Claudius the God

The frog-pool wanted a king.

Jove sent them Old King Log.

I have been as deaf and blind and wooden as a log.

The frog-pool wanted a king.

Let Jove now send them Young King Stork.

Caligula's chief fault: his stork-reign was too brief.

My chief fault: I have been far too benevolent.

I repaired the ruin my predecessors spread.

I reconciled Rome and the world to monarchy again.

Rome is fated to bow to another Caesar.

Let him be mad, bloody, capricious, wasteful, lustful.

King Stork shall prove again the nature of kings.

By dulling the blade of tyranny I fell into great error.

By whetting the same blade I might redeem that error.

Violent disorders call for violent remedies.

Yet I am, I must remember, Old King Log.

I shall float inertly in the stagnant pool.

Let all the poisons that lurk in the mud hatch out.

Nobody is familiar with his own profile, and it comes as a shock, when one sees it in a portrait, that one really looks like that to people standing beside one. For one's full face, because of the familiarity that mirrors give it, a certain toleration and even affection is felt; but I must say that when I first saw the model of the gold piece that the mint-masters were striking for me I grew angry and asked whether it was intended to be a caricature. My little head with its worried face perched on my long neck, and the Adam's apple standing out almost like a second chin, shocked me. But Messalina said: "No, my dear, that's really what you look like. In fact, it is rather flattering than otherwise."