Private

Many a time the emperor trusted me with secret despatches and ordered me to write them for him (he recognized my patriotism and my love for the Romans), suggesting that I should voluntarily humiliate...

187. It was not merely the exceptional beauty of the whole, composed as it was of most beautiful parts, but just as much the individual details that attracted the spectator’s attention, and although he...

The old foundations were raised and strengthened, or else sunk deeper. On these latter bigger and more ornate pillars were set up. Everything was done on a more artistic scale. with gold-leaf on the...

182. These acts are of doubtful interpretation — it depends on your point of view — but there was nothing at all moderate about certain other activities which I propose to speak about: he...

Although an ardent student of all branches of rhetoric, he devoted himself to forensic oratory in particular. When delivering a public speech, he cultivated a style both elegant and pure Attic, but in everyday...

And as for his acumen, that was proved by the profits he made; by the clever ways in which he saved labour; by the successful and yet economical basis on which he ran his...

173. I could, if I wished, tell you other anecdotes of this sort about Constantine. There are things which a historian would probably reject, but which a really convincing orator would not disdain to...

The collector of fines was unrelenting in his demands, for the imperial treasury, as well as the public funds, was concerned in the case. The debtor thereupon demanded an audience of the emperor, with...

This gentleness was most obvious in his dealings with moderate offenders — I mean by ‘moderate’ those who did no great harm to others. But if he discovered men going so far as to...

I was not deceived by appearances myself, though, and I knew that he had a temper, and that he held it in check, as a charioteer holds back a spirited horse. So, when the...