him. Paulinus had said that he actually resembled a man getting angry,
for somehow he was always assuming a fierce expression. [Footnote: None
of the editors, any more than the casual reader, has been able to find
anything of a sidesplitting nature in this joke. The trouble is, of
course, that the utterance sounds like a plain statement of fact.
Caracalla's natural disposition was harsh and irritable. Some have
changed the word "man" to "Pan (in anger)", but without gaining very
much. I offer for what it is worth the suggestion that a well-known
truth, especially in the case of personal characteristics, may sound
very amusing when pronounced in a quizzical or semi-ironical fashion by
a person possessing sufficient _vis comica_. Thus we may conceive
Paulinus, a professional jester, on meeting Antoninus to have blurted
out in a tone of mock surprise: "Why, anybody would really think you are
angry. You look so cross all the time!" There would then be a point in
the jest, but the point would lie not in the words but in the voice and
features of the speaker. Apart from this explanation of the possible
humor of the remark an excerpt of Peter Patricius (Exc. Vat. 143) gives
us to understand that it would be taken as a compliment by Antoninus
from the mouth of a person to whom he was accustomed to accord some
liberties, since Antoninus made a point of maintaining at all times this
character of harshness and abruptness.]--Antoninus made no account of
anything excellent: he never learned anything of the kind, as he himself
admitted. So it was that he showed a contempt for us, who possessed
something approaching education. Severus, to be sure, had trained him in
all pursuits, bar none, that tended to inculcate virtue, whether
physical or mental, so that even after he became emperor he went to
teachers and studied philosophy most of the day. He also took oil
rubbings without water and rode horseback to a distance of seven hundred
and fifty stades. Moreover, he practiced swimming even in rough water.
In consequence of this, Antoninus was, as you might say, strong, but he