[24] _Memoria rerum gestarum_, 'the recording of events ;' that is, the writing of history, the usefulness (_virtus_) of which is acknowledged. [25] The words _per insolentiam_ belong to _laudando extollere_, and the meaning is, 'that no one may believe me to extol my own occupation with excessive praise.' _Per insolentiam_ is the same as _insolenter_, _per_ expressing manner. [26] 'At least _those_ to whom it appears to be a lofty occupation,' &c. Respecting the omission of the demonstrative pronoun before the relative, even when they are in different cases, see Zumpt, S 765. [27] 'And what distinguished men were unable to attain such a distinction.' Sallust here boasts of having obtained a seat in the senate, and a high magistracy, at a time when it was a matter of difficulty, and when even men of great merit were unable to gain either. But at the same time he adds the remark, that afterwards many undeserving persons were introduced into the senate, to co-operate with whom was no honour. _Quae genera hominum_ refers to the filling up of the senate with persons from the lower classes, and even with such as were not free-born. This connivance at ambitious upstarts, or rather this recklessness in filling up the vacancies in the supreme council of Rome, was shown not only by the dictator J. Caesar, but by his successors in power, M. Antony and Octavianus. In consequence of such things, Sallust adds, it will be evident that he was justified in withdrawing from public life. [28] That is, the celebrated Fabius Maximus, surnamed Cunctator, who distinguished himself by his prudence in the second Punic War. P. Scipio is the elder Scipio Africanus, the conqueror of Hannibal. We might indeed imagine that Sallust is speaking of Scipio Africanus the younger, but his being mentioned along with Fabius Maximus must lead every reader to think of the elder Scipio. [29] The images (_imagines_) of ancestors might indeed be statues, but from the mention of wax in the next sentence, it is evident that we have to understand the wax masks which constituted the greatest ornament in the vestibule of the house of a noble family. The busts (portraits) of those ancestors who had been invested with a curule office were made of wax, and their descendants used these wax portraits to dress up persons representing in public processions the illustrious deceased, adorned with all the insignia of the offices with which they had been invested. Such processions, especially at public funerals (a real kind of masquerade), were intended to keep alive in the memory of the Romans not only the names and exploits of their illustrious statesmen and warriors, but even their bodily appearance. [30] _Scilicet_, in this passage, is not a conjunction as usual, but, as in the earlier Latinity of Plautus and Terence, it is used for _scire