Page:Correspondence of Marcus Cornelius Fronto volume 2 Haines 1920.djvu/201

 For when the judge is not satisfied with what ought to be sufficient to convince, there is no limit to uncertainty. As for one who starts on the right road a journey has a fixed destination and limit, so for those who get off the path it is easier to roam than to get home

8.    to have shut out from the senate meanwhile, in a case I will not call a good one—let us call it doubtful—a man of such advanced age, most kindly, most gentle, most learned, most dutiful.

That age, which is entitled to exemption from all duties, no law, if they are bound by a military oath  on an old man past his seventieth year you inflict a signal stain, and when, I ask, is it to be effaced? For how brief is the life left him for shaking off his dishonour and looking forward to regaining his former rank. This that you call the meanwhile, how long can he expect to hope for it? If as long as he breathes, it will be but a brief time for hope. Who delays to put the sickle to the sun-browned cornfield? and who defers the vintage when the grapes are ripe and dropping their juice? Who in fact loses time when fruits are mellowing, flowers fading, and torches burning down? Meanwhile is a word that fits the rising sun, for the setting sun the word is at once. Would that old age might put the old man off as you do Before youth, before manhood lies many a lengthy lap of life, just as days and nights may sometimes  185

