From his first infancy, his life was chequered
by various turns and perils: for, then he followed, like an exile, his
proscribed father; and when taken in quality of a step-son into the family
of Augustus, he long struggled there with many potent rivals, during the
lives of Marcellus and Agrippa; next of the young Caesars, Caius and
Lucius. His brother Drusus too eclipsed him, and possessed more eminently
the hearts of the Roman People. But above all, his marriage with Julia,
most egregiously threatened and distressed him; whether he bore the
prostitutions of his wife, or relinquished the daughter of Augustus. Upon
his return thereafter from Rhodes, he occupied for twelve years the
Prince's family, now bereft of heirs, and nigh four-and-twenty ruled the
Roman State. His manners also varied with the several junctures of his
fortune: he was well esteemed while yet a private man; and, in discharging
public dignities under Augustus, of signal reputation: covert and
subdolous in feigning virtue so long as Germanicus and Drusus survived: a
mixed character of good and evil during the days of his mother: detestably
cruel; but secret in his lewdness, while he loved or feared Sejanus: at
last he abandoned himself, at once, to the rage of tyranny and the sway of
his lusts: for, he had then conquered all the checks of shame and fear,
and thenceforth followed only the bent of his own abominable spirit.
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