A source-book of ancient history - The Search For Mecca

Oppression 539
Drietor; hence it seemed as if Diocletian could not be
guilty of rapine without also shedding blood,
II.
The Oppression Continues After Diocletian
And now this wrong of which we are going to speak,
how atrocious it is, from what impious disorder it is sprung,
The
how strange to Barbarians, how famihar to Romans I
latter impose grievous exactions upon one another. WTiat
say I? Not on one another, for the thing would be supportable
if each suffered what he inflicted. But the really
crying e\-il is that the many are pillaged by the few, who
regard the public pri\'ileges as their particular booty,
who make private gain of the debts due the state treasury.
And the guilty ones are not the great alone, but the small
as well; not judges only, but their deputies.
For where
are, I do not say the cities merely, but the municipia and
the \dllages, which have not as many tyrants as Curiales?
But they congratulate themselves perhaps on this name
of tyrant, because it seems powerful and honorable. This
is the characteristic of nearly all robbers, to rejoice and
boast if they get the reputation of being more inhuman
than they really are. What then is the place, I would ask, or
where are the leading citizens who do not devour the \"itals
of widows and of orphans and even of all the saints? For
the latter are treated as widows and orphans, either because
they do not w^sh to defend themselves, trusting in
their faith, or because they are unable to do it, on accoimt
of their weakness and iimocence. No one then is safe,
except the great, no one is protected from these devastations
and this universal brigandage, unless perhaps those
who resemble the thieves themselves. Moreover the
thing has come to such excess of wickedness that no one
but the bad can hope to be secure.
The many
are pillaged
by the few.
Salvianus,
Pro'cidence
God, V. 4.
oj
The Curiales
were themselves
oppressed,
and
m their turn
oppressed
those under
their authority;
Ancient
World, 520.
The condition
described
in
this selection
belongs to
the fifth
centurj'—the
time of the
writer.