misfortune. Prosperity probes the heart with a keener touch; misery
only calls for patience, but there is corruption in success. Honesty,
candour, and affection are the best of human qualities, and doubtless
you yourself have enough character to retain them. But the
complaisance of others will weaken your character. Flattery and
servile compliments will break down its defences and self-interest
too, the bane of all sincerity. What though you and I can talk plainly
with each other to-day? Others will address themselves not to us but
to our fortunes. To persuade an emperor what he ought to do is a
laborious task: any one can flatter him without a spark of sincerity.

'If the vast bulk of this empire could stand and keep its balance 16
without a guiding hand, the Republic might well have dated its birth
from me. As it is, things have long ago come to such a pass that
neither I in my old age can give the Roman people any better gift than
a good successor, nor you in your prime anything better than a good
emperor. Under Tiberius, Caligula, and Claudius, Rome was the heirloom
of a single family. There is a kind of liberty in the free choice we
have begun to exercise. Now that the Julian and Claudian houses are
extinct, by the plan of adoption the best man will always be
discovered. Royal birth is the gift of fortune, and is but valued as
such. In adoption we can use a free judgement, and if we wish to
choose well, the voice of the country points the way. Think of Nero,
swollen with the pride of his long line of royal ancestry. It was not
Vindex with a powerless province at his back, nor I with a single
legion that freed Rome's shoulders of that burden: it was his own
cruelty and profligacy. And that was before there was any precedent
for the conviction of an emperor.

'We have been called to the throne by the swords of those who thought