I cursed Tacitus for making me relive that day. He will judge (when he has doctored my account) that its horrors were the consequence of the degeneracy into which the loss of Republican virtue and liberty had thrust us. 'Never surely,' he wrote in a recent letter in which he urged me to delve more deeply into the putrid sink of memory, 'was there more conclusive evidence that the gods take no thought for our happiness, but only for our punishment.' I would not dispute that, merely observe that licence was as unbounded in the days of the Republic from which only the wise government of Augustus and Tiberius rescued us. The horror of the years that succeeded Nero was not the result of one particular form of government, as my old friend, so full of imaginative sympathy with the distant past, supposes; it was the ineluctable consequence of the failure of government.
Philosophers have argued much concerning the nature of men, whether we are actuated by virtue or by fear. For my part, I know from bitter experience, from reflection and self-study, from the observation of others and from my reading of history, that men are born wicked; that virtue is something only laboriously achieved, in spite of nature; and that the driving force in any man who has achieved any degree of power – even power over his own household, family and slaves – is fierce, dictatorial, destructive, even if also self-destructive. Pride, jealousy, anger, the desire for revenge on account of slights real or imagined, are forces few can, or wish to, resist.
Consider Galba. At the age of seventy-three he had enjoyed prosperity all his days. He was rich, had won the esteem, or at least the respect, of his peers. Why should he put all that at risk merely to wear the purple and be saluted as Emperor?
And Otho? A man you would have said formed for pleasure. Was that not enough to content him? There are pleasant orange groves, soft breezes and lovely docile girls in Lusitania. Yet he, too, would be called Emperor, by men no one of intelligence or taste could respect.
'Isn't it the case,' I remember saying to Domitian – perhaps not that evening, but one soon after – 'that the condition of man is a war of everyone against everyone?'
I did not believe this. That is, I did not believe it should be so. Or did I? Should be? What is there to form 'should be'?
Domitian said: 'If you are right, and life is warfare, then it behoves one to make sure of winning.'
Flavius Sabinus laughed. You speak like a child,' he said. 'It is not in mortals to command success. Therefore…'
'Therefore, what?' I said. 'Trust to the gods? They are deaf. Seek to deserve it? I have not noticed that merit is rewarded.' Flavius picked up the dice-box and threw. 'A pair of sixes,' he said. 'There's no merit in that, sir,' I replied. 'Who said there was?'
Domitian said, 'It is wrong to speak against the gods. I myself have a particular devotion to Minerva, Goddess of Wisdom, and I believe she rewards her devotees by guiding them on the true path.' 'The bird of Minerva flies only by night,' I said. What is that supposed to mean?'
'I don't know, I'm sure,' I said. 'It's something I heard a philosopher, a Greek sophist, say once. It may not mean anything, like most that philosophers say, but it's stuck in my mind and I daresay it makes as much sense as your belief that Minerva has a care for you. If she does, why' – and I threw, I recall, a cushion at him – 'are you such an ass?'
Flavius Sabinus again rattled the bones and once again threw a pair of sixes. 'Do it a third time, and I'll be Emperor,' Domitian cried out.
'Silly,' Domatilla said. Turning to me she added, 'What will you be if uncle throws again and Dom wears the purple?'
'His fool, I suppose,' I said and, turning, smiled to her, as the dice-box rattled, and a pair of sixes were disclosed on the table. The German boy Balthus tells me he belongs to the tribe of the Chatti, and that his father was taken captive in Domitian's campaign against them. I remember that campaign and the sweet valley of the Neckar and a German woman I took as my concubine. Remembering made me sentimental. I drank wine with the boy and did no more than stroke his cheek and kiss him a couple of times. He protested, but gently. Then he looked at me in fear, aware of his slave-status.