With all this Pompeius was inflated, and he neglected to get soldiers
in readiness, as if he were under no apprehension; but by words and
resolution he was overpowering Caesar, as he supposed, by carrying
decrees against him, which Caesar cared not for at all. It is even said
that one of the centurions who had been sent by him to Rome, while
standing in front of the Senate-house, on hearing that the Senate
would not give Caesar a longer term in his government. "But this," he
said, "shall give it," striking the hilt of his sword with his hand.
XXX. However, the claim of Caesar at least had a striking show of
equity. For he proposed that he should lay down his arms and that when
Pompeius had done the same and both had become private persons, they
should get what favours they could from the citizens; and he argued
that if they took from him his power and confirmed to Pompeius what he
had, they would be stigmatizing one as a tyrant and making the other a
tyrant in fact. When Curio made this proposal before the people on
behalf of Caesar, he was loudly applauded; and some even threw chaplets
of flowers upon him as on a victorious athlete. Antonius, who was
tribune, produced to the people a letter[516] of Caesar's on this
subject which he had received, and he read it in spite of the
consuls. But in the Senate, Scipio, the father-in-law of Pompeius,
made a motion, that if Caesar did not lay down his arms on a certain
day, he should be declared an enemy.
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