Let these be recited in the splendour of your assembly, and for thirty days let the prefect of the city cause them to be posted in the customary solemn manner in the most frequented places, so that, when our civic order has been acknowledged, hope may be taken away from savage characters. For with what confidence shall the insolent man take up what he knows the prince's clemency has condemned? Let the love of discipline return to all, through which both small things grow together and greater things are preserved. For we set our armies in motion, by God's help, with frequent expeditions for this very end: that we may perceive the whole community living in an orderly way under the laws. Let this exchange of rewards be rendered to our spirit: that he whom you know to be occupied with the welfare of the commonwealth may be assailed by the rarest approach of complaints. Let the judges hold to lawful strictness;
let them cast away the vow of most foul venality. Fear settles all things, if the accused finds no crime in the one who judges. Since by God's help we provide for our provinces with yearly renewal, and tribunals distributed throughout all the bounds of Italy are not lacking, we understand that an abundance of lawsuits comes from a scarcity of justice. For it is proven to be the fault of your negligence whenever men are compelled to seek from us the benefits of the laws. For who would choose to seek so far off what he saw had come to his own dwellings?
But in order to remove from you crafty excuses and from the provincials harsh hardships, we have decided by the definition of an edictal proclamation concerning certain cases hitherto neglected through the worst sloth, so that both confidence in judging rightly may grow in you and malicious boldness may gradually be diminished. Cause this to be posted in solemn manner through public gatherings for thirty days by publication, so that he may by right be held condemned who after these remedies shall presume to remain in despair. We are known to have rightly remitted the cases of sons to the persons of their fathers, so that they themselves ought to think about the advancement of those whose interest it is that Roman studies should prosper.
For it is not to be believed that you can be the less anxious on that account, whereby both the adornment of your lineage increases and counsel comes to your assembly through constant reading. For recently, since our care for you is solicitous, we have learned through the whisperings of certain persons that the teachers of Roman eloquence do not receive the fixed rewards of their labour, and that through the trafficking of certain men it comes about that the sum assigned to the masters of the schools seems to be diminished. Wherefore, since it is manifest that reward nourishes the arts, we have judged it a wickedness that anything should be withdrawn from the teachers of young men, who are rather to be summoned to glorious studies through increases of their benefits.
For the school of the grammarians is the first and fairest foundation of letters, the glorious mother of eloquence, which knows how to think unto praise and to speak without fault. In the course of speech it recognizes the discordant error just as good morals detest the foreign crime. For just as the musician produces the sweetest melody with concordant choirs, so the grammarian knows how to chant the metre with accents fittingly arranged. Grammar is the mistress of words, the adorner of the human race, which is known to help us by its counsels through the exercise of the most beautiful reading of the ancients. The barbarian kings do not use her: among lawful lords she is known to remain peculiarly her own. For arms and the rest the nations possess too;
eloquence alone is found which obeys the lords of the Romans. Hence the contest of orators sounds the trumpet-call of civil law; hence a most noble eloquence commends all the nobles; and, to be silent about the rest, this very thing which we speak comes from there.
Wherefore, conscript fathers, with favouring Divinity we bestow upon you this care, this authority: that the successor in the school of liberal letters, whether grammarian or orator, and likewise the expounder of law, may receive without any diminution the emoluments of his predecessor from those whose concern it is; and once confirmed by the authority of your first order and of the rest of the most ample senate, so long as he is found fit for the work he has undertaken, let him suffer no wicked questioning from anyone, neither about transferring nor about diminishing his allowances, but, with you ordaining and safeguarding, let him enjoy the security of his emoluments — the prefect of the city nonetheless preserving what has been established.
And lest anything be left uncertain at the will of those who pay, as soon as six months have elapsed, let the aforesaid masters receive the middle portion of the fixed sum, and let the remaining months of the year be concluded with the due repayment of the allowances; lest those be compelled to depend on another's disdain to whom it is a sacrilege to have been idle even for any moment of the hours. For we wish what has been decreed to be most firmly observed to such a degree that, if anyone whose concern it is shall think this payment, as though due, ought to be deferred, let him himself suffer the losses incurred after the manner of interest, who through punishable greed has withdrawn just emoluments from those who labour praiseworthily.
For if we lavish our wealth upon stage-players for the people's amusement, and those obtain it most eagerly who are not held to be so necessary, how much more ought it to be furnished without delay to those through whom both honourable morals arise and eloquent talents are nourished for our palace! But cause this to be made known to your venerable assembly in the presence of the masters of letters, so that, as they recognize us to be solicitous about their emoluments, so they may know that the advancement of young men is to be exacted from them all the more earnestly. Let that maxim now cease, usurped by the querulous teachers in the satirists, that the mind ought not to be occupied with two cares. Behold, they are now proved to have a tolerable lodging;
whence now they may deservedly, clinging unremittingly to one concern, be transferred with the whole vigour of their minds to the studies of the good arts. The morals of men would wander confused and undiscerned, if either fault had no fear or virtue no reward. But since both are enclosed by their own limits and their proper boundaries, it is wickedness to be in doubt about him who has deserved to be chosen by the prince's judgment. For we decree nothing out of hatred, nor do we praise anyone enticed by some gratification. Our choice comes from merits, and a man is brought near to the royal mind in proportion as he is joined in fellowship by good studies. Do not fear that you are absent, nor be anxious about the prince's ignorance. The common sort of men may perhaps lie hidden;
the offspring of the senate cannot be unknown, since those are well known who are vouched for by their merits, and whoever is praised with fame as witness is abundantly recognized. Wherefore the serene eye of our mind beheld you, though stationed very far off, and saw the merit which was not held concealed. For celebrated repute spread abroad your purpose, giving credence to your lineage by the weight of your character, not by your age. For it was not right that our sentence should find anything to be corrected in him whom so great a family had produced. You have repaid the seed of your lineage with the fruits of your character. Long age has withdrawn nothing from you;
Rome has recognized in you the ancient Decii — the Decii, I say, a lineage honoured in former ages, the help of liberty, the glory of the senate-house, the singular renown of the Roman name; to which it is specially ascribed that, when the state of the commonwealth was imperilled, it escaped the most savage enemy, and amid so great a multitude of brave men one alone was found who loved his country more. These examples, by reminding, ever kindle you, since the praise of forefathers is a great spur of modesty, while we do not allow you to be unequal to those whom we rejoice to claim as our authors. And therefore — and let this be said with God for its inaugurator — receive in the twelfth indiction the insignia of the consulship, an honour lofty indeed, but native to your family. For you fill up the consular page;
the course of the years names you again and again; and whereas abundance is for the most part wont to bring disdain, your name, repeated, is ever rendered glorious. Indeed, the heavens have favoured this lineage by granting to the desires of its fathers happy offspring of males. Hence it is that in that highest office you scarcely see a colleague who is a stranger: you have as judges those whom you have as kinsmen. O singular renown of the times! The Roman senate-house is almost filled with your family. Behold, now indeed it must be called one body, since it is established as intermingled by the fellowship of a neighbouring lineage. But do not relax your spirits in confidence of your own, nor believe it can suffice that it has fallen to your lot to rejoice in their praise.
More is demanded of the heir of good things, since he is urged on without cessation who is admonished by the virtues of his elders. Add distinguished praises: let the succeeding age come after your elders with some renown of fresh achievement. For if it is glorious for posterity to extend ancestral resources, how much more excellent is it to increase inherited virtues! We have praised your character in domestic conversation, but now it befits you to display something greater in public sight, whereon neither tender age may flatter itself, nor fear claim anything, nor a master take credit.
Consider, conscript fathers, what we should judge concerning you, that we choose for the summits of the highest dignities men of your stock whom we have never seen — not from disdainful negligence, but from honourable presumption of nature. Let things thought uncertain come to examination: surely no one would judge that there should be deliberation about a matter where nothing ambiguous is found? Our benevolence indeed embraces all, but such as these we proclaim by the testimony of truth. Grace indeed goes before, but an incorrupt sentence follows. For just as the same body of the senate-house belongs to you, so you come together into one by a praiseworthy purpose. Therefore your having loved is a judgment, whence both the increase of liberty and the adornment of our empire grows. The causes of things are always in the seed;
the fruit, once produced, reveals its authors, and whatever we deserve from Divinity is gathered from a happy progeny. Hence it is that we weigh with admiration the patrician Venantius, rejoicing both in his fruitful offspring and as the father of so many of consular rank. For he reared children to be praised without any distinction, equal in the weight of moderation, alike in the liveliness of talent, and truly brothers in the fellowship of character; whose infancy, nurtured in the good arts, exercised their youth also in arms, forming the mind with letters, the limbs with the wrestling-schools; teaching them to display constancy to friends, fidelity to their lords; and whatever divine grace bestowed upon that man, you may discern transmitted in entire perfection to his descendants.
Let others vaunt themselves in opulent possessions and think that the sole highest good is riches. But in this house an inheritance is approached not so much by patrimonies as by virtues. This is assuredly what makes men truly rich, since there can be no better gain than to have succeeded to the praises of one's elders. It has also been proved in him that nothing is lacking to good stewards. Restraining himself from another's goods, distributing his own with moderation, and admirable with unwonted praise, grievous to none, he has brought forth so many of consular rank. Let him, hearing this, receive the fruit of good deeds; let him recognize that he has as a herald the one whom he has as lord, and that among so many luminaries of the nobles he has been singularly praised.
For if it adorns men to have received the palm-embroidered robe once, what is he to be reckoned who deserves so many consulships in his sons? And therefore, conscript fathers, we clothe your foster-son Paulinus with the golden dignity, so that his youth, which shines with merits, may also gleam with the triumphal robe. The Decian family does not marvel at this honour, since their halls are full of laurelled fasces. To others this rare dignity falls but seldom: in this course of lineage a consular is almost born. Favour therefore, conscript fathers, our gifts and likewise your own candidate. For although you are styled fathers of all in general, to this one you are also specially even parents.
The fidelity of the appellation confirms your name, derived from the likeness of care, by no transferred customary usage of the word, but by an honourable lot of birth. May the Divine Powers grant you this perpetual happiness, that, although you bestow grace upon strangers, you may rejoice more vigorously in your own offspring. If our will had found you still hidden, or perhaps unhonoured, we should indeed have rejoiced to have discovered you, but we might well have doubted how you would act, since in what is new there is hope rather than fruit. But since you glory in the countless advancements and the great judgment of our lord grandfather, it is an unseemly thing to subject to dispute one whom we can scarcely proclaim with admiration.
For the judgment of so great a prince is not to be examined but to be venerated, since there can be no doubt about his deeds, when we ourselves are known to have been chosen by him — he who, ever assiduous in divine supplication, exacted of merits that he might do those things which heavenly grace would safeguard. For whom did he, setting over armies, not receive back with victory, or whom, girding as judge, did he not prove most just? You would believe him to have dealings with future events: for what his mind had conceived, the effect always rendered, and with wondrous zeal of wisdom he held no doubt about what he truly foresaw was to come. Finally, from you we can prove the excellent disposition of the prince.
For receiving you in earliest youth into the office of quaestor, he soon found you endowed with discernment and mature in the erudition of the laws. You were indeed the highest praise of the times, so that you rendered him, thus solicitous about all things, secure through unfaltering service, while you sustained so great a mass of royal genius by the powers of your eloquence. He found you delightful in dictation, rigid towards justice, and a stranger to covetousness. For you did not sell his benefits at any abominable rating, so that honour might profit you towards the riches of reputation, while it was by no means subjected to a price. Hence it is that you appeared joined to the most just prince by glorious affection, because you were separated from vices by a commendable sequestration.
That most wise arbiter burdened you with the weights of those who pleaded, and presumed so much upon the proven discernment of your mind that, in place of a benefit, he set forth your judgment without any hesitation to those who were in turmoil. How often did he reckon you among the aged nobles, when those whom so great a length of years had instructed did not suffice for your beginnings? There was plainly that which he might proclaim excellent in you: a mind open to deserving benefits and barred against the vices of covetousness, while — by I know not what compact — rare among men is a hand closed and a justice open. Let us come to the dignity of Master, which you are known to have obtained not by largess of money but by the suffrage of your character; in which post you were ever present to the quaestors.
For when there was need of refined eloquence, the case was at once entrusted to your genius. There was exacted of you by the kindly prince what he knew he had by no means committed to you, and by a certain prejudicial favour he freed others from labour, so that he might fill you with abundant praise of his own opinion. For no dignity preserved its own bounds under you, since it is established that there was entrusted to your conscience what was to be most sincerely accomplished by many nobles. No one knew how to murmur contrary things about you, although you bore envy from the prince's favour. Integrity of action overcame those who desired to disparage you: your adversaries, compelled, often spoke what their mind did not hold.
For any malice fears to profess anything against manifest goods, while it dreads being exposed to general hatred. You acted as a familiar judge to the lord of affairs and an inner noble. For when he was freed from public care, he exacted the opinions of the wise from your discourses, that he might equal himself to the ancients by his own deeds. The courses of the stars, the bays of the sea, the wonders of springs — a most acute investigator he enquired into, so that, the natures of things being more diligently scrutinized, a certain purple-clad man might seem to be a philosopher. These things become long if we set them all forth: rather let us turn to our benefits, so that what was known to be owed by him you may feel justly paid to you by the heir of the empire.
Wherefore, by God's help, by whose authorship all things prosper, from the twelfth indiction we place you in the dais and insignia of the praetorian prefecture, so that the provinces may receive a proven judge without fear — provinces which we have known hitherto to be wearied by the action of wicked men. But although you have a paternal prefecture renowned throughout the Italian world, we set before you nonetheless the examples of others not at all: use your own ways, and you have fulfilled the prayers of all. Run through, by God's help, the field of glory, which we have always known to be sought by you. For if this dignity also has proved you to be self-restrained, as we believe, this is to have surpassed the ambitious things of the world. You were indeed accustomed not to sell what is just: but now it behoves you more earnestly to come to the aid of those injured through wrong.
Let an incorruptible sense keep watch against ill-accustomed hands; let fraudulent zeal be shut out on every side, since this is worthy to come about through a sincere judge. By deferring rather longer we have indeed wearied the prayers of all on your behalf, that we might both prove the goodwill of the community towards you and that you might come the more desirable to all. For the human condition has this property: that things quickly attained are met with disdain, since everything precious grows cheap when offered, and on the contrary that is received the more sweetly which is furnished after some delay. But we are not content merely with the praise of your own times: investigate everything pertaining to the titles of the praetorian prefecture which the greed of others has been seen to defraud. Let it not be permitted to anyone to glory in his thefts or his prejudgments.
We have sent you as a light into hidden matters, since no one will be able either to deceive your prudence or to slacken your fidelity by any offering. Establish a rule also for this dignity, you who in offices formerly held displayed examples of admirable self-restraint. For although you have administered almost all the highest honours equally, you nevertheless have the proposed goods of conscience, where it befits there to be no measure. For here it is fitting to have no limit; here an honourable ambition is approved, whose very excess is pleasing. For everything to be proclaimed is found the more gloriously, the more lavishly it is sought. We have indeed heaped up, conscript fathers, with our benefits a Senator abounding in virtues, rich in morals, full of great honours;
if you consider his merits, we owe all that we pay. For by what compensation is he to be commended, who has often filled the ears of those who rule with brilliant proclamation, has handled with exceptional gravity the dignities entrusted to him, and has striven to make times that might deservedly be praised in the prince? Truth and the eloquence of his words drew the mind of the reigning lord, to whom he related all things in such a way that the very one who did them marvelled. He alleged alone what would profit all, and while he lent purple-clad praises to his hearer, he made our empire gracious to you. For he commends his own people who soothes the royal summit with a placable speech, since from you another such is believed to exist, from whom like things may be demanded.
With what eloquence too did the devoted man assert the father of our clemency in the very senate-house of Liberty! You recall how the noble orator embellished his deeds, making his virtues more wondrous than his honours. In what is settled it is granted to prove what we say. Estimate, conscript fathers, with what favour you could be regarded by him by whose body he saw himself thus adorned. For to glorious lords proclamations are more pleasing than tributes, since a stipend is paid even to a tyrant, but praise is owed to none but a good prince. What, men of praise, do you believe him content with only this, that he should strive to praise living lords, from whom, while perhaps a return of rewards is sought, the wearinesses of labour are not avoided?
He extended himself even into our ancient lineage, learning by reading what the hoary knowledge of our forefathers scarcely retained. He brought forth the kings of the Goths, hidden by long oblivion, from the lurking-place of antiquity. He restored the Amals together with the splendour of their stock, plainly showing that we have a royal lineage to the seventeenth generation. He made the Gothic origin Roman history, gathering as into one crown the flowering seed that had before been scattered here and there over the fields of books. Consider how much he loved you in our praise, who taught the nation of your prince to be wondrous from antiquity, so that, as you were always esteemed noble by your forefathers, so an ancient progeny of kings might rule over you.
We yield, conscript fathers, and even if we still wish to recount, the benefits conferred are surpassed. With what labour too did he give himself to our beginnings, when the newness of the kingdom demanded that many things be set in order? He alone was sufficient for all things: public dictation, our councils, demanded him; and by his labour it came about that the empire did not labour. We found him indeed a Master, but he fulfilled for us the office of quaestor, and, paying his dues with most just devotion, he gladly displayed to the heir's advantage the care which he had learned from our author. But adding something greater than these, he aided the beginnings of our reign both with arms and with letters.
For when cares of the coasts assailed our royal thoughts, suddenly, cast out from the inmost sanctuaries of letters, equal to his forefathers he undertook the command undaunted; and because an enemy was lacking to him, he triumphed by his excellent character. For he fed the Goths assigned to him at his own expense, so that he might neither strike down the provincials nor burden our treasury with the loads of expenses. His arms felt no losses of the possessors. He was indeed the truest guardian of the provinces: for he is properly to be called a defender who protects without harm. But as soon as the season closed the passage of ships and the care of war was relaxed, he exercised his genius rather as an author of laws, healing without loss to the litigants what had before been known to be torn apart at a price.
Such a command you read that Metellus had in Asia, such Cato had in Spain — men praised more for their discipline than through arms; and not unjustly, since to encounter an enemy is ever a varied outcome, but to have preserved the measure of morals is undoubted glory. What then? Did he, presuming upon such conduct, vaunt himself with any elation, since it is natural to men to be exalted when they have learned that they are well thought of concerning themselves? Did he not bear himself with such fellowship that he believed the prince's favour granted to him only for benefits — benevolent to all, moderate in prosperity, knowing not how to be angry unless gravely provoked? He who, though rigid in justice, does not persist austere unto the remission of his angers;
He is an excellent steward of his own affairs, and while he knows not how to covet what belongs to others, he has learned to bestow his own with a generous hand. These habits, then, the reading of Holy Scripture has made firm; for matters are always rightly conducted when the fear of heaven is set against the impulses of men. From this is drawn a manifest knowledge of all the virtues; from this wisdom is seasoned with the savour of truth. Thus he whom heavenly teaching has instructed is rendered humble in all things. To this man, therefore, conscript fathers, with God as our sponsor, we have granted from the twelfth indiction the dignity of the praetorian prefecture to be administered, that, by God's gift, with his own integrity he may settle all the complaints gathered through the bartering of the faithless, and may show himself so greatly desired that he can be of benefit to all.
May the powers above be present with what we have arranged, so that he whom we have proved prudent by long acquaintance may be found most prosperous for himself, most faithful to us, and useful to the commonwealth, and may leave to posterity a fame whereby he may make his family glorious for the ages.