_NERO_: To destroy an enemy is the greatest virtue of a leader. _SENECA_: It is a greater virtue to preserve the citizens for the father of the fatherland.[65] _NERO_: It is right for a merciful old man to admonish youth. _SENECA_: Glowing young manhood must be guided more. _NERO_: I think there is enough advice for this period of life. _SENECA_: May the gods always sanction thy policy. _NERO_: I should be foolish to fear the gods for what I myself have done. _SENECA_: Thou shouldst fear them all the more since they have given so much power to thee. _NERO_: Fortune bestows all upon me. _SENECA_: Trust not too much to her compliance. The goddess is fickle. _NERO_: He is incompetent who does not know what he may do. _SENECA_: It is commendable for a ruler to do what is right, not what he may. _NERO_: The crowd tramples upon the humble. _SENECA_: But it crushes the object of its hatred. _NERO_: The sword guards the emperor. _SENECA_: But loyalty better. _NERO_: It is imperative that they fear-- _SENECA_: Compulsion is dangerous. _NERO_: And that they obey my commands. _SENECA_: Grant privileges. _NERO_: I will be master. _SENECA_: This procedure may breed conspiracies. _NERO_: That the sword may destroy this object of contempt? _SENECA_: May this crime never happen! _NERO_: Shall I suffer my life, besides, to be sought so that, unavenged and despised, I may suddenly be overwhelmed. Even far distant exile did not subdue Plautus or Sulla whose persistent wrath arms the servants of crime for my death, since there exists in our city great partiality for these absent men and many foster the hopes of the exiles. May all my possible enemies be put to the sword! May my hated wife perish and follow her beloved brother! May whatever is noble cease to be! _SENECA_: It is glorious for a man to be eminent among illustrious men, to plan for the fatherland, to spare affliction, to refrain from fierce carnage, to control wrath, to give quiet to the world and peace to his own generation. This is the greatest virtue; by this path Heaven is gained. Augustus, the first father of the fatherland, thus attained the stars and is worshiped as a god in the temples.[66] Yet Fortune long tossed him about on land and sea, through all the vicissitudes of war until he crushed the enemy of his father. He bequeathed to thee his own divinity without bloodshed; he held the reins of empire with skillful hand; he made submissive to thy will the land and sea. Bitter envy disappears conquered by blessed harmony. The applause of the equestrian order and of the senate is aroused. Thou, the author of peace and the arbiter of the human race, chosen by the plebeians’ entreaties and the judgment of the senate,[67] now by a sacred resemblance art ruling the world as father of the fatherland. Rome implores thee to guard this appellation and entrusts to thee her own citizens.