THAT the family of the Octavii was of the first distinction in Velitrae , is rendered
					evident by many circumstances. For in the most frequented part of the town,
					there was, not long since, a street named the Octavian; and an altar was to be
					seen, consecrated to one Octavius, who being chosen general in a war with some
					neighbouring people, the enemy making a sudden attack, while he was sacrificing
					to Mars, he immediately snatched the entrails of the victim from off the fire,
					and offered them half raw upon the altar; after which, marching out to battle,
					he returned victorious. This incident gave rise to a law, by which it was
					enacted, that in all future times the entrails should be offered to Mars in the
					same manner; and the rest of the victim be carried to the Octavii.

This family, as well as several in Rome , was admitted into the senate by Tarquinius Priscus, and soon
					afterwards placed by Servius Tullius among the patricians; but in process of
					time it transferred itself to the plebeian order, and, after the lapse of a long
					interval, was restored by Julius Caesar to the rank of patricians. The first
					person of the family raised by the suffrages of the people to the magistracy,
					was Caius Rufus. He obtained the quaestorship, and had two sons, Cneius and
					Caius; from whom are descended the two branches of the Octavian family, which
					have had very different fortunes. For Cneius, and his descendants in
					uninterrupted succession, held all the highest offices of the state; whilst
					Caius and his posterity, whether from their circumstances or their choice,
					remained in the equestrian order until the father of Augustus. The
					greatgrandfather of Augustus served as a military tribune in the second Punic
					war in Sicily , under the command of
					/Emilius Pappus. His grandfather contented himself with bearing the public
					offices of his own municipality, and grew old in the tranquil enjoyment of an
					ample patrimony. Such is the account given by different authors. Augustus
					himself, however, tells us nothing more than that he was descended of an
					equestrian family, both ancient and rich, of which his father was the first who
					obtained the rank of senator. Mark Antony upbraidingly tells him that his
					great-grandfather was a freedman of the territory of Thurium , and a rope-maker, and his grandfather a
					usurer. This is all the information I have any where met with, respecting the
					ancestors of Augustus, by the father's side.

His father Caius Octavius was, from his earliest years, a person both of opulence
					and distinction: for which reason I am surprised at those who say that he was a
					money-dealer, 
					and was employed in scattering bribes, and canvassing for the candidates at
					elections, in the Campus Martius . For
					being bred up in all the affluence of a great estate, he attained with ease to
					honourable posts, and discharged the duties of them with much distinction. After
					his praetorship, he obtained by lot the province of Macedonia ; in his way to which he cut off some banditti, the
					relics of the armies of Spartacus and Catiline, who had possessed themselves of
					the territory of Thurium ; having
					received from the senate an extraordinary commission for that purpose. In his
					government of the province, he conducted himself with equal justice and
					resolution; for he defeated the Bessians and Thracians in a great battle, and
					treated the allies of the republic in such a manner, that there are extant
					letters from M. Tullius Cicero, in which he advises and exhorts his brother
					Quintus, who then held the proconsulship of Asia with no great reputation, to imitate the example of his
					neighbour Octavius, in gaining the affections of the allies of Rome .

After quitting Macedonia , before he
					could declare himself a candidate for the consulship, he died suddenly, leaving
					behind him a daughter, the elder Octavia, by Ancharia; and another daughter,
					Octavia the younger, as well as Augustus, by Atia, who was the daughter of
					Marcus Atius Balbus, and Julia, sister to Caius Julius Caesar. Balbus was, by
					the father's side, of a family who were natives of Aricia , and many of whom had been in the senate. By
					the mother's side he was nearly related to Pompey the Great; and after he had
					borne the office of praetor, was one of the twenty commissioners appointed by
					the Julian law to divide the land in Campania among the people. But Mark Antony, treating with
					contempt Augustus's descent even by the mother's side, says that his great
					grand-father was of African descent, and at one time kept a perfumer's shop, and
					at another, a bake-house, in Aricia .
					And Cassius of Parma , in a letter,
					taxes Augustus with being the son not only of a baker, but a usurer. These are
					his words: "Thou art a lump of thy mother's meal, which a money-changer of
					Nerulum taking from the newest bake-house of Aricia , kneaded into some shape, with his hands all discoloured
					by the fingering of money."

Augustus was born in the consulship of Marcus Tullius Cicero and Caius
						Antonius, 
					upon the ninth of the calends of October [the 23rd September], a little before
					sunrise, in the quarter of the Palatine
						Hill , and the street called The Ox-Heads, where now stands a chapel dedicated to
					him, and built a little after his death. For, as it is recorded in the
					proceedings of the senate, when Caius Laetorius, a young man of a patrician
					family, in pleading before the senators for a lighter sentence, upon his being
					convicted of adultery, alleged, besides his youth and quality, that he was the
					possessor, and as it were the guardian, of the ground which the Divine Augustus
					first touched upon his coming into the world; and entreated that he might find
					favour, for the sake of that deity, who was in a peculiar manner his; an act of
					the senate was passed, for the consecration of that part of his house in which
					Augustus was born.

His nursery is shewn to this day, in a villa belonging to the family, in the
					suburbs of Velitrae ; being a very
					small place, and much like a pantry. An opinion prevails in the neighbourhood,
					that he was also born there. Into this place no person presumes to enter, unless
					upon necessity, and with great devotion, from a belief, for a long time
					prevalent, that such as rashly enter it are seized with great horror and
					consternation, which a short while since was confirmed by a remarkable incident.
					For when a new inhabitant of the house had, either by mere chance, or to try the
					truth of the report, taken up his lodging in that apartment, in the course of
					the night, a few hours afterwards, he was thrown out by some sudden violence, he
					knew not how, and was found in a state of stupefaction, with the coverlid of his
					bed, before the door of the chamber.

While he was yet an infant, the surname of Thurinus was given him, in memory of
					the birth-place of his family, or because, soon after he was born, his father
					Octavius had been successful against the fugitive slaves, in the country near
						 Thurium . That he was surnamed
					Thurinus, I can affirm upon good foundation, for when a boy, I had a small
					bronze statue of him, with that name upon it in iron letters, nearly effaced by
					age, which I presented to the emperor, by whom it is now revered amongst the other
					tutelary deities in his chamber. He is also often called Thurinus
					contemptuously, by Mark Antony in his letters; to which he makes only this
					reply: "I am surprised that my former name should be made a subject of
					reproach." He afterwards assumed the name of Caius Caesar, and then of Augustus;
					the former in compliance with the will of his great-uncle, and the latter upon a
					motion of Munatius Plancus in the senate. For when some proposed to confer upon
					him the name of Romulus, as being, in a manner, a second founder of the city, it
					was resolved that he should rather be called Augustus, a surname not only new,
					but of more dignity, because places devoted to religion, and those in which
					anything is consecrated by augury, are denominated august, either from the word
						 auctus , signifying augmentation, or
						 ab avium gestu, gustuve , from the flight
					and feeding of birds; as appears from this verse of Ennius: When glorious Rome by
							august augury was built.

He lost his father when he was only four years of age; and, in his twelfth year,
					pronounced a funeral oration in praise of his grand-mother Julia. Four years
					afterwards, having assumed the robe of manhood, he was honoured with several
					military rewards by Caesar in his African triumph, although he took no part in
					the war, on account of his youth. Upon his uncle's expedition to Spain against the sons of Pompey, he was
					followed by his nephew, although he was scarcely recovered from a dangerous
					sickness; and after being shipwrecked at sea, and travelling with very few
					attendants through roads that were infested with the enemy, he at last came up
					with him. This activity gave great satisfaction to his uncle, who soon conceived
					an increasing affection for him, on account of such indications of character.
					After the subjugation of Spain , while
					Caesar was meditating an expedition against the Dacians and Parthians, he was
					sent before him to Apollonia ,
					where he applied himself to his studies; until receiving intelligence that his
					uncle was murdered, and that he was appointed his heir, he hesitated for some
					time whether he should call to his aid the legions stationed in the
					neighbourhood; but he abandoned the design as rash and premature. However,
					returning to Rome , he took possession
					of his inheritance, although his mother was apprehensive that such a measure
					might be attended with danger, and his step-father, Marcius Philippus, a man of
					consular-rank, very earnestly dissuaded him from it. From this time, collecting
					together a strong military force, he first held the government in conjunction
					with Mark Antony and Marcus Lepidus, then with Antony only, for nearly twelve
					years, and at last in his own hands during a period of four and forty.

Having thus given a very short summary of his life, I shall prosecute the several
					parts of it, not in order of time, but arranging his acts into distinct classes,
					for the sake of perspicuity. He was engaged in five civil wars, namely, those of
						 Modena , Philippi , Perugia , Sicily , and
						 Actium : the first and last of which
					were against Antony, and the second against Brutus and Cassius; the third
					against Lucius Antonius, the triumvir's brother, and the fourth against Sextus
					Pompeius, the son of Cneius Pompeius.

The motive which gave rise to all these wars was the opinion he entertained that
					both his honour and interest were concerned in revenging the murder of his
					uncle, and maintaining the state of affairs he had established. Immediately
					after his return from Apollonia ,
					he formed the design of taking forcible and unexpected measures against Brutus
					and Cassius; but they having foreseen the danger and made their escape, he
					resolved to proceed against them by an appeal to the laws in their absence, and
					impeach them for the murder. In the mean time, those whose province it was to
					prepare the sports in honour of Caesar's last victory in the civil war, not
					daring to do it, he undertook it himself. And that he might carry into effect
					his other designs with greater authority, he declared himself a candidate in the
					room of a tribune of the people who happened to die at that time, although he
					was of a patrician family, and had not yet been in the senate. But the consul,
					Mark Antony, from whom he had expected the greatest assistance, opposing him in
					his suit, and even refusing to do him so much as common justice, unless
					gratified with a large bribe, he went over to the party of the nobles, to whom
					he perceived Sylla to be odious, chiefly for endeavouring to drive Decius
					Brutus, whom he besieged in the town of Modena , out of the province, which had been given him by
					Caesar, and confirmed to him by the senate. At the instigation of persons about
					him, he engaged some ruffians to murder his antagonist; but the plot being
					discovered, and dreading a similar attempt upon himself, he gained over Caesar's
					veteran soldiers, by distributing among them all the money he could collect.
					Being now commissioned by the senate to command the troops he had gathered, with
					the rank of praetor, and in conjunction with Hirtius and Pansa, who had accepted
					the consulship, to carry assistance to Decius Brutus, he put an end to the war
					by two battles in three months. Antony writes, that in the former of these he
					ran away, and in two days afterwards made his appearance without his general's
					cloak and his horse. In the last battle, however, it is certain that he
					performed the part not only of a general, but a soldier; for, in the heat of the
					battle, when the standard-bearer of his legion was severely wounded, he took the
					eagle upon his shoulders, and carried it a long time.

In this war, Hirtius being slain in
					battle, and Pansa dying a short time afterwards of a wound, a report was
					circulated that they both were killed through his means, in order that, when
					Antony fled, the republic having lost its consuls, he might have the victorious
					armies entirely at his own command. The death of Pansa was so fully believed to
					have been caused by undue means, that Glyco, his surgeon, was placed in custody,
					on a suspicion of having poisoned his wound. And to this, Aquilius Niger adds,
					that he killed Hirtius, the other consul. in the confusion of the battle, with
					his own hands.

But upon intelligence that Antony, after his defeat, had been received by Marcus
					Lepidus, and that the rest of the generals and armies had all declared for the
					senate, he, without any hesitation, deserted from the party of the nobles;
					alleging as an excuse for his conduct, the actions and sayings of several
					amongst them; for some said, "he was a mere boy," and others threw out, "that he
					ought to be promoted to honours, and cut off," to avoid the making any suitable
					acknowledgment either to him or the veteran legions. And the more to testify his
					regret for having before attached himself to the other faction, he fined the
					Nursini in a large sum of money, which they were unable to pay, and then
					expelled them from the town, for having inscribed upon a monument, erected at
					the public charge to their countrymen who were slain in the battle of Modena , "That they fell in the cause of
					liberty."

Having entered into a confederacy with Antony and Lepidus, he brought the war at
						 Philippi to an end in two
					battles, although he was at that time weak, and suffering from sickness. In the first battle he was driven from
					his camp, and with some difficulty made his escape to the wing of the army
					commanded by Antony. And now intoxicated with success, he sent the head of
						Brutus to be cast
					at the foot of Caesar's statue, and treated the most illustrious of the
					prisoners not only with cruelty, but with abusive language; insomuch that he is
					said to have answered one of them who humbly intreated that at least he might
					not remain unburied, "That will be in the power of the birds." Two others,
					father and son, who begged for their lives, he ordered to cast lots which of
					them should live, or settle it between themselves by the sword; and was a
					spectator of both their deaths: for the father offering his life to save his
					son, and being accordingly executed, the son likewise killed himself upon the
					spot. On this account, the rest of the prisoners, and amongst them Marcus
					Favonius, Cato's rival, being led up in fetters, after they had saluted Antony,
					the general, with much respect, reviled Octavius in the foulest language. After
					this victory, dividing between them the offices of the state, Mark Antony undertook to restore order in the east, while
					Caesar conducted the veteran soldiers back to Italy , and settled them in colonies on lands belonging to the
					municipalities. But he had the misfortune to please neither the soldiers nor the
					owners of the lands; one party complaining of the injustice done them, in being
					violently ejected from their possessions, and the other, that they were not
					rewarded according to their merit.

At this time he obliged Lucius Antony, who, presuming upon his own authority as
					consul, and his brother's power, was raising new commotions, to fly to
						 Perugia , and forced him, by famine,
					to surrender at last, although not without having been exposed to great hazards,
					both before the war and during its continuance. For a common soldier having got
					into the seats of the equestrian order in the theatre, at the public spectacles,
					Caesar ordered him to be removed by an officer; and a rumour being thence spread
					by his enemies, that he had put the man to death by torture, the soldiers
					flocked together so much enraged, that he narrowly escaped with his life. The
					only thing that saved him, was the sudden appearance of the man, safe and sound,
					no violence having been offered him. And whilst he was sacrificing under the
					walls of Perugia , he nearly fell into
					the hands of a body of gladiators, who sallied out of the town.

After the taking of Perugia , he sentenced a great number of the
					prisoners to death, making only one reply to all who implored pardon, or
					endeavoured to excuse themselves, "You must die." Some authors write, that three
					hundred of the two orders, selected from the rest, were slaughtered, like
					victims, before an altar raised to Julius Caesar, upon the ides of March [15th
						April]. Nay, there are some who relate, that he entered upon the war
					with no other view, than that his secret enemies, and those whom fear more than
					affection kept quiet, might be detected, by declaring themselves, now they had
					an opportunity, with Lucius Antony at their head; and that having defeated them,
					and confiscated their estates, he might be enabled to fulfil his promises to the
					veteran soldiers.

He soon commenced the Sicilian war, but it was protracted by various delays
					during a long period; at one time
					for the purpose of repairing his fleets, which he lost twice by storm, even in
					the summer; at another, while patching up a peace, to which he was forced by the
					clamours of the people, in consequence of a famine occasioned by Pompey's
					cutting off the supply of corn by sea. But at last, having built a new fleet,
					and obtained twenty thousand manumitted slaves, who were given him for the
					oar, he formed the Julian harbour at Baiae , by letting the sea into the Lucrine and Avernian lakes;
					and having exercised his forces there during the whole winter, he defeated
					Pompey betwixt Mylae and Naulochus;
					although just as the engagement commenced, he suddenly fell into such a profound
					sleep, that his friends were obliged to wake him to give the signal. This, I
					suppose, gave occasion for Antony's reproach: " You were not able to take a
					clear view of the fleet, when drawn up in line of battle, but lay stupidly upon
					your back, gazing at the sky; nor did you get up and let your men see you, until
					Marcus Agrippa had forced the enemies' ships to sheer off." Others imputed to
					him both a saying and an action which were indefensible; for, upon the loss of
					his fleets by storm, he is reported to have said: "I will conquer in spite of
					Neptune;" and at the next Circensian games, he would not suffer the statue of
					that God to be carried in procession as usual. Indeed he scarcely ever ran more
					or greater risks in any of his wars than in this. Having transported part of his
					army to Sicily , and being on his return
					for the rest, he was unexpectedly attacked by Demochares and Apollophanes,
					Pompey's admirals, from whom he escaped with great difficulty, and with one ship
					only. Likewise, as he was travelling on foot through the Locrian territory to
						 Rhegium , seeing two of Pompey's
					vessels passing by that coast, and supposing them to be his own, he went down to
					the shore, and was very nearly taken prisoner. On this occasion, as he was
					making his escape by some by-ways, a slave belonging to Aemilius Paulus, who
					accompanied him, owing him a grudge for the proscription of Paulus, the father
					of Aemilius, and thinking he had now an opportunity of revenging it, attempted
					to assassinate him. After the defeat of Pompey, one of his colleagues, Marcus Lepidus, whom he had summoned to his aid from
						 Africa , affecting great
					superiority, because he was at the head of twenty legions, and claiming for
					himself the principal management of affairs in a threatening manner, he divested
					him of his command, but, upon his humble submission, granted him his life, but
					banished him for life to Circeii .

The alliance between him and Antony, which had always been precarious, often
					interrupted, and ill cemented by repeated reconciliations, he at last entirely
						dissolved. And to make it known to
					the world how far Antony had degenerated from patriotic feelings, he caused a
					will of his, which had been left at Rome , and in which he had nominated Cleopatra's children,
					amongst others, as his heirs, to be opened and read in an assembly of the
					people. Yet upon his being declared an enemy, he sent to him all his relations
					and friends, among whom were Caius Sosius and Titus Domitius, at that time
					consuls. He likewise spoke favourably in public of the people of Bologna , for joining in the association with
					the rest of Italy to support his cause,
					because they had, in former times, been under the protection of the family of
					the Antonii. And not long afterwards he defeated him in a naval engagement near
						 Actium , which was prolonged to so
					late an hour, that, after the victory, he was obliged to sleep on board his
					ship. From Actium he went to the isle
					of Samos to winter; but being alarmed
					with the accounts of a mutiny amongst the soldiers he had selected from the main
					body of his army sent to Brundisium 
					after the victory, who insisted on their being rewarded for their service and
					discharged, he returned to Italy . In
					his passage thither, he encountered two violent storms, the first between the
					promontories of Peloponnesus and
						 AEtolia , and the other about the
					Ceraunian mountains; in both of which a part of his Liburnian squadron was sunk,
					the spars and rigging of his own ship carried away, and the rudder broken in
					pieces. He remained only twenty-seven days at Brundisium , until the demands of the soldiers were settled, and
					then went, by way of Asia and
						 Syria , to Egypt , where laying siege to Alexandria , whither Antony had fled
					with Cleopatra, he made himself master of it in a short time. He drove Antony to
					kill himself, after he had used every effort to obtain conditions of peace, and
					he saw his corpse. Cleopatra he anxiously
					wished to save for his triumph; and when she was supposed to have been bit to
					death by an asp, he sent for the Psylli to
					endeavour to suck out the poison. He allowed them to be buried together in the
					same grave, and ordered a mausoleum, begun by themselves, to be completed. The
					eldest of Antony's two sons by Fulvia he commanded to be taken by force from the
					statue of Julius Caesar, to which he had fled, after many fruitless
					supplications for his life, and put him to death. The same fate attended
					Caesario, Cleopatra's son by Caesar, as he pretended, who had fled for his life,
					but was retaken. The children which Antony had by Cleopatra he saved, and
					brought up and cherished in a manner suitable to their rank, just as if they had
					been his own relations.

At this time he had a desire to see the sarcophagus and body of Alexander the
					Great, which, for that purpose, were taken out of the cell in which they
						rested; and after viewing
					them for some time, he paid honours to the memory of that prince, by offering a
					golden crown, and scattering flowers upon the body. 
					Being asked if he wished to see the tombs of the Ptolemies also; he replied, "I
					wish to see a king, not dead men." He reduced Egypt into the form of a province; and to render it more
					fertile, and more capable of supplying Rome with corn, he employed his army to scour the canals, into
					which the Nile , upon its rise,
					discharges itself; but which during a long series of years had become nearly
					choked up with mud. To perpetuate the glory of his victory at Actium , he built the city of Nicopolis on that part of the coast, and
					established games to be celebrated there every five years; enlarging likewise an
					old temple of Apollo, he ornamented with naval trophies the spot on which
					he had pitched his camp, and consecrated it to Neptune and Mars.

He afterwards quashed several tumults
					and insurrections, as well as several conspiracies against his life, which were
					discovered, by the confession of accomplices, before they were ripe for
					execution; and others subsequently. Such were those of the younger Lepidus, of
					Varro Muraena, and Fannius Caepio; then that of Marcus Egnatius, afterwards that
					of Plautius Rufus, and of Lucius Paulus, his grand-daughter's husband; and
					besides these, another of Lucius Audasius, an old feeble man, who was under
					prosecution for forgery; as also of Asinius Epicadus, a Parthinian mongrel, and at last that of Telephus, a
					lady's prompter; for he was
					in danger of his life from the plots and conspiracies of some of the lowest of
					the people against him. Audasius and Epicadus had formed the design of carrying
					off to the armies his daughter Julia, and his grandson Agrippa, from the islands
					in which they were confined. Telephus, wildly dreaming that the government was
					destined to him by the fates, proposed to fall both upon Octavius and the
					senate. Nay, once, a soldier's servant belonging to the army in Illyricum , having passed the porters
					unobserved, was found in the night-time standing before his chamber-door, armed
					with a hunting-dagger. Whether the person was really disordered in the head, or
					only counterfeited madness, is uncertain; for no confession was obtained from
					him by torture.

He conducted in person only two foreign wars; the Dalmatian, whilst he was yet
					but a youth; and, after Antony's final defeat, the Cantabrian. He was wounded in
					the former of these wars; in one battle he received a contusion in the right
					knee from a stone, and in another, he was much hurt in one leg and both arms, by
					the fall of a bridge. His
					other wars he carried on by his lieutenants; but occasionally visited the army,
					in some of the wars of Pannonia and
						 Germany , or remained at no great
					distance, proceeding from Rome as far
					as Ravenna , Milan , or Aquileia .

He conquered, however, partly in person, and partly by his lieutenants,
						 Cantabria , 
					 Aquitania and Pannonia , 
					 Dalmatia , with all Illyricum and Rhaetia , besides the two
					Alpine nations, the Vindelici and the Salassii. He also checked the incursions of the Dacians, by
					cutting off three of their generals with vast armies, and drove the Germans
					beyond the river Elbe ; removing two
					other tribes who submitted, the Ubii and Sicambri, into Gaul , and settling them in the country
					bordering on the Rhine . Other nations
					also, which broke into revolt, he reduced to submission. But he never made war
					upon any nation without just and necessary cause; and was so far from being
					ambitious either to extend the empire, or advance his own military glory, that
					he obliged the chiefs of some barbarous tribes to swear in the temple of Mars
					the Avenger, 
					that they would faithfully observe their engagements, and not violate the peace
					which they had implored. Of some he demanded a new description of hostages,
					their women, having found from experience that they cared little for their men
					when given as hostages; but he always afforded them the means of getting back
					their hostages whenever they wished it. Even those who engaged most frequently
					and with the greatest perfidy in their rebellion, he never punished more
					severely than by selling their captives, on the terms of their not serving in
					any neighbouring country, nor being released from their slavery before the
					expiration of thirty years. By the character which he thus acquired, for virtue
					and moderation, he induced even the Indians and Scythians, nations before known
					to the Romans by report only, to solicit his friendship, and that of the Roman
					people, by ambassadors. The Parthians readily allowed his claim to Armenia ; restoring, at his demand, the
					standards which they had taken from Marcus Crassus and Mark Antony, and offering
					him hostages besides. Afterwards, when a contest arose between several
					pretenders to the crown of that kingdom, they refused to acknowledge any one who
					was not chosen by him.

The temple of Janus Quirinus, which had been shut twice only, from the era of the
					building of the city to his own time, he closed thrice in a much shorter period,
					having established universal peace both by sea and land. He twice entered the
					city with the honours of an Ovation, namely, after the
					war of Philippi , and again after
					that of Sicily . He had also three
					curule triumphs for his several
					victories in Dalmatia , Actium , and Alexandria ; each of which lasted three
					days.

In all his wars, he never received any signal or ignominious defeat, except twice
					in Germany , under his lieutenants
					Lollius and Varus. The former indeed had in it more of dishonour than disaster;
					but that of Varus threatened the security of the empire itself; three legions,
					with the commander, his lieutenants, and all the auxiliaries, being cut off.
					Upon receiving intelligence of this disaster, he gave orders for keeping a
					strict watch over the city, to prevent any public disturbance, and prolonged the
					appointments of the prefects in the provinces, that the allies might be kept in
					order by experience of persons to whom they were used. He made a vow to
					celebrate the great games in honour of Jupiter , Optimus, Maximus, "if he would be pleased to restore
					the state to more prosperous circumstances." This had formerly been resorted to
					in the Cimbrian and Marsian wars. In short, we are informed that he was in such
					consternation at this event, that he let the hair of his head and beard grow for
					several months, and sometimes knocked his head against the door-post, crying
					out, "0, Quintilius Varus! give me back my legions!" And ever after he observed
					the anniversary of this calamity, as a day of sorrow and mourning.

In military affairs he made many alterations, introducing some practices entirely
					new, and reviving others, which had become obsolete. He maintained the strictest
					discipline among the troops; and would not allow even his lieutenants the
					liberty to visit their wives, except reluctantly, and in the winter season only.
					A Roman knight having cut off the thumbs of his two young sons, to render them
					incapable of serving in the wars, he exposed both him and his estate to public
					sale. But upon observing the farmers of the revenue very greedy for the
					purchase, he assigned him to a freedman of his own, that he might send him into
					the country, and suffer him to retain his freedom. The tenth legion becoming
					mutinous, he disbanded it with ignominy; and did the same by some others which
					petulantly demanded their discharge; withholding from them the rewards usually
					bestowed on those who had served their stated time in the wars. The cohorts
					which yielded their ground in time of action, he decimated, and fed with barley.
					Centurions, as well as common sentinels, who deserted their posts when on guard,
					he punished with death. For other misdemeanors he inflicted upon them various
					kinds of disgrace; such as obliging them to stand all day before the praetorium,
					sometimes in their tunics only, and without their belts, sometimes to carry
					poles ten feet long, or sods of turf.

After the conclusion of the civil wars, he never, in any of his military
					harangues, or proclamations, addressed them by the title of "Fellow-soldiers,"
					but as "Soldiers" only. Nor would he suffer them to be otherwise called by his
					sons or step-sons, when they were in command; judging the former epithet to
					convey the idea of a degree of condescension inconsistent with military
					discipline, the maintenance of order, and his own majesty, and that of his
					house. Unless at Rome , in case of
					incendiary fires, or under the apprehension of public disturbances during a
					scarcity of provisions, he never employed in his army slaves who had been made
					freedmen, except upon two occasions; on one, for the security of the colonies
					bordering upon Illyricum , and on the
					other, to guard the banks of the river Rhine . Although he obliged persons of fortune, both male and
					female, to give up their slaves, and they received their manumission at once,
					yet he kept them together under their own standard, unmixed with soldiers who
					were better born, and armed likewise after different fashion. Military rewards,
					such as trappings, collars, and other decorations of gold and silver, he
					distributed more readily than camp or mural crowns, which were reckoned more
					honourable than the former. These he bestowed sparingly, without partiality, and
					frequently even on common soldiers. He presented M. Agrippa, after the naval
					engagement in the Sicilian war, with a sea-green banner. Those who shared in the
					honours of a triumph, although they had attended him in his expeditions, and
					taken part in his victories, he judged it improper to distinguish by the usual
					rewards for service, because they had a right themselves to grant such rewards
					to whom they pleased. He thought nothing more derogatory to the character of an
					accomplished general than precipitancy and rashness; on which account he had
					frequently in his mouth those proverbs: σπεῦδε , hasten slowly ; and ἀσφαλὴσ γὰρ ἐστ' ἀμείνων, ἡ θράσυσ στρατηλάτησ , The
						cautious captain's better than the bold. . And "That is done fast
					enough, which is done well enough." 
				 He was wont to say also, that "a battle or a war ought never to be undertaken,
					unless the prospect of gain over balanced the fear of loss. For," said he, "men
					who pursue small advantages with no small hazard, resemble those who fish with a
					golden hook, the loss of which, if the line should happen to break, could never
					be compensated by all the fish they might take."

He was advanced to public offices before the age at which he was legally
					qualified for them; and to some, also, of a new kind, and for life. He seized
					the consulship in the twentieth year of his age, quartering his legions in a
					threatening manner near the city, and sending deputies to demand it for him in
					the name of the army. When the senate demurred, a centurion, named Cornelius,
					who was at the head of the chief deputation, throwing back his cloak, and
					showing the hilt of his sword, had the presumption to say in the senate-house,
					"This will make him consul, if ye will not." His second consulship he filled
					nine years afterwards; his third, after the interval of only one year, and held
					the same office every year successively until the eleventh. From this period,
					although the consulship was frequently offered him, he always declined it,
					until, after a long interval, not less than seventeen years, he voluntarily
					stood for the twelfth, and two years after that for a thirteenth; that he might
					successively introduce into the forum, on their entering public life, his two
					sons, Caius and Lucius, while he was invested with the highest office in the
					state. In his five consulships from the sixth to the eleventh, he continued in
					office throughout the year; but in the rest, during only nine, six, four, or
					three months, and in his second no more than a few hours. For having sat for a
					short time in the morning, upon the calends of January [1st January], in his
					curule chair. before the temple of Jupiter
					Capitolinus, he abdicated the office, and substituted another in his room. Nor
					did he enter upon them all at Rome ,
					but upon the fourth in Asia , the fifth
					in the Isle of Samos , and the eighth
					and ninth at Tarragona .

During ten years he acted as one of the triumvirate for settling the
					commonwealth, in which office he for some time opposed his colleagues in their
					design of a proscription; but after it was begun, he prosecuted it with more
					determined rigour than either of them. For whilst they were often prevailed
					upon, by the interest and intercession of friends, to show mercy, he alone
					strongly insisted that no one should be spared, and even proscribed Caius
					Toranius, his guardian, who had been formerly the
					colleague of his father Octavius in the edileship. Junius Saturnius adds this
					farther account of him: that when, after the proscription was over, Marcus
					Lepidus made an apology in the senate for their past proceedings, and gave them
					hopes of a more mild administration for the future, because they had now
					sufficiently crushed their enemies; he, on the other hand, declared that the
					only limit he had fixed to the proscription was, that he should be free to act
					as he pleased. Afterwards, however, repenting of his severity, he advanced T.
					Vinius Philopoemen to the equestrian rank, for having concealed his patron at
					the time he was proscribed. In this same office he incurred great odium upon
					many accounts. For as he was one day making an harangue, observing among the
					soldiers Pinarius, a Roman knight, admit some private citizens, and engaged in
					taking notes, he ordered him to be stabbed before his eyes, as a busy-body and a
					spy upon him. He so terrified with his menaces Tedius Afer, the consul elect,
						 for having reflected upon some
					action of his, that he threw himself from a great height, and died on the spot.
					And when Quintus Gallius, the praetor, came to compliment him with a double
					tablet under his cloak, suspecting that it was a sword he had concealed, and yet
					not venturing to make a search, lest it should be found to be something else, he
					caused him to be dragged from his tribunal by centurions and soldiers, and
					tortured like a slave: and although he made no confession, ordered him to be put
					to death, after he had, with his own hands, plucked out his eyes. His own
					account of the matter, however, is, that Quintus Gallius sought a private
					conference with him, for the purpose of assassinating him; that he therefore put
					him in prison, but afterwards released him, and banished him the city; when he
					perished either in a storm at sea, or by falling into the hands of robbers. 
				 He accepted of the tribunitian power for life, but more than once chose a
					colleague in that office for two lustra successively. He also had the
					supervision of morality and observance of the laws, for life, but without the
					title of censor; yet he thrice took a census of the people, the first and third
					time with a colleague, but the second by himself.

He twice entertained thoughts of restoring the republic; first, immediately after he had crushed
					Antony, remembering that he had often charged him with being the obstacle to its
					restoration. The second time was in consequence of a long illness, when he sent
					for the magistrates and the senate to his own house, and delivered them a
					particular account of the state of the empire. But reflecting at the same time
					that it would be both hazardous to himself to return to the condition of a
					private person, and might be dangerous to the public to have the government
					placed again under the control of the people, he resolved to keep it in his own
					hands, whether with the better event or intention, is hard to say. His good
					intentions he often affirmed in private discourse, and also published an edict,
					in which it was declared in the following terms: "May it be permitted me to have
					the happiness of establishing the commonwealth on a safe and sound basis, and
					thus enjoy the reward of which I am ambitious, that of being celebrated for
					moulding it into the form best adapted to present circumstances; so that, on my
					leaving the world, I may carry with me the hope that the foundations which I
					have laid for its future government, will stand firm and stable."

The city, which was not built in a manner suitable to the grandeur of the empire,
					and was liable to inundations of the Tiber , as well as to fires, was so much
					improved under his administration, that he boasted, not without reason, that he
					"found it of brick, but left it of marble." He also rendered it secure for the time to come against such
					disasters, as far as could be effected by human foresight. A great number of
					public buildings were erected by him, the most considerable of which were a
					forum, 
					containing the temple of Mars the Avenger, the temple of Apollo on the
						 Palatine hill, and the temple of
					Jupiter Tonans in the capitol. The reason of his building a new forum was the
					vast increase in the population, and the number of causes to be tried in the
					courts, for which, the two already existing not affording sufficient space, it
					was thought necessary to have a third. It was therefore opened for public use
					before the temple of Mars was completely finished; and a law was passed, that
					causes should be tried, and judges chosen by lot, in that place. The temple of
					Mars was built in fulfilment of a vow made during the war of Philippi , undertaken by him to avenge his
					father's murder. He ordained that the senate should always assemble there when
					they met to deliberate respecting wars and triumphs; that thence should be
					despatched all those who were sent into the provinces in the command of armies;
					and that in it those who returned victorious from the wars, should lodge the
					trophies of their triumphs. He erected the temple of Apollo 
					in that part of his house on the Palatine hill which had been struck with lightning, and which,
					on that account, the soothsayers declared the God to have chosen. He added
					porticos to it, with a library of Latin and Greek authors; and when advanced in years, used frequently there to
					hold the senate, and examine the rolls of the judges. 
				 He dedicated the temple to Jupiter Tonans [or. Apollo Tonans], in acknowledgment of his escape from a great danger
					in his Cantabrian expedition; when, as he was travelling in the night, his
					litter was struck by lightning, which killed the slave who carried a torch
					before him. He likewise constructed some public buildings in the name of others;
					for instance, his grandsons, his wife, and sister. Thus he built the portico and
					basilica of Lucius and Caius, and the
					porticos of Livia and Octavia . and the theatre of Marcellus . He also often exhorted other persons of rank to
					embellish the city by new buildings, or repairing and improving the old,
					according to their means. In consequence of this recommendation, many were
					raised; such as the temple of Hercules 
					and the Muses, by Marcius Philippus; a temple of Diana by Lucius Cornificius; the Court of Freedom by Asinius
					Pollio; a temple of Saturn by Munatius
					Plancus; a theatre by Cornelius Balbus ; an amphitheatre by Statilius Taurus, and several other
					noble edifices by Marcus Agrippa.

He divided the city into regions and districts, ordaining that the annual
					magistrates should take by lot the charge of the former; and that the latter
					should be superintended by wardens chosen out of the people of each
					neighbourhood. He appointed a nightly watch to be on their guard against
					accidents from fire; and, to prevent the frequent inundations, he widened and
					cleansed the bed of the Tiber , which
					had in the course of years been almost dammed up with rubbish, and the channel
					narrowed by the ruins of houses. 
					To render the approaches to the city more commodious, he took upon himself the
					charge of repairing the Flaminian way as far as Ariminum , and distributed the repairs
					of the other roads amongst several persons who had obtained the honour of a
					triumph; to be defrayed out of the money arising from the spoils of war. Temples
					decayed by time, or destroyed by fire, he either repaired or rebuilt; and
					enriched them, as well as many others, with splendid offerings. On a single
					occasion, he deposited in the cell of the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, sixteen
					thousand pounds of gold, with jewels and pearls to the amount of fifty millions
					of sesterces.

The office of Pontifex Maximus, of which he could not decently deprive Lepidus as
					long as he lived, he assumed as soon as he was dead. He then caused all
					prophetical books, both in Latin and Greek, the authors of which were either
					unknown, or of no great authority, to be brought in; and the whole collection,
					amounting to upwards of two thousand volumes, he committed to the flames,
					preserving only the Sibylline oracles; but not even those without a strict
					examination, to ascertain which were genuine. This being done, he deposited them
					in two gilt coffers, under the pedestal of the statue of the Palatine Apollo. He
					restored the calendar, which had been corrected by Julius Caesar, but through
					negligence was again fallen into confusion, to its former regularity; and upon that occasion,
					called the month Sextilis, by his
					own name, August, rather than September, in which he was born; because in it he
					had obtained his first consulship, and all his most considerable victories.
						 He increased
					the number, dignity, and revenues of the priests, and especially those of the
					Vestal Virgins. And when, upon the death of one of them, a new one was to be
					taken, and
					many persons made interest that their daughters names might be omitted in the
					lists for election, he replied with an oath, "If either of my own
					grand-daughters were old enough, I would have proposed her." 
				 He likewise revived some old religious customs, which had become obsolete; as the
					augury of public health, the office of high priest of
					Jupiter, the religious solemnity of the Lupercalia, with the Secular, and
					Compitalian games. He prohibited young boys from running in the Lupercalia; and
					in respect of the Secular games, issued an order, that no young persons of
					either sex should appear at any public diversions in the night-time, unless in
					the company of some elderly relation. He ordered the household gods to be decked
					twice a year with spring and summer flowers, in the
					Compitalian festival. 
				 Next to the immortal gods, he paid the highest honours to the memory of those
					generals who had raised the Roman state from its low origin to the highest pitch
					of grandeur. He accordingly repaired or rebuilt the public edifices erected by
					them; preserving the former inscriptions, and placing statues of them all, with
					triumphal emblems, in both the porticos of his forum, issuing an edict on the
					occasion, in which he made the following declaration: "My design in so doing is,
					that the Roman people may require from me, and all succeeding princes, a
					conformity to those illustrious examples." He likewise removed the statue of
					Pompey from the senate-house, in which Caius Caesar had been killed, and placed
					it under a marble arch, fronting the palace attached to Pompey's theatre.

He corrected many ill practices, which, to the detriment of the public, had
					either survived the licentious habits of the late civil wars, or else originated
					in the long peace. Bands of robbers shewed themselves openly, completely armed,
					under colour of self-defence; and in different parts of the country, travellers,
					freemen and slaves without distinction, were forcibly carried off, and kept to
					work in the houses of correction. Several
					associations were formed under the specious name of a new college, which banded
					together for the perpetration of all kinds of villany. The banditti he quelled
					by establishing posts of soldiers in suitable stations for the purpose; the
					houses of correction were subjected to a strict superintendence; all
					associations, those only excepted which were of ancient standing, and recognised
					by the laws, were dissolved. He burnt all the notes of those who had been a long
					time in arrear with the treasury, as being the principal source of vexatious
					suits and prosecutions. Places in the city claimed by the public, where the
					right was doubtful, he adjudged to the actual possessors. He struck out of the
					list of criminals the names of those over whom prosecutions had been long
					impending, where nothing further was intended by the informers than to gratify
					their own malice, by seeing their enemies humiliated; laying it down as a rule,
					that if any one chose to renew a prosecution, he should incur the risk of the
					punishment which he sought to inflict. And that crimes might not escape
					punishment, nor business be neglected by delay, he ordered the courts to sit
					during the thirty days which were spent in celebrating honorary games. To the
					three classes of judges then existing, he added a.fourth, consisting of persons
					of inferior order, who were called Ducenarii, and decided all litigations about
					trifling sums. He chose judges from the age of thirty years and upwards; that is
					five years younger than had been usual before. And a great many declining the
					office, he was with much difficulty prevailed upon to allow each class of judges
					a twelve-month's vacation in turn: and the courts to be shut during the months
					of November and December.

He was himself assiduous in his functions as a judge, and would sometimes prolong
					his sittings even into the night: if he were indisposed, his litter was placed before the tribunal, or he
					administered justice reclining on his couch at home; displaying always not only
					the greatest attention, but extreme lenity. To save a culprit, who evidently
					appeared guilty of parricide, from the extreme penalty of being sewn up in a
					sack, because none were punished in that manner but such as confessed the fact,
					he is said to have interrogated him thus: "Surely you did not kill your father,
					did you?" And when, in a trial of a cause about a forged will, all those who had
					signed it were liable to the penalty of the Cornelian law, he ordered that his colleagues on the tribunal
					should not only be furnished with the two tablets by which they decided, "guilty
					or not guilty," but with a third likewise, ignoring the offence of those who
					should appear to have given their signatures through any deception or mistake.
					All appeals in causes between inhabitants of Rome , he assigned every year to the praetor of the city; and
					where provincials were concerned, to men of consular rank, to one of whom the
					business of each province was referred.

Some laws he abrogated, and he made some new ones; such as the sumptuary law,
					that relating to adultery and the violation of chastity, the law against bribery
					in elections, and likewise that for the encouragement of marriage. Having been
					more severe in his reform of this law than the rest, he found the people utterly
					averse to submit to it, unless the penalties were abolished or mitigated,
					besides allowing an interval of three years after a wife's death, and increasing
					the premiums on marriage. The equestrian order clamoured loudly, at a spectacle
					in the theatre, for its total repeal; whereupon he sent for the children of
					Germanicus, and shewed them partly sitting upon his own lap, and partly on their
					father's; intimating by his looks and gestures, that they ought not to think it
					a grievance to follow the example of that young man. But finding that the force
					of the law was eluded, by marrying girls under the age of puberty, and by
					frequent change of wives, he limited the time for consummation after espousals,
					and imposed restrictions on divorce.

By two separate scrutinies he reduced to their former number and splendour the
					senate, which had been swamped by a disorderly crowd; for they were now more
					than a thousand, and some of them very mean persons, who, after Caesar's death,
					had been chosen by dint of interest and bribery, so that they had the nickname
					of Orcini among the people. The first of
					these scrutinies was left to themselves, each senator naming another; but the
					last was conducted by himself and Agrippa. On this occasion he is believed to
					have taken his seat as he presided, with a coat of mail under his tunic, and a
					sword by his side, and with ten of the stoutest men of senatorial rank, who were
					his friends, standing round his chair. Cordus Cremutius relates that no senator
					was suffered to approach him, except singly, and after having his bosom searched
					[for secreted daggers]. Some he obliged to have the grace of declining the
					office; these he allowed to retain the privileges of wearing the distinguishing
					dress, occupying the seats at the solemn spectacles, and of feasting publicly,
					reserved to the senatorial order. That those who were chosen and approved of, might perform
					their functions under more solemn obligations, and with less inconvenience, he
					ordered that every senator, before he took his seat in the house, should pay his
					devotions, with an offering of frankincense and wine, at the altar of that God
					in whose temple the senate then assembled, and that their stated meetings should be only twice
					in the month, namely, on the calends and ides; and that in the months of
					September and October, a certain number only, chosen by lot, such as the law
					required to give validity to a decree, should be required to attend. For
					himself, he resolved to choose every six months a new council, with whom he
					might consult previously upon such affairs as he judged proper at any time to
					lay before the full senate. He also took the votes of the senators upon any
					subject of importance, not according to custom, nor in regular order, but as he
					pleased; that every one might hold himself ready to give his opinion, rather
					than a mere vote of assent.

He also made several other alterations in the management of public affairs, among
					which were these following: that the acts of the senate should not be
						published; 
					that the magistrates should not be sent into the provinces immediately after the
					expiration of their office; that the proconsuls should have a certain sum
					assigned them out of the treasury for mules and tents, which used before to be
					contracted for by the government with private persons; that the management of
					the treasury should be transferred from the city-quaestors to the praetors, or
					those who had already served in the latter office; and that the decemviri should
					call together the court of One hundred, which had been formerly summoned by
					those who had filled the office of quaestor.

To augment the number of persons employed in the administration of the state, he
					devised several new offices: such as surveyors of the public buildings, of the
					roads, the aqueducts, and the bed of the Tiber ; for the distribution of corn to the people; the
					prefecture of the city; a triumvirate for the election of the senators; and
					another for inspecting the several troops of the equestrian order, as often as
					it was necessary. He revived the office of censor, which had been long disused, and
					increased the number of praetors. He likewise required that whenever the
					consulship was conferred on him he should have two colleagues instead of one;
					but his proposal was rejected, all the senators declaring by acclamation that he
					abated his high majesty quite enough in not filling the office alone, and
					consenting to share it with another.

He was unsparing in the reward of military merit, having granted to above thirty
					generals the honour of the greater triumph; besides which, he took care to have
					triumphal decorations voted by the senate for more than that number. That the
					sons of senators might become early acquainted with the administration of
					affairs, he permitted them, at the age when they took the garb of manhood, to assume also the distinction of the
					senatorian robe, with its broad border, and to be present at the debates in the
					senate-house. When they entered the military service, he not only gave them the
					rank of military tribunes in the legions, but likewise the command of the
					auxiliary horse. And that all might have an opportunity of acquiring military
					experience, he commonly joined two sons of senators in command of each troop of
					horse. He frequently reviewed the troops of the equestrian order, reviving the
					ancient custom of a cavalcade, which had been long laid aside. But he did not suffer any one
					to be obliged by an accuser to dismount while he passed in review, as had
					formerly been the practice. As for such as were infirm with age, or any way
					deformed, he allowed them to send their horses before them, coming on foot to
					answer to their names, when the muster roll was called over soon afterwards. He
					permitted those who had attained the age of thirty-five years, and desired not
					to keep their horse any longer, to have the privilege of giving it up.

With the assistance of ten senators, he obliged each of the Roman knights to give
					an account of his life: in regard to those who fell under his displeasure, some
					were punished; others had a mark of infamy set against their names. The most
					part he only reprimanded, but not in the same terms. The mildest mode of reproof
					was by delivering them tablets, the contents of which, confined to themselves, they were to read on the
					spot. Some he disgraced for borrowing money at low interest, and letting it out
					again upon usurious profit.

In the election of tribunes of the people, if there was not a sufficient number
					of senatorian candidates, he nominated others from the equestrian order;
					granting them the liberty, after the expiration of their office, to continue in
					whichsoever of the two orders they pleased. As most of the knights had been much
					reduced in their estates by the civil wars, and therefore durst not sit to see
					the public games in the theatre in the seats allotted to their order, for fear
					of the penalty provided by the law in that case, he enacted, that none were
					liable to it, who had themselves, or whose parents had ever, possessed a
					knight's estate. He took the census of the Roman people street by street: and
					that the people might not be too often taken from their business to receive the
					distribution of corn, it was his intention to deliver tickets three times a year
					for four months respectively; but at their request, he continued the former
					regulation, that they should receive their share monthly. He revived the former
					law of elections, endeavouring, by various penalties, to suppress the practice
					of bribery. Upon the day of election, he distributed to the freedmen of the
					Fabian and Scaptian tribes, in which he himself was enrolled, a thousand
					sesterces each, that they might, look for nothing from any of the candidates.
					Considering it of extreme importance to preserve the Roman people pure, and
					untainted with a mixture of foreign or servile blood, he not only bestowed the
					freedom of the city with a sparing hand, but laid some restriction upon the
					practice of manumitting slaves. When Tiberius interceded with him for the
					freedom of Rome in behalf of a Greek
					client of his, he wrote to him for answer, "I shall not grant it, unless he
					comes himself, and satisfies me that he has just grounds for the application."
					And when Livia begged the freedom of
					the city for a tributary Gaul , he
					refused it, but offered to release him from payment of taxes, saying, " I shall
					sooner suffer some loss in my exchequer, than that the citizenship of Rome be rendered too common." Not content with
					interposing many obstacles to either the partial or complete emancipation of
					slaves, by quibbles respecting the number, condition and difference of those who
					were to be manumitted; he likewise enacted that none who had been put in chains
					or tortured, should ever obtain the freedom of the city in any degree. He
					endeavoured also to restore the old habit and dress of the Romans; and upon
					seeing once, in an assembly of the people, a crowd in grey cloaks, he exclaimed with indignation, "See there, Romanos rerum dominos, gentemque togatem. 
					 Rome 's
							conquering sons, lords of the wide-spread globe, 
						 Stalk proudly in the toga's graceful robe. And he gave orders
					to the ediles not to permit, in future, any Romans to be present in the forum or
					circus unless they took off their short coats, and wore the toga.

He displayed his munificence to all ranks of the people on various occasions.
					Moreover, upon his bringing the treasure belonging to the kings of Egypt into the city, in his Alexandrian
					triumph, he made money so plentiful, that interest fell, and the price of land
					rose considerably. And afterwards, as often as large sums of money came into his
					possession by means of confiscations, he would lend it free of interest, for a
					fixed term, to such as could give security for the double of what was borrowed.
					The estate necessary to qualify a senator, instead of eight hundred thousand
					sesterces, the former standard, he ordered, for the future, to be twelve hundred
					thousand; and to those who had not so much, he made good the deficiency. He
					often made donations to the people, but generally of different sums; sometimes
					four hundred, sometimes three hundred, or two hundred and fifty sesterces: upon
					which occasions, he extended his bounty even to young boys, who before were not
					used to receive anything, until they arrived at eleven years of age. In a
					scarcity of corn, he would frequently let them have it at a very low price, or
					none at all; and doubled the number of the money tickets.

But to show that he was a prince who regarded more the good of his people than
					their applause, he reprimanded them very severely, upon their complaining of the
					scarcity and dearness of wine. "My son-in-law, Agrippa," he said, "has
					sufficiently provided for quenching your thirst, by the great plenty of water
					with which he has supplied the town." Upon their demanding a gift which he had
					promised them, he said, "I am a man of my word." But upon their importuning him
					for one which he had not promised, he issued a proclamation upbraiding them for
					their scandalous impudence; at the same time telling them, "I shall now give you
					nothing, whatever I may have intended to do." With the same strict firmness,
					when, upon a promise he had made of a donative, he found many slaves had been
					emancipated and enrolled amongst the citizens, he declared that no one should
					receive anything who was not included in the promise, and he gave the rest less
					than he had promised them, in order that the amount he had set apart might hold
					out. On one occasion, in a season of great scarcity, which it was difficult to
					remedy, he ordered out of the city the troops of slaves brought for sale, the
					gladiators belonging to the masters of defence, and all foreigners, excepting
					physicians and the teachers of the liberal sciences. Part of the domestic slaves
					were likewise ordered to be dismissed. When, at last, plenty was restored, he
					writes thus: "I was much inclined to abolish for ever the practice of allowing
					the people corn at the public expense, because they trust so much to it, that
					they are too lazy to till their lands; but I did not persevere in my design, as
					I felt sure that the practice would some time or other be revived by some one
					ambitious of popular favour." However, he so managed the affair ever afterwards,
					that as much account was taken of husbandmen and traders, as of the idle
						populace.

In the number, variety, and magnificence of his public spectacles, he surpassed
					all former example. Four and-twenty times, he says, he treated the people with
					games upon his own account, and three-and-twenty times for such magistrates as
					were either absent, or not able to afford the expense. The performances took
					place sometimes in the different streets of the city, and upon several stages,
					by players in all languages. The same he did not only in the forum and
					amphitheatre, but in the circus likewise, and in the septa: and sometimes he
					exhibited only the hunting of wild beasts. He entertained the people with
					wrestlers in the Campus Martius , where
					wooden seats were erected for the purpose; and also with a naval fight, for
					which he excavated the ground near the Tiber , where there is now the grove of the Caesars. During
					these two entertainments he stationed guards in the city lest, by robbers taking
					advantage of the small number of people left at home, it might be exposed to
					depredations. In the circus he exhibited chariot and foot races, and combats
					with wild beasts, in which the performers were often youths of the highest rank.
					His favorite spectacle was the Trojan game, acted by a select number of boys, in
					parties differing in age and station; thinking that it was a practice both
					excellent in itself, and sanctioned by ancient usage, that the spirit of the
					young nobles should be displayed in such exercises. Caius Nonius Asprenas, who
					was lamed by a fall in this diversion, he presented with a gold collar, and
					allowed him and his posterity to bear the surname of Torquati. But soon
					afterwards he gave up the exhibition of this game, in consequence of a severe
					and bitter speech made in the senate by Asinius Pollio, the orator, in which he
					complained bitterly of the misfortune of /Eserninus, his grandson, who likewise
					broke his leg in the same diversion. 
				 Sometimes he engaged Roman knights to act upon the stage, or to fight as
					gladiators; but only before the practice was prohibited by a decree of the
					senate, Thenceforth, the only exhibition he made of that kind, was that of a
					young man named Lucius, of a good family, who was not quite two feet in height,
					and weighed only seventeen pounds, but had a stentorian voice. In one of his
					public spectacles, he brought the hostages of the Parthians, the first ever sent
					to Rome from that nation, through the
					middle of the amphitheatre, and placed them in the second tier of seats above
					him. He used likewise, at times when there were no public entertainments, if any
					thing was brought to Rome which was
					uncommon, and might gratify curiosity, to expose it to public view, in any place
					whatever; as he did a rhinoceros in the Septa, a tiger upon a stage, and a snake
					fifty cubits long in the Comitium. It happened in the Circensian games, which he
					performed in consequence of a vow, that he was taken ill, and obliged to attend
					the Thensae, 
					reclining on a litter. Another time, in the games celebrated for the opening of
					the theatre of Marcellus, the joints of his curule chair happening to give way,
					he fell on his back. And in the games exhibited by his grandsons, when the
					people were in such consternation, by an alarm raised that the theatre was
					falling, that all his efforts to re-assure them and keep them quiet, failed, he
					moved from his place, and seated himself in that part of the theatre which was
					thought to be exposed to most danger.

He corrected the confusion and disorder with which the spectators took their
					seats at the public games, after an affront which was offered to a senator at
						 Puteoli , for whom, in a crowded
					theatre, no one would make room. He therefore procured a decree of the senate,
					that in all public spectacles of any sort, and in any place whatever, the first
					tier of benches should be left empty for the accommodation of senators. He would
					not even permit the ambassadors of free nations, nor of those which were allies
					of Rome , to sit in the orchestra;
					having found that some manumitted slaves had been sent under that character. He
					separated the soldiery from the rest of the people, and assigned to married
					plebeians their particular rows of seats. To the boys he assigned their own
					benches, and to their tutors the seats which were nearest it; ordering that none
					clothed in black should sit in the centre of the circle. Nor would he
					allow any women to witness the combats of the gladiators, except from the upper
					part of the theatre, although they formerly used to take their places
					promiscuously with the rest of the spectators. To the vestal virgins he granted
					seats in the theatre, reserved for them only, opposite the praetor's bench. He
					excluded however, the whole female sex from seeing the wrestlers: so that in the
					games which he exhibited upon his accession to the office of high-priest, he
					deferred producing a pair of combatants which the people called for, until the
					next morning; and intimated by proclamation, "his pleasure that no woman should
					appear in the theatre before five o'clock."

He generally viewed the Circensian games himself from the upper rooms of the
					houses of his friends or freedmen; sometimes from the place appointed for the
					statues of the gods, and sitting in company with his wife and children. He
					occasionally absented himself from the spectacles for several hours, and
					sometimes for whole days; but not without first making an apology, and
					appointing substitutes to preside in his stead. When present, he never attended
					to anything else; either to avoid the reflections which he used to say were
					commonly made upon his father, Caesar, for perusing letters and memorials, and
					making rescripts during the spectacles; or from the real pleasure he took in
					attending those exhibitions; of which he made no secret, he often candidly
					owning it This he manifested frequently by presenting honorary crowns and
					handsome rewards to the best performers, in the games exhibited by others; and
					he never was present at any performance of the Greeks, without rewarding the
					most deserving, according to their merit. He took particular pleasure in
					witnessing pugilistic contests, especially those of the Latins, not only between
					combatants who had been trained scientifically, whom he used often to match with
					the Greek champions; but even between mobs of the lower classes fighting in
					streets, and tilting at random, without any knowledge of the art In short, he
					honoured with his patronage all sorts of people who contributed in any way to
					the success of the public entertainments. He not only maintained, but enlarged,
					the privileges of the wrestlers. He prohibited combats of gladiators where no
					quarter was given. He deprived the magistrates of the power of correcting the
					stage-players, which by an ancient law was allowed them at all times, and in all
					places; restricting their jurisdiction entirely to the time of performance and
					misdemeanours in the theatres. He would, however, admit of no abatement, and
					exacted with the utmost rigour the greatest exertions of the wrestlers and
					gladiators in their several encounters. He went so far in restraining the
					licentiousness of stageplayers, that upon discovering that Stephanio, a
					performer of the highest class, had a married woman with her hair cropped, and
					dressed in boy's clothes, to wait upon him at table, he ordered him to be
					whipped through all the three theatres, and then banished him. Hylas, an actor
					of pantomimes, upon a complaint against him by the praetor, he commanded to be
					scourged in the court of his own house, which, however, was open to the public.
					And Pylades he not only banished from the city, but from Italy also, for pointing with his finger at a
					spectator by whom he was hissed, and turning the eyes of the audience upon
					him.

Having thus regulated the city and its concerns, he augmented the population of
						 Italy by planting in it no less
					than twenty-eight colonies, and greatly
					improved it by public works, and a beneficial application of the revenues. In
					rights and privileges, he rendered it in a measure equal to the city itself, by
					inventing a new kind of suffrage, which the principal officers and magistrates
					of the colonies might take at home, and forward under seal to the city, against
					the time of the elections. To increase the number of persons of condition, and
					of children among the lower ranks, he granted the petitions of all those who
					requested the honour of doing military service on horseback as knights, provided
					their demands were seconded by the recommendation of the town in which they
					lived; and when he visited the several districts of Italy , he distributed a thousand sesterces a head to such of
					the lower class as presented him with sons or daughters.

The more important provinces, which could not with ease or safety be entrusted to
					the government of annual magistrates, he reserved for his own administration:
					the rest he distributed by lot amongst the proconsuls; but sometimes he made
					exchanges, and frequently visited most of both kinds in person. Some cities in
					alliance with Rome , but which by their
					great licentiousness were hastening to ruin, he deprived of their independence.
					Others, which were much in debt, he relieved, and rebuilt such as had been
					destroyed by earthquakes. To those that could produce any instance of their
					having deserved well of the Roman people, he presented the freedom of Latium , or even that of the City. There is
					not, I believe, a province, except Africa and Sardinia ,
					which he did not visit. After forcing Sextus Pompeius to take refuge in those
					provinces, he was indeed preparing to cross over from Sicily to them, but was prevented by continual
					and violent storms, and afterwards there was no occasion or call for such a
					voyage.

Kingdoms, of which he had made himself master by the right of conquest, a few
					only excepted, he either restored to their former possessors, 
					or conferred upon aliens. Between kings in alliance with Rome , he encouraged most intimate union;
					being always ready to promote or favour any proposal of marriage or friendship
					amongst them; and, indeed, treated them all with the same consideration, as if
					they were members and parts of the empire. To such of them as were minors or
					lunatics he appointed guardians, until they arrived at age, or recovered their
					senses; and the sons of many of them he brought up and educated with his
					own.

With respect to the army, he distributed the legions and auxiliary troops
					throughout the several provinces. He stationed a fleet at Misenum , and another at Ravenna , for the protection of the Upper and
					Lower Seas. A certain number of the
					forces were selected, to occupy the posts in the city, and partly for his own
					body-guard; but he dismissed the Spanish guard, which he retained about him till
					the fall of Antony; and also the Germans, whom he had amongst his guards, until
					the defeat of Varus. Yet he never permitted a greater force than three cohorts
					in the city, and had no (praetorian) camps. The rest he quartered in the
					neighbourhood of the nearest towns, in winter and summer camps. All the troops
					throughout the empire he reduced to one fixed model with regard to their pay and
					their pensions; determining these according to their rank in the army, the time
					they had served, and their private means; so that after their discharge, they
					might not be tempted by age or necessities to join the agitators for a
					revolution. For the purpose of providing a fund always ready to meet their pay
					and pensions, he instituted a military exchequer, and appropriated new taxes to
					that object. In order to obtain the earliest intelligence of what was passing in
					the provinces, he established posts, consisting at first of young men stationed
					at moderate distances along the military roads, and afterwards of regular
					couriers with fast vehicles; which appeared to him the most commodious, because
					the persons who were the bearers of dispatches, written on the spot, might then
					be questioned about the business, as occasion occurred.

In sealing letters-patent, rescripts, or epistles, he at first used the figure of
					a sphinx, afterwards the head of Alexander the Great and at last his own,
					engraved by the hand of Dioscorides; which practice was retained by the
					succeeding emperors. He was extremely precise in dating his letters, putting
					down exactly the time of the day or night at which they were dispatched.

Of his clemency and moderation there are abundant and signal instances. For, not
					to enumerate how many and what persons of the adverse party he pardoned,
					received into favour, and suffered to rise to the highest eminence in the state;
					he thought it sufficient to punish Junius Novatus and Cassius Patavinus, who
					were both plebeians, one of them with a fine, and the other with an easy
					banishment; although the former had published, in the name of young Agrippa, a
					very scurrilous letter against him, and the other declared openly, at an
					entertainment where there was a great deal of company, " that he neither wanted
					inclination nor courage to stab him." In the trial of Emilius 'Elianus, of
						 Cordova , when, among other charges
					exhibited against him, it was particularly insisted upon, that he used to
					calumniate Caesar, he turned round to the accuser, and said, with an air and
					tone of passion, "I wish you could make that appear; I shall let ,Elianus know
					that I have a tongue too, and shall speak sharper of him than he ever did of
					me." Nor did he, either then or afterwards, make any farther inquiry into the
					affair. And when Tiberius, in a letter, complained of the affront with great
					earnestness, he returned him an answer in the following terms: "Do not, my dear
					Tiberius, give way to the ardour of youth in this affair; nor be so indignant
					that any person should speak ill of me. It is enough, for us, if we can prevent
					any one from really doing us mischief."

Although he knew that it had been customary to decree temples in honour of the
					proconsuls, yet he would not permit them to be erected in any of the provinces,
					unless in the joint names of himself and Rome . Within the limits of the city, he positively refused any
					honour of that kind. He melted down all the silver statues which had been
					erected to him, and converted the whole into tripods, which he consecrated to
					the Palatine Apollo. And when the people importuned him to accept the
					dictatorship, he bent down on one knee, with his toga thrown over his shoulders,
					and his breast exposed to view, begging to be excused.

He always abhorred the title of Lord, as ill-omened and offensive. And when, in a play, performed at the
					theatre, at which he was present, these words were introduced, "O just and
					gracious lord," and the whole company, with joyful acclamations, testified their
					approbation of them, as applied to him, he instantly put a stop to their
					indecent flattery, by waving his hand, and frowning sternly, and next day
					publicly declared his displeasure, in a proclamation. He never afterwards would
					suffer himself to be addressed in that manner, even by his own children or
					grand-children, either in jest or earnest, and forbad them the use of all such
					complimentary expressions to one another. He rarely entered any city or town, or
					departed from it, except in the evening or the night, to avoid giving any person
					the trouble of complimenting him. During his consulships, he commonly walked the
					streets on foot; but at other times, rode in a close carriage. He admitted to
					court even plebeians, in common with people of the higher ranks: receiving the
					petitions of those who approached him with so much affability, that he once
					jocosely rebuked a man, by telling him, "You present your memorial with as much
					hesitation as if you were offering money to an elephant." On senate days, he
					used to pay his respects to the Conscript Fathers only in the house, addressing
					them each by name as they sat, without any prompter; and on his departure, he
					bade each of them farewell, while they retained their seats. In the same manner,
					he maintained with many of them a constant intercourse of mutual civilities,
					giving them his company upon occasions of any particular festivity in their
					families; until he became advanced in years, and was incommoded by the crowd at
					a wedding. Being informed that Gallus Terrinius, a senator, with whom he had
					only a slight acquaintance, had suddenly lost his sight, and under that
					privation had resolved to starve himself to death, he paid him a visit, and by
					his consolatory admonitions diverted him from his purpose.

On his speaking in the senate, he has been told by one of the members, "I did not
					understand you," and by another, "I would contradict you, could I do it with
					safety." And sometimes, upon his being so much offended at the heat with which
					the debates were conducted in the senate, as to quit the house in anger, some of
					the mem- bers have repeatedly exclaimed: "Surely, the senators ought to have
					liberty of speech on matters of govern- ment." Antistius Labeo, in the election
					of a new senate, when each, as he was named, chose another, nominated Marcus
					Lepidus, who had formerly been Augustus's ene- my, and was then in banishment;
					and being asked by the latter, "Is there no other person more deserving?" he
					replied, "Every man has his own opinion." Nor was any one ever molested for his
					freedom of speech, although it was carried to the extent of insolence.

Even when some infamous libels against him were dispersed in the senate-house, he
					was neither disturbed, nor did he give himself much trouble to refute them. He
					would not so much as order an inquiry to be made after the authors; but only
					proposed, that, for the future, those who published libels, or lampoons, in a
					borrowed name, against any person, should be called to account.

Being provoked by some petulant jests, which were designed to render him odious,
					he answered them by a proclamation; and yet he prevented the senate from passing
					an act, to restrain the liberties which were taken with others in people's
					wills. Whenever he attended at the election of magistrates, he went round the
					tribes, with the candidates of his nomination, and begged the votes of the
					people in the usual manner. He likewise gave his own vote in his tribe, as one
					of the people. He suffered himself to be summoned as a witness upon trials, and
					not only to be questioned, but to be cross-examined, with the utmost patience.
					In building his Forum, he restricted himself in the site, not presuming to
					compel the owners of the neighbouring houses to give up their property. He never
					recommended his sons to the people, without adding these words. "If they deserve
					it." And upon the audience rising on their entering the theatre, while they were
					yet minors, and giving them applause in a standing position, he made it a matter
					of serious complaint. 
				 He was desirous that his friends should be great and powerful in the state, but
					have no exclusive privileges, or be exempt from the laws which governed others.
					When Asprenas Nonius, an intimate friend of his, was tried upon a charge of
					administering poison at the instance of Cassius Severus, he consulted the senate
					for their opinion what was his duty under the circumstances; "For," said he, "I
					am afraid lest, if I should stand by him in the cause, I may be supposed to
					screen a guilty man; and if I do not, to desert and prejudge a friend." With the
					unanimous concurrence, therefore, of the senate, he took his seat amongst his
					advocates for several hours, but without giving him the benefit of speaking to
					character, as was usual. He likewise appeared for his clients; as on behalf of
					Scutarius, an old soldier of his, who brought an action for slander. He never
					relieved any one from prosecution but in a single instance, in the case of a man
					who had given information of the conspiracy of Muraena; and that he did only by
					prevailing upon the accuser, in open court, to drop his prosecution.

How much he was beloved for his worthy conduct in all these respects, it is easy
					to imagine. I say nothing of the decrees of the senate in his honour, which may
					seem to have resulted from compulsion or deference. The Roman knights
					voluntarily, and with one accord, always celebrated his birth for two days
					together; and all ranks of the people yearly, in performance of a vow they had
					made, threw a piece of money into the Curtian lake, as an offering
					for his welfare. They likewise, on the calends [first] of January, presented for
					his acceptance new-year's gifts in the capitol, though he was not present: with
					which donations he purchased some costly images of the Gods, which he erected in
					several streets of the city: as that of Apollo Sandaliarius, Jupiter Tragoedus,
						 and others. When
					his house on the Palatine hill was
					accidentally destroyed by fire, the veteran soldiers, the judges, the tribes,
					and even the people, individually, contributed, according to the ability of
					each, for rebuilding it; but he would accept only of some small portion out of
					the several sums collected, and refused to take from any one person more than a
					single denarius. Upon his return home from any of the provinces, they attended
					him not only with joyful acclamations, but with songs. It is also remarked, that
					as often as he entered the city, the infliction of punishment was suspended for
					the time.

The whole body of the people, upon a sudden impulse, and with unanimous consent,
					offered him the title of FATHER OF HIS COUNTRY. It was announced to him first at
						 Antium , by a deputation from the
					people, and upon his declining the honour, they repeated their offer on his
					return to Rome , in a full theatre,
					when they were crowned with laurel. The senate soon afterwards adopted the
					proposal, not in the way of acclamation or decree, but by commissioning M.
					Messala, in an unanimous vote, to compliment him with it in the following terms:
					" With hearty wishes for the happiness and prosperity of yourself and family,
					Caesar Augustus, (for we think we thus most effectually pray for the lasting
					welfare of the state), the senate, in agreement with the Roman people, salute
					you by the title of FATHER OF YOUR COUNTRY." To this compliment Augustus
					replied, with tears in his eyes, in these words (for I give them exactly as I
					have done those of Messala): "Having now arrived at the summit of my wishes, O
					Conscript Fathers, what else have I to beg of the Immortal Gods, but the
					continuance of this your affection for me to the last moments of my life?" 
				 To the physician Antonius Musa, who had cured him of a dangerous illness, they
					erected a statue near that of aEsculapius, by a general subscription. Some heads
					of families ordered in their wills, that their heirs should lead victims to the
					capitol, with a tablet carried before them, and pay their vows, " Because
					Augustus still survived." Some Italian cities appointed the day upon which he
					first visited them, to be thenceforth the beginning of their year. And most of
					the provinces, besides erecting temples and altars, instituted games, to be
					celebrated to his honour, in most towns, every five years. 
				 The kings, his friends and allies, built cities in their respective kingdoms, to
					which they gave the name of Caesarea :
					and all with one consent resolved to finish, at their common expense, the temple
					of Jupiter Olympius, at Athens ,
					which had been begun long before, and consecrate it to his Genius. They
					frequently also left their kingdoms, laid aside the badges of royalty, and
					assuming the toga, attended and paid their respects to him daily, in the manner
					of clients to their patrons: not only at Rome , but when he was travelling through the provinces.

Having thus given an account of the manner in which he filled his public offices
					both civil and military, and his conduct in the government of the empire, both
					in peace and war; I shall now describe his private and domestic life, his habits
					at home and among his friends and dependents, and the fortune attending him in
					those scenes of retirement, from his youth to the day of his death. He lost his
					mother in his first consulship, and his sister Octavia, when he was in the
					fifty-fourth year of his age. He
					behaved towards them both with the utmost kindness whilst living, and after
					their decease paid the highest honours to their memory.

He was contracted when very young to the daughter of Publius Servilius Isauricus;
					but upon his reconciliation with Antony after their first rupture, the armies on both
					sides insisting on a family alliance between them, he married Antony's
					step-daughter Claudia, the daughter of Fulvia by Publius Claudius, although at
					that time she was scarcely marriageable; and upon a difference arising with his
					mother-in-law Fulvia, he divorced her untouched, and a pure virgin. Soon
					afterwards he took to wife Scribonia, who had before been twice married to men
					of consular rank, and was a mother by one of them. With her he likewise
						parted, being quite tired out, as he
					himself writes, with the perverseness of her temper; and immediately took Livia
					Drusilla, though then pregnant, from her husband Tiberius Nero; and she had
					never any rival in his love and esteem.

By Scribonia he had a daughter named Julia , but no children by Livia , although extremely desirous of issue. She, indeed,
					conceived once, but miscarried. He gave his daughter Julia in the first instance to Marcellus , his sister's son, who had just
					completed his minority; and, after his death, to Marcus Agrippa, having
					prevailed with his sister to yield her son-in-law to his wishes; for at that
					time Agrippa was married to one of the Marcellas, and had children by her.
					Agrippa dying also, he for a long time thought of several matches for Julia in even the equestrian order, and at
					last resolved upon selecting Tiberius 
					for his step-son; and he obliged him to part with his wife at that time
					pregnant, and who had already brought him a child. Mark Antony writes, "That he
					first contracted Julia to his son, and
					afterwards to Cotiso, king of Getae, demanding at the same
					time the king's daughter in marriage for himself."

He had three grandsons by Agrippa and Julia , namely, Caius, Lucius , and Agrippa; and two granddaughters, Julia and Agrippina. Julia he married to Lucius Paulus, the censor's son, and Agrippina
					to Germanicus, his sister's grandson. Caius and Lucius he adopted at home, by
					the ceremony of purchase from their father, advanced
					them, while yet very young, to offices in the state, and when they were
					consuls-elect, sent them to visit the provinces and armies. In bringing up his
					daughter and grand-daughters, he accustomed them to domestic employments, and
					even spinning, and obliged them to speak and act every thing openly before the
					family, that it might be put down in the diary. He so strictly prohibited them
					from all converse with strangers, that he once wrote a letter to Lucius
					Vinicius, a handsome young man of a good family, in which he told him, "You have
					not behaved very modestly, in making a visit to my daughter at Baiae ." He usually instructed his grandsons
					himself in reading, swimming, and other rudiments of knowledge; and he laboured
					nothing more than to perfect them in the imitation of his hand-writing. He never
					supped but he had them sitting at the foot of his couch; nor ever travelled but
					with them in a chariot before him, or riding beside him.

But in the midst of all his joy and hopes in his numerous and well-regulated
					family, his fortune failed him. The two Julias, his daughter and grand-daughter,
					abandoned themselves to such courses of lewdness and debauchery, that he
					banished them both. Caius and Lucius he
					lost within the space of eighteen months; the former dying in Lycia , and the latter at Marseilles . His third grandson Agrippa, with
					his step-son Tiberius, he adopted in the forum, by a law passed for the purpose
					by the sections; but he soon afterwards discarded Agrippa for his coarse and unruly
					temper, and confined him at Surrentum .
					He bore the death of his relations with more patience than he did their
					disgrace; for he was not overwhelmed by the loss of Caius and Lucius; but in the
					case of his daughter, he stated the facts to the senate in a message read to
					them by the quaestor, not having the heart to be present himself; indeed, he was
					so much ashamed of her infamous conduct, that for some time he avoided all
					company, and had thoughts of putting her to death. It is certain that when one
					Phoebe, a freed-woman and confidant of hers, hanged herself about the same time,
					he said, "I had rather be the father of Phoebe than of Julia." In her banishment
					he would not allow her the use of wine, nor any luxury in dress; nor would he
					suffer her to be waited upon by any male servant, either freeman or slave,
					without his permission, and having received an exact account of his age,
					stature, complexion, and what marks or scars he had about him. At the end of
					five years he removed her from the island [where she was confined] to the
					continent, and treated her with less severity, but could
					never be prevailed upon to recall her. When the Roman people interposed on her
					behalf several times with much importunity, all the reply he gave was: "I wish
					you had all such daughters and wives as she is." He likewise forbad a child, of
					which his granddaughter Julia was delivered after sentence had passed against
					her, to be either owned as a relation, or brought up. Agrippa, who was equally
					intractable, and whose folly increased every day, he transported to an
						island, and placed a guard of soldiers about him;
					procuring at the same time an act of the senate for his confinement there during
					life. Upon any mention of him and the two Julias, he would say, with a heavy
					sigh, Would I were wifeless, or had childless died! 
					 nor did he usually call them by any other name than that of his "three
					imposthumes or cancers."

He was cautious in forming friendships, but clung to them with great constancy;
					not only rewarding the virtues and merits of his friends according to their
					deserts, but bearing likewise with their faults and vices, provided that they
					were of a venial kind, For amongst all his friends, we scarcely find any who
					fell into disgrace with him, except Salvidienus Rufus, whom he raised to the
					consulship, and Cornelius Gallus, whom he made prefect in Egypt ; both of them men of the lowest
					extraction. One of these, being engaged in plotting a rebellion, he delivered
					over to the senate, for condemnation; and the other, on account of his
					ungrateful and malicious temper, he forbad his house, and his living in any of
					the provinces. When, however, Gallus, being denounced by his accusers, and
					sentenced by the senate, was driven to the desperate extremity of laying violent
					hands upon himself, he commended, indeed, the attachment to his person of those
					who manifested so much indignation, but he shed tears, and lamented his unhappy
					condition, "That I alone," said he, " cannot be allowed to resent the misconduct
					of my friends in such a way only as I would wish." The rest of his friends of
					all orders flourished during their whole lives, both in power and wealth, in the
					highest ranks of their several orders, notwithstanding some occassional lapses.
					For, to say nothing of others, he sometimes complained that Agrippa was hasty,
					and Maecenas a tattler; the former having thrown up all his employments and
					retired to Mitylene , on suspicion of
					some slight coolness, and from jealousy that Marcellus received greater marks of
					favour; and the latter having confidentially imparted to his wife Terentia the
					discovery of Murena's conspiracy. 
				 He likewise expected from his friends, at their deaths as well as during their
					lives, some proofs of their reciprocal attachment. For though he was far from
					coveting their property, and indeed would never accept of any legacy left him by
					a stranger, yet he pondered in a melancholy mood over their last words; not
					being able to conceal his chagrin, if in their wills they made but a slight, or
					no very honourable mention of him, nor his joy, on the other hand, if they
					expressed a grateful sense of his favours, and a hearty affection for him. And
					whatever legacies or shares of their property were left for him by such as were
					parents, he used to restore to their children, either immediately, or if they
					were under age, upon the day of their assuming the manly dress, or of their
					marriage; with interest.

As a patron and master, his behaviour in general was mild and conciliating; but
					when occasion required it, he could be severe. He advanced many of his freedmen
					to posts of honour and great importance, as Licinus, Enceladus, and others; and
					when his slave, Cosmus, had reflected bitterly upon him, he resented the injury
					no further than by putting him in fetters. When his steward, Diomedes, left him
					to the mercy of a wild boar, which suddenly attacked them while they were
					talking together, he considered it rather a cowardice than a breach of duty; and
					turned an occurrence of no small hazard into a jest, because there was no
					knavery in his steward's. conduct. He put to death Proculus, one of his most
					favourite freedmen, for maintaining a criminal commerce with other men's wives.
					He broke the legs of his secretary, Thallus, for taking a bribe of five hundred
					denarii to discover the contents of one of his letters. And the tutor and other
					attendants of his son Caius, having taken advantage of his sickness and death,
					to give loose to their insolence and rapacity in the province he governed, he
					caused heavy weights to be tied about their necks, and had them thrown into a
					river.

In his early youth various aspersions of an infamous character were heaped upon
					him. Sextus Pompey reproached him with being an effeminate fellow; and M.
					Antony, with earning his adoption from his uncle by improper means. Lucius
					Antony, likewise Mark's brother, charges him with the same.

That he was guilty of various acts of adultery, is not denied even by his
					friends; but they allege in excuse for it, that he engaged in those intrigues
					not from lewdness, but from policy, in order to discover more easily the designs
					of his enemies, through their wives. Mark Antony, besides the precipitate
					marriage of Livia, charges him with taking the wife of a man of consular rank
					from table, in the presence of her husband, into a bed-chamber, and bringing her
					again to the entertainment, with her ears very red, and her hair in great
					disorder: that he had divorced Scribonia, for resenting too freely the excessive
					influence which one of his mistresses had gained over him: that his friends were
					employed to pimp for him, and accordingly obliged both matrons and ripe virgins
					to strip, for a complete examination of their persons, in the same manner as if
					Thoranius, the dealer in slaves, had them under sale. And before they came to an
					open rupture, he writes to him in a familiar manner, thus: "Why are you changed
					towards me? Because I lie with a queen? She is my wife. Is this a new thing with
					me, or have I not done so for these nine years? And do you take freedoms with
						 Drusilla only? May health and
					happiness so attend you, and when you read this letter, you are not in dalliance
					with Tertulla, Terentilla, Rufilla, or Salvia Titiscenia, or all of them. What
					matters it to you where, or upon whom, you spend your manly vigour?"

A private entertainment which he gave, commonly called the Supper of the Twelve
					Gods, and at which the guests were dressed in the habit of gods and goddesses,
					while he personated Apollo himself, afforded subject of much conversation, and
					was imputed to him not only by Antony in his letters, who likewise names all the
					parties concerned, but in the following well-known anonymous verses: Cum primum istorum conduxit mensa choragum, 
						 Sexque deos vidit Mallia , sexque
							deas 
						 Impia dum Phoebi Caesar mendacia ludit, 
						 Dum nova divorum coenat adulteria: 
						 Omnia se a terris tunc numina declinarunt: 
						 Fugit et auratos Jupiter ipse thronos. 
					 When Mallia late beheld, in mingled train, 
						 Twelve mortals ape twelve deities in vain, 
						 Caesar assumed what was Apollo's due, 
						 And wine and lust inflamed the motley crew. 
						 At the foul sight the gods avert their eyes, 
						 And from his throne great Jove indignant flies. What rendered
					this supper more obnoxious to public censure, was, that it happened at a time
					when there was a great scarcity, and almost a famine, in the city. The day
					after, there was a cry current among the people, "that the gods had eaten up all
					the corn; and that Caesar was indeed Apollo, but Apollo the Tormentor;" under
					which title that god was worshipped in some quarter of the city. He was likewise charged with being excessively fond of fine furniture,
					and Corinthian vessels, as well as with being addicted to gaming. For, during
					the time of the proscription, the following line was written upon his statue:
						 Pater argentarius, ego Corinthiarius; 
					 My father was a silversmith, my dealings are in
						brass; because it was believed, that he had put some persons
					upon the list of the proscribed, only to obtain the Corinthian vessels in their
					possession. And afterwards, in the Sicilian war, the following epigram was
					published: Postquam bis classe victus naves
							perdidit, 
						 Aliquando ut vincat, ludit assidue aleam. 
					 Twice having lost a fleet in luckless fight, 
						 To win at last, he games both day and night.

With respect to the charge or imputation of loathsome impurity before-mentioned,
					he very easily refuted it by the chastity of his life, at the very time when it
					was made, as well as ever afterwards. His conduct likewise gave the lie to that
					of luxurious extravagance in his furniture, when, upon the taking of Alexandria , he reserved for himself nothing of
					the royal treasures but a porcelain cup, and soon afterwards melted down all the
					vessels of gold, even such as were intended for common use. But his amorous
					propensities never left him, and, as he grew older, as is reported, he was in
					the habit of debauching young girls, who were procured for him, from all
					quarters, even by his own wife. To the observations on his gaming, he paid not
					the smallest regard; but played in public, but purely for his diversion, even
					when he was advanced in years; and not only in the month of December, but at other times, and upon
					all days, whether festivals or not. This evidently appears from a letter under
					his own hand, in which he says, "I supped, my dear Tiberius, with the same
					company. We had, besides, Vinicius, and Silvius the father. We gamed at supper
					like old fellows, both yesterday and to-day. And as any one threw upon the
						 tali aces or sixes, he put down for every
					talus a denarius; all which was gained by him who threw a Venus." In another letter, he
					says: "We had, my dear Tiberius, a pleasant time of it during the festival of
					Minerva: for we played every day, and kept the gaming-board warm. Your brother
					uttered many exclamations at a desperate run of ill-fortune; but recovering by
					degrees, and unexpectedly, he in the end lost not much. I lost twenty thousand
					sesterces for my part; but then I was profusely generous in my play, as I
					commonly am; for had I insisted upon the stakes which I declined, or kept what I
					gave away, I should have won about fifty thousand. But this I like better: for
					it will raise my character for generosity to the skies." In a letter to his
					daughter, he writes thus . "I have sent you two hundred and fifty denarii, which
					I gave to every one of my guests; in case they were inclined at supper to divert
					themselves with the Tali, or at the game of Even-or-Odd."

In other matters, it appears that he was moderate in his habits, and free from
					suspicion of any kind of vice. He lived at first near the Roman Forum, above the
					Ring-maker's Stairs, in a house which had once been occupied by Calvus the
					orator. He afterwards moved to the Palatine
						Hill , where he resided in a small house belonging
					to Hortensius, no way remarkable either for size or ornament; the piazzas being
					but small, the pillars of Alban stone,
						 and
					the rooms without any thing of marble, or fine paving. He continued to use the
					same bed-chamber, both winter and summer, during forty years: for though he was sensible that the city did not agree with his
					health in the winter, he nevertheless resided constantly in it during that
					season. If at any time he wished to be perfectly retired, and secure from
					interruption, he shut himself up in an apartment at the top of his house, which
					he called his Syracuse or Τεχνόφυον or he
					went to some villa belonging to his freedmen near the city. But when he was
					indisposed, he commonly took up his residence in the house of Maecenas. Of all the places of retirement from the city, he chiefly frequented
					those upon the seacoast, and the islands of Campania , or the towns nearest the city, such as Lanuvium , Praeneste , and Tibur , where he often used to
					sit for the administration of justice, in the porticos of the temple of
					Hercules. He had a particular aversion to large and sumptuous palaces; and some
					which had been raised at a vast expense by his grand-daughter, Julia , he leveled to the ground. Those of his
					own, which were far from being spacious, he adorned, not so much with statues
					and pictures, as with walks and groves, and things which were curious either for
					their antiquity or rarity; such as, at Capri , the huge limbs of sea-monsters and wild beasts, which
					some affect to call the bones of giants; and also the arms of ancient
					heroes.

His frugality in the furniture of his house appears even at this day, from some
					beds and tables still remaining, most of which are scarcely elegant enough for a
					private family. It is reported that he never lay upon a bed, but such as was
					low, and meanly furnished. He seldom wore any garment but what was made by the
					hands of his wife, sister, daughter, and grand-daughters. His togas were neither scanty nor full; and the
					clavus was neither remarkably broad or narrow. His shoes were a little higher
					than common, to make him appear taller than he was. He had always clothes and
					shoes, fit to appear in public, ready in his bed-chamber for any sudden
					occasion.

At his table which was always plentiful and elegant, he constantly entertained
					company; but was very scrupulous in the choice of them, both as to rank and
					character. Valerius Messala informs us, that he never admitted any freedmen to
					his table, except Menas, when rewarded with the privilege of citizenship, for
					betraying Pompey's fleet. He writes, himself, that he invited to his table a
					person in whose villa he lodged, and who had formerly been employed by him as a
					spy. He often came late to table, and withdrew early; so that the company began
					supper before his arrival, and continued at table after his departure. His
					entertainments consisted of three entries, or at most of only six. But if his
					fare was moderate, his courtesy was extreme. For those who were silent, or
					talked in whispers, he encouraged to join in the general conversation; and
					introduced buffoons and stage players, or even low performers from the circus,
					and very often itinerant humourists, to enliven the company.

Festivals and holidays he usually celebrated very expensively, but sometimes only
					with merriment. In the Saturnalia, or at any other time when the fancy took him,
					he distributed to his company clothes, gold and silver; sometimes coins of all
					sorts, even of the ancient kings of Rome and of foreign nations; sometimes nothing but towels,
					sponges, rakes, and tweezers, and other things of that kind, with tickets on
					them, which were enigmatical, and had a double meaning. He
					used likewise to sell by lot among his guests articles of very unequal value,
					and pictures with their fronts reversed; and so, by the unknown quality of the
					lot, disappoint or gratify the expectation of the purchasers. This sort of
					traffic went round the whole company, every one being obliged to buy something,
					and to run the chance of loss or gain with the rest.

He ate sparingly (for I must not omit even this), and commonly used a plain diet.
					He was particularly fond of coarse bread, small fishes, new cheese made of cow's
						milk, and green figs of the sort which
					bear fruit twice a year. He did not wait for
					supper, but took food at any time, and in any place, when he had an appetite.
					The following passages relative to this subject, I have transcribed from his
					letters. " I ate a little bread and some small dates, in my carriage." Again. "
					In returning home from the palace in my litter, I ate an ounce of bread, and a
					few raisins." Again.. "No Jew, my dear Tiberius , ever keeps such strict fast upon the Sabbath, as I have to-day; for while in the bath, and after the first hour of the
					night, I only ate two biscuits, before I began to be rubbed with oil." From this
					great indifference about his diet, he sometimes supped by himself, before his
					company began, or after they had finished, and would not touch a morsel at table
					with his guests.

He was by nature extremely sparing in the use of wine. Cornelius Nepos says, that
					he used to drink only three times at supper in the camp of Modena ; and when he indulged himself the most,
					he never exceeded a pint; or if he did his stomach rejected it. Of all wines, he
					gave the preference to the Rhaetian, but scarcely ever drank any in the
					day-time. Instead of drinking, he used to take a piece of bread dipped in cold
					water, or a slice of cucumber, or some leaves of lettuce, or a green, sharp,
					juicy apple.

After a slight repast at noon, he used to seek repose, dressed as he was, and with his shoes on, his feet covered,
					and his hand held before his eyes. After supper he commonly withdrew to his
					study, a small closet, where he sat late, until he had put down in his diary all
					or most of the remaining transactions of the day, which he had not before
					registered. He would then go to bed, but never slept above seven hours at most,
					and that not without interruption; for he would wake three or four times during
					that time. If he could not again fall asleep, as sometimes happened, he called
					for some one to read or tell stories to him, until he became drowsy, and then
					his sleep was usually protracted till after day-break. He never liked to lie
					awake in the dark, without somebody to sit by him. Very early rising was apt to
					disagree with him. On which account, if he was obliged to rise betimes, for any
					civil or religious functions, in order to guard as much as possible against the
					inconvenience resulting from it, he used to lodge in some apartment near the
					spot, belonging to any of his attendants. If at any time a fit of drowsiness
					seized him in passing along the streets, his litter was set down while he
					snatched a few moments' sleep.

In person he was handsome and graceful through every period of his life. But he
					was negligent in his dress; and so careless about dressing his hair, that he
					usually had it done in great haste, by several barbers at a time. His beard he
					sometimes clipped, and sometimes shaved; and either read or wrote during the
					operation. His countenance, either when discoursing or silent, was so calm and
					serene, that a Gaul of the first rank
					declared amongst his friends, that he was so softened by it, as to be restrained
					from throwing him down a precipice, in his passage over the Alps , when he had been admitted to approach
					him, under pretence of conferring with him. His eyes were bright and piercing;
					and he was willing it should be thought that there was something of a divine
					vigour in them. He was likewise not a little pleased to see people, upon his
					looking stedfastly at them, lower their countenances, as if the sun shone in
					their eyes. But in his old age, he saw very imperfectly with his left eye. His
					teeth were thin set, small and scaly, his hair a little curled, and inclining to
					a yellow colour. His eye-brows met; his ears were small, and he had an aquiline
					nose. His complexion was betwixt brown and fair; his stature but low; though
					Julius Marathus, his freedman, says he was five feet and nine inches in height.
					This, however, was so much concealed by the just proportion of his limbs, that
					it was only perceivable upon comparison with some taller person standing by
					him.

He is said to have been born with many spots upon his breast and belly, answering
					to the figure, order, and number of the stars in the constellation of the Bear.
					He had besides several callosities resembling scars, occasioned by an itching in
					his body, and the constant and violent use of the strigil in being rubbed. He had a weakness in his left
					hip, thigh, and leg, insomuch that he often halted on that side; but he received
					much benefit from the use of sand and reeds. He likewise sometimes found the
					fore-finger of his right hand so weak, that when it was benumbed and contracted
					with cold, to use it in writing, he was obliged to have recourse to a circular
					piece of horn. He had occasionally a complaint in the bladder; but upon voiding
					some stones in his urine, he was relieved from that pain.

During the whole course of his life, he suffered, at times, dangerous fits of
					sickness, especially after the conquest of Cantabria ; when his liver being injured by a defluxion upon it,
					he was reduced to such a condition, that he was obliged to undergo a desperate
					and doubtful method of cure: for warm applications having no effect, Antonius
						Musa directed
					the use of those which were cold. He was likewise subject to fits of sickness at
					stated times every year; for about his birth-day he was commonly a little indisposed. In the
					beginning of spring, he was attacked with an inflation of the midriff; and when
					the wind was southerly, with a cold in his head. By all these complaints, his
					constitution was so shattered, that he could not easily bear either heat or
					cold.

In the winter, he was protected against the inclemency of the weather by a thick
					toga, four tunics, a shirt, a flannel stomacher, and swathings upon his legs and
					thighs. In summer, he
					lay with the doors of his bedchamber open, and frequently in a piazza, refreshed
					by a bubbling fountain, and a person standing by to fan him. He could not bear
					even the winter's sun; and at home, never walked in the open air without a
					broad-brimmed hat on his head. He usually travelled in a litter, and by night;
					and so slow, that he was two days in going to Praeneste or Tibur .
					And if he could go to any place by sea, he preferred that mode of travelling. He
					carefully nourished his health against his many infirmities, avoiding chiefly
					the free use of the bath; but he was often rubbed with oil, and sweated in a
					stove; after which he was washed with tepid water, warmed either by a fire, or
					by being exposed to the heat of the sun. When, upon account of his nerves, he
					was obliged to have recourse to sea-water, or the waters of Albula , he was contented with sitting over a wooden tub, which he called
					by a Spanish name Dureta, and plunging his hands and feet in the water by
					turns.

As soon as the civil wars were ended, he gave up riding and other military
					exercises in the Campus Martius , and
					took to playing at ball, or foot-ball; but soon afterwards used no other
					exercise than that of going abroad in his litter, or walking. Towards the end of
					his walk, he would run leaping, wrapped up in a short cloak or cape. For
					amusement, he would sometimes angle, or play with dice, pebbles, or nuts, with
					little boys, collected from various countries, and particularly Moors and
					Syrians, for their beauty or amusing talk. But dwarfs, and such as were in any
					way deformed, he held in abhorrence, as lusus natura (nature's abortions), and
					of evil omen.

From early youth he devoted himself with great diligence and application to the
					study of eloquence, and the other liberal arts. In the war of Modena , notwithstanding the weighty affairs in
					which he was engaged, he is said to have read, written, and declaimed every day.
					He never addressed the senate, the people, or the army, but in a premeditated
					speech, though he did not want the talent of speaking extempore on the spur of
					the occasion. And lest his memory should fail him, as well as to prevent the
					loss of time in getting up his speeches, it was his general practice to recite
					them. In his intercourse with individuals, and even with his wife Livia, upon
					subjects of importance he wrote on his tablets all he wished to express, lest,
					if he spoke extempore, he should say more or less than was proper. He delivered
					himself in a sweet and peculiar tone, in which he was diligently instructed by a
					master of elocution. But when he had a cold, he sometimes employed a herald to
					deliver his speeches to the people.

He composed many tracts in prose on various subjects, some of which he read
					occasionally in the circle of his friends, as to an auditory. Among these was
					his "Rescript to Brutus respecting Cato ." Most of the pages he read himself, although he was advanced
					in years, but becoming fatigued, he gave the rest to Tiberius to finish. He
					likewise read over to his friends his "Exhortations to Philosophy," and the
					"History of his own Life," which he continued in thirteen books, as far as the
					Cantabrian war, but no farther. He likewise made some attempts at poetry. There
					is extant one book written by him in hexameter verse, of which both the subject
					and title is " Sicily ." There is also a
					book of Epigrams, no larger than the last, which he composed almost entirely
					while he was in the bath. These are all his poetical compositions: for though he
					begun a tragedy with great zest, becoming dissatisfied with the style, he
					obliterated the whole; and his friends saying to him, "What is your Ajax doing?"
					he answered, "My Ajax met with a sponge."

He cultivated a style which was neat and chaste, avoiding frivolous or harsh
					language, as well as obsolete words, which he calls disgusting. His chief object
					was to deliver his thoughts with all possible perspicuity. To attain this end,
					and that he might nowhere perplex, or retard the reader or hearer, he made no
					scruple to add prepositions to his verbs, or to repeat the same conjunction
					several times; which, when omitted, occasion some little obscurity, but give a
					grace to the style. Those who used affected language, or adopted obsolete words,
					he despised, as equally faulty, though in different ways. He sometimes indulged
					himself in jesting, particularly with his friend Maecenas, whom he rallied upon
					all occasions for his fine phrases, and
					bantered by imitating his way of talking. Nor did he spare Tiberius, who was
					fond of obsolete and far-fetched expressions. He charges Mark Antony with
					insanity, writing rather to make men stare, than to be understood; and by way of
					sarcasm upon his depraved and fickle taste in the choice of words, he writes to
					him thus: "And are you yet in doubt, whether Cimber Annius or Veranius Flaccus
					be more proper for your imitation ? Whether you will adopt words which
					Sallustius Crispus has borrowed from the Origines' of Cato? Or do you think that
					the verbose empty bombast of Asiatic orators is fit to be transfused into our
					language ?" And in a letter where he commends the talent of his grand-daughter,
					Agrippina, he says, "But you must be particularly careful, both in writing and
					speaking, to avoid affectation."

In ordinary conversation, he made use of several peculiar expressions, as appears
					from letters in his own hand-writing; in which, now and then, when he means to
					intimate that some persons would never pay their debts, he says, "They will pay
					at the Greek Calends." And when he advised patience in the present posture of
					affairs, he would say, "Let us be content with our Cato." To describe anything
					in haste, he said, "It was sooner done than asparagus is cooked." He constantly
					puts baceolus for stultus , pullejaceus for
						 pullus , vacerrosus for cerritus ,
						 vapide se habere for male , and betizare for languere , which is commonly called lachanizare. Likewise simus for sumus , domos for domus in
					the genitive singular. With respect to the last two peculiarities, lest any person should
					imagine that they were only slips of his pen, and not customary with him, he
					never varies. I have likewise remarked this singularity in his hand-writing: he
					never divides his words, so as to carry the letters which cannot be inserted at
					the end of a line to the next, but puts them below the other, enclosed by a
					bracket.

He did not adhere strictly to orthography as laid down by the grammarians, but
					seems to have been of the opinion of those who think, that we ought to write as
					we speak; for as to his changing and omitting not only letters but whole
					syllables, it is a vulgar mistake. Nor should I have taken notice of it, but
					that it appears strange to me, that any person should have told us, that he sent
					a successor to a consular lieutenant of a province, as an ignorant, illiterate
					fellow, upon his observing that he had written ixi for ipsi. When he had
					occasion to write in cypher, he put b for a ,
						 c for b , and so forth; and instead of
						 z , aa .

He was no less fond of the Greek literature, in which he made considerable
					proficiency; having had Apollodorus of Pergamus , for his master in rhetoric; whom. though much
					advanced in years, he took with him from The City, when he was himself very
					young, to Apollonia . 
				 Afterwards, being instructed in philology by Sephaerus, he received into his
					family Areus the philosopher, and his sons Dionysius and Nicanor; but he never
					could speak the Greek tongue readily, nor ever ventured to compose in it. For if
					there was occasion for him to deliver his sentiments in that language, he always
					expressed what he had to say in Latin, and gave it another to translate. He was
					evidently not unacquainted with the poetry of the Greeks, and had a great taste
					for the ancient comedy, which he often brought upon-the stage, in his public
					spectacles. In reading the Greek and Latin authors, he paid particular attention
					to precepts and examples which might be useful in public or private life. Those
					he used to extract verbatim, and gave to his domestics, or send to the
					commanders of the armies, the governors of, the provinces, or the magistrates of
					the city, when any of them seemed to stand in need of admonition. He likewise
					read whole books to the senate, and frequently made them known to the people by
					his edicts; such as the orations of Quintus Metellus "for the Encouragement of
					Marriage," and those of Rutilius "On the Style of Building;" to show the people that he was not the first who had promoted
					those objects, but that the ancients likewise had thought them worthy their
					attention. He patronized the men of genius of that age in every possible way. He
					would hear them read their works with a great deal of patience and good nature;
					and not only poetry and history, but orations and dialogues. He was displeased,
					however, that anything should be written upon himself, except in a grave manner,
					and by men of the most eminent abilities: and he enjoined the praetors not to
					suffer his name to be made too common in the contests amongst orators and poets
					in the theatres.

We have the following account of him respecting his belief in omens and such
					like. He had so great a dread of thunder and lightning that he always carried
					about him a seal's skin, by way of preservation. And upon any apprehension of a
					violent storm, he would retire to some place of concealment in a vault under
					ground; having formerly been terrified by a flash of lightning, while travelling
					in the night, as we have already mentioned.

He neither slighted his own dreams nor those of other people relating to himself.
					At the battle of Philippi , although he
					had resolved not to stir out of his tent, on account of his being indisposed,
					yet, being warned by a dream of one of his friends, he changed his mind; and
					well it was that he did so, for in the enemy's attack, his couch was pierced and
					cut to pieces, on the supposition of his being in it. He had many frivolous and
					frightful dreams during the spring; but in the other parts of the year, they
					were less frequent and more significative. Upon his frequently visiting a temple
					near the Capitol, which he had dedicated to Jupiter Tonans, he dreamt that
					Jupiter Capitolinus complained that his worshippers were taken from him, and
					that upon this he replied, he had only given him The Thunderer for his porter.
						 He therefore immediately
					suspended little bells round the summit of the temple; because such commonly
					hung at the gates of great houses. In consequence of a dream, too, he always, on
					a certain day of the year, begged alms of the people. reaching out his hand to
					receive the dole which they offered him.

Some signs and omens he regarded as infallible. If in the morning his shoe was
					put on wrong, the left instead of the right, that boded some disaster. If when
					he commenced a long journey, by sea or land, there happened to fall a mizzling
					rain, he held it to be a good sign of a speedy and happy return. He was much
					affected likewise with any thing out of the common course of nature. A
						palm-tree which chanced to grow up between some stones in
					the court of his house, he transplanted into a court where the images of the
					Household Gods were placed, and took all possible care to make it thrive. In the
					island of Capri , some decayed branches
					of an old ilex, which hung drooping to the ground, recovered themselves upon his
					arrival; at which he was so delighted, that he made an exchange with the
					Republic of Naples ,
					of the island of OEnaria [ Ischia ], for
					that of Capri . He likewise observed
					certain days; as never to go from home the day after the Nundinae, nor to begin any serious
					business upon the nones; avoiding nothing else in it, as he writes to
					Tiberius, than its unlucky name.

With regard to the religious ceremonies of foreign nations, he was a strict
					observer of those which had been established by ancient custom; but others he
					held in no esteem. For, having been initiated at Athens , and coming afterwards to hear a cause at Rome , relative to the privileges of the
					priests of the Attic Ceres, when some of the mysteries of the sacred rites were
					to be introduced in the pleadings, he dismissed those who sat upon the bench as
					judges with him, as well as the by-standers, and heard the argument upon those
					points himself. But, on the other hand, he not only declined, in his progress
					through Egypt , to go out of his way to
					pay a visit to Apis, but he likewise commended his grandson Caius for not paying
					his devotions at Jerusalem in his
					passage through Judea .

Since we are upon this subject, it may not be improper to give an account of the
					omens, before and at his birth, as well as afterwards, which gave hopes of his
					future greatness, and the good fortune that constantly attended him. A part of
					the wall of Velletri having in former
					times been struck with thunder, the response of the soothsayers was, that a
					native of that town would some time or other arrive at supreme power; relying on
					which prediction, the Velletrians both then, and several times afterwards, made
					war upon the Roman people, to their own ruin. At last it appeared by the event,
					that the omen had portended the elevation of Augustus. 
				 Julius Marathus informs us, that a few months before his birth, there happened at
						 Rome a prodigy, by which was
					signified that Nature was in travail with a king for the Roman people; and that
					the senate, in alarm, came to the resolution that no child born that year should
					be brought up; but that those amongst them, whose wives were pregnant, to secure
					to themselves a chance of that dignity, took care that the decree of the senate
					should not be registered in the treasury. 
				 I find in the theological books of Asclepiades the Mendesian, that Atia, upon attending at midnight a religious
					solemnity in honour of Apollo, when the rest of the matrons retired home, fell
					asleep on her couch in the temple, and that a serpent immediately crept to her,
					and soon after withdrew. She awaking upon it, purified herself, as usual after
					the embraces of her husband; and instantly there appeared upon her body a mark
					in the form of a serpent, which she never after could efface, and which obliged
					her, during the subsequent part of her life, to decline the use of the public
					baths. Augustus, it was added, was born in the tenth month after, and for that
					reason was thought to be the son of Apollo. The same Atia, before her delivery,
					dreamed that her bowels stretched to the stars, and expanded through the whole
					circuit of heaven and earth. His father Octavius, likewise, dreamt that a
					sun-beam issued from his wife's womb. 
				 Upon the day he was born, the senate being engaged in a debate on Catiline's
					conspiracy, and Octavius, in consequence of his wife's being in childbirth,
					coming late into the house, it is a well-known fact, that Publius Nigidius, upon
					hearing the occasion of his coming so late, and the hour of his wife's delivery,
					declared that the world had got a master. Afterwards, when Octavius, upon
					marching with his army through the deserts of Thrace , consulted the oracle in the grove of father Bacchus,
					with barbarous rites, concerning his son, he received from the priests an answer
					to the same purpose; because, when they loured wine upon the altar, there burst
					out so prodigious a flame, that it ascended above the roof of the temple, and
					reached up to the heavens; a circumstance which had never happened to any one
					but Alexander the Great, upon his sacrificing at the same altars. And the next
					night he dreamt that he saw his son under more than human appearance, with
					thunder and a sceptre, and the other insignia of Jupiter , Optimus, Maximus, having on his head a radiant crown,
					mounted upon a chariot decked with laurel, and drawn by six pair of milk-white
					horses. 
				 Whilst he was yet an infant, as Caius Drusus relates, being laid in his cradle by
					his nurse, and in a low place, the next day he was not to be found, and after he
					had been sought for a long time, he was at last'discovered upon a lofty tower,
					lying with his face towards the rising sun. When
					he first began to speak, he ordered the frogs that happened to make a
					troublesome noise, upon an estate belonging to the family near the town, to be
					silent; and there goes a report that frogs never croaked there since that time.
					As he was dining in a grove at the fourth mile-stone on the Campanian road, an
					eagle suddenly snatched a piece of bread out of his hand, and, soaring to a
					prodigious height, after hovering, came down most unexpectedly, and returned it
					to him. 
				 Quintus Catulus had a dream, for two nights successively after his dedication of
					the Capitol. The first night he dreamt that Jupiter , out of several boys of the order of the nobility, who
					were playing about his altar, selected one, into whose bosom he put the public
					seal of the commonwealth, which he held in his hand; but in his vision the next
					night, he saw in the bosom of Jupiter 
					Capitolinus, the same boy; whom he ordered to be removed, but it was forbidden
					by the God, who declared that it must be brought up to become the guardian of
					the state. The next day, meeting Augustus, with whom till that hour he had not.
					the least acquaintance, and looking at him with admiration, he said he was
					extremely like the boy he had seen in his dream. Some give a different account
					of Catulus's first dream, namely, that Jupiter , upon several noble lads requesting of him that they
					might have a guardian, had pointed to one amongst them, to whom they were to
					prefer their requests; and putting his fingers to the boy's mouth to kiss, he
					afterwards applied them to his own. 
				 Marcus Cicero, as he was attending Caius Caesar to the Capitol, happened to be
					telling some of his friends a dream which he had the preceding night, in which
					he saw a comely youth, let down from heaven by a golden chain, who stood at the
					door of the Capitol, and had a whip put into his hands by Jupiter. And
					immediately upon sight of Augustus, who had been sent for by his uncle Caesar to
					the sacrifice, and was as yet perfectly unknown to most of the company, he
					affirmed that it was the very boy he had seen in his dream. When he assumed the
					manly toga, his senatorian tunic becoming loose in the seam on each side, fell
					at his feet. Some would have this to forbode, that the order, of which that was
					the badge of distinction, would some time or other be subject to him. 
				 Julius Caesar, in cutting down a wood to make room for his camp near Munda , happened to light
					upon a palm-tree, and ordered it to be preserved as an omen of victory. From the
					root of this tree there put out immediately a sucker, which, in a few days, grew
					to such a height as not only to equal, but overshadow it, and afford room for
					many nests of wild pigeons which built in it, though that species of bird
					particularly avoids a hard and rough leaf. It is likewise reported, that Caesar
					was chiefly influenced by this prodigy, to prefer his sister's grandson before
					all others for his successor. 
				 In his retirement at Apollonia , he went
					with his friend Agrippa to visit Theogenes, the astrologer, in his gallery on
					the roof. Agrippa, who first consulted the fates, having great and almost
					incredible fortunes predicted of him, Augustus did not choose to make known his
					nativity, and persisted for some time in the refusal, from a mixture of shame
					and fear, lest his fortunes should be predicted as inferior to those of Agrippa.
					Being persuaded, however, after much importunity, to declare it, Theogenes
					started up from his seat, and paid him adoration. Not long afterwards, Augustus
					was so confident of the greatness of his destiny, that he published his
					horoscope, and struck a silver coin, bearing upon it the sign of Capricorn,
					under the influence of which he was born.

After the death of Caesar, upon his return from Apollonia , as he was entering the city, on a sudden, in a clear
					and bright sky, a circle resembling the rainbow surrounded the body of the sun;
					and, immediately afterwards, the tomb of Julia , Caesar's daughter, was struck by lightning. In his first
					consulship, whilst he was observing the auguries, twelve vultures presented
					themselves, as they had done to Romulus. And when he offered sacrifice, the
					livers of all the victims were folded inward in the lower part; a circumstance
					which was regarded by those present, who had skill in things of that nature, as
					an indubitable prognostic of great and wonderful fortune.

He certainly had a presentiment of the issue of all his wars. When the troops of
					the Triumviri were collected about Bolognia, an eagle, which sat upon his tent,
					and was attacked by two crows, beat them both, and struck them to the ground, in
					the view of the whole army; who thence inferred that discord would arise between
					the three colleagues, which would be attended with the like event: and it
					accordingly happened. At Philippi , he
					was assured of success by a Thessalian, upon the authority, as he pretended, of
					the Divine Casar himself; who had appeared to him while he was travelling in a
					bye-road. At Perugia , the sacrifice not
					presenting any favourable intimations, but the contrary, he ordered fresh
					victims; the enemy, however, carrying off the sacred things in a sudden sally,
					it was agreed amongst the augurs, that all the dangers and misfortunes which had
					threatened the sacrificer, would fall upon the heads of those who had got
					possession of the entrails. And, accordingly, so it happened. The day before the
					sea-fight near Sicily , as he was
					walking upon the shore, a fish leaped out of the sea, and laid itself at his
					feet. At Actium , while he was going
					down to his fleet to engage the enemy, he was met by an ass with a fellow
					driving it. The name of the man was Eutychus, and that of the animal, Nichon.
						 After
					the victory, he erected a brazen statue to each, in a temple built upon the spot
					where he had encamped.

His death, of which I shall now speak, and his subsequent deification, were
					intimated by divers manifest prodigies. As he was finishing the census amidst a
					great crowd of people in the Campus
						Martius , an eagle hovered round him several times, and then
					directed its course to a neighbouring temple, where it settled upon the name of
					Agrippa, and at the first letter. Upon observing this, he ordered his colleague
					Tiberius to put up the vows, which it is usual to make on such occasions, for
					the succeeding Lustrum. For he declared he would not meddle with what it was
					probable he should never accomplish, though the tables were ready drawn for it.
					About the same time, the first letter of his name, in an inscription upon one of
					his statues, was struck out by lightning; which was interpreted as a presage
					that he would live only a hundred days longer, the letter C denoting that
					number; and that he would be placed amongst the Gods, as Aesar, which is the
					remaining part of the word Caesar, signifies, in the Tuscan language, a God.
						 
					Being, therefore, about dispatching Tiberius to Illyricum , and designing to go with him as far as Beneventum , but being detained by
					several persons who applied to him respecting causes they had depending, he
					cried out, (and it was afterwards regarded as an omen of his death), "Not all
					the business in the world, shall detain me at Rome one moment longer;" and setting out upon his journey, he
					went as far as Astura ; whence, contrary to his custom,
					he put to sea in the nighttime, as there was a favourable wind.

His malady proceeded from diarrhoea; notwithstanding which, he went round the
					coast of Campania , and the adjacent
					islands, and spent four days in that of Capri ; where he gave himself up entirely to repose and
					relaxation. Happening to sail by the bay of Puteoli , the passengers and mariners aboard a ship of
						 Alexandria , just then arrived, clad all in white, with chaplets upon their heads,
					and offering incense, loaded him with praises and joyful acclamations, crying
					out, " By you we live, by you we sail securely, by you enjoy our liberty and our
					fortunes." At which being greatly pleased, he distributed to each of those who
					attended him, forty gold pieces, requiring from them an assurance on oath, not
					to employ the sum given them in any other way, than the purchase of Alexandrian
					merchandize. And during several days afterwards, he distributed Togae and Pallia,
					among other gifts, on condition that the Romans should use the Greek, and the
					Greeks the Roman dress and language. He likewise constantly attended to see the
					boys perform their exercises, according to an ancient custom still continued at
						 Capri . He gave them likewise an
					entertainment in his presence, and not only permitted, but required from them
					the utmost freedom in jesting, and scrambling for fruit, victuals, and other
					things which he threw amongst them. In a word, he indulged himself in all the
					ways of amusement he could contrive. He called an island near Capri , Ἀπραγόπολισ , "The City of the Do-littles," from the indolent
					life which several of his party led there. A favourite of his, one
						Masgabas, he used to call κτιστήσ , as if he had been the planter of the island. And
					observing from his room a great company of people with torches, assembled at the
					tomb of this Masgabas, who died the year before, he uttered very distinctly this
					verse, which he made extempore: κτιστοῦ δὲ τύμβον 
					 Blazing with lights I see the founder's
						tomb. Then turning to Thrasyllus, a companion of Tiberius, who
					reclined on the other side of the table, he asked him, who knew nothing about
					the matter, what poet he thought was the author of that verse; and on his
					hesitating to reply, he added another: ὁρᾷς 
					 Honor'd with torches, Masgabas you see; and
					put the same question to him concerning that likewise. The latter replying,
					that, whoever might be the author, they were excellent verses, he set up a great laugh, and fell into an extraordinary
					vein of jesting upon it. Soon afterwards, passing over to Naples , although at that time greatly
					disordered in his bowels by the frequent returns of his disease, he sat out the
					exhibition of the gymnastic games which were performed in his honour every five
					years, and proceeded with Tiberius to the place intended. But on his return, his
					disorder increasing, he stopped at Nola , sent for Tiberius back again, and had a long discourse with
					him in private; after which, he gave no further attention to business of any
					importance.

Upon the day of his death, he now and then enquired, if there was any disturbance
					in the town on his account; and calling for a mirror, he ordered his hair to be
					combed, and his shrunk cheeks to be adjusted. Then asking his friends who were
					admitted into the room, "Do you think that I have acted my part on the stage of
					life well?" he immediately subjoined, εἰ δὲ πᾶν 
						 δότε κρότον, καὶ πάντεσ ὑμεῖσ μετὰ χαρᾶσ κτυπήσατε. 
					 If all be right, with joy your voices raise, 
						 In loud applauses to the actor's praise. After which, having
					dismissed them all, whilst he was inquiring of some persons who were just
					arrived from Rome , concerning Drusus's
					daughter, who was in a bad state of health, he expired suddenly, amidst the
					kisses of Livia , and with these words:
						" Livia ! live mindful of our union;
					and now, farewell!" dying a very easy death, and such as he himself had always
					wished for. For as often as he heard that any person had died quickly and
					without pain, he wished for himself and his friends the like εὐθανασίαν (an easy death), for that was the
					word he made use of. He betrayed but one symptom, before he breathed his last,
					of being delirious, which was this: he was all on a sudden much frightened, and
					complained that he was carried away by forty men. But this was rather a presage,
					than any delirium: for precisely that number of soldiers belonging to the
					praetorian cohort, carried out his corpse.

He expired in the same room in which his father Octavius had died, when the two
					Sextus's, Pompey and Apuleius, were consuls, upon the fourteenth of the calends
					of September [the 19th August], at the ninth hour of the day, being seventy-six
					years of age, wanting only thirty-five days. His remains were carried by
					the magistrates of the municipal towns and colonies, from Nola to Bovillae, and in the night-time, because of the season of the year.
					During the intervals, the body lay in some basilica, or great temple, of each
					town. At Bovillae it was met by the Equestrian Order, who carried it to the
					city, and deposited it in the vestibule of his own house. The senate proceeded
					with so much zeal in the arrangement of his funeral, and paying honour to his
					memory, that amongst several other proposals, some were for having the funeral
					procession made through the triumphal gate, preceded by the image of Victory
					which is in the senate-house, and the children of highest rank of both sexes
					singing the funeral dirge. Others proposed, that on the day of the funeral, they
					should lay aside their gold rings, and wear rings of iron; and others, that his
					bones should be collected by the priests of the principal colleges. One likewise
					proposed to transfer the name of August to September, because he was born in the
					latter, but died in the former. Another moved, that the whole period of time,
					from his birth to his death, should be called the Augustan age, and be inserted
					in the calendar under that title. But at last it was judged proper to be
					moderate in the honours paid to his memory. Two funeral orations were pronounced
					in his praise, one before the temple of Julius , by Tiberius ;
					and the other before the rostra, under the old shops, by Drusus, Tiberius's son.
					The body was then carried upon the shoulders of senators into the Campus Martius , and there burnt. A man of
					pretorian rank affirmed upon oath, that he saw his spirit ascend from the
					funeral pile to heaven. The most distinguished persons of the equestrian order,
					bare-footed, and with their tunics loose, gathered up his relics, and
					deposited them in the mausoleum, which had been built in the sixth consulship
					between the Flaminian Way and the bank
					of the Tiber ; at which time
					likewise he gave the groves and walks about it for the use of the people.

He made a will a year and four months before his death, upon the third of the
					nones of April [the 11th of April], in the consulship of Lucius Plancus, and
					Caius Silius. It consisted of two skins of parchment, written partly in his own
					hand, and partly by his freedmen Polybius and Hilarian; and had been committed
					to the custody of the Vestal Virgins, by whom it was now produced, with three
					codicils under seal, as well as the will: all these were opened and read in the
					senate. He appointed as his direct heirs, Tiberius for two-thirds of his estate, and Livia for the other third, both of whom he
					desired to assume his name. The heirs in remainder were Drusus, Tiberius 's son, for one third, and Germanicus
					with his three sons for the residue. In the third place, failing them, were his
					relations, and several of his friends. He. left in legacies to the Roman people
					forty millions of sesterces; to the tribes three millions five hundred thousand; to the praetorian
					troops a thousand each man; to the city cohorts five hundred; and to the legions
					and soldiers three hundred each; which several sums he ordered to be paid
					immediately after his death, having taken due care that the money should be
					ready in his exchequer. For the rest he ordered different times of payment. In
					some of his bequests he went as far as twenty thousand sesterces, for the
					payment of which he allowed a twelvemonth; alleging for this procrastination the
					scantiness of his estate; and declaring that not more than a hundred and fifty
					millions of sesterces would come to his heirs: notwithstanding that during the
					twenty preceding years, he had received, in legacies from his friends, the sum
					of fourteen hundred millions; almost the whole of which, with his two paternal
						estates, and others which had been left him, he
					had spent in the service of the state. He left orders that the two Julias, his
					daughter and granddaughter, if any thing happened to them, should not be buried
					in his tomb. With regard to the three codicils before
					mentioned, in one of them he gave orders about his funeral; another contained a
					summary of his acts, which he intended should be inscribed on brazen plates, and
					placed in front of his mausoleum; in the third he had drawn up a concise account
					of the state of the empire; the number of troops enrolled, what money there was
					in the treasury, the revenue, and arrears of taxes; to which were added the
					names of the freedmen and slaves from whom the several accounts might be taken.

Remarks on Augustus 
				 OCTAVIUS Caesar, afterwards Augustus, had now attained to the same position in
					the state which had formerly been occupied by Julius Caesar; and though he entered upon it by violence, he
					continued to enjoy it through life with almost uninterrupted tranquillity. By
					the long duration of the late civil war, with its concomitant train of public
					calami- ties, the minds of men were become less averse to the prospect of an
					absolute government; at the same time that the new emperor, naturally prudent
					and politic, had learned from the fate of Julius the art of preserving supreme
					power, without arrogating to himself any invidious mark of distinction. He
					affected to decline public honours, disclaimed every idea of personal
					superiority, and in all his behaviour displayed a degree of moderation which
					prognosticated the most happy effects, in restoring peace and prosperity to the
					harassed empire. The tenor of his future conduct was suitable to this auspicious
					commencement. While he endeavoured to conciliate the affections of the people by
					lending money to those who stood in need of it, at low interest, or without any
					at all, and by the exhibition of public shows, of which the Romans were
					remarkably fond; he was attentive to the preservation of a becoming dignity in
					the government, and to the correction of morals. The senate, which, in the time
					of Sylla, had increased to upwards of four hundred, and, during the civil war,
					to a thousand, members, by the admission of improper persons, he reduced to six
					hundred; and being invested with the ancient office of censor, which had for
					some time been disused, he exercised an arbitrary but legal authority over the
					conduct of every rank in the state; by which he could degrade senators and
					knights, and inflict upon all citizens an ignominious sentence for any immoral
					or indecent behaviour. But nothing contributed more to render the new form of
					government acceptable to the people, than the frequent distribution of corn, and
					sometimes largesses, amongst the commonalty: for an occasional scarcity of
					provisions had always been the chief cause of discontents and tumults in the
					capital. To the interests of the army he likewise paid particular attention. It
					was by the assistance of the legions that he had risen to power; and they were
					the men who, in the last resort, if such an emergency should ever occur, could
					alone enable him to preserve it. 
				 History relates, that after the overthrow of Antony, Augustus held a consultation
					with Agrippa and Maecenas about restoring the republican form of government;
					when Agrippa gave his opinion in favour of that measure, and Maecenas opposed
					it. The object of this consultation, in respect to its future consequences on
					society, is perhaps the most important ever agitated in any cabinet, and
					required, for the mature discussion of it, the whole collective wisdom of the
					ablest men in the empire. But this was a resource which could scarcely be
					adopted, either with security to the public quiet, or with unbiassed judgment in
					the determination of the question. The bare agitation of such a point would have
					excited immediate and strong anxiety for its final result; while the friends of
					a republican government, who were still far more numerous than those of the
					other party, would have strained every nerve to procure a determination in their
					own favour; and the pretorian guards, the surest protection of Augustus, finding
					their situation rendered precarious by such an unexpected occurrence, would have
					readily listened to the secret propositions and intrigues of the republi cans
					for securing their acquiescence to the decision on the popular side. If, when
					the subject came into debate, Augustus should be sincere in the declaration to
					abide by the resolution of the council, it is beyond all doubt, that the
					restoration of a republican governmeni would have been voted by a great majority
					of the assembly. If, on the contrary, he should not be sincere, which is the
					more probable supposition, and should incur the suspicion of practising secretly
					with members for a decision according to his wish, he would have rendered
					himself obnoxious to the public odium, and given rise to discontents which might
					have endangered his future security. 
				 But to submit this important question to the free and unbiassed docision of a
					numerous assembly, it is probable, neither suited the inclination of Augustus,
					nor perhaps, in his opinion, consisted with his personal safety. With a view to
					the attainment of unconstitutional power, he had formerly deserted the cause of
					the republic when its affairs were in a prosperous situation; and now, when his
					end was accomplished, there could be little ground to expect, that he should
					voluntarily relinquish the prize for which he had spilt the best blood of
						 Rome , and contended for so many
					years. Ever since the final defeat of Antony in the battle of Actium , he had governed the Roman state with
					uncontrolled authority; and though there is in the nature of unlimited power an
					intoxicating quality, injurious both to public and private virtue, yet all
					history contradicts the supposition of its being endued with any which is
					unpalatable to the general taste of mankind. 
				 There were two chief motives by which Augustus would naturally be influenced in a
					deliberation on this important subject; namely, the love of power, and the
					personal danger which he might incur from relinquishing it. Either of these
					motives might have been a sufficient in ducement for retaining his authority;
					but when they both concurred, as they seem to have done upon this occasion,
					their united force was irresistible. The argument, so far as relates to the love
					of power, rests upon a ground, concerning the solidity of which, little doubt
					can be entertained: but it may be proper to inquire, in a few words, into the
					foundation of that personal danger which he dreaded to incur, on returning to
					the station of a private citizen. 
				 Augustus, as has been already observed, had formerly sided with the party which
					had attempted to restore public liberty after the death of Julius Caesar: but he
					afterwards abandoned the popular cause, and joined in the ambitious plans of
					Antony and Lepidus to usurp amongst themselves the entire dominion of the state.
					By this change of conduct, he turned his arms against the supporters of a form
					of government which he had virtually recognized as the legal constitution of
						 Rome ; and it involved a direct
					implication of treason against the sacred representatives of that government,
					the consuls, formally and duly elected. Upon such a charge he might be amenable
					to the capital laws of his country. This, however, was a danger which might be
					fully obviated, by procuring from the senate and people an act of oblivion,
					previously to his abdication of the supreme power; and this was a preliminary
					which doubtless they would have admitted and ratified with unanimous
					approbation. It therefore appears that he could be exposed to no inevitable
					danger on this account: but there was another quarter where his person was
					vulnerable, and where even the laws might not be sufficient to protect him
					against the efforts of private resentment. The bloody proscription of the
					Triumvirate no act of amnesty could ever erase from the minds of those who had
					been deprived by it of their nearest and dearest relations; and amidst the
					numerous connections of the illustrious men sacrificed on that horrible
					occasion, there might arise some desperate avenger, whose indelible resentment
					nothing less would satisfy than the blood of the surviving delinquent. Though
					Augustus, therefore, might not, like his great predecessor, be stabbed in the
					senate-house, he nmight perish by the sword or the poniard in a less conspicuous
					situation. After all, there seems to have been little danger from this quarter
					likewise; for Sylla, who in the preceding age had been guilty of equal
					enormities, was permitted, on relinquishing the place of perpetual dictator, to
					end his days in quiet retirement; and the undisturbed security which Augustus
					ever afterwards enjoyed, affords sufficient proof, that all apprehension of
					danger to his person was merely chimerical. 
				 We have hitherto considered this grand consultation as it might be influenced by
					the passions or prejudices of the emperor: we shall now take a short view of the
					subject in the light in which it is connected with considerations of a political
					nature, and with public utility. The arguments handed down by history respecting
					this consultation are few, and imperfectly delivered; but they may be extended
					upon the general principles maintained on each side of the question. 
				 For the restoration of the republican government, it might be contended, that
					from the expulsion of the kings to the dictatorship of Julius Caesar, through a
					period of upwards of four hundred and sixty years, the Roman state, with the
					exception only of a short interval, had flourished and increased with a degree
					of prosperity unexampled in the annals of human kind: that the republican form
					of government was not only best adapted to the improvement of national grandeur,
					but to the security of general freedom, the great object of all political
					association: that public virtue, by which alone nations could subsist in vigour,
					was cherished and protected by no mode of administration so much as by that
					which connected, in the strongest bonds of union, the private interest of
					individuals with those of the community: that the habits and prejudices of the
					Roman people were unalterably attached to the form of government established by
					so long a prescription, and they would never submit, for any length of time, to
					the rule of one person, without making every possible effort to recover their
					liberty: that though despotism, under a mild and wise prince, might in some
					respects be regarded as preferable to a constitution which was occasionally
					exposed to the inconvenience of faction and popular tumults, yet it was a
					dangerous experiment to abandon the government of the nation to the contingency
					of such a variety of characters as usually occurs in the succession of princes;
					and, upon the whole, that the interests of the people were more safely entrusted
					in the hands of annual magistrates elected by themselves, than in those of any
					individual whose power was permanent, and subject to no legal control. 
				 In favour of despotic government it might be urged, that though Rome had subsisted long and gloriously under a
					republican form of government, yet she had often experienced such violent shocks
					from popular tumults or the factions of the great, as had threatened her with
					imminent destruction: that a republican government was only accommodated to a
					people amongst whom the division of property gave to no class of citizens such a
					degree of preeminence as might prove dangerous to public freedom: that there was
					required in that form of political constitution, a simplicity of life and
					strictness of manners which are never observed to accompany a high degree of
					public prosperity: that in respect of all these considerations, such a form of
					government was utterly incompatible with the present circumstances of the
					Romans: that by the conquest of so many foreign nations, by the lucrative
					governments of provinces, the spoils of the enemy in war, and the rapine too
					often practised in time of peace, so great had been the aggrandizement of
					particular families in the preceding age, that though the form of the ancient
					constitution should still remain inviolate, the people would no longer live
					under a free republic, but an aristocratical usurpation, which was always
					productive of tyranny: that nothing could preserve the commonwealth from
					becoming a prey to some daring confederacy, but the firm and vigorous
					administration of one person, invested with the whole executive power of the
					state, unlimited and uncontrolled: in fine, that as Rome had been nursed to maturity by the government of six
					princes successively, so it was only by a similar form of political constitution
					that she could now be saved from aristocratical tyranny on one hand, or, on the
					other, from absolute anarchy. 
				 On whichever side of the question the force of argument may be thought to
					preponderate, there is reason to believe that Augustus was guided in his
					resolution more by inclination and prejudice than by reason. It is related,
					however, that hesitating between the opposite opinions of his two counsellors,
					he had recourse to that of Virgil, who joined with Maecenas in advising him to
					retain the imperial power, as being the form of government most suitable to the
					circumstances of the times.