SATIRE XI.
If Atticus[685] sups extravagantly, he is considered a splendid[686] fellow: if Rutilus does so, he is thought mad. For what is received with louder laughter on the part of the mob, than Apicius[687] reduced to poverty?
Every club,[688] the baths, every knot of loungers, every theatre,[689] is full of Rutilus. For while his sturdy and youthful limbs are fit to bear arms,[690] and while he is hot in blood, he is driven[691] (not indeed forced to it, but unchecked by the tribune) to copy out[692] the instructions and imperial commands of the trainer of gladiators. Moreover, you see many whom their creditor, often cheated of his money, is wont to look out for at the very entrance of the market;[693] and whose inducement to live exists in their palate alone. The greatest wretch among these, one who must soon fail, since his ruin is already as clear[694] as day, sups the more extravagantly and the more splendidly. Meanwhile they ransack all the elements for dainties;[695] the price never standing in the way of their gratification. If you look more closely into it, those please the more which are bought for more. Therefore they have no scruple[696] in borrowing a sum, soon to be squandered, by pawning[697] their plate, or the broken[698] image of their mother; and, with the 400[699] sesterces, seasoning an earthen[700] dish to tickle their palate. Thus they are reduced to the hotch-potch[701] of the gladiator.
It makes therefore all the difference who it is that procures these same things. For in Rutilus it is luxurious extravagance. In Ventidius it takes a praiseworthy name, and derives credit from his fortune.
I should with reason despise the man who knows how much more lofty Atlas is than all the mountains in Libya, yet this very man knows not how much a little purse differs from an iron-bound chest.[702] "Know thyself," came down from heaven:[703] a proverb to be implanted and cherished in the memory, whether you are about to contract matrimony,[704] or wish to be in a part of the sacred[705] senate:—(for not even Thersites[706] is a candidate for the breast-plate of Achilles: in which Ulysses exhibited himself in a doubtful character:[707])—or whether you take upon yourself to defend a cause of great moment. Consult your own powers; tell yourself who you are; whether you are a powerful orator, or like a Curtius, or a Matho,[708] mere spouters.
One must know one's own measure, and keep it in view, in the greatest and in most trifling matters; even when a fish is to be bought. Do not long for a mullet,[709] when you have only a gudgeon in your purse. For what end awaits you, as your purse[710] fails and your gluttony increases: when your patrimony and whole fortune is squandered[711] upon your belly, what can hold your money out at interest, your solid plate, your flocks, and lands?
By such proprietors as these, last of all[712] the ring is parted with, and Pollio[713] begs with his finger bare. It is not the premature funeral pile, or the grave, that is luxury's horror, but old age,[714] more to be dreaded than death itself. These are most commonly the steps: money, borrowed at Rome, is spent before the very owners' faces; then when some trifling residue is left, and the lender of the money is growing pale, they give leg-bail[715] and run to Baiæ and Ostia. For now-a-days to quit the forum[716] is not more discreditable to you than to remove to Esquiline from hot[717] Suburra. This is the only pain that they who flee their country feel, this their only sorrow, to have lost the Circensian games[718] for one[719] year. Not a drop of blood remains in their face; few attempt to detain modesty, now become an object of ridicule and fleeing from the city.
You shall prove to-day by your own experience, Persicus, whether all these things, which are very fine to talk about, I do not practice in my life, in my moral conduct, and in reality: but praise vegetables,[720] while in secret I am a glutton: in others' hearing bid my slave bring me water-gruel,[721] but whisper "cheese-cakes" in his ear. For since you are my promised guest, you shall find me an Evander:[722] you shall come as the Tirynthian, or the guest, inferior indeed to him, and yet himself akin by blood to heaven: the one sent to the skies by water,[723] the other by fire.
Now hear your bill of fare,[724] furnished by no public market.[725]