Page:The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, A Roman Slave.djvu/16

 the triumphal palm, saying to the knight, with a mocking smile, "Although I was on your side, Laberius, a Syrian has beaten you." "Such is the fate of man," answered the poet; "to-day, ever thing; to-morrow, nothing." Notwithstanding, to restore the honor of the knight, lost by compliance with his own orders, Cæsar passed him a gold ring, the symbol of knightly rank, and added to it a present of five hundred thousand sesterces (about nineteen thousand dollars).

This solemn contest between the two greatest mine writers of Rome, was not the last; it was sometimes repeated. But Laberius, thenceforth confessing the superiority of his conqueror, was content with saying, that another would some day claim it over him; while Cæsar, according to Aulus Gellius, continued to prefer Syrus. After the death of his rival, and notwithstanding his jealous predictions, Syrus reigned sole master of the stage for nearly fifteen years, - Romae scenam tenet, says St. Jerome in his chronicle; and he continued sole master of it during the rest of his life, which was prolonged, as is generally supposed, to the beginning of the reign of Augustus (year of Rome 725; B.C. 29).

Many testimonials of the ancients prove that the renown of this writer did by no means die with him, and St. Jerome informs us, that after the lapse of four centuries, he was read by the Roman youth in the public schools. Seneca, the tragedian, borrowed from him more than once, and the philosopher often speaks in his praise. "He is," said he, "the most sublime of dramatic poets, when he abstains from the nothings designed for the lowest benches of the amphitheater." "How well, he writes on another occasion, would his sayings become, not the barefooted actors of mimes, but the buskined tragedian!"

Macrobius and Aulus Gellius, who with Seneca have done most to preserve us these sayings, are as loud in their praises of them as the philosopher. Petronius, who admired this author so much as to compare him with Cicero, grants the latter superiority in acquirements only: "Syrus," said he, "had the nobler soul." There is in fact nothing more elevated than the sentiments expressed in the greater