PERSIUS, SATIRE V
will in vain pursue it, seeing that your wheel is the hind wheel, and that your axle is the second, not the first.
73What we want is true liberty;[1] not by that kind is it that any Publius enrolled in the Veline tribe becomes the possessor of a ticket for a ration of mangy corn. O souls barren of truth, you who think that one twirl of the thumb can make a Roman citizen! Look at Dama here; an under-strapper not worth three groats; blear-eyed from drink; a man who would tell a lie about a half-feed of corn; his master gives him one spin, when lo and behold! in the turning of a top, he comes forth as Marcus Dama![2]—"What? Do you hesitate to lend money when Marcus is the surety?—Are you uneasy with Marcus for a judge?"—"Marcus has said it, it must be so!"—"Pray, Marcus, put your signature to these deeds."—This, indeed, is liberty undefiled! This is the kind we get from our caps of liberty!
83"And pray how otherwise would you describe a free man than as one who is free to live as he chooses? I am free to live as I choose; am I not more free than Brutus?"—"Your logic is at fault," says my Stoical friend, whose ears have been well washed with pungent vinegar; "I accept the rest; but you must strike out the words 'you are free' and 'as you choose."'
- ↑ This passage has caused much trouble to commentators, but can be simply explained. "We have need of liberty (i.e. the true liberty)—a kind of liberty not possessed by any Publius (any Tom, Dick, or Harry) who by getting enrolled in the Veline tribe becomes the owner of a ticket entitling him to a mouldy ration of corn." Hac stands for the true kind of liberty: "it is not by that sort of liberty that Publius becomes possessed of a corn-ticket." (See Professor Housman, l.c. p. 23.) The Veline tribe was the latest addition to the local tribes instituted by Servius Tullius, making up the total to thirty-five, a number which was never exceeded. The allusion in tesserula is to the free distribution of corn made to all citizens enrolled in the tribes.
- ↑ The process of manumission here ridiculed was that by the rod (vindicta). The master took the slave before the Praetor or other magistrate, a third person touched the slave with the rod (virga or festuca or vindicta), saying "Hunc hominem liberum esse aio." The master then acknowledged the claim by turning the man round, with the words "Hunc hominem liberum esse aio." The ceremony was then complete. See below, 88. The newly-enfranchised citizen at once rejoices in a praenomtn; so Hor. Sat. II. v. 32. "Quinte" puia, aut "Publi" (gaudent praenomine molles Auricidae).
