[523] 'Sume dicationem, si bonus fuero, pro Republica et me: si malus, pro Republica in me.'
[524] 'Quando et moderna quae loquimur.' (Notice again moderna.)
[525] So the contemporary poet Maximian, speaking of his own past successes as an orator, and a good-looking one, says:
'Nec minor his aderat sublimis gratia formae
Quae vel si decent cetera, muta placet.'
Elegiae i. 17-18.
[526] 'Qui sapienti deliberatione pertractans quamvis in aliena religione.'
[527] The words of Cassiodorus are, 'crinea sunt ista certamina.' No one seems able to suggest a meaning for crinea. The editors propose to read civica, which however is very flat, and not exactly in Cassiodorus' manner. I suspect some recondite classical allusion, which has been missed by the transcribers, has led to the corruption of the text.
[528] 'Pater his fascibus praefuit sed et frater eadem resplenduit claritate.'
[529] 'Nam cum ... auspicia nostra Liguribus felix portitor nuntiasti, et sapientiae tuae allocutione firmasti, in errorem quem de occasu conceperant, ortum nostri imperii in gaudia commutabant.' Does this obscure passage indicate some revolutionary movements in Liguria after the death of Theodoric, perhaps fomented by the Frankish neighbours of Italy?
[530] 'Quando sub ingrato successore palatinum officium praeconia ejus tacere non potuit.'
[531] 'Adjectis saeculi vitiis, ditatus claris honoribus.' The text is evidently corrupt. 'Abjectis' seems to be required; but some MSS. instead of 'vitiis' read 'Odovacris.' In any case Odovacar's government is evidently alluded to. Cf. the words used of the same man in the letter announcing the elevation of his other son, Cyprian ([v. 41]): 'Nam pater huic, sicut meministis, Opilio fuit, vir quidem abjectis temporibus ad excubias tamen Palatinas electus.'