Yet in things which shall worthily and more near concern the majesty of a prince, we shall fear to be so unnaturally cruel to our own fame, as to neglect them. True it is, conscript fathers, that we have raised Sejanus from obscure, and almost unknown gentry, Sen. How, how! to the highest and most conspicuous point of greatness, and, we hope, deservingly; yet not without danger: it being a most bold hazard in that sovereign, who, by his particular love to one, dares adventure the hatred of all his other subjects. Arr. This touches; the blood turns. But we affy in your loves and understandings, and do no way suspect the merit of our Sejanus, to make our favours offensive to any. Sen. O! good, good. Though we could have wished his zeal had run a calmer course against Agrippina and our nephews, howsoever the openness of their actions declared them delinquents; and, that he would have remembered, no innocence is so safe, but it rejoiceth to stand in the sight of mercy: the use of which in us, he hath so quite taken away, toward them, by his loyal fury, as now our clemency would be thought but wearied cruelty, if we should offer to exercise it. Arr. I thank him; there I look'd for't. A good fox! Some there be that would interpret this his public severity to be particular ambition; and that, under a pretext of service to us, he doth but remove his 5 Our clemency would be thought but wearied cruelty,] Ego vero clementiam non voco lassam crudelitatem. Senec. de Clemen. Lib. i. c. 11. WHAL. z De hac epist. vid. Dio. Rom. Hist. Lib. Iviii. p. 719, et Juv. Sat. X. own lets alleging the strengths he hath made to himself, by the prætorian soldiers, by his faction in court and senate, by the offices he holds himself, and confers on others, his popularity and dependents, his urging and almost driving us to this our unwilling retirement, and, lastly, his aspiring to be our son-in-law. Sen. This is strange! Arr. I shall anon believe your vultures, Marcus. Your wisdoms, conscript fathers, are able to examine, and censure these suggestions. But, were they left to our absolving voice, we durst pronounce them, as we think them, most malicious. Sen. O, he has restored all; list! Yet are they offered to be averred, and on the lives of the informers. What we should say, or rather what we should not say, lords of the senate, if this be true, our gods and goddesses confound us if we know! Only we must think, we have placed our 6 I shall anon believe your vultures, Marcus ;] i. e. your augury, what you conjectured. Lepidus, in a former scene, had foretold the downfal of Sejanus. 7 What we should say, or rather what we should not say, lords of the senate, if this be true, our gods and goddesses confound us if we know!] Juvenal styles the letter which Tiberius sent to the senate, verbosa et grandis epistola; and this before us is agreeable to that character. So far the judgment of Jonson is evident enough: but it seems to have failed him, when he inserted the words above as a part of this epistle. They are to be found, indeed, both in Tacitus and Suetonius; and are very remarkable in themselves: but they are reported, which makes them still more remarkable, to have been the beginning of a letter he once wrote to the senate; and, in that connection,.. they are a much stronger evidence of uneasiness and perturbation of spirit in the emperor, arising from the consciousness of guilt. The poet indeed hath added something, and given a different turn to the words, that he might introduce them in this epistle with the greater propriety: Insigne visum est earum Cæsaris literarum initium: nam his verbis exorsus est: Quid scribam vobis, P. C. aut quomodo scribam, aut quid omnino non scribam benefits ill; and conclude, that in our choice, either we were wanting to the gods, or the gods to us. [The senators shift their places. Arr. The place grows hot; they shift. We have not been covetous, honourable fathers, to change; neither is it now any new lust that alters our affection, or old lothing; but those needful jealousies of state, that warn wiser princes hourly to provide their safety; and do teach them how learned a thing it is to beware of the humblest enemy; much more of those great ones, whom their own employed favours have made fit for their fears. 1 Sen. Away. 2 Sen. Sit farther. Cot. Let's remove Arr. Gods! how the leaves drop off, this little wind! We therefore desire, that the offices he holds be first seized by the senate; and himself suspended from all exercise of place or power-- hoc tempore, dii me deæque pejus perdant quàm perire quotidie sentio, si scio. Tacit. Ann. Lib. vi. c. 6. WHAL. It is with regret that I so often find myself obliged to differ from Whalley. I cannot possibly think that Jonson's judgment failed him in this instance: the words which he has adopted are extremely proper for the occasion, and might be fitly used by a Roman in any question of extraordinary doubt and difficulty. How could it escape the critic, that the only passage which gave peculiarity to the quotation from the historian (for the rest is common enough) is, Dii me deæque pejus perdant quam perire quotidie sentio, which strongly marks the intolerable anguish of a guilty mind, and which Jonson has wholly omitted? In a word, he has shewn uncommon skill in the composition of this letter, and entered with matchless dexterity into the cloudy and san. guinary character of Tiberius. To provide their safety ;] i. e. to look to, by anticipation. A latinism, like a hundred other expressions in this play. Whalley probably overlooked this sense of the word, for he inserted for after it; but Jonson has it again in the dedication to Volpone:" who providing" (foreseeing) "the hurts these Licentious spirits may do in a state," &c. Sen. How! San. [Thrusting by.] By your leave. Arr. Come, porpoise; where's Haterius? His gout keeps him most miserably constant; Your dancing shews a tempest. Sej. Read no more. Reg. Lords of the senate, hold your seats: read on. Sej. These letters they are forged. Reg. A guard! sit still. Enter LACO, with the guards. Arr. Here's change! Reg. Bid silence, and read forward. Pra. Silence!--and himself suspended from all exercise of place or power, but till due and mature trial be made of his innocency, which yet we can faintly apprehend the necessity to doubt. If, conscript fathers, to your more searching wisdoms, there shall appear farther cause---or of farther proceeding, either to seizure of lands, goods, or more--it is not our power that shall limit your authority, or our favour that must corrupt your justice: either were dishonourable in you, and both uncharitable to ourself. We would willingly be present with your counsels in this business; but the danger of so potent a faction, if it should prove so, a Come, porpoise, &c.] Sanquinius has been already described as fat and clumsy; but the allusion is to a circumstance often mentioned by the navigators of Jonson's days, that the gambols of porpoises always portended foul weather. Thus Webster: "He lifts his nose like a porpus before a storm." Dutchess of Malfy. The awkward motion of this unwieldy sycophant, in hastening from the side of Sejanus, is well illustrated by the example. • Dio. Rom. Hist. Lib. lviii. p. 719, et Suet. Tib. forbids our attempting it: except one of the consuls would be entreated for our safety, to undertake the guard of us home; then we should most readily adventure. In the mean time, it shall not be fit for us to importune so judicious a senate, who know how much they hurt the innocent, that spare the guilty; and how grateful a sacrifice to the gods, is the life of an ingrateful person. We reflect not, in this, on Sejanus, (notwithstanding, if you keep an eye upon him--and there is Latiaris, a senator, and Pinnarius Natta, two of his most trusted ministers, and so professed, whom we desire not to have apprehended, but as the necessity of the cause exacts it. Reg. A guard on Latiaris! The reverend spy is caught! who pities him? [Exeunt Latiaris and Natta, guarded. Hang up the instrument. Sej. Give leave. Lac. Stand, stand.! He comes upon his death, that doth advance An inch toward my point. Sej. Have we no friends here? Arr. Hush'd! Where now are all the hails and acclamations? Enter MACRO. Mac. Hail to the consuls, and this noble senate! Sej. Is Macro here? O, thou art lost, Sejanus! [Aside. Mac. Sit still, and unaffrighted, reverend fa thers; Macro, by Cæsar's grace, the new-made provost, |