III. (15) Accordingly, when the news was spread abroad that he was sick while the weather was still suitable for navigation (for it was the beginning of the autumn, which is the last season during which nautical men can safely take voyages, and during which in consequence they all return from the foreign marts in every quarter to their own native ports and harbours of refuge, especially all who exercise a prudent care not to be compelled to pass the winter in a foreign country); they, forsaking their former life of delicateness and luxury, now wore mournful faces, and every house and every city became full of depression and melancholy, their grief being now equal to and counterbalancing the joy which they experienced a short time before. (16) For every portion of the habitable world was diseased in his sickness, feeling affected with a more terrible disease than that which was oppressing Gaius; for his sickness was that of the body alone, but the universal malady which was oppressing all men every where was one which attacked the vigour of their souls, their peace, their hopes, their participation in and enjoyment of all good things; (17) for men began to remember how numerous and how great are the evils which spring from anarchy, famine, and war, and the destruction of trees, and devastations, and deprivation of lands, and plundering of money, and the intolerable fear of slavery and death, which no one can relieve, all which evils appeared to admit of but one remedy, namely the recovery of Gaius. (18) Accordingly when his disease began to abate, in a very short time even the men who were living on the very confines of the empire heard of it and rejoiced, for nothing is swifter than report, {3}{so Virgil says, Aen. 4.174.} and immediately every city was full of suspense and expectation, being continually eager for better news, until at length his perfect recovery was announced by fresh arrivals, at which news they again returned to their original cheerfulness, each thinking the health of Gaius to be his own salvation; (19) and this feeling pervaded every continent and every island, for no one can recollect so great and general a joy affecting any one country or any one nation, at the good health or prosperity of their governor, as now pervaded the whole of the habitable world at the recovery of Gaius, and at his being able to resume the exercise of his power and having completely got rid of his sickness. (20) For they all rejoiced, from ignorance of the truth, like men who are now for the first time beginning to exchange a wandering and uncivilised mode of life for a social and civilised system, and instead of dwelling in desert places, and the open air, and the mountain districts, to live in walled cities, and instead of living without any governor, or protector, or lawgiver, to be now established under the care of a governor to be a sort of shepherd and leader of a more domesticated flock; (21) for the human mind is apt to be blind towards the perception of what is really expedient and beneficial for it, being influenced rather by conjecture and notions of probability than by real knowledge.
IV. (22) At all events it was not long before Gaius-who was now looked upon as a saviour and benefactor, and who was expected to shower down some fresh and everlasting springs of benefits upon all Asia and Europe, so as to endow the inhabitants with inalienable happiness and prosperity, both separately to each individual and generally to the whole state-began, as the proverb has it, at home, and changed into a ferocity of disposition, or, I should rather say, displayed the savageness which he had previously overshadowed by pretence and hypocrisy; (23) for he put to death his cousin who had been left as the partner of his kingdom, and who was in fact a more natural successor to it than he himself; for he himself was only Tiberius’s grandson by adoption, but the other was so by blood; arguing as a pretext that he had detected him in plotting against him, though his very age was a sufficient refutation of any such accusation; for the unhappy victim was only just emerging from boyhood, and beginning to rank among the youths. (24) And, as some person say, if Tiberius had lived a short time longer, Gaius would have been made away with, as he began to be looked upon by him with unalterable suspicion, and the genuine grandson of Tiberius would have been named the future emperor, and the inheritor of his paternal kingdom. (25) But Tiberius was carried off by fate, before he could bring his designs to their completion; and Gaius thought that he should be able to escape all evil report which might arise from his transgressing the principles of justice with respect to his partner by outwitting him. (26) And the contrivance which he adopted was of the following character. Having assembled all the chief magistrates, he said: “I am desirous that he who is my cousin by birth and my brother in affection, in accordance with the instruction of Tiberius who is now dead, shall be a partner with me in my absolute authority. But you yourselves perceive that he is as yet a mere child, and that he is in need of masters, and teachers, and guardians; (27) since what can be a more desirable blessing for me than that my one mind and one body shall not be loaded with so great a weight of the cares of government, but for me to have some one who may be able to lighten and alleviate them by sharing them? I, therefore,” said he: “passing over and being superior to all tutors, and masters, and guardians, register myself as his father, and him as my son.”
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