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Correspondence With The Emperor TrajanPart VII
Part VII
LXI
Trajan to Pliny
Your letter, my dearest Secundus, was extremely acceptable, as it
informed me of the zeal and affection with which you, together with the army
and the provincials, solemnized the day of my accession to the empire.
LXII
To the Emperor Trajan
The debts which were owing to the public are, by the prudence, Sir, of
your counsels, and the care of my administration, either actually paid in or
now being collected: but I am afraid the money must lie unemployed. For as, on
one side, there are few or no opportunities of purchasing land, so on the
other, one cannot meet with any person who is willing to borrow of the
public^1 (especially at 12 per cent. interest) when they can raise money upon
the same terms from private sources. You will consider then, Sir, whether it
may not be advisable, in order to invite responsible persons to take this
money, to lower the interest; or if that scheme should not succeed, to place
it in the hands of the decurii, upon their giving sufficient security to the
public. And though they should not be willing to receive it, yet as the rate
of interest will be diminished, the hardship will be so much the less.
[Footnote 1: The reason why they did not choose to borrow of the public at the
same rate of interest which they paid to private persons was (as one of the
commentators observes) because in the former instance they were obliged to
give security, whereas in the latter they could raise money upon their
personal credit. M.]
LXIII
Trajan to Pliny
I agree with you, my dear Pliny, that there seems to be no other method
of facilitating the placing out of the public money than by lowering the
interest; the measure of which you will determine according to the number of
the borrowers. But to compel persons to receive it who are not disposed to do
so, when possibly they themselves may have no opportunity of employing it, is
by no means consistent with the justice of my government.
LXIV
To the Emperor Trajan
I return you my warmest acknowledgments, Sir, that, among the many
important occupations in which you are engaged, you have condescended to be my
guide on those points on which I have consulted you: a favour which I must now
again beseech you to grant me. A certain person presented himself with a
complaint that his adversaries, who had been banished for three years by the
illustrious Servilius Calvus, still remained in the province: they, on the
contrary, affirmed that Calvus had revoked their sentence, and produced his
edict to that effect. I thought it necessary, therefore, to refer the whole
affair to you. For as I have your express orders not to restore any person who
has been sentenced to banishment either by myself or others, so I have no
directions with respect to those who, having been banished by some of my
predecessors in this government, have by them also been restored. It is
necessary for me, therefore, to beg you would inform me, Sir, how I am to act
with regard to the above-mentioned persons, as well as others, who, after
having been condemned to perpetual banishment, have been found in the province
without permission to return; for cases of that nature have likewise fallen
under my cognizance. A person was brought before me who had been sentenced to
perpetual exile by the proconsul Julius Bassus, but knowing that the acts of
Bassus, during his administration, had been rescinded, and that the senate had
granted leave to all those who had fallen under his condemnation of appealing
from his decision at any time within the space of two years, I enquired of
this man whether he had accordingly stated his case to the proconsul. He
replied he had not. I beg then you would inform me whether you would have him
sent back into exile, or whether you think some more severe and what kind of
punishment should be inflicted upon him, and such others who may hereafter be
found under the same circumstances. I have annexed to my letter the decree of
Calvus, and the edict by which the persons above-mentioned were restored, as
also the decree of Bassus.
LXV
Trajan to Pliny
I will let you know my determination concerning those exiles who were
banished for three years by the proconsul P. Servilius Calvus, and soon
afterwards restored to the province by his edict, when I shall have informed
myself from him of the reasons of this proceeding. With respect to that person
who was sentenced to perpetual banishment by Julius Bassus, yet continued to
remain in the province, without making his appeal if he thought himself
aggrieved (though he had two years given him for that purpose), I would have
him sent in chains to my praetorian prefects:^1 for, only to remand him back
to a punishment which he has contumaciously eluded will by no means be a
sufficient punishment.
[Footnote 1: These, in the original institution as settled by Augustus, were
only commanders of his body-guards; but in the later times of the Roman empire
they were next in authority under the emperor, to whom they seem to have acted
as a sort of prime ministers. M.]
LXVI
To the Emperor Trajan
When I cited the judges, Sir, to attend me at a sessions^2 which I was
going to hold, Flavius Archippus claimed the privilege of being excused as
exercising the profession of a philosopher.^3 It was alleged by some who were
present that he ought not only to be excused from that office, but even struck
out of the roll of judges, and remanded back to the punishment from which he
had escaped by breaking his chains. At the same time a sentence of the
proconsul Velius Paullus was read, by which it appeared that Archippus had
been condemned to the mines for forgery. He had nothing to produce in proof of
this sentence having ever been reversed. He alleged, however, in favour of his
restitution, a petition which he presented to Domitian, together with a letter
from that prince, and a decree of the Prusensians in his honour. To these he
subjoined a letter which he had received from you; as also an edict and a
letter of your august father confirming the grants which had been made to him
by Domitian. For these reasons, notwithstanding crimes of so atrocious a
nature were laid to his charge, I did not think proper to determine anything
concerning him, without first consulting with you, as it is an affair which
seems to merit your particular decision. I have transmitted to you, with this
letter, the several allegations on both sides.
[Footnote 2: The provinces were divided into a kind of circuits called
conventus, whither the proconsuls used to go in order to administer justice.
The judges here mentioned must not be understood to mean the same sort of
judicial officers as with us; they rather answered to our juries M.]
[Footnote 3: By the imperial constitutions the philosophers were exempted from
all public functions. Catanaeus. M.]
Domitian`s Letter to Terentius Maximus
"Flavius Archippus, the philosopher, has prevailed with me to give an
order that six hundred thousand sesterces^4 be laid out in the purchase of an
estate for the support of him and his family, in the neighbourhood of
Prusias,^5 his native country. Let this be accordingly done; and place that
sum to the account of my benefactions."
[Footnote 4: About $24,000.]
[Footnote 5: Geographers are not agreed where to place this city; Cellarius
conjectures it may possibly be the same with Prusa ad Olympum, Prusa at the
foot of Mount Olympus in Mysia. M.]
From the Same to L. Appius Maximus
"I recommend, my dear Maximus, to your protection that worthy
philosopher, Archippus; a person whose moral conduct is agreeable to the
principles of the philosophy he professes; and I would have you pay entire
regard to whatever he shall reasonably request."
The Edict of the Emperor Nerva
"There are some points, no doubt, Quirites, concerning which the happy
tenor of my government is a sufficient indication of my sentiments; and a good
prince need not give an express declaration in matters wherein his intention
cannot but be clearly understood. Every citizen in the empire will bear me
witness that I gave up my private repose to the security of the public, and in
order that I might have the pleasure of dispensing new bounties of my own, as
also of confirming those which had been granted by predecessors. But lest the
memory of him^6 who conferred these grants, or the diffidence of those who
received them, should occasion any interruption to the public joy, I thought
it as necessary as it is agreeable to me to obviate these suspicions by
assuring them of my indulgence. I do not wish any man who has obtained a
private or a public privilege from one of the former emperors to imagine he is
to be deprived of such a privilege, merely that he may owe the restoration of
it to me; nor need any who have received the gratifications of imperial favour
petition me to have them confirmed. Rather let them leave me at leisure for
conferring new grants, under the assurance that I am only to be solicited for
those bounties which have not already been obtained, and which the happier
fortune of the empire has put it in my power to bestow."
[Footnote 6: Domitian.]
From the Same to Tullius Justus
"Since I have publicly decreed that all acts begun and accomplished in
former reigns should be confirmed, the letters of Domitian must remain valid."
LXVII
To the Emperor Trajan
Flavius Archippus has conjured me, by all my vows for your prosperity,
and by your immortal glory, that I would transmit to you the memorial which he
presented to me. I could not refuse a request couched in such terms; however,
I acquainted the prosecutrix with this my intention, from whom I have also
received a memorial on her part. I have annexed them both to this letter; that
by hearing, as it were, each party, you may the better be enabled to decide.
LXVIII
Trajan to Pliny
It is possible that Domitian might have been ignorant of the
circumstances in which Archippus was when he wrote the letter so much to that
philosopher`s credit. However, it is more agreeable to my disposition to
suppose that prince designed he should be restored to his former situation;
especially since he so often had the honour of a statue decreed to him by
those who could not be ignorant of the sentence pronounced against him by the
proconsul Paullus. But I do not mean to intimate, my dear Pliny, that if any
new charge should be brought against him, you should be the less disposed to
hear his accusers. I have examined the memorial of his prosecutrix, Furia
Prima, as well as that of Archippus himself, which you sent with your last
letter.
LXIX
To the Emperor Trajan
The apprehensions you express, Sir, that the lake will be in danger of
being entirely drained if a communication should be opened between that and
the sea, by means of the river, are agreeable to that prudence and forethought
you so eminently possess; but I think I have found a method to obviate that
inconvenience. A channel may be cut from the lake up to the river so as not
quite to join them, leaving just a narrow strip of land between, preserving
the lake; by this means it will not only be kept quite separate from the
river, but all the same purposes will be answered as if they were united: for
it will be extremely easy to convey over that little intervening ridge
whatever goods shall be brought down by the canal. This is a scheme which may
be pursued, if it should be found necessary; but I hope there will be no
occasion to have recourse to it. For, in the first place, the lake itself is
pretty deep; and, in the next, by damming up the river which runs from it on
the opposite side and turning its course as we shall find expedient, the same
quantity of water may be retained. Besides, there are several brooks near the
place where it is proposed the channel shall be cut which, if skilfully
collected, will supply the lake with water in proportion to what it shall
discharge. But if you should rather approve of the channel`s being extended
farther and cut narrower, and so conveyed directly into the sea, without
running into the river, the reflux of the tide will return whatever it
receives from the lake. After all, if the nature of the place should not admit
of any of these schemes, the course of the water may be checked by sluices.
These, however, and many other particulars, will be more skilfully examined
into by the engineer, whom, indeed, Sir, you ought to send, according to your
promise, for it is an enterprise well worthy of your attention and
magnificence. In the meanwhile, I have written to the illustrious Calpurnius
Macer, in pursuance of your orders, to send me the most skilful engineer to be
had.
LXX
Trajan to Pliny
It is evident, my dearest Secundus, that neither your prudence nor your
care has been wanting in this affair of the lake, since, in order to render it
of more general benefit, you have provided so many expedients against the
danger of its being drained. I leave it to your own choice to pursue whichever
of the schemes shall be thought most proper. Calpurnius Macer will furnish
you, no doubt, with an engineer, as artificers of that kind are not wanting in
his province.
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