He belauds the clemency of a man, who, he tells us
elsewhere, used to kill men with as much _sang froid_ as a dog eats
offal; the prodigious powers of memory of a divine creature who used to
ask people to dice and to dinner whom he had executed the day before,
and who even inquired as to the cause of his wife's absence a few days
after having given the order for her execution; the extraordinary
eloquence of an indistinct stutterer, whose head shook and whose broad
lips seemed to be in contortions whenever he spoke.[32] If Polybius
feels sorrowful, let him turn his eyes to Caesar; the splendour of that
most great and radiant deity will so dazzle his eyes that all their
tears will be dried up in the admiring gaze. Oh that the bright
occidental star which has beamed on a world which, before its rising,
was plunged in darkness and deluge, would only shed one little beam
upon him!
[Footnote 32: These slight discrepancies of description are taken from
counter passages of _Consol, ad Polyb._. and the _Ludus de Morte
Caesaris._]
No doubt these grotesque and gorgeous flatteries, contrasting strangely
with the bitter language of intense hatred and scathing contempt which
Seneca poured out on the memory of Claudius after his death, were penned
with the sole purpose of being repeated in those divine and benignant
ears.
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