2 We have only to read that the
panegyrics pronounced by Arulenus Rusticus on Paetus Thrasea, and by Herennius
Senecio on Priscus Helvidius, were made capital crimes, that not only their
persons but their very books were objects of rage, and that the triumvirs were
commissioned to burn in the forum those works of splendid genius. They fancied,
forsooth, that in that fire the voice of the Roman people, the freedom of the
Senate, and the conscience of the human race were perishing, while at the same
time they banished the teachers of philosophy, and exiled every noble pursuit,
that nothing good might anywhere confront them. Certainly we showed a
magnificent example of patience; as a former age had witnessed the extreme of
liberty, so we witnessed the extreme of servitude, when the informer robbed us
of the interchanges of speech, and hearing. We should have lost memory as well
as voice, had it been as easy to forget as to keep silence.
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