Yes, you are right; things go from bad to worse;
And what the end will be I do not know.

 

CETHEGUS. Bah! I am not concerned about the end.
The fleeting moment I enjoy; each cup
Of pleasure as it comes I empty, — letting
All else go on to ruin as it will.

 

LENTULUS. Happy is he who can. I am not blessed
With your indifference, that can outface
The day when nothing shall be left us more,
Nothing with which to pay the final score.

 

STATILIUS. And not the faintest glimpse of better things!
Yet it is true: a mode of life like ours —

 

CETHEGUS. Enough of that!

 

LENTULUS. Today because of debt
The last of my inheritance was seized.

 

CETHEGUS. Enough of sorrow and complaint! Come, friends!
We’ll drown them in a merry drinking bout!

 

COEPARIUS. Yes, let us drink. Come, come, my merry comrades!

 

LENTULUS. A moment, friends; I see old Manlius yonder, —
Seeking us out, I think, as is his wont.

 

MANLIUS. [Enters impetuously.]
Confound the shabby dogs, the paltry scoundrels!
Justice and fairness they no longer know!

 

LENTULUS. Come, what has happened? Wherefore so embittered?

 

STATILIUS. Have usurers been plaguing you as well?

 

MANLIUS. Something quite different. As you all know,
I served with honor among Sulla’s troops;
A bit of meadow land was my reward.
And when the war was at an end, I lived
Thereon; it furnished me my daily bread.
Now is it taken from me! Laws decree —
State property shall to the state revert
For equal distribution. Theft, I say, —
It is rank robbery and nothing else!
Their greed is all they seek to satisfy.

 

COEPARIUS. Thus with our rights they sport to please themselves.
The mighty always dare do what they will.

 

CETHEGUS. [Gaily.] Hard luck for Manlius! Yet, a worse mishap
Has come to me, as I shall now relate.
Listen, — you know my pretty mistress, Livia, —
The little wretch has broken faith with me,
Just now when I had squandered for her sake
The slender wealth that still remained to me.

 

STATILIUS. Extravagance — the cause of your undoing.

 

CETHEGUS. Well, as you please; but I will not forego
My own desires; these, while the day is fair,
To their full measure I will satisfy.

 

MANLIUS. And I who fought so bravely for the glory
And might which now the vaunting tyrants boast!
I shall — ! If but the brave old band were here,
My comrades of the battlefield! But no;
The greater part of them, alas, is dead;
The rest live scattering in many lands. —

 

MANLIUS. Oh, what are you, the younger blood, to them?
You bend and cringe before authority;
You dare not break the chains that bind you fast;
You suffer patiently this life of bondage!

 

LENTULUS. By all the Gods, — although indeed he taunts us,
Yet, Romans, is there truth in what he says.

 

CETHEGUS. Oh, well, — what of it? He is right, we grant,
But where shall we begin? Ay, there’s the rub.

 

LENTULUS. Yes, it is true. Too long have we endured
This great oppression. Now — now is the time
To break the bonds asunder that injustice
And vain ambition have about us forged.

 

STATILIUS. Ah, Lentulus, I understand.