‘Sulla quoque immensis accessit cladibus ultor. 139 Ille quod exiguum restabat sanguinis urbi Hausit: dumque nimis iam putria membra recidit, Excessit medicina modum, nimiumque secuta est, Qua morbi duxere, manus. . . . 143 Tum data libertas odiis, resolutaque legum 145 Frenis ira ruit. Non uni cuncta dabantur, Sed fecit sibi quisque nefas: semel omnia victor Iusserat . . . Hisne Salus rerum, Felix his Sulla vocari, 221 His meruit tumulum medio sibi tollere Campo? Haec rursus patienda manent: hoc ordine belli Ibitur: hic stabit civilibus exitus armis.’ . . . . Sic maesta senectus 232 Praeteritique memor flebat metuensque futuri. 233 LUCAN, _Pharsalia_, ii. 139-148, 221-224. [Linenotes: 139. +Sulla ... ultor+ = _Sulla too in his vengeance came to crown these fearful disasters_. --Haskins. 141-143. +dumque ... manus.+ Sulla is compared to a surgeon who in too great haste to remove the mortified flesh cuts away the sound flesh also. 146. +non uni ...+ = _all crimes were not committed for one man’s sake_, i.e. to please Sulla. 223-224. +hoc ordine belli ibitur+ = _in this course of war events will move_. --H. i.e. History will repeat itself. 232. +sic maesta senectus.+ An old man, who had lived through the Marian and Sullan times, predicts similar horrors of the Civil War between Caesar and Pompey.] +The Proscriptions.+ ‘They were the product not of passion or thirst of blood, but of a cool political calculation, and the conviction of its inevitable necessity.’ --Ihne. B17 A. _Sulla appointed Dictator, 81 B.C._ Dictator creatus (cuius honoris usurpatio per annos centum et viginti intermissa; nam proximus post annum quam Hannibal Italia excesserat, uti appareat populum Romanum usum dictatoris haud metu desiderasse tali quo timuisset potestatem) imperio, {5} quo priores ad vindicandum maximis periculis patriam usi erant, eo in immodicae crudelitatis licentiam usus est. VELLEIUS PATERCULUS, ii. 28. [Linenotes: 1-2. +cuius honoris ... intermissa.+ The last real Dictator (M. Junius Pera) was appointed after Cannae 216 B.C. 5-8. +imperio quo ... usus est.+ ‘The Dictator of the first age of the Republic down to the Punic Wars had always a _well-defined special duty to discharge in a given time_. Sulla’s task was of _a general nature and all-comprehensive range_, and he had the most essential of all monarchical attributes, which is _the unlimited duration of office_.’ --Ihne.] B. _Sulla lays down his Dictatorship, 79 B.C._ Nec minoris impotentiae voces propalam edebat, ut Titus Ampius scribit, ‘Nihil esse rempublicam, {10} appellationem modo sine corpore ac specie. Sullam nescisse litteras, qui dictaturam deposuerit.’ SUETONIUS, _Divus Iulius_, 77.