"
By this speech, in appearance popular, he still retained the spirit and
force of the sovereignty. He likewise sustained by gratuities, the dignity
of some necessitous Senators: hence it was the more wondered, that he
received with haughtiness and repulse the petition of Marcus Hortalus, a
young man of signal quality and manifestly poor. He was the grandson of
Hortensius the Orator; and had been encouraged by the deified Augustus,
with a bounty of a thousand great sestertia, [Footnote: L8333.] to marry
for posterity; purely to prevent the extinction of a family most
illustrious and renowned. The Senate were sitting in the palace, and
Hortalus having set his four children before the door, fixed his eyes, now
upon the statue of Hortensius, placed amongst the orators; then upon that
of Augustus; and instead of speaking to the question, began on this wise:
"Conscript Fathers, you see there the number and infancy of my children;
not mine by my own choice, but in compliance with the advice of the
Prince: such too was the splendour of my ancestors, that it merited to be
perpetuated in their race; but for my own particular, who, marred by the
revolution of the times, could not raise wealth, nor engage popular
favour, nor cultivate the hereditary fortune of our house, the fortune of
Eloquence: I deemed it sufficient if, in my slender circumstances, I lived
no disgrace to myself, no burden to others.
Pages:
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188