THE SAYINGS OF MARCUS
deserved, Caligula had earned his death, Otho and Vitellins ought never to have reigned. His opinion of Galba was similar, for he remarked that in an Emperor avarice[1] was the most hateful of faults. In a word, rebels had never been able to overcome either Augustus or Trajan or Hadrian or his own father, for many as they were, they had been crushed against the wish or without the knowledge of the reigning Emperor. Antoninus himself, however, besought the Senate not to proceed with severity against accomplices in the rebellion, asking at the same time that no Senator should in his reign be punished with death; and this won for him the love of all.
(16) Philostratus, Vit. Soph. ii. 9, p. 252, Kays.
It is no flatterer's praise but the truest and most just to call Aristides the founder of Smyrna. For he made so moving a lament to Marcus over the utter destruction of this city by earthquakes and openings in the ground, that over the rest of the mournful tale the Emperor sighed repeatedly, but at the "breezes blowing over a city of desolation" he even let tears fall upon the writing,[2] and granted the restoration of the city in accordance with the suggestions of Aristides.[3] It chanced also that Aristides had already made the acquaintance of Marcus in Ionia, for when they were attending the lectures of the Athenian Damianus, the Emperor who had already been three days in Smyrna, not yet knowing Aristides personally, requested the Quintilii[4] to see that the man should not be passed over unnoticed in the imperial levée. They said
- ↑ cp. Capit. xxix. 5: Nihil magis et timuit et depre catus est quam avaritiae famam de qua se multis epistulis purgat. Dio, after speaking of his liberality and public benefactions, says (71. 32, § 3): ἀφ' οὗπερ καὶ νῦν θαυμάζω τῶν αἰτιωμένων αὐτὸν ὡς οὐ μεγαλόφρονα γενόμενον.
- ↑ We have the letter, addressed to Marcus and Commodus, in the works of Aristides (Jebb, § 209). Its date would be 177–180.
- ↑ Lit. to the tune set by Aristides.
- ↑ Two brothers, famed for their character, ability, and fraternal affection. They exercised conjointly the governor- ship of Achaia, and later a military command in Pannonia. They also shared an unjust death at the hands of Commodus.
