For his "remedies"
are what other people call crimes: his cruelty is disguised as
"austerity", his avarice as "economy", while by "discipline" he means
punishing and insulting you. It is but seven months since Nero's
death, and already Icelus alone has embezzled more than all the
depredations of Polyclitus and Vatinius and Aegialus[63] put together.
Why, Vinius would have been less greedy and lawless had he been
emperor himself. As it is, he treats us as his own subjects and
despises us as Galba's. His own fortune alone could provide the
largess which they daily cast in your teeth but never pay into your
pocket.
'Nor in Galba's successor either is there any hope for you. Galba 38
has seen to that. He has recalled from exile the man whose avarice and
sour temper he judged most like his own. You witnessed for yourselves,
my comrades, the extraordinary storm which signified Heaven's
abhorrence at that ill-starred adoption. The Senate and People of Rome
feel the same. They are counting on your courage. You alone can give
strength to the right policy: it is powerless without you, however
good it be. It is not to war and danger that I call you. All the
troops are with us. That single plain-clothes cohort[64] is no longer
a defence to Galba, but a hindrance. When once they have caught sight
of you, when once they come to take their orders from me, the only
quarrel between you will be who can do most to put me in their debt.
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