THE ANNALS OF TACITUS


BOOK I

A.D. 14 AND 15.


Kings were the original Magistrates of Rome: Lucius Brutus founded Liberty
and the Consulship: Dictators were chosen occasionally, and used only in
pressing exigencies. Little more than two years prevailed the supreme
power of the Decemvirate, and the consular jurisdiction of the military
Tribunes not very many. The domination of Cinna was but short, that of
Sylla not long. The authority of Pompey and Crassus was quickly swallowed
up in Caesar; that of Lepidus and Anthony in Augustus. The Commonwealth,
then long distressed and exhausted by the rage of her civil dissensions,
fell easily into his hands, and over her he assumed a sovereign dominion;
yet softened with a venerable name, that of Prince or Chief of the Senate.
But the several revolutions in the ancient free state of Rome, and all her
happy or disastrous events, are already recorded by writers of signal
renown. Nor even in the reign of Augustus were there wanting authors of
distinction and genius to have composed his story; till by the prevailing
spirit of fear, flattery, and abasement they were checked. As to the
succeeding Princes, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero; the dread of
their tyranny, whilst they yet reigned, falsified their history; and after
their fall, the fresh detestation of their cruelties inflamed their
Historians. Hence my own design of recounting briefly certain incidents in