Tacitus
Roman orator, lawyer, and senator.
Their shields are black, their bodies dyed. They choose dark nights for battle, and, by the dread and gloomy aspect of their death-like host, strike terror into the foe, who can never confront their strange and almost infernal appearance.
Once killing starts, it is difficult to draw the line.
Liberty is given by nature even to mute animals.
All this is unauthenticated, and I shall leave it open.
What is today supported by precedents will hereafter become a precedent.
Conspicuous by his absence.
Tu vero felix, Agricola, non vitae tantum claritate, sed etiam opportunitate mortis.
Auferre, trucidare, rapere, falsis nominibus imperium; atque, ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
Some might consider him as too fond of fame; for the desire for glory clings even to the best men longer than any other passion.
The images of twenty of the most illustrious families—the Manlii, the Quinctii, and other names of equal splendour—were carried before it [the bier of Junia]. Those of Brutus and Cassius were not displayed; but for that very reason they shone with pre-eminent lustre.
To abandon your shield is the basest of crimes; nor may a man thus disgraced be present at the sacred rites, or enter their council; many, indeed, after escaping from battle, have ended their infamy with the halter.
Idque apud imperitos humanitas vocabatur, cum pars servitutis esset.
The desire for safety stands against every great and noble enterprise.
He upbraided Macro, in no obscure and indirect terms, "with forsaking the setting sun and turning to the rising".
…ibi boni mores valent quam alibi bonae leges.
Et maiores vestros et posteros cogitate.
Indeed, the crowning proof of their valour and their strength is that they keep up their superiority without harm to others.
Great empires are not maintained by timidity.
Mercury is the deity whom they chiefly worship, and on certain days they deem it right to sacrifice to him even with human victims.