Plutarch: Lives of the noble Grecians and Romans
kindness, and as became a prince, he restored him to his kingdom of
Epirus, and gave the same obliging reception to all Pyrrhus's
principal commanders, his camp and whole army having fallen into his
hands.
CAIUS MARIUS
We are altogether ignorant of any third name of Caius Marius; as also
of Quintus Sertorius, that possessed himself of Spain; or of Lucius
Mummius that destroyed Corinth, though this last was surnamed
Achaicus from his conquests, as Scipio was called Africanus, and
Metellus, Macedonicus. Hence Posidonius draws his chief argument to
confute those that hold the third to be the Roman proper name, as
Camillus, Marcellus, Cato; as in this case, those that had but two
names would have no proper name at all. He did not, however, observe
that by his own reasoning he must rob the women absolutely of their
names; for none of them have the first, which Posidonius imagines the
proper name with the Romans. Of the other two, one was common to the
whole family, Pompeii, Manlii, Cornelii, (as with us Greeks, the
Heraclidae, and Pelopidae,) the other titular, and personal, taken
either from their natures, or actions, or bodily characteristics, as
Macrinus, Torquatus, Sylla; such as are Mnemon, Grypus, or Callinicus
among the Greeks. On the subject of names, however, the irregularity
of custom, would we insist upon it, might furnish us with discourse
enough.
There is a likeness of Marius in stone at Ravenna, in Gaul, which I
myself saw, quite corresponding with that roughness and harshness of
character that is ascribed to him. Being naturally valiant and
warlike, and more acquainted also with the discipline of the camp
than of the city, he could not moderate his passion when in
authority. He is said never to have either studied Greek, or to have
made use of that language in any matter of consequence; thinking it
ridiculous to bestow time in that learning, the teachers of which
were little better than slaves. So after his second triumph, when at
the dedication of a temple he presented some shows after the Greek
fashion, coming into the theater, he only sat down and immediately
departed. And, accordingly, as Plato often used to say to Xenocrates
the philosopher, who was thought to show more than ordinary harshness
of disposition, "I pray you, good Xenocrates, sacrifice to the
Graces"; so if any could have persuaded Marius to pay his devotions
to the Greek Muses and Graces, he had never brought his incomparable
actions, both in war and peace, to so unworthy a conclusion, or
wrecked himself, so to say, upon an old age of cruelty and
vindictiveness, through passion, ill-timed ambition, and insatiable
cupidity. But this will further appear by and by from the facts.
He was born of parents altogether obscure and indigent, who supported
themselves by their daily labor; his father of the same name with
himself, his mother called Fulcinia. He had spent a considerable
part of his life before he saw and tasted the pleasures of the city;
having passed previously in Cirrhaeaton, a village of the territory
of Arpinum, a life, compared with city delicacies, rude and
unrefined, yet temperate, and conformable to the ancient Roman
severity. He first served as a soldier in the war against the
Celtiberians, when Scipio Africanus besieged Numantia; where he
signalized himself to his general by courage far above his comrades,
and, particularly, by his cheerfully complying with Scipio's
reformation of his army, before almost ruined by pleasures and
luxury. It is stated, too, that he encountered and vanquished an
enemy in single combat, in his general's sight. In consequence of
all this he had several honors conferred upon him; and once when at
an entertainment a question arose about commanders, and one of the
company (whether really desirous to know, or only in complaisance)
asked Scipio where the Romans, after him, should obtain such another
general, Scipio, gently clapping Marius on the shoulder as he sat
next him, replied, "Here, perhaps." So promising was his early youth
of his future greatness, and so discerning was Scipio to detect the
distant future in the present first beginnings. It was this speech
of Scipio, we are told, which, like a divine admonition, chiefly
emboldened Marius to aspire to a political career. He sought, and by
the assistance of Caecilius Metellus, of whose family he as well as
his father were dependents, obtained the office of tribune of the
people. In which place, when he brought forward a bill for the
regulation of voting, which seemed likely to lessen the authority of
the great men in the courts of justice, the consul Cotta opposed him,
and persuaded the senate to declare against the law, and call Marius
to account for it. He, however, when this decree was prepared,
coming into the senate, did not behave like a young man newly and
undeservedly advanced to authority, but, assuming all the courage
that his future actions would have warranted, threatened Cotta unless
he recalled the decree, to throw him into prison. And on his turning
to Metellus, and asking his vote, and Metellus rising up to concur
with the consul, Marius, calling for the officer outside, commanded
him to take Metellus into custody. He appealed to the other
tribunes, but not one of them assisted him; so that the senate,
immediately complying, withdrew the decree. Marius came forth with
glory to the people and confirmed his law, and was henceforth
esteemed a man of undaunted courage and assurance, as well as a
vigorous opposer of the senate in favor of the commons. But he
immediately lost their opinion of him by a contrary action; for when
a law for the distribution of corn was proposed, he vigorously and
successfully resisted it, making himself equally honored by both
parties, in gratifying neither, contrary to the public interest.
After his tribuneship, he was candidate for the office of chief
aedile; there being two orders of them, one the curules, from the
stool with crooked feet on which they sat when they performed their
duty; the other and inferior, called aediles of the people. As soon
as they have chosen the former, they give their voices again for the
latter. Marius, finding he was likely to be put by for the greater,
immediately changed and stood for the less; but because he seemed too
forward and hot, he was disappointed of that also. And yet though he
was in one day twice frustrated of his desired preferment, (which
never happened to any before,) yet he was not at all discouraged, but
a little while after sought for the praetorship, and was nearly
suffering a repulse, and then, too, though he was returned last of
all, was nevertheless accused of bribery.
Cassius Sabaco's servant, who was observed within the rails among
those that voted, chiefly occasioned the suspicion, as Sabaco was an
intimate friend of Marius; but on being called to appear before the
judges, he alleged, that being thirsty by reason of the heat, he
called for cold water, and that his servant brought him a cup, and
as soon as he had drunk, departed; he was, however, excluded from the
senate by the succeeding censors, and not undeservedly either, as was
thought, whether it might be for his false evidence, or his want of
temperance. Caius Herennius was also cited to appear as evidence,
but pleaded that it was not customary for a patron, (the Roman word
for protector,) to witness against his clients, and that the law
excused them from that harsh duty; and both Marius and his parents
had always been clients to the family of the Herennii. And when the
judges would have accepted of this plea, Marius himself opposed it,
and told Herennius, that when he was first created magistrate he
ceased to be his client; which was not altogether true. For it is
not every office that frees clients and their posterity from the
observance due to their patrons, but only those to which the law has
assigned a curule chair. Notwithstanding, though at the beginning of
the suit it went somewhat hard with Marius, and he found the judges
no way favorable to him; yet, at last, their voices being equal,
contrary to all expectation, he was acquitted.
In his praetorship he did not get much honor, yet after it he
obtained the further Spain; which province he is said to have
cleared of robbers, with which it was much infested, the old
barbarous habits still prevailing, and the Spaniards, in those days,
still regarding robbery as a piece of valor. In the city he had
neither riches nor eloquence to trust to, with which the leading men
of the time obtained power with the people, but his vehement
disposition, his indefatigable labors, and his plain way of living,
of themselves gained him esteem and influence; so that he made an
honorable match with Julia, of the distinguished family of the
Caesars, to whom that Caesar was nephew who was afterwards so great
among the Romans, and, in some degree, from his relationship, made
Marius his example, as in his life we have observed.
Marius is praised for both temperance and endurance, of which latter
he gave a decided instance in an operation of surgery. For having,
as it seems, both his legs full of great tumors, and disliking the
deformity, he determined to put himself into the hands of an
operator; when, without being tied, he stretched out one of his legs,
and silently, without changing countenance, endured most excessive
torments in the cutting, never either flinching or complaining; but
when the surgeon went to the other, he declined to have it done,
saying, "I see the cure is not worth the pain."
The consul Caecilius Metellus. being declared general in the war
against Jugurtha in Africa, took with him Marius for lieutenant;
where, eager himself to do great deeds and services that would get
him distinction, he did not, like others, consult Metellus's glory and
the serving his interest, and attributing his honor of lieutenancy
not to Metellus, but to fortune, which had presented him with a
proper opportunity and theater of great actions, he exerted his
utmost courage. That war, too, affording several difficulties, he
neither declined the greatest, nor disdained undertaking the least of
them; but surpassing his equals in counsel and conduct, and matching
the very common soldiers in labor and abstemiousness, he gained great
popularity with them; as indeed any voluntary partaking with people
in their labor is felt as an easing of that labor, as it seems to
take away the constraint and necessity of it. It is the most
obliging sight in the world to the Roman soldier to see a commander
eat the same bread as himself, or lie upon an ordinary bed, or assist
the work in the drawing a trench and raising a bulwark. For they do
not so much admire those that confer honors and riches upon them, as
those that partake of the same labor and danger with themselves; but
love them better that will vouchsafe to join in their work, than
those that encourage their idleness.
Marius thus employed, and thus winning the affections of the
soldiers, before long filled both Africa and Rome with his fame, and
some, too, wrote home from the army that the war with Africa would
never be brought to a conclusion, unless they chose Caius Marius
consul. All which was evidently unpleasing to Metellus; but what
more especially grieved him was the calamity of Turpillius. This
Turpillius had, from his ancestors, been a friend of Metellus, and
kept up constant hospitality with him; and was now serving in the
war, in command of the smiths and carpenters of the army. Having the
charge of a garrison in Vaga, a considerable city, and trusting too
much to the inhabitants, because he treated them civilly and kindly,
he unawares fell into the enemy's hands. They received Jugurtha into