"Comrades, I cannot say in what character I have presented myself to you; I
refuse to call myself a subject, now that you have named me Prince, or
Prince, while another reigns. Your title also will be equally uncertain, so
long as it shall be a question, whether it is the Emperor of the Roman
people, or a public enemy, whom you have in your camp. Mark you, how in one
breath they cry for my punishment and for your execution. So evident it is,
that we can neither perish, nor be saved, except together. Perhaps, with his
usual clemency, Galba has already promised that
we should die, like the man, who, though
no one demanded it, massacred so many thousands of perfectly guiltless
soldiers. A shudder comes over my soul, whenever I call to mind that ghastly
entry, Galba's solitary victory, when, before the eyes of the capital he
gave orders to decimate the prisoners, the suppliants, whom he had admitted
to surrender. These were the auspices with which he entered the city. What
is the glory that he has brought to the throne? None but that he has
murdered Obultronius Sabinus and Cornelius Marcellus in
Spain, Betuus Chilo in
Gaul,
Fonteius Capito in
Germany, Clodius Macer in
Africa, Cingonius on the high road, Turpilianus in the
city, Nymphidius in the camp. What province, what camp in the world, but is
stained with blood and foul with crime, or, as he expresses it himself,
purified and chastened? For what others call crimes he calls reforms, and,
by similar misnomers, he speaks of strictness instead of barbarity, of
economy instead of avarice, while the cruelties and affronts inflicted upon
you he calls discipline. Seven months only have passed since Nero fell, and
already Icelus has seized more than the Polycleti, the Vatinii, and the Elii
amassed. Vinius would not have gone so far with his rapacity and lawlessness
had he been Emperor himself; as it is, he has lorded it over us as if we had
been his own subjects, has held us as cheap as if we had been another's.
That one house would furnish the donative, which is never given you, but
with which you are daily upbraided.
