Letter 6027: You ask me to think out for you the headings of the speech you will deliver as consul-designate in praise of the...
Pliny the Younger→Annius Severus|c. 104 AD|Pliny the Younger
imperial politics
To Severus.
You ask me to think out for you the headings of the speech you will deliver as consul-designate in praise of the Emperor. It is no difficult matter to find what to say, but it is difficult to know what to choose, for his virtues afford such wide scope for an address. However, I will write as you require, or - as I should prefer - will tell you in private conversation, as soon as I have shown you my chief reason for hesitating to do so. For I am doubtful whether I ought to persuade you to make the same sort of speech that I did. When I was consul-designate I carefully refrained from everything which looked like adulation, even though it was not, not so much to prove my independence and resolution as to show that I fully understood our sovereign's worth, for I saw that it would redound most to his praise if I avoided the appearance of being obliged to propose the honours I did. I even recalled the fact that honours had been showered on the very worst emperors, from whom our excellent emperor could not better be distinguished than by a different form of addressing him in the senate, and my reason for not passing over this point in silence was to prevent his thinking that it was forgetfulness on my part rather than my settled opinion. Such was the course I took ; but the same line of argument does not please or suit all speakers. Moreover, not only do men differ, but circumstances and times change, and the wisdom of following or not following a certain course of action depends entirely on these mutations of men and things. The recent achievements of our most noble Emperor * offer a new, abundant, and justifiable theme for panegyric. For these reasons, as I said before, I am not sure whether to recommend you to adopt the line which I took, but I am quite sure that it was my duty to lay before you the method which I pursued, in order to help you to a decision. Farewell.
[Note: Trajan returned from his victories in Dacia in 106 A.D.]
L To Severus.
You ask me to think out for you the headings of the speech you will deliver as consul-designate in praise of the Emperor. It is no difficult matter to find what to say, but it is difficult to know what to choose, for his virtues afford such wide scope for an address. However, I will write as you require, or - as I should prefer - will tell you in private conversation, as soon as I have shown you my chief reason for hesitating to do so. For I am doubtful whether I ought to persuade you to make the same sort of speech that I did. When I was consul-designate I carefully refrained from everything which looked like adulation, even though it was not, not so much to prove my independence and resolution as to show that I fully understood our sovereign's worth, for I saw that it would redound most to his praise if I avoided the appearance of being obliged to propose the honours I did. I even recalled the fact that honours had been showered on the very worst emperors, from whom our excellent emperor could not better be distinguished than by a different form of addressing him in the senate, and my reason for not passing over this point in silence was to prevent his thinking that it was forgetfulness on my part rather than my settled opinion. Such was the course I took ; but the same line of argument does not please or suit all speakers. Moreover, not only do men differ, but circumstances and times change, and the wisdom of following or not following a certain course of action depends entirely on these mutations of men and things. The recent achievements of our most noble Emperor * offer a new, abundant, and justifiable theme for panegyric. For these reasons, as I said before, I am not sure whether to recommend you to adopt the line which I took, but I am quite sure that it was my duty to lay before you the method which I pursued, in order to help you to a decision. Farewell.
(*) Trajan returned from his victories in Dacia in 106 A.D.
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To Severus.
You ask me to think out for you the headings of the speech you will deliver as consul-designate in praise of the Emperor. It is no difficult matter to find what to say, but it is difficult to know what to choose, for his virtues afford such wide scope for an address. However, I will write as you require, or - as I should prefer - will tell you in private conversation, as soon as I have shown you my chief reason for hesitating to do so. For I am doubtful whether I ought to persuade you to make the same sort of speech that I did. When I was consul-designate I carefully refrained from everything which looked like adulation, even though it was not, not so much to prove my independence and resolution as to show that I fully understood our sovereign's worth, for I saw that it would redound most to his praise if I avoided the appearance of being obliged to propose the honours I did. I even recalled the fact that honours had been showered on the very worst emperors, from whom our excellent emperor could not better be distinguished than by a different form of addressing him in the senate, and my reason for not passing over this point in silence was to prevent his thinking that it was forgetfulness on my part rather than my settled opinion. Such was the course I took ; but the same line of argument does not please or suit all speakers. Moreover, not only do men differ, but circumstances and times change, and the wisdom of following or not following a certain course of action depends entirely on these mutations of men and things. The recent achievements of our most noble Emperor * offer a new, abundant, and justifiable theme for panegyric. For these reasons, as I said before, I am not sure whether to recommend you to adopt the line which I took, but I am quite sure that it was my duty to lay before you the method which I pursued, in order to help you to a decision. Farewell.
[Note: Trajan returned from his victories in Dacia in 106 A.D.]
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.