn beforehand.

66.3. "You know, doubtless, that we have a law, from the time we have dwelt in this city, that the senate is mistress of all things, save to appoint magistrates, to ratify laws, and to declare war or to end one in being; of these three the people has the power by casting its vote. And at present we deliberate about nothing other than war and peace, so that there is much necessity that the people, becoming master of the vote, should ratify our opinions.

66.4. "Having ordered the multitude, therefore, according to this law to come to the Forum, when you have declared your opinions, we will give it the vote, thinking that thus your strife would best be lifted; and whatever the majority votes, this we shall hold valid. Worthy, surely, to obtain this honour are those who remain well-disposed to the city and are to share equally with us in evils and goods."

67.1. Having said this, they dissolved the assembly. On the following days, having ordered that all in the fields and forts should be summoned, and having proclaimed to the senate to come on the same day, when they perceived that the city was full of crowds and that the opinions of the patricians were being overborne by the entreaties which the fathers and infant children of the seceders made with wailing and lamentation, on the appointed day they went out to the Forum, which from much

67.2. of the night was crowded throughout with a multifarious throng. And coming forward to the temple of Vulcan, where it was their custom to hold the assemblies, first they praised the people for the eagerness and zeal of their coming in such numbers; then they urged them to wait quietly until the senate's preliminary decree should be made; and to the kinsmen of the seceders they advised good hopes, as men who would before long recover their dearest. After this, going into the council, they themselves discoursed reasonable and moderate words, and thought fit that the others too should declare kindly and humane opinions. First of all the rest they called Menenius; who, rising, used the same words as before, summoning the senate to the reconciliation, and declared the same opinion, thinking fit to send an embassy to the seceders quickly with full powers for the settlement.

68.1. After him rose, called by age, those who had held the consular office, to all of whom it seemed best to use the opinion of Menenius, until the word came down to Appius. He, rising, said: "I see that it is acceptable both to the consuls, senators, and to almost all the rest of you to bring back the people on whatever terms it itself thinks fit; and I alone of all am left of those who opposed the settlement, remaining hateful to them and no longer of any use to you.

68.2. "Yet not on this account will I depart from what I resolved from the first, nor will I willingly leave my post in the polity. The more deserted I become of those who chose the same things as I, the more honoured I shall be by you at some time hereafter; and praise shall be mine while I live, and, when I am dead, remembrance from those who come after. May it be, then, O Capitoline Jupiter and gods who watch over our city, heroes and divinities, as many as oversee the land of the Romans, that the return of the exiles be fair and expedient for all, and may I be proved false in the hopes

68.3. I hold for the future. But if any evil befall the city from these counsels—and this will be plain before long—may you yourselves give swift correction to it and sure safety to the commonwealth, and to me, who neither on any other occasion chose to say what is pleasant rather than what is most useful, nor now betray the common good while contriving my own private safety,

68.4. be gracious and kind. To the gods, then, I pray these things, for there is no longer need of words; but my opinion, which I declare as before, is that those of the commoners who remain in the city be released from their debts, but that we war with all zeal against the seceders, so long as they remain in arms."

69.1. Having said this, he ceased. When the opinions of the elders had attached themselves to that of Menenius, and the word came down to the younger, the whole senate being upright, there rose Spurius Nautius, successor of one of the most illustrious houses; for the founder of their line, Nautius, was one of those who set out the colony with Aeneas, who was priest of Athena Polias and carried off the image of the goddess when he migrated, which others kept by succession, those of the line of the Nautii; and he was thought, both for his own valour, to be the most brilliant of the young men, and that before long he would attain the consular power.

69.2. Beginning to make a common defence on behalf of all the young men—that they had used neither contentiousness toward their fathers nor arrogance when they held the contrary purpose in the former senate, but, if at all they erred, they erred through their youth in failing of judgment—he ended by saying that he would furnish the proof of this in their change of mind. At all events, he said, they yielded to them as wiser, to vote everything they thought expedient for the commonwealth, since they at least would oppose nothing of these things, but

69.3. would obey their elders. When the other young men declared the like with him, except a very few of Appius' kinsmen, the consuls, praising their good order and exhorting them to show themselves such in all common affairs, chose as envoys the ten most distinguished of the elders, all but one of consular rank. Those appointed were these: Agrippa Menenius Lanatus, son of Gaius; Manius Valerius, son of Volusus...; Publius Servilius, son of Publius...; Publius Postumius Tubertus, son of Quintus; Titus Aebutius Flavius, son of Titus; Servius Sulpicius Camerinus, son of Publius; Aulus Postumius Balbus, son of Publius; Aulus Verginius Caelimontanus, son of Aulus.

69.4. After this, the senate being dissolved, the consuls, coming forward to the assembly, read the decree of the senate and brought forward the envoys; and when all thought fit to learn the instructions given to them, they said in public: to do, in whatever way they could, the making of friendship for the people with the patricians without guile and deceit, and to bring back the fugitives to their own with speed.

70.1. The envoys, having received these instructions from them, set out the same day. Rumour, outrunning their coming, announced to those in the camp all that had happened in the city, and at once all, leaving the stronghold, met the envoys while they were still on the road. There was in the camp a certain very turbulent and factious man, sharp in mind to foresee something of what was to come from afar, and able to say what he thought, being talkative and not without glibness, who was called Lucius Junius, of the same name as the one who overthrew the kings; and, wishing to fulfil the namesake, he thought fit to be surnamed Brutus too. To the many, then, laughter at the man's empty pretension came, and whenever they wished to mock him they called him Brutus.

70.2. This man, having taught Sicinius, the commander of the camp, that it was not better for the people lightly to entrust itself to the proposals, lest, from a lesser claim, it should find its return the more dishonourable, but to hold out for a long while and put a kind of feigned tragedy upon affairs, and having promised that he himself would take up the speech on behalf of the people and having laid down the rest of what should be done or said, persuaded Sicinius. After this Sicinius, summoning the people to an assembly, bade the envoys speak about what they had come for.

71.1. Coming forward, Manius Valerius, who was the eldest and most popular of them, the multitude witnessing his zeal with most kindly cries and salutations, when he had obtained silence, used such words as these: "There is nothing now to hinder you, commoners, from returning again to your own and being reconciled with the fathers.

71.2. "For the senate has voted you a fair and expedient return, and has made it its resolve to bear no rancour for anything that has happened; and us, whom it knew to be most devoted to the people and honoured by you for our justice, it has sent as envoys, having invested us with full powers for the settlement, that, not using opinions and conjectures about your mind, but hearing from yourselves on what terms you think fit to end the dissension—if any of your demands be moderate and hindered neither by impossibility nor by some other irreparable disgrace—we may grant them to you, no longer awaiting the council's opinion, nor putting off matters to long delays and the envy of opponents.

71.3. "The senate having thus voted, receive their favours gladly, commoners, with all eagerness and zeal, accounting it a great thing—such great good fortune—and owing much thanks to the gods for it, if the city of the Romans, ruling so many men, and a council that holds the leadership of all the goods in it, though it is not their ancestral way to yield to any of their adversaries, bow to you alone in their claim willingly, and have neither thought fit to bargain precisely about what befits each party, as superiors with inferiors, but themselves were first to send an embassy about a settlement, nor received with anger your arrogant answers, which you made to the former envoys, but endured this proud and boyish weight of your arrogance, like good fathers with foolish children; and thought fit to send yet another embassy and to take less than their due and to endure everything, citizens, that is

71.4. moderate. Standing, then, on such good fortune, do not delay to say, commoners, what you need, nor trifle with us, but, ending the strife, depart rejoicing to the city that bore and reared you—to which you rendered no fair returns for your nurture, leaving it, as far as in you lay, deserted and a pasture for sheep. But if you let slip this opportunity, you will often pray to find another like it."

72.1. When Valerius had ceased, Sicinius came forward and said that those who deliberate well ought to examine the expedient not from a single argument, but to set before themselves the opposing argument too, especially when considering matters of such moment; and he thought fit that those who wished should speak to these things, laying aside all shame and reserve; for the affairs, shut up in such necessities, permitted them to yield neither to hesitation nor to

72.2. shame. When silence fell—since all looked at one another seeking the one who would speak for the common good, but none appeared, for Sicinius kept using the same words—there came forward, according to his promise, that Lucius Junius, the one who wished to be surnamed Brutus, and, having met with a sudden burst of applause from the multitude, delivered such a harangue:

72.3. "The fear of the patricians, commoners, still frozen in your souls, seems to dismay you, and on this account, being humbled, you hesitate to bring out into the open the words you are accustomed to use among yourselves. And perhaps each of you thinks his neighbour will speak for the common good, and that all rather, if there be any risk, will endure it, while he himself, having stood in safety, will, of whatever good comes from daring, have his share without fear—an ill calculation. For if all of us should suppose this, the cowardice of each one of you singly will become a common harm to all, and in seeking his own private safety each man

72.4. will destroy the common good of all. But if you did not before know that your fear is loosed and that you hold your freedom securely along with your arms, learn it now at least, using these men as teachers. For the haughty and harsh come now not commanding you as before, nor threatening, but begging and exhorting you to return to your own, and they begin to deal with you as with free men on equal terms. Why, then, are you still dismayed at them and silent, and do not have free spirits and, breaking your bridles at last, say in common what you have suffered at their hands? O wretched men,

72.5. what do you fear? That you will suffer some harm by using me as leader of your free speech? For I will risk it on your behalf, speaking what is just with frankness to them, and I will hide nothing. And since Valerius said there was nothing to hinder you from returning to your homes, the senate granting the return and having voted besides to bear no rancour, I will answer him these things, which are true and necessary to be said.

73.1. "There are, Valerius, many other things to hinder us from laying down our arms and putting ourselves in your power, but three the greatest and most manifest. First, that you come accusing us as wrongdoers and think to grant the return as a kind of benefit; next, that you give no hint, in summoning us to the reconciliation, on what just and humane terms we shall make it; and last, that nothing of what you may promise is sure to us, but you have continued often to deceive and cheat us.

73.2. "I will speak of each separately, beginning from the just; for both privately and in public one ought to begin from the just. We, then, if we are wronging you at all, need neither impunity nor amnesty; and indeed we do not even think fit to share in the city any longer, but will endure, wherever necessity may lead us, entrusting ourselves to fortune and the divinities as guides. But if, being wronged by you, we have been forced to make trial of the fortune in which we are, why do you not confess that you yourselves, having dealt ill with us, need pardon and amnesty? But now you say you grant what you ask for, and the anger from which you seek to be freed, this you boast as though you were remitting it—confounding the nature of truth and reversing the claim of justice.

73.3. "That you are not wronged but do the wrong, and, having received many great benefits from the people—some toward freedom, some toward empire—have rendered it no fair returns, learn. And I will make my arguments from facts which you yourselves know; and, by the gods, if I say anything false, do not endure it, but at once refute me.

74.1. "Our ancient polity was monarchy, and we continued to use this polity down to the seventh generation; and through all these leaderships the people was never at any time worsted by the kings, and least of all by the last; I forbear to say that it reaped many great goods from their rule.

74.2. "For, apart from the rest of their courting of it—by which, flattering it, they wished it to be their own and your enemy, which all do who manage their power in tyrannic fashion—when they had conquered after a long war Suessa, a most prosperous city, though they might have shared the spoils with no one but kept them themselves and surpassed all kings in wealth, they did not think fit to do so, but brought all the booty into the common stock; so that we, apart from slaves and cattle and the rest of the possessions, which were many and fair, distributed five minae of silver per man.

74.3. "Neglecting these things, when they used their power more tyrannically—erring not against the people but against you—we, ill-bearing what was being done, withdrew from goodwill toward the kings and attached ourselves to you; and rising up against them with you, both those in the city and those in the camp, we expelled them and, bringing it to you, entrusted to you their power. And though it was often in our power to go over to the exiles for the great gifts they held out to us, that we might abandon our faith to you, we did not endure it, but drained off many great and continuous wars and dangers on your behalf; and to the present, this seventeenth year now, we have been worn out fighting all men for the common freedom.

74.4. "For while the polity was still unsettled—as is wont to happen amid changes made suddenly—against two of the most distinguished cities of the Tyrrhenians, the Tarquinienses and the Veientes, who wished to bring back the kings with a great army, we, few against many, ventured and fought it out, and, displaying the greatest zeal, conquered in battle and drove off those arrayed against us, and with the surviving consul preserved the magistracy.

74.5. "Not long after, when Porsina, king of the Tyrrhenians, himself thought fit to bring back the exiles, with the force from all Tyrrhenia which he led and those long since gathered by the exiles, we, having no force a match for them and on this account shut up in a siege and helplessness and want of every resource, by enduring all the terrors compelled him, become our friend, to depart.

74.6. "Last of all, when the kings had prepared a third return through the Latin nation and were bringing thirty cities against us, seeing you supplicating and lamenting and each one of you calling upon us, reminding us of comradeship and fellowship of rearing and brotherhood in arms, we did not endure to abandon you; but, thinking it the fairest and most brilliant contest, the one on your behalf, we advanced against the perils, hazarding that greatest of dangers, in which, receiving many wounds and losing many persons of kinsmen and comrades and tent-mates, we conquered the enemy and slew their commanders and destroyed the whole royal kindred.

75.1. "These are the things we furnished beyond our strength, through our own eagerness, toward freeing you from the tyrants, set to it not by necessity more than by valour. Now hear what we did toward your being honoured and ruling others and putting on a dominion greater than the original expectation; and, if I turn the speech aside at all from the truth, as I said at the beginning, oppose

75.2. me. For you, when the safety of your freedom seemed secure, did not think it enough to remain at this, but, rushing to daring and innovation—and perhaps thinking all that surrounds freedom an enemy, and well-nigh proclaiming war against all men—you thought fit to use our bodies for all the ventures and contests on behalf of this greed.

75.3. "How many cities, then, waging war against you one and two at a time for their freedom, we made subject—some overcoming them in pitched battle, some taking them by storm of their walls—I pass over. For why should I tell the deeds bit by bit, having such abundance of arguments? But all Tyrrhenia, divided into twelve principalities and abounding in power great both by land and by sea—who were they that helped win it and made it subject to you? And these Sabines here, a nation so great, with whom you had ever the contest for the primacy—what aid afforded you no longer to dispute over equality? And what of the thirty cities of the Latins, lifted up not only by greatness of power but also proud in claiming the more just—who were they that enslaved them and made them, begging against the enslavement and razing of their cities, flee for refuge to you?

76.1. "I pass over the rest—how, while not yet at variance with you, and ourselves laying claim to the hopes from empire, we shared the dangers with you. But when you had plainly clothed your magistracy in tyranny and were proved to be treating us like slaves, and we no longer remained the same in our minds toward you, and at the same time nearly all the subjects were rising in revolt—the Volscians beginning the rebellion, and following them the Aequians, Hernicans, Sabines, and many others—and it seemed there was such an opportunity as no other, had we wished it, to accomplish one of two things, either to overthrow your empire or to render it more moderate for the future—do you remember into what despair of empire you came and how you were utterly dispirited, whether we should not join the contests with you or, in anger, turn against you as enemies, and how many entreaties and promises you made?

76.2. "What, then, did we, the humble and insulted by you, do then? Worsted by your entreaties and persuaded by the promises which this excellent Servilius, then consul, made to the people, we bore no rancour for the old wrongs, but, hoping for good things for the time to come, gave ourselves to you, and, having in a short time finished all the warlike work, came back leading many prisoners and fair booty.

76.3. "In return for which, what thanks did you render us? Just thanks, worthy of the dangers? Whence? Far from it. You falsified the promises which you bade the consul make on behalf of the commonwealth, and the man himself, this excellent one whom you used for the deceit, you made to have no share in the triumph, though most of all men deserving to obtain this honour, fixing on him the insult for no other reason than that he thought fit you should do what is just as you had promised, and was plainly indignant at the deceit.

77.1. "And lately—for, adding this to my speech about the just, I will cease—when the Aequians and Sabines and Volscians, using one mind, both themselves rose up and summoned the rest, were you not forced to flee for refuge to us, the humble and base, you the grave and weighty, promising everything for your safety then? And, that you might not seem to deceive us again, which you often did, you found as a veil for the deceit this Manius Valerius, the most popular of men; trusting in whom, that we should not be deceived by a dictator, and that a man kind toward us, we joined you in this war too and conquered the enemy, enduring contests not small nor few nor obscure.

77.2. "But when the fairest part of the war had reached its end sooner than the hope of all, so far were you from rejoicing and owing much thanks to the people, that you thought fit to keep us still, against our will, under the standards in arms, that you might evade the promises as you had resolved from the first. And when the man would not endure the deceit nor the shame of the deed, but brought the standards into the city and dismissed the forces to their homes, making this a pretext for not doing what was just, you insulted him, and observed none of your agreements with us, but in the same act committed three of the greatest crimes: abolishing the dignity of the senate, destroying the faith of the man, and making unprofitable to your benefactors the thanks for their toils.

77.3. "Having these and many other like things to say to you, patricians, we do not think fit to turn to supplications and entreaties of you, nor, like those who have done dreadful deeds, to receive our return on impunity and amnesty. Yet we do not think we ought to argue precisely about these things at present, since we have assembled to discourse about concord, but we let them go, consigning them to neglect and oblivion.

78.1. "But on what terms you make your embassy, and what you have come to ask, why do you not say plainly? On what hopes do you think fit that we return to the city? Having taken what fortune as guide of the road? With what cheer or joy to receive us? For up to now we hear you holding forth nothing humane or good—no honours, no offices, no remedy for poverty, nothing whatever at all. And yet you ought not to say what you are about to do, but, having done it, to say it, that, having already received some deed done from goodwill, we might conjecture the rest

78.2. will be such. I suppose, then, they will say to this that they have come with full powers, so that whatever we persuade one another of shall be valid. Let this be true; let what follows from it come to pass; I make no objection. But I wish to learn from them what will be after this—when we have said on what terms we think fit to make the return, and these have been conceded by them—who will be the guarantor to us of the agreements?

78.3. "Trusting what security shall we lay our arms from our hands and put our persons again into their power? The decrees of the senate to be written about these things—for not yet written? And what again will prevent these from being annulled by other decrees, whenever it seems good to Appius and those who think like him? Or the dignity of the envoys, who pledge their own faith? But it was through these very men that they deceived us before. Or, having procured pledges from them by oaths in covenants before the gods? But I, beyond all human faith, fear this—which I see despised by those in power; and the involuntary compacts of those who claim to rule toward those who lay claim to freedom, not now first but having often learned of, I know hold good only so long as their necessities prevail.

78.4. "What, then, is such a friendship and faith, in which we shall be forced to court one another against our judgment, each side watching its own opportunities? And after this, suspicions and continual slanders against one another, envies and hatreds and every other form of evils, and a great contest as to who shall first destroy his rival, suffering lying in the future delay.

79.1. "And of a civil war, as all know, there is nothing worse, in which the conquered are unfortunate and the conquerors do wrong, and it falls to the one to be destroyed by their dearest, to the other to destroy their dearest. To such fortunes and disasters, not to be prayed for, neither do you, patricians, call us, nor let us, commoners, hearken to them; but, as fortune has divided us from one another, let us be content. Let these, then, have the whole city and reap it without us and enjoy all the other goods alone, having cast the humble and inglorious commoners from their country; and let us depart, wherever the divinity may lead us, reckoning that we leave a foreign place, not our own city.

79.2. "For to none of us is there left here a lot of land, nor an ancestral hearth, nor common sacred rites, nor a dignity as in a country, clinging to which we should love the place and remain even against our will; nor even the freedom of our persons won with arms by many toils; since some things the many wars destroyed, others the want of daily necessaries consumed, and others we were robbed of by these arrogant creditors—to whom in the end we wretches were forced to till our own lots, digging, planting, ploughing, tending flocks, fellow slaves to our own war-captured bondsmen, some bound with chains, some with fetters, some, like the fiercest of beasts, with collars and irons.

79.3. "Outrages and insults and lashes and toils from night to night, and every other cruelty and insolence and arrogance which we endured, I pass over. Freed, then, by the divinity from so great and so many evils, let us flee from them gladly, with all the zeal and power each man has, making fortune and god, who save us, our guides on the road, reckoning freedom our country and valour our wealth. For every land will receive us as partners—to those who receive us we shall be, on the one hand, not grievous, on the other, useful.

80.1. "Let there be for us examples of these things many Greeks and many barbarians, but most of all the forefathers of these men and of us; of whom some, rising up with Aeneas from Asia into Europe, founded a city in the land of the Latins, and others, later setting out from Alba under Romulus' leadership of the colony, established in these places the city we now leave.

80.2. "And we have a force not only not a little greater than theirs, but threefold, and a juster cause for the migration. For those who migrated from Ilium were driven out by enemies, but we from here by friends; and surely it is more piteous to be driven out by one's own than by strangers. And those who joined with Romulus

80.3. in the expedition, for the sake of getting better land, despised their fathers'; but we, leaving the city-less and hearth-less life, set out a colony neither envied by gods nor grievous to men nor a burden to any land; and we have not even come through blood and kindred slaughters against those who drive us out, nor harmed with fire and steel the land we leave, nor left behind any memorial of eternal enmity, as it is the custom for treacherous exiles and those shut up in unwilling necessities

80.4. to do. Calling the gods and divinities to witness, who lead all mortal things according to justice, and leaving to them to exact the penalties on our behalf, we ask only this: that those of us who have in the city infant children and parents and any wives who may wish to share our fortune, take back their persons. This is enough for us to receive, and we need nothing else from our country. But fare you well and live the life you choose, thinking thus in matters of polity and partnership against the humbler sort, alien and unsharing."

81.1. Brutus, then, having spoken such words, ceased; and to those present, all that he said about the just seemed true, and all his accusations of the council's haughtiness, but most of all those in which he showed the security of the agreements full of guile and deceit. When at the end he went through the outrages they had suffered from the creditors, and reminded each man of his own evils, no one was so hard in mind that he did not melt into tears and bewail the common misfortunes; and this happened not to them alone, but also to those come from the senate. For not even the envoys had strength to restrain their tears, reflecting on the calamities arising from the dividing of the city; and there was a long time in which, downcast and tearful and at a loss

81.2. what to say, they stood. When the great lamentation had ceased and silence held the assembly, there came forward to make defence against these things one who seemed to surpass the other citizens in age and dignity, Titus Larcius, who, twice appointed consul, having used the power called dictatorship best of all men, made that envied office be reckoned holy and full of reverence.

81.3. Setting out to make speeches about the just—blaming the creditors as having done cruel and inhuman deeds, but laying hold of the poor as not justly thinking fit to be released from their debts by force rather than by favour, and as not rightly being angry with the senate because they obtained none of the moderate things from it,

81.4. rather than with the guilty; and trying to show that small was the part of the people that did wrong unwillingly, forced by the length of its poverty to ask for the release, but the greater part, given over to licence and insolence and living by pleasures and prepared to serve its desires by plunder from others' goods; and thinking that the wretched must be distinguished from the wicked, and those needing humanity from those deserving hatred; and setting up certain other such arguments, true indeed, but not pleasing to all his hearers—he did not persuade, but there was much murmuring at each point, and from some indignation as if he were embittering their griefs, from others acknowledgments as if he hid nothing of the truth; but this latter part was far less than the other, so that they were obliterated by the many, and the cry of the indignant prevailed.

82.1. When Larcius had added a few words more to these and laid hold of their uprising and the rashness of their counsels, Sicinius, who was then leader of the people, taking up the speech, exasperated their tempers still more, saying that from these very words they could best learn what honours and favours would receive them when they returned to their country.

82.2. "For to men who, being at the height of their dangers and needing the people's help and come for this, it does not even now occur to make moderate and humane speeches—what disposition must we think they will assume, when affairs go for them according to their hope, and the things now insulted in words become subject in deeds? From what arrogance will they refrain, from what maltreatment, from what tyrannic cruelty?

82.3. "But if it suffices you to be slaves all the time of your life, bound and scourged and destroyed by fire and steel and famine and every outrage, do not waste time, but, throwing away your arms and putting your two hands behind you, follow them; but if there is in you any longing for freedom, do not endure them. And you, envoys, either say on what just terms you summon us, or, not saying them, depart from the assembly; for we will give you the floor no longer."

83.1. When he ceased, all present applauded as men agreeing with one who had reasoned what was needful; and after this, silence coming, Menenius Agrippa—who had both made the speeches in the senate on behalf of the people and was most responsible for the opinion that the embassy with full powers be sent—signalled that he too wished to speak. To them the matter seemed answered to their prayer, and now at least they supposed they would hear words holding true settlements and saving opinions for both sides.

83.2. And at first all roared out with a great cry, bidding him speak; then they checked themselves, and so great a silence held the assembly that the place differed not at all from a desert. He, in other respects, was thought to have used the most persuasive words possible and aimed at the wish of his hearers; and at the end of his harangue he is said to have told a fable in the manner of Aesop, fashioned to have much likeness to the affairs, and by this most of all to have won them—whence the speech is deemed worthy of remembrance and is borne in all the ancient histories. What was said by him was as follows:

83.3. "We were sent by the senate to you, commoners, neither to make defence on its behalf nor to accuse you; for these things did not seem to have their season nor to be suited to the fortunes that grip the commonwealth; but to dissolve the strife with all zeal and contrivance and to set the polity back into its original order, having the full power for this. So that concerning the just we do not think there is need, as Junius here did, to spin out the time at great length; but on what humane terms we think the strife should be dissolved, and what faith there will be to confirm our agreements—about these things,

83.4. which we have resolved, we will speak to you. To us, reflecting that every strife is healed in every city when the causes that furnished the difference are removed, it seemed necessary to recognise and stop the very pretexts that began the dissension. Finding that the harsh exactions of the loans had become the causes of the present evils, thus we correct them: we think it just that all who owe debts and cannot discharge them be released from their obligations; and if the persons of any who are past due are held by the lawful terms, these too we judge to be free; and as many as, convicted in private suits, have been handed over to those who condemned them, these too we wish to be free, and we make void their condemnations.

83.5. "Concerning the contracts of past time, then, which we judge made the secession, we set them right in this way; concerning those that shall be later, as shall seem good to you, the people, and to those of the council deliberating in common, a law being ratified, so let it stand. Was it not these things that set you apart from the patricians, commoners, and, if you obtained them, did you think they sufficed you and you reached for nothing else? They are now given you; depart at once rejoicing to your country.

84.1. "The pledges that will confirm these agreements and furnish you security shall be all such as are lawful and customary among those who dissolve enmities. The senate will vote these things and give the rank of law to what shall be written; or rather, let what is resolved be written here by you, and the senate will obey it.

84.2. "That the things now conceded shall remain firm, and that nothing contrary to them shall later be brought forward by the senate—first we, the envoys, are sureties, giving you our persons and souls and offspring as pledges; next the other senators, as many as shall be enrolled with the decree; for surely nothing will ever be written against the people without our consent. For we who lead the council and first declare our opinions of the rest are we.

84.3. "The last pledge for all men, Greeks and barbarians, which no time will ever abolish, is that which, by oaths and covenants, makes the gods sureties of the agreements; by which many bitter enmities of private men, and many wars set up between cities, have been reconciled. And if you take this pledge, either entrust to a few of the leaders of the council to give you the oaths on behalf of the whole senate, or think fit that all who are enrolled in the decrees swear over sacrifices that they will in very truth keep firm the things agreed.

84.4. "Right hands and covenants and pledges made before the gods do not you slander, Brutus, nor abolish the fairest of human practices; nor do you, commoners, endure him saying that they are the knaveries of unholy and tyrannic men, which are far from the valour of the Romans.

85.1. "Having spoken of one more pledge, which is neither unknown to any man nor disputed, I will cease. And what is this? That which introduces the common interest and makes both parts be saved through one another. This, indeed, first and alone draws us together to the same place and will never let us be apart from one another. For the ignorant multitude will always need, and will never cease needing, intelligent leadership, and the council able to lead will need the crowds willing to be ruled; and not by opinion alone

85.2. have we conjectured this, but by deed have we made trial and know it. Why, then, do we frighten and make trouble for one another? Why do we speak base words, when we have good deeds in hand, instead of, opening ourselves and throwing our two arms about one another, going to our country to recover the old delight of the sweetest things and the longing dearest of all, but seek instead non-existent securities and faithless faiths, like the bitterest enemies who suspect everything for the worse? For us, commoners, of the council, one pledge suffices about your never being base toward us, should you return—we who know your good services in rearing us and your lawful practices and the rest of the valour you have often displayed in peace and in war.

85.3. "And if, through necessity of faith and hope, the contracts should get a common correction, the rest at least we trust will be good on your side, and we need neither oaths nor hostages nor any other pledge whatever from the multitude; we, on the contrary, will oppose nothing of your demands. And concerning the faith, with which Brutus tried to slander us, these things suffice. But if any envy, not just, lurks in you, persuading you to think evil concerning the senate, I wish to speak a word against this too, commoners; and—by the gods—hear me in quiet and with attention.

86.1. "A city is somehow like a human body. For each is compounded and made of many parts; and neither part has the same power as the parts within them, nor furnishes equal services.

86.2. "If, then, the parts of the human body should take each a separate sense and voice of their own, and then strife should fall among them, all the rest becoming of one mind against the belly alone, and the feet should say that the whole body rests upon them; the hands, that they work the crafts and procure the necessaries and fight enemies and furnish many other benefits to the common good; the shoulders, that all the burdens are carried upon them; the mouth, that it speaks; the head, that it sees and hears and, embracing all the other senses, holds them, through which the creature is preserved; and then they should say to the belly: 'But you, good lady, what of these do you do, or what is your favour and benefit to us? Nay, you are so far from doing and helping us accomplish anything of common use, that you even work against us and trouble us, and—a thing unbearable—compel us to serve you and to fetch from every quarter for the filling of your own desires.

86.3. "'Come, why do we not lay claim to freedom and rid ourselves of the many businesses we endure for her sake?' If, then, these things should seem good to them, and each should no longer do its own work, can the body in any way endure for long, but would it not within a few days be consumed by the worst of deaths, famine? One could not say otherwise.

86.4. "In the same way conceive also concerning a city. For many are the peoples that fill it too, in nothing like one another, of whom each furnishes the common good its own particular service, as the limbs do the body. For some till the fields, some fight for them against enemies, some bring in many benefits by sea through trade, others work the necessary crafts. If, then, all these peoples should rise in strife against the council gathered from the best, and say: 'But you, council, what good do you do us, and for what cause do you think fit to rule the others? For you could say nothing.' And then: 'Shall we not rid ourselves of this tyranny of yours at last and dwell without

86.5. "'a leader?' If, then, conceiving these things, they should stand off from their accustomed practices, what will prevent this city from perishing miserably and miserably by famine and war and every other evil? Learning, then, commoners, that just as in our bodies the belly, ill-reviled by the many, nourishes the body while it is nourished and preserves it while it is preserved, and is a kind of common feast distributing to all what is fitting and the cause of the harmony, so in cities the council, which administers the common affairs and provides for what befits each, preserves and guards and sets right everything—cease your envious cries against it, that you were cast from your country and that as wanderers and beggars you go about because of it. For it has done you no harm, nor would it do; but itself it calls and beseeches and, opening its soul along with the gates, receives you."

87.1. While Menenius was saying such things, many and various cries arose from those present throughout the whole harangue. But when at the end of his speech he turned to lamentations and bewailed the misfortunes about to seize both those remaining in the city and those driven out, and the fortunes of both, tears poured from all, and with one accord and one cry they shouted to lead them to the city and not waste time; and very nearly did they hasten to depart from the assembly, having entrusted all affairs to the envoys and contrived nothing further for their security, had not Brutus come forward and checked their impulses, saying that all the rest was well for the people, all that the senate promised, and that they owed it much thanks for the concessions; but that he feared for all time, and lest tyrannic men, attempting it perhaps at some later day,

87.2. should bear rancour against the people for what had happened. There was one only safeguard for all who fear their superiors—if it became plain to them that those who wished to wrong them had no power; but while the ability to do wicked deeds was present, the wicked would not lack the will. If, then, they should obtain this security, they would need nothing further.

87.3. When Menenius interposed and bade him say what security he thought the people still needed, "Grant us," he said, "to appoint magistrates each year from ourselves, however many, who shall have authority over nothing else, but shall help those of the commoners who are wronged or overpowered, and shall not look on while any one is robbed of his rights. This we beseech and beg of you, besides the other things you have granted—if the reconciliation is not word but deed—to give and bestow."

88.1. The people, when they heard this, with a great cry that held a long while both praised the man and urged the envoys to grant them this also. The envoys, withdrawing from the assembly and conferring a little among themselves, returned not long after. When silence fell, Menenius came forward and said: "The matter, commoners, is great and full of many strange suspicions; and fear and concern enter us, lest at some time we make two cities in one; yet, for the part that lies with us, not even against this request of yours do we set ourselves.

88.2. "Only grant us this, which is for your sakes too: allow some of the envoys to go into the city and declare this to the senate; for though we have the power from it to make the settlement however we wish, being autocrats of the promises, we do not think fit ourselves to take this, but, since a new matter has met us beyond expectation, having taken away our own power, we will carry it and lay it upon the council; though we are persuaded that it too will think the same as we. I, then, will remain here and with me a part of the embassy, but Valerius will go and the rest with

88.3. him." These things seemed good; and in haste, mounting their horses, those who were to declare to the senate what had happened rode to the city. When the consuls set the matter before the councillors, the opinion of Valerius was to grant this favour too to the people; but Appius, who from the first had opposed the reconciliation, then too openly spoke against it, shouting and calling the gods to witness and foretelling to the polity how great a seed of evils it was about to sow. But he did not persuade the many, who had set out, as I said, to dissolve the strife. There came, then, a decree of the senate, that all the other things which the envoys had promised the people should be valid, and that the security

88.4. which it asked be granted. The envoys, having arranged these matters, on the following day came to the camp and made clear what the senate had resolved. After this, Menenius advising the commoners to send some to the city, to whom the senate would give the pledges, there was sent Lucius Junius Brutus, of whom I spoke before, and with him Marcus Decius and Spurius Icilius. Of those come from the senate, half returned to the city with Brutus and his colleagues, while Agrippa, with the rest, remained at the camp, being asked to draw up the law for the commoners according to which they would appoint the magistrates.

89.1. On the following day Brutus and his colleagues were present, having made the compacts with the senate through the fetial priests, whom the Romans call Fetiales. The people, divided into the phratries then existing—or however one wishes to call them, which those men call curiae—appoint these annual magistrates: Lucius Junius Brutus and Gaius Sicinius Bellutus, whom they had already as leaders, and besides these Gaius and Publius Licinius and Gaius Visellius Ruga.

89.2. These five men were the first to take up the tribunician power, on the fourth day before the Ides of December, as is done even to our own time. When the elections were completed, to those come from the senate everything seemed well concerning the matters for which they were sent; but Brutus, calling an assembly, advised the commoners to declare the office sacred and inviolable, confirming its security by law and

89.3. oath. These things seemed good to all, and this law was written by him and his colleagues: "Let no one compel a tribune, against his will, to do anything, as if he were one of the many, nor scourge him, nor order another to scourge, nor kill him, nor bid kill. And if anyone do any of the forbidden things, let him be accursed, and let his goods be consecrated to Demeter, and let him who kills any of those who have done these things be

89.4. clear of bloodshed. And, that for the future the people may not have the power to abolish this law, but that it remain unalterable for all time, it was ordained that all Romans swear over sacrifices that they would use the law, both they and their descendants for all time; and a curse was added to the oath, that to those who kept it the heavenly gods and the divinities below be gracious, but to those who transgressed it the opposite both from gods and from divinities, as upon men liable to the greatest guilt. From this it became a custom among the Romans that the persons of the tribunes be sacred and inviolate, and it remains so to our own time."

90.1. When they had voted these things, they built an altar on the height where they had encamped, which from the fear that then held them they named, as their ancestral tongue signifies, of Jupiter Deimatius (the Affrighter); and having performed sacrifices to it and consecrated the place that received them, they came down to the city with the envoys.

90.2. Having rendered thank-offerings also to the gods in the city, and persuaded the patricians to ratify the office by casting their vote, when they had obtained this too from them, they further asked the senate to permit them to appoint each year two men from the commoners who should serve the tribunes in whatever they needed, and should judge the cases which those committed to them, and should take care of the sacred and public places and of the abundance in the market.

90.3. Having received this concession too from the senate, they appoint men whom they called assistants of the tribunes, colleagues, and judges. Now, however, in the native tongue, from one of the works they perform, they are called overseers of sacred places (aediles), and they no longer have a power subservient to others, as before, but many great things have been entrusted to them, and in most respects they somewhat resemble the agoranomoi among the Greeks.

91.1. When affairs had settled and the city recovered its original order, an army was levied by the commanders against the foreign enemies, the people bringing much zeal and in a short time making ready everything needful for the war. When the consuls had cast lots concerning the command, as is their custom, Spurius Cassius, who obtained the care of affairs in the city, remained, taking a sufficient part of the levied force; while Postumus Cominius led out the rest of the army, leading a worthy portion of the Romans themselves and a not small Latin allied force.

91.2. Resolving to attack the Volscians first, he seized at the first assault their city Longula, the men in it having attempted to lay claim to some valour and sent out a force into the open by which they trusted to ward off the assailants, but having been shamefully compelled to flee before displaying any brilliant deed, and having done nothing noble even in the assault on the walls. In a single day, at all events, the Romans both mastered their land without effort and took the city by storm with little trouble.

91.3. The Roman general, allowing the soldiers to plunder the goods found there and leaving a garrison in the city, led the force against another city of the Volscians, called Polusca, which is not far distant from Longula. No one daring to meet him, having traversed the country with much ease, he assaulted the walls; and of the soldiers, some breaking through the gates, others mounting the wall by ladders, on the same day they become masters of this city too.

91.4. When he had taken the city, choosing out a few, the authors of the revolt, he put them to death, and punishing the rest by confiscation of money and depriving them of their arms, he compelled them for the future to be subjects of the Romans.

92.1. Leaving in this city too a small part of the army for a guard, on the following day, taking up the force, he advanced against Corioli, a very notable city and, as it were, the metropolis of the Volscians; where there was a strong force gathered, and the wall was not easy to take, and the necessaries for war had long since been prepared by those within. Attempting the assault on the walls, until late evening he was beaten off by his opponents, losing many of his own men.

92.2. On the next day, having prepared rams and wicker shields and ladders, he was making ready as if to make trial of the city with his whole force; but hearing that the Antiates were about to come to the aid of the Coriolani in great strength, on account of kinship, and that those sent were already on the road, he divided his army, resolving with the half to assault the walls, leaving Titus Larcius in charge of it,

92.3. and with the rest he purposed to bar the assailants. And there were two contests on the same day; and the Romans conquered—all fighting eagerly, but one man displaying incredible valour and performing deeds beyond all telling, who was of the patrician class and of not undistinguished fathers, called Gaius Marcius, a man temperate in his daily life and full of a free spirit. The manner of each of the two battles was as follows. Larcius, leading out the army at daybreak, brought it up to the walls of Corioli and made assaults at many points; but the Coriolani, priding themselves on the help from the Antiates, which they trusted would be present not long after, opening all the gates, rushed in a mass upon the enemy.

92.4. The Romans received their first onset and dealt many blows to those who came to grips; then, as more came on, being thrust down a sloping place, they gave way. Seeing this, Marcius, of whom I spoke before, took his stand with a few and received the oncoming throng of the enemy; and having struck down many of them, when the rest gave way and fled toward the city, he followed, ever killing those at hand and urging the fugitives among his own to turn back and take heart and follow him.

92.5. They, ashamed at the deed, turned again and pressed upon those opposite them, striking and pursuing; and in a short time, each routing those they grappled with, they pressed upon the walls; and Marcius, now daring the danger more boldly, went still further forward, and, coming to the very gates, fell in with the fugitives into the wall. When many others had rushed in with him, in many parts of the city there was much slaughter on both sides—some fighting along the streets, others about the houses being captured.

92.6. The women too within helped the work, hurling tiles from the roofs upon the enemy, and, so far as each had strength and power, eagerly aided their country. Yet they did not hold out long against the perils, but were forced to surrender themselves to the conquerors. The city being thus taken, the rest of the Romans turned to plundering what was found there and continued a long while busy with the spoils, since there was much money in the place and many slaves;

93.1. but Marcius, who first and before many had withstood the enemy and proved the most brilliant of all the Romans both in the assault on the walls and in the contests within them, appeared still more brilliant in the second contest set against the Antiates. For he did not think fit to be absent from this battle either, but, as soon as the city was taken, taking with him the few who could follow, he went at a run, and finding the forces already drawn up and about to come to grips, first announced to his own the capture of the city, showing as its proof the smoke which was being borne up in quantity from the burning houses, and begging the consul, he posted himself against the strongest part of the enemy.

93.2. And when the signals for battle were raised, he was the first to come to grips with the opponents, and, having killed many of those who engaged him, thrust himself into the middle of their phalanx. The Antiates no longer endured to fight him at close quarters, but left their ranks wherever he came on, and, surrounding him in a body, hurled at him as he advanced and pursued, retreating. Postumus, when he learned this, fearing lest the man, being isolated, should suffer some harm, sent the best of the young men to aid him; and they, forming their companies dense, charged the enemy. As those in front did not receive them but turned to flight, advancing further they found Marcius full of wounds and saw about him many corpses lying and men half-dead.

93.3. After this they now advanced in common, with Marcius as leader, against those still remaining in formation, killing those who withstood and treating them like slaves. Worthy of mention, indeed, were the other Romans too in this battle, but the best of them were those who had shielded Marcius; and above all Marcius himself, who was unquestionably the chief author of the victory. When it was now growing dark, the Romans withdrew to their camp, thinking highly of the victory and having both killed many of the Antiates and leading many prisoners.

94.1. On the following day Postumus, summoning the army to an assembly, went through much praise of Marcius and bound him with crowns of valour, rendering thank-offerings for both contests. He presented him with a war-horse adorned with the trappings of a general and ten captive persons, leaving it to him to take whom he wished, and as much silver as he himself could carry away, and from the rest of the booty many fair first-fruits.

94.2. When a great cry arose from all, as men praising and rejoicing with him, Marcius, coming forward, said he owed great thanks both to the consul and to all the rest for the honours with which they deemed him worthy; yet he would not avail himself of them, but would be content with the horse, for the splendour of its trappings, and one captive, who happened to be his guest-friend. The soldiers, who before too had admired the man for his nobility, marvelled still more at his disdain of wealth and that he bore so great good fortune with moderation. From this deed he was surnamed Coriolanus, and had become the most distinguished of all those of his age.

94.3. When the battle against the Antiates had reached this end, the rest of the cities of the Volscians dissolved their enmity toward the Romans; and as many as held the like sentiments with them—those already in arms and those preparing for war—ceased. Dealing with all these with moderation, Postumus returned home and disbanded the army. Cassius, the other of the consuls, who had been left in Rome, dedicated in the meantime the temple of Demeter and Dionysus and Cora, which is set up at the boundaries of the largest of the circuses, above the very starting-stalls—Aulus Postumius the dictator having vowed on behalf of the city to dedicate it to the gods, at the time when he was about to contend against the Latin army, and the senate after the victory having voted that its entire building be made from the spoils; and it then received its completion.

24.1. At the same time new treaties also were made, with oaths, with all the cities of the Latins for peace and friendship, since they had attempted no disturbance in the strife and were plainly rejoicing in the return of the people, and seemed ready to share in the war against the seceders.

24.2. What was written in the treaties was as follows: "Let there be peace between the Romans and all the cities of the Latins toward one another, so long as heaven and earth keep the same station; and let them neither make war on one another, nor bring in wars from elsewhere, nor furnish safe roads to those who bring war; and let them help with all their power those who are warred upon; and of the spoils and booty from common wars let each side obtain an equal share; and let the judgments of private contracts be made within ten days, in whatever place the contract was made. To these treaties let it be permitted neither to add anything nor to take anything from them, save what shall seem good to the Romans and all the Latins."

24.3. These things, then, the Romans and the Latins agreed with one another, swearing over sacrifices. And the senate voted also to render thank-offerings to the gods for the reconciliation with the people, adding one day to the so-called Latin Festivals, which were two: the first having been consecrated by King Tarquinius, at the time when he conquered the Tyrrhenians; the other added by the people, when, having expelled the kings, it made the city free; to which the third was then assigned for the sake of the return of the seceders.

24.4. The presidency and the care of the sacrifices and games held in them the assistants of the tribunes took over—those who now have the aedilician power, as I said—adorned by the senate with purple and an ivory chair and the other insignia which the kings had.

96.1. Not long after the festival, one of the consulars, Menenius Agrippa, ended his life—he who had conquered the Sabines and led home a most brilliant triumph over them, by whom the senate, being persuaded, granted the return to the exiles, and the people, trusting him, laid down their arms; and the city buried him at public charge and with the fairest and most splendid funeral of all men. For the man had no estate sufficient for the magnificence of a funeral procession and burial; so that even to the guardians of his children, when they deliberated, it seemed best to bring him out and bury him cheaply, as one of the many.

96.2. But the people did not allow it; rather, the tribunes, gathering the multitude into an assembly and going through many encomiums of the man's deeds both in war and in civic affairs, and his temperance and the frugality of his life, but most of all extolling with their praises to the utmost his self-restraint with regard to money-making, said it was the most shameful of things that so great a man should obtain an obscure and humble burial through poverty; and they exhorted the people to undertake the expense and to contribute man by man as much as they themselves should

96.3. appoint. To the hearers it was welcome, and at once, each bringing what was appointed, a great sum of money was gathered. The senate, learning this, took the matter as a disgrace and resolved not to look on while the most distinguished of the Romans was buried by a man-by-man collection, but judged that the expense should be made from the public funds, entrusting the care to the quaestors. They, contracting for the provisions at very much money and adorning his body with the most costly array and supplying everything else for magnificence, buried him worthily of his valour.

96.4. And the people, vying with the senate in honour, did not even think fit to take back the sum contributed, though the quaestors returned it, but bestowed it on the man's children, pitying their poverty, that they might do nothing unworthy of their father's valour. There was also a census at this time through the consuls, from which were found more than a hundred and ten thousand persons in all who registered. And these were the things done by the Romans in the consulship of these men.