pro thalamis, verso iam discite more curules,
non matrum pilenta sequi.
[99] MSS. have surgat.
chaste Lucretia plunged the dagger into her bosom and Cloelia swam the astonished Tiber? Were the fasces reft from Tarquin to be given to Eutropius? Let Hell ope her jaws and all who have sat in my curule chair come and turn their backs upon their colleague. Decii, self-sacrificed for your country’s good, come forth from your graves; and you, fierce Torquati; and thou, too, great-hearted shade of poor Fabricius. Serranus, come thou hither, if now thou ploughest the acres of the holy dead and cleavest the fallow lands of Elysium. Come Scipios, Lutatius, famed for your victories over Carthage, Marcellus, conqueror of Sicily, rise from the dead, thou Claudian race, you progeny of Curius. Cato, thou who wouldst not live beneath Caesar’s rule, come thou forth from thy simple tomb and brave the sight of Eutropius. Immortal bands of Bruti and Corvini, return to earth. Eunuchs don your robes of office, sexless beings assume the insignia of Rome. They have laid hands on the toga that inspired Hannibal and Pyrrhus with terror. They now despise the fan and aspire to the consul’s cloak. No longer do they carry the maidenly parasol for they have dared to wield the axes of Latium.
“Unhappy band, leave your womanly fastnesses, you whom the male sex has discarded and the female will not adopt. The knife has cut out the stings of love and by that wounding you are pure. A mixture are you of two ages—child and greybeard and nought between. Take your seats, fathers in name alone. Come new lords, come sterile senate, throng your leader Eutropius. Fill the judgement-seat, not the bedchamber. Change your habits and learn to follow the consul’s chair, not the woman’s litter.
“Ne prisca revolvam
neu numerem, quantis iniuria mille per annos 475
sit retro ducibus, quanti foedabitur aevi