[337] 'Omni incivilitate submotâ.'
[338] 'Necessitas moderamen non diligit.'
[339] 'Gothi per Picenum sive Thuscias utrasque residentes.' What are the two Thusciae?
[340] 'Debitas functiones.'
[341] 'Si quis ergo jussa nostra agresti spiritu resupinatus abjecerit, casas ejus appositis titulis fisci nostri juribus vindicabis; ut qui juste noluit parva solvere, rationabiliter videatur maxima perdidisse.'
[342] 'Scelus enim, quod nos pro sacerdotali honore relinquimus impunitum, majori pondere credimus vindicandum.' The words seem to be purposely vague, but I think they allude to the judgment of Heaven on the offender.
[343] Basilius, the patron of Sidonius, was Consul in 463, and another Basilius, perhaps the father of the accused, was Consul in 480. The person here spoken of may be the same as the Basilius, 'olim regio ministerio depulsus,' whom Boethius (Phil. Cons. i. 4) mentions as one of his accusers; but it seems more likely that in that case this imputation of magical practices would also have been referred to by him. The name Basilius was a somewhat common one at this time.
[344] At the beginning of the first letter occurs the remarkable expression 'Abscedat ritus de medio jam profanus; conticescat poenale murmur animarum,' which the commentator interprets of the ventriloquistic sounds produced by soothsayers. Cf. Milton's Christmas Hymn:
'No voice or hideous hum
Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving.'
[345] 'Universis Massiliae constitutis.' A curious expression.