Moral essays. With an English translation by J.W. Basore

ON MERCY, I. IX. lo-x. lway of your ruling except me. You cannot guardyour ovm house ;just lately the influence of a merefreedman defeated you in a private suit ;plainly,nothing can be easier for you than to take actionagainst Caesar ! Tell me, if I alone block yourhopes, >nll Paulus and Fabius Maximus and theCossi and the Servilii and the great hne of nobles,who are not the representatives of empty names,but add distinction to their pedigree— will theseput up ^\ith you ?Not to fill up a great part of my book in repeatingall his words—for he is known to have talked morethan two hours, lengthening out this ordeal withwhich alone he intended to be content—at last hesaid ": Cinna, a second time I grant you yom- Ufe ;the first time you were an open enemy, now, a plotterand a parricide. From this day let there be abeginning of friendship between us ; let us put tothe test which one of us acts in better faith—I ingranting you your life, or you in ONving it to me."Later he, unsolicited, bestowed upon him the consulship,chiding him because he did not boldly standfor the office. He found Cinna most friendly andloyal, and became his sole heir. No one plottedagainst him further.Your great-great-grandfather spared the vanquished; for if he had not spared them, whomwould he have had to rule ? Sallustius and aCocceius and a Deillius and the whole inner circleof his court he recruited from the camp of hisopponents ; and now it was his own mercifulnessthat gave him a Domitius, a Messala, an Asinius, aCicero, and all the flower of the state. What a longtime was granted even Lepidus to die ! For many387