[85] Gellius, xvii. 21.
[86] He speaks of Eurydice as the wife of Aeneas. This statement he is supposed to have derived from the Cypria.
[87] Cicero, Arch. 9.
[88] 'Wisdom is banished from amongst us, violence rules the day: the good orator is despised, the rough soldier loved; striving, not with words of learning, but with words of hate, they get embroiled in feuds, and stir up enmity one with another. The battle is fought, not according to law, but with the sword they demand their rights, assail the sovereign power, advance by sheer force.'
[89] Cic. De Off. i. 12.
[90] 'Neither do I ask gold for myself, nor offer ye to me a ransom. Let us wage the war, not like hucksters, but like soldiers—with the sword, not with gold, putting our lives to the issue. Whether our mistress Fortune, wills that you or I should reign, or what her purpose be, let us prove by valour. And hearken too to this saying,—The brave men, whom the fortune of battle spares, their liberty I have resolved to spare. Take my offer, as I grant it, under favour of the great gods.'
[91] 'Whither have your minds, which heretofore were wont to stand firm, madly swerved from the straight course?'
[92] A comparison with the original passage (Iliad, vi. 506), will show that Ennius, while reproducing much, though not all, of the force and life of Homer's image, has added also some touches of his own:—
ὡς δ᾽ ὅτε τις στατὸς ἵππος, ἀκοστήσας ἐπὶ φάτνῃ
δεσμὸν ἀπορρήξας θείῃ πεδίοιο κροαίνων,