No More Learning

But Tiberius, as if he rather
apprehended the augmentation of his power, argued "that it was a heavy
task upon his moderation, to choose so many magistrates, and to postpone
so many candidates. That disgusts from disappointments were hardly
avoided in yearly elections; though, for their solacement, fresh hopes
remained of approaching success in the next; now how great must be the
hatred, how lasting the resentment of such whose pretensions were to be
rejected beyond five years? and whence could it be foreseen that, in
so long a tract of time, the same men would continue to have the
same dispositions, the same alliances and fortunes? even an annual
designation to power made men imperious; how imperious would it make
them, if they bore the honour for five years! besides, it would multiply
every single magistrate into five, and utterly subvert the laws which
had prescribed a proper space for exercising the diligence of the
candidates, and for soliciting as well as enjoying preferments. "

By this speech, in appearance popular, he still retained the spirit
and force of the sovereignty. He likewise sustained by gratuities, the
dignity of some necessitous Senators: hence it was the more wondered,
that he received with haughtiness and repulse the petition of Marcus
Hortalus, a young man of signal quality and manifestly poor. He was
the grandson of Hortensius the Orator; and had been encouraged by
the deified Augustus, with a bounty of a thousand great sestertia,
[Footnote: £8333. ] to marry for posterity; purely to prevent the
extinction of a family most illustrious and renowned. The Senate were
sitting in the palace, and Hortalus having set his four children before
the door, fixed his eyes, now upon the statue of Hortensius, placed
amongst the orators; then upon that of Augustus; and instead of speaking
to the question, began on this wise: "Conscript Fathers, you see there
the number and infancy of my children; not mine by my own choice, but in
compliance with the advice of the Prince: such too was the splendour of
my ancestors, that it merited to be perpetuated in their race; but for
my own particular, who, marred by the revolution of the times, could not
raise wealth, nor engage popular favour, nor cultivate the hereditary
fortune of our house, the fortune of Eloquence: I deemed it sufficient
if, in my slender circumstances, I lived no disgrace to myself, no
burden to others. Commanded by the Emperor, I took a wife; behold
the offspring of so many Consuls; behold the descendants of so many
Dictators! nor is this remembrance invidiously made, but made to move
mercy. In the progress of your reign, Caesar, these children may arrive
at the honours in your gift; defend them in the meantime from want:
they are the great-grandsons of Hortensius; they are the foster sons of
Augustus. "

The inclination of the Senate was favourable; an incitement this to
Tiberius the more eagerly to thwart Hortalus. These were in effect his
words: "If all that are poor recur hither for a provision of money to
their children, the public will certainly fail, and yet particulars
never be satiated.
Our ancestors, when they permitted a departure from
the question, to propose somewhat more important to the State, did not
therefore permit it, that we might here transact domestic matters, and
augment our private rents: an employment invidious both in the Senate
and the Prince; since, whether they grant or deny the petitioned
bounties, either the people or the petitioners will ever be offended.
But these, in truth, are not petitions; they are demands made against
order, and made by surprise: while you are assembled upon other affairs,
he stands up and urges your pity, by the number and infancy of his
children; with the same violence, he charges the attack to me, and as
it were bursts open the exchequer; but if by popular bounties we exhaust
it, by rapine and oppression we must supply it. The deified Augustus
gave you money, Hortalus; but without solicitation he gave it, and on
no condition that it should always be given: otherwise diligence will
languish; sloth will prevail; and men having no hopes in resources
of their own, no anxiety for themselves, but all securely relying on
foreign relief, will become private sluggards and public burdens. " These
and the like reasonings of Tiberius were differently received; with
approbation by those whose way it is to extol, without distinction,
all the doings of Princes, worthy and unworthy; by most, however, with
silence, or low and discontented murmurs. Tiberius perceived it, and
having paused a little, said "his answer was particularly to Hortalus;
but if the Senate thought fit, he would give his sons two hundred great
sestertia each. " [Footnote: £1666. ] For this all the Senators presented
their thanks; only Hortalus said nothing; perhaps through present awe,
or perhaps possessed, even in poverty, with the grandeur of his ancient
nobility. Nor did Tiberius ever show further pity, though the house of
Hortensius was fallen into shameful distress.

At the end of the year, a triumphal arch was raised near the Temple of
Saturn; a monument this for the recovery of the Varian Eagles, under
the conduct of Germanicus, under the auspices of Tiberius. A temple was
dedicated to Happy Fortune near the Tiber, in the gardens bequeathed to
the Roman People by Caesar, the Dictator. A chapel was consecrated to
the Julian family, and statues to the deified Augustus, in the suburbs
called Bovillae. In the consulship of Caius Celius and Lucius Pomponius,
the six-and-twentieth of May, Germanicus Caesar triumphed over the
Cheruscans, the Cattans, the Angrivarians, and the other nations as far
as the Elbe. In the triumph were carried all the spoils and captives,
with the representations of mountains, of rivers, and of battles; so
that his conquests, because he was restrained from completing them, were
taken for complete. His own graceful person, and his chariot filled with
his five children, heightened the show and the delight of the beholders;
yet they were checked with secret fears, as they remembered "that
popular favour had proved malignant to his father Drusus; that his uncle
Marcellus was snatched, in his youth, from the burning affections of the
populace; and that ever short-lived and unfortunate were the favourites
of the Roman People. "

Tiberius distributed to the people, in the name of Germanicus, three
hundred sesterces a man, [Footnote: £2, 10s. ] and named himself his
colleague in the Consulship.