I shall discharge to the life.
(iII. ii. 104.)
He was justified in objecting to methods of dissimulation and flattery, but, if only he had been reasonable, a middle course would not have been hard to find, which should safeguard his self-respect while pacifying the populace. It is because his self-respect is of passion not of reason, that he is so unconciliatory, and therefore almost as culpable as if he were guilty of the opposite fault. Plutarch, indeed, thinks he is more so. In his comparison between him and Alcibiades, he is in this matter more lenient to the latter:
He is lesse to be blamed, that seeketh to please and gratifie his common people; then he that despiseth and disdaineth them, and therefore offereth them wrong and injurie, bicause he would not seeme to flatter them, to winne the more authoritie. For as it is an evill thing to flatter the common people to winne credit; even so it is besides dishonesty, and injustice also, to atteine to credit and authoritie, for one to make him selfe terrible to the people, by offering them wrong and violence.
This passage has inspired the criticism of the officer of the Capitol; who, however, impartially holds the scales.
If he did not care whether he had their love or no, he waved indifferently ’twixt doing them neither good nor harm: but he seeks their hate with greater devotion than they can render it him; and leaves nothing undone that may fully discover him their opposite. Now, to seem to affect the malice and displeasure of the people is as bad as that which he dislikes, to flatter them for their love.
(iI. ii. 18.)
With this temper it is natural that the arrogance of success, lack of nous, and want of adaptability—which is often merely another form of self-will—should bring about his ruin; and it is these three characteristics, or a modicum of them, to which Aufidius in point of fact attributes his banishment.
First he was
A noble servant to them; but he could not