102. What is there left, Aemilianus, that in your opinion I have failed to refute? What had I to gain by my magic that should lead me to attempt to win Pudentilla by love-philtres? What had I to gain from her? A small dowry instead of a large one? Truly my incantations were miraculous. That she should refund her dowry to her sons rather than leave it in my possession? What magic can surpass this? That she should at my exhortation present the bulk of her property to her sons and leave me nothing, although before her marriage with myself she had shown them no special generosity? [What a criminal use of love-philtres!] or perhaps I had better call it a generous action which has not received its deserts! By her will, which she drew up in a fit of violent irritation against her son, she leaves as her heir that same son with whom she had quarrelled, rather than myself to whom she was devoted! For all my incantations it was only with difficulty that I persuaded her to this. Suppose that you were pleading your case, not before Claudius Maximus, a man of the utmost fairness and unswerving justice, but before a judge of depraved morals and of ferocious temper, one in fact who naturally inclined to the side of the accuser and was only too ready to condemn the accused! Give him some hint to follow! Give him even the slightest reasonable opportunity for declaring in your favour! At least invent something, devise some suitable reply to questions such as have been put to you. Nay, since every action must necessarily have some motive, answer me this, you who say that Apuleius tried to influence Pudentilla's heart by magical charms, answer me this! What did he seek to get from her by so doing? Was he in love with her beauty? You say not! Did he covet her wealth? The evidence of the marriage settlement denies it, the evidence of the deed of gift denies it, the evidence of the will denies it! It shows not only that I did not court the generosity of my wife, but that I even repulsed it with some severity. What other motives can you allege? Why are you struck dumb? Why this silence? What has become of that ferocious utterance with which you opened the indictment, couched in the name of my step-son? 'This is the man, most excellent Maximus, whom I have resolved to indict before you.'
103. Why did you not add 'He whom I indict is my teacher, my step-father, my mediator'? But how did you proceed? 'He is guilty of the most palpable and numerous sorceries.' Produce one of these many sorceries or at least some doubtful instance from those which you style so palpable. Nay, see whether I cannot reply to your various charges with two words to each. 'You clean your teeth.' Excusable cleanliness. 'You look into mirrors.' Philosophers should. 'You write verse.' 'Tis permitted. 'You examine fish.' Following Aristotle. 'You worship a piece of wood.' So Plato. 'You marry a wife.' Obeying law. 'She is older than you.' Nothing commoner. 'You married for money.' Take the marriage-settlement, remember the deed of gift, read the will!
If I have rebutted all their charges, word by word, if I have refuted all their slanders, if I am beyond reproach, not only as regards their accusations but also as regards their vulgar abuse, if I have done nothing to impair the honour of philosophy, which is dearer to me than my own safety, but on the contrary have smitten my adversary hip and thigh and vanquished him at all points, if all my contentions are true, I can await your estimate of my character with the same confidence with which I await the exercise of your power; for I regard it as less serious and less terrible to be condemned by the proconsul than to incur the disapproval of so good and so perfect a man.
THE FLORIDA
The exordium to a discourse delivered in a town through which
Apuleius passes in the course of a journey.
1. It is the usual practice of wayfarers with a religious disposition, when they come upon a sacred grove or holy place by the roadside, to utter a prayer, to offer an apple, and pause for a moment from their journeying. So I, on entering the revered walls of your city, feel that, for all my haste, it is my duty to ask your favour, to make an address, and to break the speed of my journey. I cannot conceive aught that could give a traveller juster cause to halt in sign of reverence; no altar crowned with flowers, no grotto shadowed with foliage,[35] no oak bedecked with horns, no beech garlanded with the skins of beasts, no mound whose engirdling hedge proclaims its sanctity, no tree-trunk hewn into the semblance of a god, no turf still wet with libations, no stone astream with precious unguents. For these are but small things, and though there be a few that seek them out and do them worship, the majority note them not and pass them by.