United States or Puerto Rico ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The havoc caused by pestilence at Rome was not less than that caused by the sword among the allies: the only surviving consul died, as well as other distinguished men, Marcus Valerius, Titus Verginius Rutilus, augurs: Servius Sulpicius, chief priest of the curies: while among undistinguished persons the virulence of the disease spread extensively: and the senate, destitute of human aid, directed the people's attention to the gods and to vows: they were ordered to go and offer supplications with their wives and children, and to entreat the favour of Heaven.
We have also the comments of Pliny on a panegyrical oration, which Tacitus pronounced, when consul, upon his predecessor in the consular office, Verginius Rufus, perhaps the most remarkable man of his age, distinguished alike as a hero, a statesman, and a scholar, and yet so modest or so wise that he repeatedly refused the offer of the imperial purple.
Under his guidance the tribunes were frequently driven from the forum, the commons routed and dispersed; such as came in his way, came off ill-treated and stripped: so that it became quite clear that, if he were allowed to proceed in this way, the law was as good as defeated Then, when the other tribunes were now almost thrown into despair, Aulus Verginius, one of the colleges, appointed a day for Cæso to take his trial on a capital charge.
Persius Flaccus pursued his studies at Volterra till he was twelve years old, and then continued them at Rome, under Remmius Palaemon, the grammarian, and Verginius Flaccus, the rhetorician. Arriving at the age of twenty-one, he formed a friendship with Annaeus Cornutus , which lasted through life; and from him he learned the rudiments of philosophy.
The consuls, under the immediate compulsion of the senate, led forth the youth from the city to war, and thereby rendered the rest of the commons more quiet. And the enemy indeed, having merely filled the Romans with fear that proved groundless, departed in great haste. Numicius marched to Antium against the Volscians, Verginius against the Aequans.
The battle with the Tuscans at the Janiculum was also the charge brought against him: but being a man of impetuous spirit, as he had formerly done in time of public peril, so now in the danger which threatened himself, he dispelled it by boldly meeting it, by confuting not only the tribunes but the commons also, in a haughty speech, and upbraiding them with the condemnation and death of Titus Menenius, by the good offices of whose father the commons had formerly been re-established, and now had those magistrates and enjoyed those laws, by virtue of which they then acted so insolently: his colleague Verginius also, who was brought forward as a witness, aided him by assigning to him a share of his own glory: however so had they changed their mind the condemnation of Menenius was of greater service to him.
That he would not afford him the chance of doing so on that day; but in order that he might now know that the concession had been made not to his petulance, but to the absent Verginius, to the name of father and to liberty, that he would not decide the case on that day, nor introduce a decree: that he would request Marcus Claudius to forego somewhat of his right, and to suffer the girl to be bailed till the next day.
VERGINIUS RUFUS wrote erotic poems, and an epigram of his is quoted by Pliny. VESTRICIUS SPURINNA was a lyricist, and had been consul under Domitian; a fine account of him is given by Pliny. The only Roman poetess of whom we possess any fragment, belongs to this epoch, the highborn lady SULPICIA. She is celebrated by Martial for her chaste love- elegies, and for fidelity to her husband Calenus.
"Does that Aulus Verginius," said he, "deserve less punishment than Appius Herdonius, because he was not in the Capitol? Considerably more, by Hercules, if any one will look at the matter fairly.
This wicked scheme was too late, as it deserved: for Verginius, having already obtained his leave had set out at the first watch, while the letter regarding his detention was delivered on the following morning without effect.
Word Of The Day