Kenney_and_Clausen B.M.W.(eds.) - Get a Free Blog

PROSE LITERATURE
at all.' It is of special interest that, if genuine, this is the earliest extant prosewriting
in any language by a woman:
Verbis conceptis deierare ausim, praeterquam qui Tiberium Gracchum necarunt,
neminem inimicum tantum molestiae tantumque laboris quantum te ob has res mihi
tradidisse, quem oportebat omnium eorum quos antehac habui liberos [eorum] partis
tolerare, atque curare ut quam minimum sollicitudinis in senecta haberem, utique
quaecumque ageres, ea uelles maxume mihi placere, atque uti nefas haberes rerum
maiorum aduersum raeam sententiam quicquam facere, praesertim mihi quoi parua
pars uitae superest. ne id quidem tam breue spatium potest opitulari quin et mihi
aduersere et rem publicam profliges? denique quae pausa erit? ecquando desinet
familia nostra insanire? ecquando modus ei rei haberi poterit? ecquando desinemus et
habentes et praebentes molestiis insistere? ecquando perpudescet miscenda atque
perturbanda re publica? sed si omnino non id fieri potest, ubi ego mortua ero, petito
tribunatum: per me facito quod lubebit, cum ego non sentiam. ubi ego mortua ero,
parentabis mihi et inuocabis deum parentem. in eo tempore nonne pudebit te eorum
deum preces expetere, quos uiuos atque praesentes relictos atque desertos habueris?
ne ille sirit Iuppiter te ea perseuerare nee tibi tantam dementiam uenire in animum!
et si perseueras, uereor ne in omnem uitam tantum laboris culpa tua recipias, uti nullo
tempore tute tibi placere possis.
'uerba ex epistula Corneliae Gracchorum matris ex libro Corneli Nepotis de
Latin is Historicis excerpta.' (Nepos, frag. 2 Winstedt)
/ would take a solemn oath that apart from those who killed Tiberius Gracchus no
one has given me so much trouble and so much pain as you in this matter, who ought
to undertake the part of all the children I have ever had, and to make sure that I
should have as little worry as possible in my old age, and that, whatever your schemes
might be,you should wish them to be agreeable to me,and that you should count it a sin
to take any major step against my wishes, especially considering I have only a little
part of life left. Is it quite impossible to cooperate for even, that short space of time
without your opposing me and ruining our country? Where will it all end? Will
our family ever cease from madness? Can a bound ever be put to it? Shall we ever
cease to dwell on affronts, both causing and suffering them? Shall we ever begin to feel
true shame for confounding and destroying the constitution? But if that is quite
impossible, when I am dead, then seek the Tribunate. Do what you like as jar as I am
concerned, when I am not there to know it. When I am dead, you wilt sacrifice to me
and invoke me as your hallowed parent. At that time will you not be ashamed to seek
the intercession of those hallowed ones whom alive and present you treated with
abandonment and desertion? May Jove above not let you persist in this nor let such
lunacy enter your mind! But if you do persist, I fear that through your own fault you
will encounter so much trouble throughout your whole life that at no time will you be
able to rest content.
Cornelia wrote from Misenum, whither she had retired from Rome after
Tiberius' assassination (133 B.C.). It is precisely because she is in deadly earnest
that she addresses Gaius as if he were a public meeting, and it is remarkable that
1
Cicero knew a collection of her letters, Brut, an; cf. Leo (1913) 3°4f-
146
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