Plutarch: Lives of the noble Grecians and Romans
returned in safety.
But when the whole strength of the Volscians was brought together into
the field, with great expedition and alacrity, it appeared so
considerable a body, that they agreed to leave part in garrison, for the
security of their towns, and with the other part to march against the
Romans. Marcius now desired Tullus to choose which of the two charges
would be most agreeable to him. Tullus answered, that since he knew
Marcius to be equally valiant with himself, and far more fortunate, he
would have him take the command of those that were going out to the war,
while he made it his care to defend their cities at home, and provide
all conveniences for the army abroad. Marcius thus reinforced, and much
stronger than before, moved first towards the city called Circaeum, a
Roman colony. He received its surrender, and did the inhabitants no
injury; passing thence, he entered and laid waste the country of the
Latins, where he expected the Romans would meet him, as the Latins were
their confederates and allies, and had often sent to demand succors from
them. The people, however, on their part, showing little inclination
for the service, and the consuls themselves being unwilling to run the
hazard of a battle, when the time of their office was almost ready to
expire, they dismissed the Latin ambassadors without any effect; so that
Marcius, finding no army to oppose him, marched up to their cities, and,
having taken by force Toleria, Lavici, Peda, and Bola, all of which
offered resistance, not only plundered their houses, but made a prey
likewise of their persons. Meantime, he showed particular regard for
all such as came over to his party, and, for fear they might sustain any
damage against his will, encamped at the greatest distance he could, and
wholly abstained from the lands of their property.
After, however, that he had made himself master of Bola, a town not
above ten miles from Rome, where he found great treasure, and put almost
all the adults to the sword; and when, on this, the other Volscians that
were ordered to stay behind and protect their cities, hearing of his
achievements and success, had not patience to remain any longer at home,
but came hastening in their arms to Marcius, saying that he alone was
their general and the sole commander they would own; with all this, his
name and renown spread throughout all Italy, and universal wonder
prevailed at the sudden and mighty revolution in the fortunes of two
nations which the loss and the accession of a single man had effected.
All at Rome was in great disorder; they were utterly averse from
fighting, and spent their whole time in cabals and disputes and
reproaches against each other; until news was brought that the enemy had
laid close siege to Lavinium, where were the images and sacred things of
their tutelar gods, and from whence they derived the origin of their
nation, that being the first city which Aeneas built in Italy. These
tidings produced a change as universal as it was extraordinary in the
thoughts inclinations of the people, but occasioned a yet stranger
revulsion of feeling among the patricians. The people now were for
repealing the sentence against Marcius, an calling him back into the
city; whereas the senate, being assembled to preconsider the decree,
opposed and finally rejected the proposal, either out of the mere humor
of contradicting and withstanding the people in whatever they should
desire, or because they were unwilling, perhaps, that he should owe his
restoration to their kindness or having now conceived a displeasure
against Marcius himself, who was bringing distress upon all alike,
though he had not been ill treated by all, and was become, declared
enemy to his whole country, though he knew well enough that the
principal and all the better men condoled with him, and suffered in his
injuries.
This resolution of theirs being made public, the people could proceed no
further, having no authority to pass anything by suffrage, and enact it
for a law, without a previous decree from the senate. When Marcius
heard of this, he was more exasperated than ever, and, quitting the
seige of Lavinium, marched furiously towards Rome, and encamped at a
place called the Cluilian ditches, about five miles from the city. The
nearness of his approach did, indeed, create much terror and
disturbance, yet it also ended their dissensions for the present; as
nobody now, whether consul or senator, durst any longer contradict the
people in their design of recalling Marcius but, seeing their women
running affrighted up and down the streets, and the old men at prayer in
every temple with tears and supplications, and that, in short, there was
a general absence among them both of courage and wisdom to provide for
their own safety, they came at last to be all of one mind, that the
people had been in the right to propose as they did a reconciliation
with Marcius, and that the senate was guilty of a fatal error to begin a
quarrel with him when it was a time to forget offenses, and they should
have studied rather to appease him. It was, therefore, unanimously
agreed by all parties, that ambassadors should be dispatched, offering
him return to his country, and desiring he would free them from the
terrors and distresses of the war. The persons sent by the senate with
this message were chosen out of his kindred and acquaintance, who
naturally expected a very kind reception at their first interview, upon
the score of that relation and their old familiarity and friendship with
him; in which, however, they were much mistaken. Being led through the
enemy's camp, they found him sitting in state amidst the chief men of
the Volscians, looking insupportably proud and arrogant. He bade them
declare the cause of their coming, which they did in the most gentle and
tender terms, and with a behavior suitable to their language. When they
had made an end of speaking, he returned them a sharp answer, full of
bitterness and angry resentment, as to what concerned himself, and the
ill usage he had received from them; but as general of the Volscians, he
demanded restitution of the cities and the lands which had been seized
upon during the late war, and that the same rights and franchises should
be granted them at Rome, which had been before accorded to the Latins;
since there could be no assurance that a peace would be firm and
lasting, without fair and just conditions on both sides. He allowed
them thirty days to consider and resolve.
The ambassadors being departed, he withdrew his forces out of the Roman
territory. This, those of the Volscians who had long envied his
reputation, and could not endure to see the influence he had with the
people laid hold of, as the first matter of complaint against him. Among
them was also Tullus himself, not for any wrong done him personally by
Marcius, but through the weakness incident to human nature. He could
not help feeling mortified to find his own glory thus totally obscured,
and himself overlooked and neglected now by the Volscians, who had so
great an opinion of their new leader that he alone was all to them,
while other captains, they thought, should be content with that share of
power, which he might think fit to accord. From hence the first seeds
of complaint and accusation were scattered about in secret, and the
malcontents met and heightened each other's indignation, saying, that to
retreat as he did was in effect to betray and deliver up, though not
their cities and their arms, yet what was as bad, the critical times and
opportunities for action, on which depend the preservation or the loss
of everything else; since in less than thirty days' space, for which he
had given a respite from the war, there might happen the greatest
changes in the world. Yet Marcius spent not any part of the time idly,
but attacked the confederates of the enemy ravaged their land, and took
from them seven great and populous cities in that interval. The Romans,
in the meanwhile, durst not venture out to their relief; but were
utterly fearful, and showed no more disposition or capacity for action,
than if their bodies had been struck with a palsy, and become destitute
of sense and motion. But when the thirty days were expired, and Marcius
appeared again with his whole army, they sent another embassy- to
beseech him that he would moderate his displeasure, and would withdraw
the Volscian army, and then make any proposals he thought best for both
parties; the Romans would make no concessions to menaces, but if it
were his opinion that the Volscians ought to have any favor shown them,
upon laying down their arms they might obtain all they could in reason
desire.
The reply of Marcius was, that he should make no answer to this as
general of the Volscians, but, in the quality still of a Roman citizen,
he would advise and exhort them, as the case stood, not to carry it so
high, but think rather of just compliance, and return to him, before
three days were at an end, with a ratification of his previous demands;
otherwise, they must understand that they could not have any further
freedom of passing through his camp upon idle errands.
When the ambassadors were come back, and had acquainted the senate with
the answer, seeing the whole state now threatened as it were by a
tempest, and the waves ready to overwhelm them, they were forced, as we
say in extreme perils, to let down the sacred anchor. A decree was
made, that the whole order of their priests, those who initiated in the
mysteries or had the custody of them, and those who, according to the
ancient practice of the country, divined from birds, should all and
every one of them go in full procession to Marcius with their pontifical
array, and the dress and habit which they respectively used in their
several functions, and should urge him, as before, to withdraw his
forces, and then treat with his countrymen in favor of the Volscians.
He consented so far, indeed, as to give the deputation an admittance
into his camp, but granted nothing at all, nor so much as expressed
himself more mildly; but, without capitulating or receding, bade them
once for all choose whether they would yield or fight, since the old
terms were the only terms of peace. When this solemn application proved
ineffectual, the priests, too, returning unsuccessful, they determined to
sit still within the city, and keep watch about their walls, intending
only to repulse the enemy, should he offer to attack them, and placing
their hopes chiefly in time and in extraordinary accidents of fortune;
as to themselves, they felt incapable of doing any thing for their own
deliverance; mere confusion and terror and ill-boding reports possessed
the whole city; till at last a thing happened not unlike what we so
often find represented, without, however, being accepted as true by
people in general, in Homer. On some great and unusual occasion we find
him say: --
But him the blue-eyed goddess did inspire;
and elsewhere: --
But some immortal turned my mind away,
To think what others of the deed would say;
and again: --
Were 't his own thought or were 't a god's command.
People are apt, in such passages, to censure and disregard the poet, as
if, by the introduction of mere impossibilities and idle fictions, he
were denying the action of a man's own deliberate thought and free
choice; which is not, in the least, the case in Homer's representation,
where the ordinary, probable, and habitual conclusions that common
reason leads to are continually ascribed to our own direct agency. He
certainly says frequently enough: --
But I consulted with my own great soul;
or, as in another passage: --
He spoke. Achilles, with quick pain possessed,
Revolved two purposes in his strong breast;
and in a third: --