Quintilian: DECLAMATIONES MAIORES

From the burning house a young man carried out his father. While he went back for his mother, he lost both her and his eyes. His father brought in for him a stepmother.

quae accessit quodam tempore ad maritum, dixit parari illi venenum, quod iuvenis in sinu haberet, et sibi promissam dimidiam partem bonorum, si illud marito porrexisset. intravit ad caecum pater interrogavitque, an haec vera essent; ille negavit. exquisivit et invenit in sinu venenum, interrogavit, cui parasset; ille tacuit.

she, who at a certain time approached her husband, said that poison was being prepared for him, which the young man had in his bosom, and that half the goods had been promised to herself, if she had proffered it to her husband. the father went in to the blind man and asked whether these things were true; he denied it. he searched and found poison in his bosom, and asked for whom he had prepared it; he was silent.

recessit pater et mutato testamento novercam fecit heredem. eadem nocte strepitus in domo fuit: intravit familia in cubiculum domini, invenit ipsum occisum et novercam iuxta cadaver dormienti similem, caecum in limine cubiculi sui stantem, gladium eius sub pulvino cruentatum. accusant se invicem caecus et noverca.

the father withdrew and, the testament having been changed, made the stepmother heir. the same night there was a commotion in the house: the household entered the master’s bedchamber, found him himself slain and the stepmother next to the corpse, similar to one sleeping, the blind man standing on the threshold of his own bedchamber, his sword bloodied beneath the pillow. the blind man and the stepmother accuse one another.

[1] Sentio, iudices, pudori iuvenis, pro quo minimum est quod parricida non est, gravissimum videri, quod absolvendus est contra novercam, et plurimum caeco de reverentia deperire virtutum, cum in patrocinium summae pietatis affertur quicquid defenderet alium innocentem. hoc primum itaque publicis allegamus affectibus, quod pro se reus indignatur uti corporis probatione: solus omnium non remittit sibi, ut incredibilior sit in parricidio caecus, quam fuit cum videret. homo omnium, quos umquam miseros fecere virtutes, innocentissimus parricidium negavit ante quam pater occideretur, et, ne quid hodiernae sollicitudini praestari putetis, fecit, quod est summum in rebus humanis nefas, ne vel in alio crederetur.

[1] I perceive, judges, that to the modesty of the youth—for whom the least thing is that he is not a parricide—the gravest thing seems this: that he must be acquitted against his stepmother; and that the blind man loses very much of the reverence owed to virtues, when, in advocacy of the highest pietas, there is brought forward whatever would defend some other innocent. This first, therefore, we allege to the public affections: that the defendant is indignant to use a proof from his body; he alone of all does not remit to himself that a blind man be held more unbelievable in parricide than he was when he could see. A man, the most innocent of all whom virtues have ever made wretched, denied parricide before his father was slain; and, lest you think anything is being provided to today’s anxiety, he did what is the utmost nefas in human affairs, so that it might not be believed even of another.

ignoscite per fidem, quod indignatur se iuvenis in honorem tantum calamitatis absolvi; filium, qui patrem ex incendio sua caecitate servavit, facinus est hoc tantum innocentem videri, quod illum non potuerit occidere.

Forgive, by your good faith, that the youth is indignant at being absolved only in honor of his calamity; it is an outrage that the son, who by his own blindness saved his father from the conflagration, should seem innocent on this alone: that he was not able to kill him.

Nam quod ad mulierem, iudices, pertinet, quae defendi non potest, <ni>si patrem caecus occidit, tam inpudentem delationis necessitatem malo, quam si tantum negaret. viderit qui fiduciam veritatis putat, quod caeco facinus obiectum est; deprehensa mulieris audacia est, quod non potest nisi incredibilium conparatione defendi; et quisquis caecum invicem accusat, solus est reus. aliae, iudices, esse debuerunt adversus hanc debilitatem probationes: caecus in parricidio non debet suspectus fieri, sed deprehendi.

Now as regards the woman, judges, who cannot be defended unless the blind man killed his father, I prefer so shameless a necessity of delation, rather than that she should merely deny. Let him see to it who deems there is confidence of truth in that a crime has been alleged against a blind man; the woman’s audacity is detected by the fact that it cannot be defended save by a comparison of incredibilities; and whoever in turn accuses the blind man is the only guilty party. Other proofs, judges, ought to have been produced against such a disability: a blind man in parricide ought not to be made suspect, but to be apprehended.

[2] Quaeso itaque, iudices, ut haec prima pro causa iuvenis putetis, quae contra illum nimia sunt. nihil magis debet esse pro caeco, quam quod adversus illum fuerunt multa fingenda; et constat de pietate, de innocentia hominis, qui expugnandus fuit parricidii similitudine. congesta sunt adversus miseram debilitatem ferrum, cruor, venenum et quicquid non potest esse negligentiae nisi nescientis.

[2] I therefore beseech, judges, that you reckon this first as in favor of the young man’s case: that the things against him are excessive. Nothing ought to be more for the blind man than that many things had to be fabricated against him; and it stands established concerning the piety and the innocence of the man, who had to be overthrown by a similitude of parricide. Piled up against the wretched debility were steel, gore, poison, and whatever cannot be a matter of negligence except of one not knowing.

nemo, iudices, nemo diligentior debet esse ad facinus, quam qui parricidium potuit facere caecus.

No one, judges, no one ought to be more diligent in a crime than he who could have committed parricide while blind.

Iuvenis iste, de quo summa in rebus humanis monstra finguntur, eius fuit erga parentes semper affectus, quem nefas est optare de liberis. cum domus ignium saepta violentia rapuisset miseris senibus omne praesidium, illa festinatione, qua fugimus, erumpimus, in medium cucurrit incendium. in quanto tunc periculo fuit, rerum natura[e], pietas!

This young man, about whom the greatest monstrosities in human affairs are being fabricated, had always toward his parents such affection as it is unlawful to wish for in children. When the house, enclosed by the violence of the flames, had snatched away every protection from the wretched old people, with that haste with which we flee and burst out, he ran into the midst of the conflagration. In how great danger then was, O nature[e] of things, O piety!

dum diu multumque attonitus haeret, dum ad utrumque respicit, ad utrumque discurrit, paene infelicissimos parentes perdidit pietatis aequalitas. ut deinde miserrimos senes cluserat iam propior ignis (audiat licet invita pietas), patrem iuvenis elegit, et de pariter ardentibus vices disposuit affectus. vixdum posito sene, cum illum quoque miraremur explicitum, iterum flammas aperuit, et undique coeuntis incendii redditus globis arserat iuvenis, si tardius perdidisset oculos.

while for a long time and much, astonished, he stands fixed, while he looks toward each, runs to each, the equality of his piety almost lost him his most-unlucky parents. when then the nearer fire had now enclosed the most miserable old folk (let reluctant piety hear it), the young man chose the father, and, of those burning equally, his affection apportioned turns. scarcely had the old man been set down, as we marveled that he too had been brought out, he again opened a way through the flames, and, with the returning masses of the fire coalescing from every side, the young man would have burned, if he had lost his eyes more slowly.

[3] facinus est, iudices, non hoc quoque maximis contigisse conatibus, ut servaretur et mater. minus tamen in utroque fecerat, nisi perdidisset oculos. viderint, qui filium in eo magis parente mirantur, in cuius salutem faciem vultusque consumpsit; patri praestitit caecitatem, qui amisit oculos, dum repetit quam reliquerat matrem.

[3] It is an outrage, judges, that not even with the greatest endeavors did this also come to pass, that the mother too be saved. Yet he would have done less in regard to both, had he not lost his eyes. Let those consider it, who marvel more at the son in that parent for whose safety he consumed his face and countenance; he rendered to his father blindness, he who lost his eyes while returning for the mother whom he had left.

Non expectetis certum habeo, iudices, ut excusem, quod pater induxit caeco novercam; factum est eo tempore, quo constabat patrem filio senem solvendo non esse. contenderim quin immo iuvenis fuisse consilium, ut pater, cui matrimonium filiumque abstulerat incendium, residua senectutis alia consolaretur uxore, et ut domus, quae caecum tantum habebat et senem, acciperet ex coniugio ministeria custodita. facinus est, iudices, quod bonos privignos novercae facilius decipiunt nec levius oderunt.

Do not expect—this I hold for certain, judges—that I should excuse the fact that the father introduced a stepmother to his blind son; it was done at that time when it stood established that the father, an old man, was not, for his son, sufficient to discharge his support. I would contend—nay rather—that it was the young man’s counsel, that the father, from whom the conflagration had taken away his matrimony and his son, might console the residue of his old age with another wife, and that the household, which had only a blind man and an old man, might receive from the conjugal union ministrations of custody. It is a crime, judges, that stepmothers more easily deceive good step-sons and hate them no less.

quam multis insidiis, quam multis artibus patet caecitas innocentis! mulier, cui spem invadendae hereditatis praestabat debilitas privigni, senectus mariti, intellexit hoc solum deesse sceleris occasioni, ut prius infamaretur parricidii caecus. viso igitur hoc, quod sibi iuvenis non videbatur esse privignus, venenum, quod in miseri sinu abdiderat, deprehensura nuntiavit patri, tamquam parricidium pararetur.

By how many ambushes, by how many arts does the blindness of the innocent lie open! The woman, to whom the weakness of her stepson and the old age of her husband afforded the hope of invading the inheritance, understood that this alone was lacking to the occasion of the crime: that first the blind man be branded with parricide. This therefore having been seen—that to herself the youth did not seem to be a stepson—intending to discover the poison which she had concealed in the wretch’s bosom, she announced it to the father, as though parricide were being prepared.

et quia mendacium poterat facile nudari, si quem conscium nominasset, totam delationem sic ordinavit, ut sibi crederetur promissam dimidiam partem bonorum, si venenum seni voluisset ipsa porrigere.

and because the mendacity could easily be laid bare, if she had named any accomplice, she so arranged the whole delation that it would be believed a half part of the goods had been promised to herself, if she had been willing to proffer the poison to the old man herself.

[4] videtis, iudices, qua praeparatione noverca ad testamentum patris accesserit: mulierem, quam credit maritus noluisse partem bonorum accipere pro scelere, necesse est sic remuneret, ut faciat heredem. o quanto aliter probatur parricidium, quod iam potest deprehendi! mulier, quae se dicebat in conscientiam sceleris admissam, non hoc primum exegit a patre, ut quaereret, quis parasset caeco venenum, quis dedisset; inde maximum sciebat posse fieri quaestionis errorem: instituit, ut innocentissimus iuvenis interrogaretur repente, subito, infamatura velut deprehensi trepidationem, seu tacuisset caecus, seu negasset.

[4] you see, judges, with what preparation the stepmother has approached the father’s testament: the woman whom the husband believes to have been unwilling to accept a share of the goods in exchange for the crime, it is necessary that he thus remunerate, that he make her heir. O how differently parricide is proved, when now it can be detected! the woman, who said that she had been admitted into the conscience of the crime, did not first demand this from the father, that he inquire who had prepared poison for the blind man, who had given it; from that she knew the greatest error of the inquisition could arise: she arranged that the most innocent young man be questioned suddenly, abruptly, intending to defame, as the panic of one caught, his agitation, whether the blind man had kept silent or had denied.

adductus ad filium senex dixit iuveni quicquid audierat. numquam, iudices, tam simplicis innocentiae fuit facinus negare: non esset ausus iuvenis coram ea muliere mentiri, quae prodidit et sciit, ubi esset venenum. ut vero sensit infelix instantem novercam postulantemque, ut sinus iuvenis exquireretur, tunc vero attonitus, haerens, et tota malorum suorum cogitatione confusus intellexit hoc argumentum eius esse, quae parasset, ut posset deprehendi; igitur propere, festinanter omnia membra pertractans et mersis in sinum manibus, dum cuncta suspicionibus, dum tactu iuvenis explorat, venenum primus invenit.

Brought to his son, the old man said to the youth whatever he had heard. Never, judges, was denying so much an act of such simple innocence: the young man would not have dared to lie before that woman who had betrayed and knew where the poison was. But when the unhappy man sensed the stepmother pressing and demanding that the folds of the young man’s garment be searched, then indeed, thunderstruck, stuck fast, and confounded by the whole thought of his troubles, he understood that this was the scheme of her who had prepared it so that it might be detected; therefore quickly, hastily, handling all his limbs and with his hands plunged into his bosom—while he examines everything in suspicions, while by the touch he explores the youth—he himself first found the poison.

[5] laudo, iudices, innocentiam silentii, laudo fiduciam, quod interrogatus, cui parasset, non putavit sibi defendendum venenum. rem quin immo fecit eius, qui sciret patrem non crediturum, et, quae maxima est innocentiae contumacia, persuasionem senis nulla voluit excusatione corrumpere. non fuit illud trepidatio, non tacita confessio; quisquis habet venenum, habet et quod respondeat deprehensus.

[5] I praise, judges, the innocence of silence, I praise the confidence, that, when asked for whom he had prepared it, he did not think the poison ought to be defended by him. Nay rather, he acted the part of one who knew the father would not believe, and—what is the greatest contumacy of innocence—he was unwilling to corrupt the old man’s persuasion with any excuse. That was not trepidation, not a tacit confession; whoever has poison has also what to answer when apprehended.

Fecit post haec senex rem hominis, quem non movisset quicquid invenerat. non torsit ministeria caeci, et de scelere, in quo solus nocens esse parricida non poterat, non explicuit ordinem quaestionis, sed quod plus est quam absolvere, remisit iuveni defensionem. utrum deinde intellectis deterrimae mulieris insidiis filium paulisper voluerit exheredatione protegere et diligentius de patrimonio suo deliberaturus interim captaverit, ut videretur mulieris cupiditati iam non obstare privignus, an facillimum fu<er>it, ut exheredationem quoque impetraret noverca caeci ab homine, cui tam multa persuaserat, cogitationibus vestris relinquo; hoc tantum dixisse contentus sum: testamentum continuo mutavit, et, ne quis miretur hanc festinationem, statim subsecutum est, ut periret.

After this the old man did the deed of a man whom nothing he had discovered would have moved. He did not rack the attendants of the blind man, and, in a crime in which the parricide could not have been the only guilty party, he did not unfold the order of the quaestio; but, what is more than acquitting, he waived the young man’s defense. Whether then, once he had understood the snares of that most depraved woman, he wished for a little while to protect his son by disinheritance and, being about to deliberate more carefully about his patrimony, meanwhile angled so that the stepson would seem no longer to stand in the way of the woman’s cupidity; or whether it was very easy that the stepmother of the blind man also obtain disinheritance from a man to whom she had persuaded so many things, I leave to your thoughts. Content with saying only this: he changed his testament immediately, and, lest anyone marvel at this haste, it straightway followed that he perished.

an interfuerit, iudices, iuvenis huius, ut viveret pater, qui iam alio moriebatur herede, vos aestimabitis; non interfuit, ut occideretur.

Whether it mattered, judges, to this young man that his father should live—who was already dying with another as heir—you will assess; it did not matter that he be killed.

[6] Facinus, iudices, quod illa nocte in cubiculo novercae, quod in lectulo factum est, domus tota sensit, nemo non sibi visus est iuxta fuisse; excitari sola noverca non potuit illo loco, unde venerat fragor. concurrit familia, quo sollicitos atque trepidantis ducebat strepitus, quem sequebantur: invenerunt senem occisum, novercam iuxta cadaver sic iacentem, ne statim possent interrogare, quis occidisset. nuntiatum est deinde facinus et caeco; inventus est, quod innocentiae sufficit, non a scelere rediens, stans in limine cubiculi sui animo quo discurrebant videntes.

[6] The deed, judges, which that night in the stepmother’s bedchamber, which on the little bed was done, the whole house felt; no one did not seem to himself to have been close by. To be roused only the stepmother could not, in that very place whence the crash had come. The household runs together, where the clatter was leading the anxious and trembling, which they were following: they found the old man slain, the stepmother lying next to the cadaver thus, so that they could not immediately ask who had killed him. Then the crime was announced also to the blind man; he was found—as suffices for innocence—not returning from the crime, standing on the threshold of his own bedroom, with his mind running to and fro as the seeing were running about.

ut deinde ferrum iuvenis inquireretur, exegit eadem utique, quae postulaverat de veneno. quod in lectulo gladius cruentatus inventus est, non deprecor, iudices, quin contra caecitatem non minus argumentum putetis quam quod inveniri potuit venenum. in parricidii suspicione gladius cruentatus novissima probatio debet esse, non sola.

that then the blade of the youth be inquired after, she assuredly exacted the same things which she had demanded concerning the venom. as for the fact that a blood-stained sword was found in the little bed, I do not deprecate, judges, your considering it no less an argument against the blindness than that the venom could be found. under a suspicion of parricide, a blood-stained sword ought to be the very last proof, not the sole one.

Ignoscite magnorum periculorum metus, ignoscite humana discrimina; defensionem iuvenis lacrimis primum gemituque prosequimur. perdidit infelix patrem, perdidit [et] caecitas illum senem, cuius oscula, cuius amplexum imponebat vulneribus oculorum, cui praestabat caecus, ut viveret. misera ignorantia, misera debilitas, quod te noverca non sic potius decipere maluit, ut biberes venenum!

Forgive the fears of great perils, forgive human crises; we accompany the youth’s defense first with tears and with a groan. The unlucky one has lost his father, and blindness has deprived him of that old man as well, whose kisses, whose embrace he would lay upon the wounds of his eyes, for whom, though blind, he provided support, that he might live. Wretched ignorance, wretched debility, that your stepmother did not prefer rather to deceive you thus, so that you would drink poison!

[7] Facinus est, iudices, comparationem fieri, utri credibilius sit parricidium. idem vos putatis efficere noctium merita et affectus osculis blanditiisque quaesitos quod natalium pignorumque reverentias? nullas ego facilius perire crediderim quam corporum caritates, et, licet matrimoniis paulatim reverentia gravitatis accedat, possunt tamen distrahi facilitate quae coeunt.

[7] It is an outrage, judges, that a comparison be made as to which of the two parricide is more credible. Do you think that the deserts of nights and the affections sought by kisses and blandishments accomplish the same as the reverences due to birth and to pledges (children)? I would more readily believe no loves to perish than the loves of bodies; and, although to marriages there gradually comes a reverence of gravity, yet the things that come together can be drawn apart by the very facility with which they cohere.

uxor est, quam iungit, quam diducit utilitas, cuius haec sola reverentia est, quod videtur inventa causa liberorum. aspicimus matrimoniorum singula momenta rixantia; mutant cotidie domos et per amplexus lectulosque discurrunt. placet etiam post liberos alius maritus, et, unde deprehendas omnium scelerum facilitatem, +possunt non amare viventes+. quid, si huic uxoriae vilitati novercale nomen adiungas?

She is a wife, whom utility joins and whom utility separates, whose sole reverence is this: that she seems invented as a cause for children. We behold the individual moments of marriages wrangling; they change houses daily and run to and fro through embraces and little beds. Even after children another husband pleases, and—whence you may deprehend the facility of every crime—+they can not love the living+. What then, if you add the stepmotherly (novercal) name to this wifely cheapness?

mulieri, quae post liberos inducitur, matrimonii non contingit tota reverentia.

To the woman who is introduced after children, the entire reverence of matrimony does not befall.

[8] Quanto alios praestat affectus diligere vitae, lucis auctorem! liberi ac parentis non alius mihi videtur affectus quam quo rerum natura, quo mundus ipse constrictus est. quisquamne mortalium confodiet illud sacrum venerandumque corpus, quod potest ex ignibus rapi, pro quo bene consumuntur oculi?

[8] How much the affection that loves the Author of life, of light, surpasses others! The affection of child and parent seems to me no other than that by which the nature of things—by which the world itself—is bound together. Will any of mortals stab that sacred and to‑be‑venerated body, which can be snatched from the fires, for which the eyes are well spent?

non invenio, iudices, quemadmodum possit esse citra liberos salva reverentia: non est difficile, ut maritum uxor occidat, si non est difficilius, ut filius patrem.

I do not find, judges, how reverence can be kept safe without children; it is not difficult for a wife to kill her husband, if it is not more difficult for a son to kill his father.

Non est, iudices, quod putetis inter mulierem et virum de scelere quaeri, neque est, quod se noverca sexus occasione tueatur; maior est caecitatis infirmitas. sunt et feminis ad scelera vires, cum habent causas virorum. quin immo, si interroges, facilius haec pectora metus, odium, ira corrumpunt, et, quoniam non habent roboris tantum, unde vitia mentium vincant, plerumque facinus infirmitate fecerunt.

Judges, there is no reason for you to think that the question is between woman and man about a crime, nor is there reason for a stepmother to defend herself by the occasion of sex; the infirmity of blindness is the greater. Women too have strength for crimes, when they have the causes of men. Nay rather, if you ask, fear, hatred, anger more easily corrupt these hearts; and, since they do not have so much robustness, whereby they might conquer the vices of the mind, for the most part they have committed crime through infirmity.

sane tamen illis sceleribus sufficere non possint, quae discursum, quae exigunt laborem; quod vero tam muliebre possis invenire facinus quam occidere hominem iuxta te iacentem, aggredi senem, qui se tuis crediderit amplexibus, cuius somnos ipsa disponas, ipsa custodias? omnis alius percussor deprehendi potest, antequam feriat; uxor non sentitur, nisi dum occidit. non est, iudices, incredibile, ut occiderit mulier hominem, quem dicitur potuisse caecus occidere.

indeed, however, they cannot suffice for those crimes that involve running to and fro, that exact labor; but what crime could you find so womanish as to kill a man lying next to you, to attack an old man who has entrusted himself to your embraces, whose slumbers you yourself arrange, you yourself guard? every other assassin can be apprehended before he strikes; a wife is not noticed, except while she is killing. it is not, judges, unbelievable that a woman killed a man whom, it is said, even a blind man could have killed.

[9] Facinus est, iudices, si caecos habere non credimus nisi necessitatis innocentiam. prima est infirmitas caecitatis, ut nolit. fallitur, quisquis hanc calamitatem non animorum putat esse, sed corporum; totius hominis debilitas est oculos perdidisse, et, si diligenter actus intuearis humanos, ministeria luminum sumus.

[9] It is an outrage, judges, if we do not believe the blind to possess anything except the innocence of necessity. The first infirmity of blindness is that it is not willed. He is mistaken, whoever thinks this calamity to belong not to souls but to bodies; to have lost one’s eyes is a debility of the whole man, and, if you carefully consider human actions, we are the ministers of the eyes.

caecus non irascitur, non odit, non concupiscit, et, cum corpora nostra vigorem de luminibus accipiant, pereunt cum suis vitia causis, en ad quod erumpant manus, quae proxima quaeque tamdiu quaerunt, manus quae sua quoque ministeria non explicant! audebit quicquam corpus illud, quod ad singulos sibi videtur decidere motus, cui quicquid ante se est, donec exploretur, abruptum est? facinus admittet, in quo nihil ipse facturus est, facinus, quod totum credat alio?

The blind man does not grow irate, does not hate, does not burn with concupiscence; and, since our bodies receive vigor from the lights, the vices perish along with their causes. Lo, to what should the hands erupt, which keep seeking whatever is nearest—hands which do not even unfold their own ministrations! Will that body dare anything, which seems to itself to sink at each several motion, to which whatever is before it, until it be explored, is a precipice? Will he commit a crime, in which he himself will do nothing—a crime which he would entrust wholly to another?

quid, si caecitas sit, quam fecerint ignes? nemo in incendio solos ex homine perdit oculos; tunc facies sentit incendium, cum ambusti defecere gressus, cum opponi non possunt pro oculis manus, et ad lumina nostra flammas omnium membrorum vulneribus admittimus. caecum vel hoc faciet innocentem, quod, licet viribus, licet sufficiat audacia, non habet persuasionem hominis, qui possit imponere.

What if the blindness be one that fires have made? No one in a conflagration loses only the eyes from a man; then the face feels the fire, when the steps, scorched, have failed, when the hands cannot be set in opposition in place of the eyes, and to our lights we admit the flames through the wounds of all the limbs. Blindness will make him innocent even on this score: that, though strength be present, though boldness suffice, he does not have the persuasion of a man who could impose upon others.

[10] Nefas est, iudices, hunc iuvenem reliquarum debilitatium ratione defendi; quam incredibile est, ut occiderit patrem, qui pati non potuit ut perderet! rogo, quid opus gladio, quid veneno parricidae? quantulum fuit potius servare matrem!

[10] It is nefarious, judges, that this young man be defended by the rationale of the remaining debilities; how incredible it is that he killed his father, he who could not suffer that he be lost! I ask, what need has a parricide of a sword, what of poison? how little a thing it would rather have been to save his mother!

'rapiatur ex parentibus illa infirmior, illa peritura.' parricidium sic facere potuisti, ut optimus filius videreris.

'let that weaker one be snatched from her parents, that one destined to perish.' you could commit parricide thus, so that you might seem the best son.

Quantum deinde putatis impatientissimis affectibus accessisse? post caecitatem carior est pater, cum in locum successit oculorum, et tunc est infinita pietas, cum in illa debeas amare quod feceris. quid dicitis, iudices?

How much then do you suppose has been added to the most impatient affections? after the cecity the father is dearer, since he has succeeded to the place of the eyes, and then there is infinite piety, when in that you ought to love what you have done. what say you, judges?

transferet in facinus hunc caecitatis suae iuvenis favorem, ad quem cotidie laudatura civitas coit, cui assident omnes liberi, omnes parentes? faciet se pariter pietatis et sceleris exemplum? facilius est, ut occidas patrem, a quo sis ipse servatus.

Will the young man transfer into a crime this favor won by his own blindness, around whom the city, ready to laud, gathers every day, at whose side all children, all parents take their seats? Will he make himself equally an exemplar of pietas and of crime? It is easier that you kill the father by whom you yourself have been saved.

Nullius umquam, iudices, parricidii magis debuistis excutere causas. 'cupiditas,' inquit, 'iuvenem egit in facinus.' hoc si credibile, si verum est, debet videri, mulier heres maritum, an patrem caecus exheredatus occiderit. habeant sane, iudices, hanc nefariae cupiditatis festinationem, quos vitiorum ardor, quos cotidie luxuria praecipitat.

Judges, you ought never to have scrutinized the causes of any parricide more. “Desire,” he says, “drove the youth into the crime.” If this is believable, if it is true, it ought to be considered whether the woman, the heir, killed her husband, or the blind, disinherited man killed his father. Let those, judges, whom the ardor of vices, whom luxury daily precipitates, have, to be sure, this hastiness of nefarious desire.

quo caeco hereditatem vel innocenti? oculi sunt, oculi, per quos paupertatem ferre non possumus, oculi tota nostra luxuria. hi nos in omnia cotidie vitia praecipitant: mirantur, adamant, concupiscunt.

What is an inheritance to a blind man, even to an innocent one? Eyes, eyes—through which we cannot bear poverty; the eyes are our whole luxury. These precipitate us every day into all vices: they marvel, they fall in love, they lust.

facilius impleas animi satietatem. quo, per fidem, divitias iuveni, apud quem omnium rerum diversitas perit? circumdes licet hanc debilitatem fulgore, divitiis, caeco tamen tunc magis cuncta desunt, cum contigerunt, nec invenias debilitatem, cui magis cum paupertate conveniat.

You more easily fill the spirit’s satiety. To what end, by my faith, riches for a youth, in whom the diversity of all things perishes? Though you surround this debility with splendor, with riches, yet to the blind man all things are the more lacking then, when they have been attained; nor will you find a debility that more agrees with poverty.

homo in honorem parentum excaecatus patrimonio sub patre melius utetur.

a man, blinded for the honor of his parents, will use his patrimony better under his father.

[11] Et quod, per fidem, parricidii genus iuvenis elegit? 'venenum,' inquit, 'paravit.' cur, per fidem, si sufficit ferro, facinus adgreditur, cui adhibere conscium, cui praestare debeat ministrum, cum maius habere possit in gladio parricida secretum? an postea iuveni succurrit, quid possent facere manus, et se circa venenum deprehensa debilitas collegit in vires?

[11] And what, by my faith, kind of parricide did the youth choose? “He prepared venom,” he says. Why, by my faith, if steel suffices, does he undertake a crime for which he must employ an accomplice, must provide a minister, when a parricide can have greater secret in the sword? Or did it afterwards occur to the youth what his hands could do, and did the weakness, detected about the poison, gather itself into strength?

nemo, iudices, nemo nescit, quemadmodum possit occidere.

No one, judges, no one is ignorant of how one can kill.

Intellexit, iudices, noverca, quam incredibile esset, ut videretur caecus parasse venenum; igitur adiecit temptatam se, ut illud ipsa porrigeret. date, per fidem, iudices, +invenite+ verba. secreto privignus et noverca de parricidio loquuntur; ita se non putet uterque temptari?

She understood, judges, the stepmother, how unbelievable it would be that a blind man should seem to have prepared poison; therefore she added that she had been solicited, that she herself should proffer it. Grant, by your good faith, judges, +find+ words. In secret the stepson and the stepmother speak about parricide; would not each think that he is being tempted?

quid dicitis, iudices? nullumne tota domo, quod corrumperet, aliud parricida pectus invenit? difficilius hoc credas novercae, si te a nullo alio putes impetraturum.

What say you, judges? In the whole house did the parricide find no other breast to corrupt? You would more hardly credit this of the stepmother, if you suppose you could procure it from no other.

non ergo iuvenis credit hanc omnia loqui cum patre, omnium blanditiarum primum esse sermonem? novercam timeas <nec> negantem. non habet fidem ei credere parricidium, quem scias proditurum, nisi impetraveris.

Does the young man therefore not believe that she says everything to his father, that of all blandishments discourse is the first? fear a stepmother, <even when she denies>. It has no credence to entrust a parricide to one whom you know will betray you, unless you have prevailed.

[12] per fidem, iudices, diligenter attendite criminis diversitatem: temptatam se in parricidii conscientia mulier affirmat. quis vero dubitet numquam hoc privignum fuisse facturum, si habere conscium potuisset alium? 'atqui venenum iam paravit, emit.' et cum haec ipse facere non potuerit caecus, quis est iste, cui parricidii tantum instrumenta creduntur?

[12] By your good faith, judges, diligently attend to the diversity of the charge: the woman affirms that she was tempted in the conscience of parricide. Who, indeed, would doubt that this stepson would never have done this, if he had been able to have another confidant? 'And yet he has already prepared the poison, he bought it.' And since he, blind, could not have been able to do these things himself, who is this man to whom such instruments of parricide are entrusted?

cur non idem porrigit seni? vel, si non potest decipi maritus nisi manibus uxoris, cur ante parricidium struitur quam sciat, an noverca promittat? nam quod vult videri promissam sibi partem bonorum, non est argumentum, nisi et ipsum probatur.

Why does he not offer the same to the old man? Or, if the husband cannot be deceived except by the hands of his wife, why is parricide being set up before it is known whether the stepmother will promise? For as to his wishing it to seem that a share of the estate has been promised to him, that is not an argument, unless that very point too is proven.

mulier, quae sollicitatur ad facinus, quemadmodum sibi consulit, ne illam parricida decipiat? et probationes prospicere debuit seu factura quod rogabatur, seu proditura. adde, quod neque odit novercam caecus, cui parricidium credit, neque hereditate corrumpitur, cuius contentus est parte dimidia.

the woman, who is solicited to a criminal deed, how does she take counsel for herself, lest the parricide deceive her? and she ought to have provided for proofs, whether she were going to do what was being asked, or to betray it. add that the blind man neither hates the stepmother, whom he entrusts with the parricide, nor is he corrupted by the inheritance, of which he is content with the half part.

nemo, iudices, parricidium faciet, quo alius utatur.

no one, judges, will commit parricide, for another to make use of.

Exigo igitur, ut istud parricidium caeci tu socia, tu conscia manifestius probes. quid opus est, ut iam venenum iuvenis habeat? potius sermonibus vestris interpone testes, fac coram servis loquatur, fac intersint amici, fac audiat pater; facillimum est caeci decipere secretum: utere, mulier, homine, qui se commisit oculis tuis, utere membris, quae regis, manibus, quas moves.

I therefore exact that you make more manifest proof of that parricide of the blind man—you, accomplice, you, confidante. What need is there that the youth should now have the poison? Rather, interpose witnesses into your conversations; see to it he speak in the presence of the slaves, see to it friends be present, see to it the father hear; it is very easy to deceive a blind man’s secret: use, woman, the man who has committed himself to your eyes, use the limbs that you rule, the hands that you move.

volo venenum ipse proferat, ipse porrigat, volo te rursus in facinus hortetur, volo plura promittat: parricidium caeci deprehendi potest, dum tibi fatetur.

I want him himself to bring forth the poison, himself to proffer it; I want him again to exhort you into the crime, I want him to promise more: the parricide of the blind man can be detected, while he confesses to you.

[13] 'sed,' inquit, 'inventus est tenens venenum.' exiguum argumentum, noverca, de magna facilitate fecisti: non accusas caecum sed ostendis. homo expositus ad omnem occasionem, ad omne ludibrium, quem tactus, quem proxima quaeque decipiunt, quid refert, quid in sinu habeat, ille, quem deprehendere possis qualem relinquas, a quo modo noverca digressa est, cuius ordinavit vestes, tetigit sinus, membra composuit? venenum potest habere sic, ut nesciat, potest sic, ut aliud putet.

[13] 'but,' she says, 'he was found holding venom.' a meager argument, stepmother; you have made it a matter of great facility: you do not accuse the blind man but you point him out. a man exposed to every occasion, to every mockery, whom touch deceives, whom each and every thing nearby deceives—what does it matter what he has in his bosom, that man whom you can apprehend just as you leave him, from whom just now the stepmother has departed, whose garments she arranged, she touched his bosom, she composed his limbs? he can have venom in such a way that he does not know, he can have it in such a way that he thinks it something else.

si mehercule volueris, tenebit et palam, si iusseris, accipiet coram servulis, coram amicis; et, si venenum non dices, hauriet, bibet. nullo magis, iudices, argumento potest innocentia caecitatis intellegi, quam quod videtur deprehensus iuvenis: si parricida est et exquiritur, hanc saltem sibi praestabit dissimulationem, ne teneat venenum.

If, by Hercules, you wish, he will even hold it openly; if you command, he will receive it in the presence of the little servants, in the presence of friends; and, if you do not say “poison,” he will quaff it, he will drink. By no argument more, judges, can the innocence of blindness be understood, than by the fact that the youth seems to have been apprehended: if he is a parricide and is being sought out, he will at least provide himself this dissimulation, not to hold the poison.

Neminem, iudices, credo mirari, quod iuvenis interrogatus, cui parasset, verba non habuit. non fuit illud patris indignatio, non fuit dolor; venenum iuvenis expavit. auferunt nobis vocem quae fieri posse non credimus, et silentium est admiratio subita miserorum.

I believe no one, judges, marvels that the young man, when interrogated for whom he had prepared it, had no words. That was not a father’s indignation, it was not grief; the young man shuddered at the poison. Things which we do not believe can happen take away our voice, and silence is the sudden astonishment of the wretched.

nescit tacere deprehensorum scelerum trepidatio, et statim respondet illa cum suo sibi scelere parata defensio: tacere facilius est deceptis quam deprehensis. quid, per fidem, facere vultis iuvenem, quem de parricidio consulit pater ille servatus? miror hercule non dixisse: 'volui, sum veneficus, sum parricida.' et invidiam putarem, si confessus esset.

The trepidation of detected crimes does not know how to keep silent, and at once that defense, prepared together with its own crime, replies: to keep silent is easier for the deceivers than for the detected. What, by my faith, do you wish the young man to do, whom that father, saved alive, questions about parricide? I marvel, by Hercules, that he did not say: “I intended it; I am a poisoner; I am a parricide.” And I would have called it invidious, if he had confessed.

bene quod nescit iuvenis, quemadmodum parricidium neget neque habet illa deprehensorum multa verba. venenum, quod tenet caecus, ipsius est, si illud excuset.

Well that the young man does not know how he should deny parricide, nor has he those many words of the apprehended. The poison, which the blind man holds, is his, if he should excuse it.

[14] 'Sed,' inquit, 'exheredatus a patre est.' poteram, iudices, secretum hoc senis profundumque vocare consilium; contra iuvenem tamen esse non debet, etiam ut de parricidio crediderit novercae. notum hoc, iudices, ac vulgare facinus est, quod plerumque contra liberos amantur uxores, et sequentium matrimoniorum non aliunde quam de damno pietatis affectus est. genus infirmissimae servitutis est senex maritus, et uxoriae caritatis ardorem flagrantius frigidis concipimus adfectibus.

[14] 'But,' he says, 'he was disinherited by his father.' I could, judges, call this the old man’s secret and deep counsel; nevertheless it ought not to tell against the youth, even if he has believed his stepmother about parricide. This, judges, is a known and vulgar crime: that wives are loved in preference to children, and the passion of subsequent marriages arises from nothing else than from a loss to piety. The kind of most infirm servitude is an old husband, and the ardor of uxorial charity we conceive more flamingly out of frigid affections.

quid, quod necesse est inpatientius amet maritus uxorem, qui sibi videtur filium iam perdidisse? facillimum est de caeco parricidium credere, cum hucusque erraveris, ut inquireres. volo scire, iudices, quid fecerit homo senex, qui parricidam filium sciat.

What of this, that it is necessary that a husband love his wife more impatiently, who seems to himself already to have lost his son? It is very easy to believe parricide of the blind man, since you have erred thus far, to the point of inquiring. I wish to know, judges, what the old man did, who knows his son to be a parricide.

non culleum parat, non illud porrigit venenum, non saltem abdicatione dimittit; testamentum tantummodo mutat, et parricida sola paupertate punitur. rogo, quis praecipitat, urget? adeone non potest fieri idem postero die?

he does not prepare the culleus, he does not proffer that poison, he does not even dismiss him by abdication; he only changes the testament, and the parricide is punished by poverty alone. I ask, who precipitates, who urges? Can the same thing not be done on the following day?

gravius hoc faciet pater, si non praestiterit uxori. quid, quod hoc ipsum tam placide, tam quiete facit, quasi captet imponere? quid dicitis, miserorum parentum affectus?

He will do this more gravely as a father, if he has not provided for his wife. What of the fact that he does this very thing so placidly, so quietly, as though he were angling to impose a deception? What say you, affections of wretched parents?

exheredaturus filium pater non advocat propinquos, non contrahit amicos, nullis lacrimis tabulae, nulla vociferatione complentur? nescis, senex, quanta tibi opus sit ratione tabularum: exheredas miserabilem parricidam.

A father about to disinherit his son—does he not call in kinsmen, does he not gather friends; are the tablets filled with no tears, with no vociferation? Do you not know, old man, how much you have need of reasoning in the matter of the tablets: you are disinheriting a pitiable parricide.

[15] non est, iudices, quod putetis ideo nullum adiectum ad exheredationem iuvenis elogium, quia de scelere constaret: nemo umquam ideo non obiecit filio parricidium, quia crederetur.

[15] there is no reason, judges, for you to think that for this reason no statement of grounds was appended to the youth’s disinheritance—because the crime was established: no one ever for that reason failed to charge his son with parricide, because it would be believed.

Per fidem, iudices, duorum, inter quos de scelere quaeritur, aestimemus mutato testamento proximam noctem. iuvenis, seu innocens, seu parricida est, adhuc in suo silentio stupet, nec facile dixerim, unde maior trepidatio, si alienum tenuit an suum venenum. noverca rem inter manus habet anxiam.

By your good faith, judges, let us assess, of the two between whom inquiry is made concerning the crime, the last night, with the testament altered. the youth, whether he is innocent or a parricide, is still stupefied in his own silence, nor would I easily say whence the greater trepidation comes, whether he held another’s poison or his own. the stepmother has an anxious matter on her hands.

trepidam. nihil est difficilius quam differre gaudium, quod scias te non mereri, et filio se esse praelatam non est longa persuasio; expectat nunc, ut iuvenis agat causam postero die, ut credulum senem propinqui, ut civitas universa castiget, et se noverca sensit unius tantum noctis heredem. non creditur testamento hominis, qui eadem nocte, qua filium exheredavit, occiditur.

agitated. Nothing is more difficult than to defer a joy which you know you do not merit, and that she has been preferred to the son is no lengthy persuasion; she now waits for the young man to plead his cause on the next day, for the kinsmen to castigate the credulous old man, for the whole city to chastise, and the stepmother perceived herself to be the heiress of only a single night. No credence is given to the testament of a man who is killed on the same night on which he disinherited his son.

[16] Tractemus nunc, iudices, ipsius sceleris comparationem. caecus ignorat, ubi iaceat senex, an iam quiescat; et quam difficile est, ut credat illum, qui modo de parricidio suspicatus est, dormire patrem! tu sentis, quando senem vicerit lassitudo curarum.

[16] Let us now, judges, handle the contrivance of the crime itself. the blind man does not know where the old man lies, or whether he is now at rest; and how difficult it is for him who only just now suspected parricide to believe that his father is sleeping! you sense when the weariness of cares has overcome the old man.

caeco quis renuntiat +quod diei noctisve secretum aut sitis+ pariter, an una quiescentium fores vallaverit cura servorum? tu facere potes occasionem, uxor et domina. caeco fortassis ad aliud limen errandum est, tibi hoc solum restat, ut ferias.

Who reports to the blind man what secret or site of day or of night, equally, or whether the care of the slaves has with one [bar] barricaded the door of the sleepers? You, wife and mistress, can create the occasion. Perhaps the blind man must wander to another threshold; for you this alone remains: to knock.

caecus necesse est quietem patris ipsa corporum electione confundat, tu iugulum, tu potes pertractare pectus, dum amplecteris. nobis iterum casus, rursus reditus incerta temptanda sunt; tibi restat, ut statim membra conponas, ut quiescas. non sufficiunt facinus facturo solae cogitationes, et vix tam multa pariter sciretis, oculi.

the blind man must confound the father’s quiet by the very selection of bodies; you can feel over the jugular, you can handle the breast, while you embrace. for us, hazards again, a return again, uncertainties must be ventured; for you it remains to set the limbs in order at once, to rest. for one about to commit a crime, thoughts alone do not suffice, and scarcely would eyes know so many things at once.

per fidem, iudices, ab utro credibilius est occisum senem, a noverca, quae prospexit, ut et alius possit esse suspectus, an a iuvene, cuius invidia periturus est, etiam ut illum alius occidat?

By your good faith, judges, by which of the two is it more credible that the old man was slain: by the stepmother, who provided that another too could be suspect, or by the young man, by whose envy he is about to perish, even to the point that another should kill him?

Intuemini, per fidem, iudices, procedentem parricidam. quos non ista vestigia frangant rumpantque somnos! vestigia dura semper errantium, quae non valent suspensis praetemptatisque gressibus librare corpus, et quia diu sunt incerta, nutantia, necesse est gravius premant solum, cui crediderunt.

Behold, by your good faith, judges, the parricide coming forward. Whose sleep would these footsteps not shatter and burst! The steps are always hard of those who err, who are not able, with suspended and tentative paces, to balance the body; and because for a long time they are uncertain, wavering, it is necessary that they press more heavily upon the ground, to which they have entrusted themselves.

quanto ex hoc plus accipiat necesse est illa nocturni silentii quies! <quid,> quod ambulantis caeci nec manus cessant? praemittuntur, explorant, et adesse se nuntiant +illa per quae complexus veniunt.+ non sit in potestate caeci, quin tanto se fateatur strepitu: quicquid occurrit, nequaquam potest evitare caecitas nisi offensa.

how much more must that quiet of nocturnal silence receive from this! <what,> that the hands of the blind man as he walks do not cease either? they are sent ahead, they explore, and they announce that they are present +those things by which embraces come.+ it is not in the blind man’s power but to betray himself by so great a racket: whatever he meets, blindness can by no means evade except by an offense, a collision.

ut ambulare, ut ingredi nocte possimus, dies facit.

Day makes it so that we can walk, so that we can advance by night.

[17] Quam multa deinde supersunt, postquam ad patrem perventum est! exploretur necesse es pariter iacentium prima diversitas, vultus, ora tractentur, detrahantur velamenta corporibus, quaeratur vulneri locus: ita ex duobus neutrum excitat? gravior semper dexterae tractatus errantis.

[17] How many things, then, remain, after one has come to the father! it is necessary that there be explored the first diversity of those lying side by side, let the visages, the mouths be handled, let the coverings be drawn off from the bodies, let the locus of the wound be sought: and thus, out of the two, does he rouse neither? heavier always is the handling of an errant right hand.

paulatim deinde admovendus est pectori mucro, et, ne qua confundatur ignorantia nimium liber ictus, praecedat oportet gladium manus; unde tantum virium caeco, ut in uno statim ictu mors tota peragatur? incertum vulnus sit necesse est, cuius impetum non regitis, oculi, nec possis custodire destinatum ferro locum, dum ad colligendum vulneris pondus dexterae redire permittitur. utrum deinde iuvenis post vulnus unum continuo fugit (et quemadmodum scit, an facinus expleverit?), an potius expectat, ut de parricidio cadaveri credat?

little by little then the blade’s point must be brought to the chest, and, lest by ignorance the too-free stroke be thrown into confusion, the hand ought to precede the sword; whence so much strength for the blind, that in a single stroke at once the whole death be accomplished? the wound must needs be uncertain, whose onrush you, O eyes, do not govern, nor can you safeguard the place destined for the iron, while the right hand is permitted to draw back to gather the weight of the wound. whether then the youth after one wound immediately flees (and how does he know whether he has completed the deed?), or rather does he wait, so that he may trust the parricide to a corpse?

ecce iterum per eadem incerta redeundum est, omnia rursus periculose temptanda <quae> venienti. fidem vestram, iudices, ut nobis prosit argumentum criminis nostri: caecus si nec venire nec reverti sine strepitu potest, neque sic occidere potuit, ut deciperet novercam.

Behold, again there must be a return through the same uncertainties; everything must again be perilously attempted by the one who is coming. By your good faith, judges, may this profit us as an argument of our charge: if a blind man can neither come nor return without a noise, he could not have killed in such a way as to deceive the stepmother.

[18] Te, te hoc loco, mulier, interrogo: quae tam gravis quies, ut te mors tam vicina non excitet? parvulis noctium turbamur offensis, excitant nos exigui plerumque motus, vox incerta, longinqua, et aliquando ipsum silentium. illorum sane iuxta te suprema non sentias, quos senectus languoresque dissolvunt; hominis, qui ferro occiditur, tumultuatur exitus et similis est repugnanti.

[18] You, you I question in this place, woman: what sleep is so heavy that death so near does not rouse you? we are disturbed by the very small offenses of the nights, slight motions for the most part rouse us, an uncertain, far-off voice, and sometimes silence itself. Granted, you would not sense right beside you the last moments of those whom old age and languors dissolve; but the departure of a man who is slain by iron is tumultuous and is like one resisting.

quid, quod necesse est nulla mors inquietior sit, quam quae statim tota est? nam quod dormiens occisus est, non est, quod sic aestimetis, tamquam per illam quietem transierit in mortem; sit aliquid necesse est inter soporem mortemque medium, nec potest iungi tanta diversitas, cum sit somnus ipse pars vitae. non multum interest, quietem nostram ratio vitae rumpat an mortis: hominem, qui dormiens occiditur, ipsa mors excitat.

What of the fact that it must be that no death is more unquiet than that which is straightway entire? For as to the claim that he was slain while sleeping, you should not assess it as though through that quiet he passed into death; there must be something intermediate between slumber and death, nor can so great a diversity be conjoined, since sleep itself is a part of life. It makes no great difference whether our quiet is broken by the principle of life or of death: a man who is killed while sleeping is awakened by death itself.

sane non habuerit supremam vocem, habet utique palpitationes, habet motus et quicquid totus lectulus sciat. ecquando, mulier, seni tuo blandius inplicita iacuisti? sicine dormis, quae modo turbasti totam domum, cuius privignus parricida, miser est maritus?

Granted he did not have a last utterance, he surely has palpitations, has motions, and whatever the whole little bed would know. Ever, woman, have you lain more fondly entwined with your old man? Is this how you sleep—you who just now threw the whole house into turmoil, whose step‑son is a parricide, whose husband is wretched?

en ecce vitalibus ruptis in amplexus tuos effunditur cruor, et fugiens per vulnus anima agit ante se anhelitus, agit crebra suspiria. en iterum largus ille sanguis circa tuos duratur artus, stringeris deficientium rigore membrorum; non moveris, non expavescis, sed dormis per tot diversitates? non relinquitur, quid aliud simulare possit mulier, cui necesse est iuxta eum inveniri, quem occidit.

Lo, behold, with the vitals ruptured, gore is poured out into your embraces, and the soul, fleeing through the wound, drives before it gasps, drives frequent sighs. Lo again that copious blood is hardened around your limbs; you are constricted by the rigor of failing members; you do not move, you do not take fright, but you sleep amid so many diversities? There is nothing left that a woman could simulate, who must be found next to him whom she has killed.

[19] non est, iudices, quod incredibile putetis, ut quis perferat dormientis simulationem; nihil est, quod facilius humana calliditas possit imitari. sic quidam cadaverum expressere pallorem, et contra verbera, experimenta telorum mortium pertulere patientiam. quanto facilius simulare rem, cuius imitationi sufficit clusisse lumina, laxasse membra, dedisse suspiriis modum et anhelitus neglegenter egisse!

[19] there is no reason, judges, for you to think it incredible that someone sustain the simulation of a sleeper; there is nothing that human cleverness can more easily imitate. thus certain men have expressed the pallor of cadavers, and have borne with patience against blows, the experiments of deadly weapons. how much more easily to simulate a thing, for the imitation of which it suffices to have closed the eyes, relaxed the limbs, given measure to the sighs, and managed the breaths carelessly!

inter dormientem simulantemque non est nisi conscientia. nam quod ad tot vestigia, tot manus, tot proclamationes in eodem tenore duravit, nolite mirari: facilius excites dormientem, et haec est omnium natura rerum, ne quid diutius perferas quam quod imitaris. simulare somnum habet et hanc facilitatem, quod videtur similis excitato, qui deprehensus est.

Between a sleeper and one simulating there is nothing except consciousness. For as to her having endured in the same tenor amid so many vestiges, so many hands, so many outcries, do not marvel: you more easily rouse a sleeper, and this is the nature of all things, that one does not endure anything longer than what one imitates. To simulate sleep has also this facility, that the one who is caught seems like someone awakened.

quid hoc esse vis, mulier, quod te non excitat res, qua domus tota turbatur? illam servilis neglegentiae quietem, illos sine curis, sine adfectibus somnos, illos, qui non statim promo timore prosiliunt, fragor noctis agitavit. quantus deinde fremitus discurrentium tota domo!

What would you have this be, woman, that the affair by which the whole house is thrown into turmoil does not rouse you? That repose of servile negligence, those slumbers without cares, without affections, those which do not straightway leap up at the first alarm, the night’s din has agitated. How great then was the roar of those running to and fro through the whole house!

prima sunt evigilantium praesidia clamores, nec potest quieta res esse noctis auxilium. minore strepitu commota es, cum excitareris. ecce cubiculi vestri fores trepidae festinationis effringuntur inpulsu, en lumen super lectulum ingerunt multae manus, et ad prostratorum corporum +similitudinem+ cubiculum gemitu, vociferatione completur: tu iaces et in cadaveris similitudinem usque resoluta es. hoc tu quietem putas esse?

the first safeguards of those waking are clamors, nor can the aid of the night be a quiet matter. you were stirred by a lesser din when you were being roused. behold, the doors of your bedchamber are broken open by the impact of anxious haste, lo, many hands pour light upon your little bed, and, to the +likeness+ of prostrate bodies, the chamber is filled with groaning, with vociferation: you lie there and are relaxed right into the likeness of a cadaver. do you think this is repose?

patientia est.

It is patience.

[20] Vestrae, iudices, aestimandum relinquo prudentiae strepitum, quem in cubiculo senis fuisse confessi sunt, qui illo potissimum concurrerunt, utrum putetis factum conluctatione morientis, an a peracta caede referentis gladium mulieris fuisse discursum, an hoc quoque inter artes novercae, ut omnibus sceleris sui partibus sensim quieteque dispositis ipsa ad excitandam familiam fecerit strepitum, cui hoc solum supererat, ut sic inveniretur. fragor, quo familia excitata est, si redeuntis caeci fuit, deprehensus iuvenis esset, antequam gladium referret.

[20] I leave to your prudence, judges, the appraisal of the noise, which those who chiefly converged there confessed to have been in the old man’s bedchamber—whether you think it was made by the struggling of the dying man, or that, after the murder was accomplished, it was the scurrying of the woman carrying back the sword, or that this too was among the stepmother’s arts: that, with all the parts of her crime arranged gradually and quietly, she herself made the noise to rouse the household—for whom this alone remained, that she be found thus. The crash by which the household was awakened, if it was of the returning blind man, the youth would have been apprehended before he returned the sword.

Ut sciatis, iudices, neminem fuisse in domo, quem non fragor ille confuderit, caecus quoque inventus in limine est, sicut solet ultro citroque commeare. iuvenis, si inter suum patrisque cubiculum facile discurrit, quid adhuc in limine facit? evasit, effugit, gladium iam reposuit.

So that you may know, judges, that there was no one in the house whom that crash did not confound, the blind man too was found on the threshold, as he is wont to go to and fro. The young man, if he easily runs between his own and his father’s bedchamber, what is he still doing on the threshold? He has gotten away, fled, has already put the sword back.

et quanto facilius est caeco simulare somnos, vultum quietis imitari!

and how much easier it is for a blind man to simulate slumbers, to imitate the countenance of repose!

[21] quod, per fidem, maius subitae confusionis argumentum est, quam quod caecus exiluit et stetit! gravius necesse est expavescant, quibus de sollicitudine sua non renuntiant oculi, et, cum clusus animus non exit in visus, non habet, unde timori suo par sit. deprehensus est iuvenis, ubi illum destituerat impetus timoris.

[21] what, by my faith, is a greater argument of sudden confusion than that the blind man leapt out and stood! More grievously must those be panic-stricken, whose eyes do not report back concerning their own solicitude; and, since the mind, being shut in, does not exit into sight, it has nothing by which its fear may find an equal. The young man was apprehended where the impetus of fear had abandoned him.

potest neglegere caecitas in cubiculo suo ducem, in quo dies omnes cunctasque noctes agit iter, quod iam multis offensis, multis edidicit erroribus: extra limen caecitas est, inde error ac tenebrae. nihil est innocentius caeco, qui nec in scelere deprehensus est, nec in dissimulatione.

Blindness can neglect a guide in its own chamber, in which it makes its journey all the days and all the nights, a route which, after many collisions and many errors, it has learned by heart: beyond the threshold is blindness; from there, error and darkness. Nothing is more innocent than the blind man, who has been apprehended neither in crime nor in dissimulation.

Proclamat hoc loco iuvenis: 'ut primum,' inquit, 'me, pater, fragor domus et velut tui confudere gemitus, iterum tamquam te rapturus exilui. tunc primum miser sensi facinus caecitatis; steti, donec mihi nuntiareris occisus, et in illa discurrentium trepidatione tenui miser otium timoris. o, si numen aliquod paulisper accommodasset oculos!

At this point the youth cries out: 'As soon as,' he says, 'the crash of the house and, as it were, your groans, father, confounded me, again I leapt forth as though to snatch you away. Then for the first time, wretched, I felt the enormity of blindness; I stood, until it was announced to me that you had been slain, and in that trepidation of those running to and fro I, wretched, held the leisure of fear. O, if some numen had for a little while lent me eyes!

primus in cubiculum intrassem patris, invenissem fortassis adhuc aliqua verba morientis, loqui, interrogare potuissem. tarda et trepida sunt officia servorum; ego te deprehendissem, noverca, vigilantem.'

I would have been the first to enter my father’s bedchamber, I might perhaps have found still some words of the dying man, I could have spoken, I could have questioned. The duties of servants are slow and trembling; I would have apprehended you, stepmother, awake.'

[22] 'Sed,' inquit, 'gladius caeci cruentatus inventus est.' non est, iudices, caecitatis audacia de parricidio referre gladium, et homo, cuius paulo ante exquisiti sunt sinus, non referret in cubiculum suum ferrum, quod non tegere posset, non abscondere, et tamen cruentatum sciat. quis hanc iudices, inpudentiam ferat? negat caeco surripi potuisse gladium mulier, quae se quiete defendit; et quanto facilius est somnos decipere miserorum?

[22] 'But,' he says, 'the blind man's sword, bloodied, was found.' It is not, judges, within the audacity of blindness to bring back a sword from a parricide; and a man whose folds of clothing had just now been examined would not bring into his own bedroom a blade which he could neither cover nor conceal, and yet would know to be bloodstained. Who, judges, would bear this shamelessness? The woman, who defends herself by "quiet" (sleep), denies that a sword could have been stolen from a blind man; and how much easier is it to deceive the slumbers of the wretched?

gravior est quies quibus ex lassitudine calamitatium venit. caeco vero facile est etiam vigilanti subripere gladium. +quemadmodum paratur argumentum.

rest is heavier for those to whom it comes from the lassitude of calamities. but indeed it is easy to filch a sword from a blind man even while awake. +how the argument is prepared.

quaedam facere non potest neglegentia, et facilius est, ut caecitatem imitentur oculi. gladium cruentatum reponendi hic tantum causas habet, qui occidit alieno.

Negligence cannot do certain things, and it is easier for the eyes to imitate blindness. Only he has reasons for putting back the bloodstained sword, who has killed with another man's sword.

[23] Sentio, iudices, iamdudum indignari miserrimum iuvenem, quod argumentis, quod probatione defenditur. reddenda sunt maximo virorum patrocinia tam piae caecitatis, et agenda reliqua pars causae admiratione. intueri mihi, iudices, videor expeditionis illius incredibilem novamque faciem: vadit rapto patre iuvenis per ardentes crescentesque flammas, dicturum me putatis, ut evadat, ut fugiat?

[23] I perceive, judges, that the most wretched youth has long been indignant because he is defended by arguments, by proof. The advocacy of the greatest of men must be rendered to such pious blindness, and the remaining part of the case must be conducted with admiration. I seem to myself, judges, to behold the incredible and novel face of that expedition: the youth goes, with his father snatched up, through ardent and increasing flames; do you think I am going to say, so that he may get away, so that he may flee?

properat miser, ut revertatur? en membra contactu stringuntur ignium, pater tamen toto cooperitur amplexu, et ardentibus tunc quoque paene luminibus texerunt manus alterius oculos. hoc nunc me putatis stupere, mirari, quod huic iuvenis oneri per medios ignium globos et ruentia tecta sufficit?

Does the miserable man hasten, that he may turn back? Behold, his limbs are constricted by the contact of the fires; the father nevertheless is covered with an all-encompassing embrace, and, though his eyes then too were almost burning, his hands covered the eyes of the other. Do you think this is what I am now stupefied at, what I marvel at—that the youth is equal to this burden through the very midst of globes of fire and the collapsing roofs?

illud est, cui vix habere possit mortalitas fidem: visus est sibi fecisse rem facilem. quantae, dii deaeque, pietatis audacia est ire rursus in flammas, illo ubi patrem paene perdideris! iam non erat illud penates, iam non erat domus, ubique tamen iuveni videbatur ardere mater.

That is the thing to which mortality could scarcely hold faith: he seemed to himself to have done an easy deed. How great, gods and goddesses, is the audacity of piety, to go back again into the flames, to that place where you had almost lost your father! That was no longer the Penates, that was no longer a home, yet everywhere to the youth it seemed that his mother was burning.

iam miser undique flagrantibus membris, cum discurrentem clusisset ignis, quod solum supererat virium genus, matrem quaerebat oculis. non fuit illud +primum ignium+ perire lumina candentia: non protexerunt flagrantem sua membra faciem, et oculi quaerentibus matrem manibus arserunt. rursus infelix totum tactu perlustrat incendium, et, unde maximus est conlabentium culminum fragor, illo debilitas tamquam inventura revocatur.

now the wretch, with his limbs blazing on all sides, when the fire had shut him in as he ran about, the only kind of strength that remained, was seeking his mother with his eyes. it was not +the first act of the fires+ that the shining eyes should perish: his own limbs did not protect his blazing face, and his eyes burned while his hands were seeking his mother. again the unlucky one surveys the whole conflagration by touch, and to the place whence is the greatest crash of the collapsing roofs, to that spot his weakness is called back, as though about to find her.

solus omnium servatus est beneficio caecitatis.

alone of all, he was preserved by the benefit of blindness.

Protrahatur, iudices, si videtur, in medium reus; plurimum probationibus adicere debent truces vultus, terribilis minaxque facies. hic est, iudices, qui dicitur tota nocte discurrisse, hic ille circumspectus, hic ille felix parricida. recesserunt cuncta debilitatis officia, et hominis, qui circa genua vestra ducendus est, non est qui dirigat gressus, non servuli supersunt, non penates.

Let the defendant, judges, if it seems good, be drawn forth into the midst; savage countenances, a terrible and menacing face, ought to add very much to the proofs. This is, judges, the one who is said to have run about the whole night, this is that circumspect fellow, this that fortunate parricide. All the offices of debility have withdrawn, and as for the man who must be led about your knees, there is no one to direct his steps, no little servants remain, no household gods.

respondete, per fidem, respondete, mortales: utrum hic patrem occidit an perdidit? quid agis, infelicissime iuvenis? rogandum est, neque habes +totas+ preces!

Respond, by good faith, respond, mortals: whether this man slew his father or lost him? What are you doing, most unlucky youth? It must be asked, and you do not have +all+ your pleas!

perit ille vester ambitus, vestra miseratio! sed nefas est, ut reatus iste sentiat debilitatis adversa: nos agedum, iuvenis, ducimus, nostris humeris, nostris manibus innitere, nos tibi pedes, nos accommodamus oculos. quid aversaris, infelix, quid repugnas?

That courting-of-favor of yours, that compassion of yours goes to waste! But it is an impiety that this accused should feel the adverse things of debilitation: come then, young man, we will lead you; lean upon our shoulders, upon our hands; we will be your feet, we will accommodate to you eyes. Why do you turn away, unhappy one, why do you resist?

scimus te non rogare pro vita, sed dura, miser, dura; saltem vive, dum vincas. decet te hic quoque virtutium tuarum cumulus, decet, ut digneris moriturus absolvi.

we know you are not asking for life, but for hard things, wretch, hard ones; at least live, until you may conquer. here too the cumulus—the accumulation—of your virtues befits you; it befits that, about to die, you deign to be absolved.