[678] Nota urbi et populo. Juvenal uses almost the very words of Tacitus. "An discidium inquit (Narcissus) tuum nôsti? Nam matrimonium Silii vidit populus et senatus et miles: ac ni properè agis tenet urbem maritus." Ann., xi., 30.
[679] Prœbenda. Cf. Tac., Ann., xi., 38.
"Inevitable death before thee lies,
But looks more kindly through a lady's eyes!" Dryden.
[680] Tomacula, "the liver and other parts cut out of the pig minced up with the fat." Mart., i., Ep. xlii., 9, "Quod fumantia qui tomacla raucus circumfert tepidus coquus popinis." The other savory ingredients are given by Facciolati; the Greeks called them τεμάχη or τεμάχια.
[681] Munera.
"A soul that can securely death defy,
And count it Nature's privilege to die." Dryden.
[682] Hercules. Alluding to the well-known "Choice of Hercules" from Prodicus. Xen., Mem.
[683] Nullum numen. Repeated, xiv., 315.
[684] "The reasonings in this Satire," Gibbon says, "would have been clearer, had Juvenal distinguished between wishes the accomplishment of which could not fail to make us miserable, and those whose accomplishment might fail to make us happy. Absolute power is of the first kind; long life of the second."