First of all the Ephesians applied. They alleged, that "Diana and Apollo were not, according to the credulity of the vulgar, born at Delos: in their territory flowed the river Cenchris; where also stood the Ortygian Grove: there the big-bellied Latona, leaning upon an olive tree, which even then remained, was delivered of these deities; and thence by their appointment the Grove became sacred. Thither Apollo himself, after his slaughter of the Cyclops, retired for a sanctuary from the wrath of Jupiter: soon after, the victorious Bacchus pardoned the suppliant Amazons, who sought refuge at the altar of Diana: by the concession of Hercules, when he reigned in Lydia, her temple was dignified with an augmentation of immunities; nor during the Persian monarchy were they abridged: they were next maintained by the Macedonians, and then by us."
The Magnesians next asserted their claim, founded on an establishment of Lucius Scipio, confirmed by another of Sylla: the former after the defeat of Antiochus; the latter after that of Mithridates, having, as a testimony of the faith and bravery of the Magnesians, dignified their temple of the Leucophrynaean Diana with the privileges of an inviolable sanctuary. After them, the Aphrodisians and Stratoniceans produced a grant from Caesar the Dictator, for their early services to his party; and another lately from Augustus, with a commendation inserted, "that with zeal unshaken towards the Roman People, they had borne the irruption of the Parthians." But these two people adored different deities: Aphrodisium was a city devoted to Venus; that of Stratonicea maintained the worship of Jupiter and of Diana Trivia. Those of Hierocaesarea exhibited claims of higher antiquity, "that they possessed the Persian Diana, and her temple consecrated by King Cyrus." They likewise pleaded the authorities of Perpenna, Isauricus, and of many more Roman captains, who had allowed the same sacred immunity not to the temple only, but to a precinct two miles round it. Those of Cyprus pleaded right of sanctuary to three of their temples: the most ancient founded by Aerias to the Paphian Venus; another by his son Amathus to the Amathusian Venus; the third to the Salaminian Jupiter by Teucer, the son of Telamon, when he fled from the fury of his father.
The deputies too of other cities were heard. But the Senate tired with so many, and because there was a contention begun amongst particular parties for particular cities; gave power to the Consuls "to search into the validity of their several pretensions, and whether in them no fraud was interwoven;" with orders "to lay the whole matter once more before the Senate." The Consuls reported that, besides the cities already mentioned, "they had found the temple of AEsculapius at Pergamus to be a genuine sanctuary: the rest claimed upon originals, from the darkness of antiquity, altogether obscure. Smyrna particularly pleaded an oracle of Apollo, in obedience to which they had dedicated a temple to Venus Stratonices; as did the Isle of Tenos an oracular order from the same God, to erect to Neptune a statue and temple. Sardis urged a later authority, namely, a grant from the Great Alexander; and Miletus insisted on one from King Darius: as to the deities of these two cities; one worshipped Diana; the other, Apollo. And Crete too demanded the privilege of sanctuary, to a statue of the deified Augustus." Hence diverse orders of Senate were made, by which, though great reverence was expressed towards the deities, yet the extent of the sanctuaries was limited; and the several people were enjoined "to hang up in each temple the present decree engraven in brass, as a sacred memorial, and a restraint against their lapsing, under the colour of religion, into the abuses and claims of superstition."
At the same time, a vehement distemper having seized Livia, obliged the Emperor to hasten his return to Rome; seeing hitherto the mother and son lived in apparent unanimity; or perhaps mutually disguised their hate: for, not long before, Livia, having dedicated a statue to the deified Augustus, near the theatre of Marcellus, had the name of Tiberius inscribed after her own. This he was believed to have resented heinously, as a degrading the dignity of the Prince; but to have buried his resentment under dark dissimulation. Upon this occasion, therefore, the Senate decreed "supplications to the Gods; with the celebration of the greater Roman games, under the direction of the Pontifs, the Augurs, the College of Fifteen, assisted by the College of Seven, and the Fraternity of Augustal Priests." Lucius Apronius had moved, that "with the rest might preside the company of heralds." Tiberius opposed it; he distinguished between the jurisdiction of the priests and theirs; "for that at no time had the heralds arrived to so much pre-eminence: but for the Augustal Fraternity, they were therefore added, because they exercised a priesthood peculiar to that family for which the present vows and solemnities were made," It is no part of my purpose to trace all the votes of particular men, unless they are memorable for integrity, or for notorious infamy: this I conceive to be the principal duty of an historian, that he suppress no instance of virtue; and that by the dread of future infamy and the censures of posterity, men may be deterred from detestable actions and prostitute speeches. In short, such was the abomination of those times, so prevailing the contagion of flattery, that not only the first nobles, whose obnoxious splendour found protection only in obsequiousness; but all who had been Consuls, a great part of such as had been Praetors, and even many of the unregistered Senators, strove for priority in the vileness and excess of their votes. There is a tradition, that Tiberius, as often as he went out of the Senate, was wont to cry out in Greek, Oh men prepared for bondage! Yes, even Tiberius, he who could not bear public liberty, nauseated this prostitute tameness of slaves.
BOOK IV. — A.D. 23-28.
When Caius Asinius and Caius Antistius were Consuls, Tiberius was in his ninth year; the State composed, and his family flourishing (for the death of Germanicus he reckoned amongst the incidents of his prosperity) when suddenly fortune began to grow boisterous, and he himself to tyrannise, or to furnish others with the weapons of tyranny. The beginning and cause of this turn arose from Aelius Sejanus, captain of the Praetorian cohorts. Of his power I have above made mention; I shall now explain his original, his manners, and by what black deeds he strove to snatch the sovereignty. He was born at Vulsinii, son to Sejus Strabo, a Roman knight; in his early youth, he was a follower of Caius Caesar (grandson of Augustus) and lay then under the contumely of having for hire exposed himself to the constupration of Apicius; a debauchee wealthy and profuse: next by various artifices he so enchanted Tiberius, that he who to all others was dark and unsearchable, became to Sejanus alone destitute of all restraint and caution: nor did he so much accomplish this by any superior efforts of policy (for at his own stratagems he was vanquished by others) as by the rage of the Gods against the Roman State, to which he proved alike destructive when he flourished and when he fell. His person was hardy and equal to fatigues; his spirit daring but covered; sedulous to disguise his own counsels, dexterous to blacken others; alike fawning and imperious; to appearance exactly modest; but in his heart fostering the lust of domination; and, with this view, engaged at one time in profusion, largesses, and luxury; and again, often laid out in application and vigilance; qualities no less pernicious, when personated by ambition for the acquiring of Empire.
The authority of his command over the guards, which was but moderate before his time, he extended, by gathering into one camp all the Praetorian cohorts then dispersed over the city; that thus united, they might all at once receive his orders, and by continually beholding their own numbers and strength, conceive confidence in themselves and prove a terror to all other men. He pretended, "that the soldiers, while they lived scattered, lived loose and debauched; that when gathered into a body, there could, in any hasty emergency, be more reliance upon their succour; and that when encamped, remote from the allurements of the town, they would in their discipline be more exact and severe." When the encampment was finished, he began gradually to allure the affections of the soldiers, by all the ways of affability, court, and familiarity: it was he too who chose the Centurions, he who chose the Tribunes. Neither in his pursuits of ambition did the Senate escape him; but by distinguishing his followers in it with offices and provinces, he cultivated power and a party there: for, to all this Tiberius was entirely resigned; and even so passionate for him, that not in conversation only, but in public, in his speeches to the Senate and people, he treated and extolled him, as the sharer of his burdens; nay, allowed his effigies to be publicly adored, in the several theatres, in all places of popular convention, and even amongst the Eagles of the legions.
But to his designs were many retardments: the Imperial house was full of Caesars; the Emperor's son a grown man, and his grandsons of age: and because the cutting them off all at once, was dangerous; the treason he meditated, required a gradation of murders. He however chose the darkest method, and to begin with Drusus; against whom he was transported with a fresh motive of rage. For, Drusus impatient of a rival, and in his temper inflammable, had upon some occasional contest, shaken his fist at Sejanus, and, as he prepared to resist, given him a blow on the face. As he therefore cast about for every expedient of revenge, the readiest seemed to apply to Livia his wife: she was the sister of Germanicus, and from an uncomely person in her childhood, grew afterwards to excel in loveliness. As his passion for this lady was vehement, he tempted her to adultery, and having fulfilled the first iniquity (nor will a woman, who has sacrificed her chastity, stick at any other) he carried her greater lengths, to the views of marriage, a partnership in the Empire, and even the murder of her husband. Thus she, the niece of Augustus, the daughter-in-law of Tiberius, the mother of children by Drusus, defiled herself, her ancestors, and her posterity, with a municipal adulterer; and all to exchange an honourable condition possessed, for pursuits flagitious and uncertain. Into a fellowship in the guilt was assumed Eudemus, physician to Livia; and, under colour of his profession, frequently with her in private. Sejanus too, to avoid the jealousy of the adulteress, discharged from his bed Apicata his wife, her by whom he had three children. But still the mightiness of the iniquity terrified them, and thence created caution, delays, and frequently opposite counsels.