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Letters of the Younger Pliny, First Series — Volume 1 By: the Younger Pliny (62?-113) |
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FIRST SERIES. THE WALTER SCOTT PUBLISHING CO., LTD,
LONDON AND FELLING ON TYNE.
NEW YORK: 3 EAST 14TH STREET. NOTE. In the following translation the Teubner text, edited by Keil,
has been followed.
INTRODUCTION. Some slight memoir and critical estimate of the author of this
collection of Letters may perhaps be acceptable to those who are
unfamiliar with the circumstances of the times in which he lived.
Moreover, few have studied the Letters themselves without feeling a warm
affection for the writer of them. He discloses his character therein so
completely, and, in spite of his glaring fault of vanity and his endless
love of adulation, that character is in the main so charming, that one
can easily understand the high esteem in which Pliny was held by the
wide circle of his friends, by the Emperor Trajan, and by the public at
large. The correspondence of Pliny the Younger depicts for us the
everyday life of a Roman gentleman in the best sense of the term. We
see him practising at the Bar; we see him engaged in the civil
magistracies at Rome, and in the governorship of the important province
of Bithynia; we see him consulted by the Emperor on affairs of state,
and occupying a definite place among the "Amici Caesaris." Best of all,
perhaps, we see him in his daily life, a devoted scholar, never so happy
as when he is in his study, laboriously seeking to perfect his style,
whether in verse or prose, by the models of the great writers of the
past and the criticisms of the friends whom he has summoned, in a
friendly way, to hear his compositions read or recited. Or again we
find him at one of his country villas, enjoying a well earned leisure
after the courts have risen at Rome and all the best society has betaken
itself into the country to escape the heats and fevers of the capital.
We see him managing his estates, listening to the complaints of his
tenants, making abatements of rent, and grumbling at the agricultural
depression and the havoc that the bad seasons have made with his crops.
Or he spends a day in the open air hunting, yet never omits to take with
him a book to read or tablets on which to write, in case the scent is
cold and game is not plentiful. In short, the Letters of Pliny the
Younger give us a picture of social life as it was in the closing years
of the first, and the opening years of the second century of the
Christian era, which is as fascinating as it is absolutely unique. Pliny was born either in 61 or 62 A.D. at Comum on Lake Larius. His
father, Lucius Caecilius Cilo, had been aedile of the colony, and, dying
young, left a widow, who with her two sons, sought protection with her
brother, Caius Plinius Secundus, the famous author of the Natural
History. The elder Pliny in his will adopted the younger of the two
boys, and so Publius Caecilius Secundus as he was originally called
took thenceforth the name of Caius Plinius, L.F. Caecilius Secundus.
Though later usage has assigned him the name of Pliny the Younger, he
was known to his contemporaries and usually addressed as Secundus. But
in his early years Pliny was placed under the guardianship of Virginius
Rufus, one of the most distinguished Romans of his day, a successful and
brilliant general who had twice refused the purple, when offered to him
by his legionaries, and who lived to a ripe old age the Wellington of
his generation. So it was at Comum that he spent his early boyhood, and
his affection for his birthplace led him in later years to provide for
the educational needs of the youth of the district, who had previously
been obliged to go to Mediolanum (Milan) to obtain their schooling.
What can be better, he asks, than for children to be educated where they
are born, so that they may grow to love their native place by residing
in it? Pliny was fortunate in having so distinguished an uncle. On the
accession of Vespasian, the elder Pliny was called to Rome by the
Emperor, and when his nephew vixdum adolescentus joined him in the
capital, he took charge of his studies... Continue reading book >>
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