It wouldn't do to wear you out with a long oration, Maximus, in responding to these things. There's no need for words when the records speak much more eloquently -- the records in which everything is different from what these rapacious jerks have made up about me, the facts of my present circumstances and my provisions for gaining things in the future. First you'll see that this wealthy woman's dowry was moderate and wasn't a gift, only a trust. Moreover, this marriage was contracted with the provision that if she were to die without our having children, the whole dowry would remain with her sons, Pontianus and Pudens. If, however, she were to die with one son or one daughter remaining, then the dowry would be divided, with part going to the most recently born son, and the remainder going to her other sons from the first marriage.

[92] I'll demonstrate these things, as I've said, by the public records themselves. It may be that Aemelianus won't believe that only three hundred thousand coins have been recorded as the dowry and that this dowry, by the agreement of Pudentilla, would be given to her sons at the reading of her will.

If you please, take the record with your own hands. Give it to your instigator, Rufinus. Let him read it. He should be ashamed of his swollen pride and his ambitious lying. In fact, though needy and deprived, he endowed his daughter with four hundred thousand coins which he received from a creditor. Pudentilla, a wealthy woman, was content with three hundred thousand for a dowry and has a husband -- who, after rejecting many great dowries, is content with the empty name of such a small one, counting the rest as nothing except his own wife. He figures that all the household goods and other riches are in their conjugal union and their mutual love.

Though who would find fault if a woman, a widow and of average looks but not of moderate age, wanted to marry and used a large dowry and easy situation to rouse up a youth, who himself wasn't lacking in health, intelligence or fortune? An unmarried and beautiful woman, even if she's incredibly poor, still has a large dowry, since she carries to her new husband an natural quality of spirit, the grace of beauty and the beginnings of youth.

The worth of her virginity is most pleasing to all husbands by right and by merit. After all, you can give back everything you took as dowry whenever you please -- you're not constrained by an obligation. You can pay back the money, return the slaves, move out of the house, and withdraw from the estates. Only virginity can't be returned, once it's been taken -- it's the only element of the the dowry to remain with the husband.

A widow, however, leaves in a divorce in the same condition in which she came to marriage. She offers nothing which she can't demand back again, but she comes already having lost her virginity to someone else. She's certainly not at all submissive to you with regards to what you want. And she's suspicious of her new house just as much as she herself should be suspect on account of having already had one separation: whether she lost her husband by death (which would make her not at all desirable, being a woman who brings unfavorable omens and unfortunate marriages), or she departed in divorce.

In either case, it's the woman's fault. She either was so intolerable that she was rejected, or so insolent that she did the rejecting.

On account of these and other factors, widows tempt suitors with an inflated dowry, which Pudentilla would have done for another husband if she hadn't found a philosopher who scorned of money.

[93] And really, now, if I'd desired the woman for the sake of greed, what would have been more useful to me in taking over her house than to breed dislike between mother and sons, to extract any affection for her children from her heart, so that all by myself I might conquer the abandoned woman more easily and more firmly?

Isn't this invented event the action of a robber? When in fact, I was a supporter,
a mediator,
a promoter of peace,
harmony,
devotion. Not only did I not plant new feuds, but I entirely uprooted the old ones. I encouraged my wife, whose whole fortune, according to these men, I'd already eaten up through and through -- as I say, I encouraged her, and finally persuaded her to immediately pay back her money (which I mentioned before) to her sons who were demanding it back, in estates appraised cheaply and for the amount they wanted.

Moreover, I persuaded her to give them from her household property the most fertile fields,
the lofty, luxuriously decorated house,
and a great quantity of wheat,
barley,
wine,
olive oil,
and other crops.
Also, no less than four hundred slaves,
and herds besides, neither small nor of mean price. In this way she might keep them cheerful with the part she'd given them and encourage them with good hope for the rest of the inheritance.

These things, therefore, I extorted with difficulty from the unwilling Pudentilla -- for she'll let me tell it as it was -- I wrested them, pleading mightily, from the unwilling and angry woman. I reconciled the mother to her sons, and I furnished my stepsons with much money, in this first kindness of a stepfather.

[94] This was known by the whole city. Everyone cursed Rufinus and exalted me with praises. Pontianus came to us, with his brother so unlike him, before Pudentilla had finished her gift-giving. Falling at our feet, he asked us to forgive and forget all the events of the past. He kissed our hands, weeping, and said that he regretted listening to Rufinus and men like him. After that, he also humbly begged me to clear himself before the most honorable Lollianus Avitus, whom I'd recently recommended to him for beginning his study of rhetoric. Obviously, he'd found out that a few days before I had written to Avitus everything in detail, just as it happened. This, too, he got from me.

And so, when he took my letter, he went on to Carthage, where Lollianus Avitus awaited you, Maximus, since by then his term as consul was nearly over. When Avitus read my letters, he congratulated Pontianus with his own particular grace, because Pontianus had quickly corrected his own error.

Through Pontianus, Avitus wrote back to me such letters -- good gods! with what learning, what pleasantness, what charm and at the same time pleasure in words -- quite like "a good man skillful in speaking." I know that you, Maximus, will gladly hear his letters; and if I read them aloud, I will proclaim them in my own voice. Bring Avitus's letters here, so that my pride might become my protection. But it's all right, let the water flow. I want to read the letters of this great man repeatedly, three or four times, no matter how much time it takes.

[95] I'm not unaware that I should have concluded after these letters of Avitus. For could I bring out a more reliable character witness, a more august observer of my life, a more eloquent counsel? In the course of my life, I've diligently become acquainted with many articulate men with Roman names, but I've never admired another as much. There's no one today -- for what it's worth -- who is known for or aspires to eloquence, who wouldn't prefer to be Avitus, if he wanted to compare himself to him without envy. Almost all the different virtues of oratory come together in that man. Whatever speech Avitus arranges will be so perfectly complete in every respect that
Cato wouldn't find it lacking in dignity,
Laelius in smoothness,
Gracchus in force,
Caesar in passion,
Hortensius in arrangement,
Calvus in subtlety,
Sallust in economy,
Cicero in wealth.

If you heard Avitus, you'd want nothing added, removed, or otherwise changed at all. I see, Maximus, how favorably you listen to these features which you recognize in your friend Avitus. Your kindness encouraged me to say just a few things about him. But I won't yield to your good will so much that I permit myself to begin now at the end about his outstanding virtues -- I'm almost worn out now, and this case is winding down. Instead, I will keep them for when my strength is fresh and my time is free.

[96] Now, though it annoys me, I have to turn my speech from the remembrance of so great a man back to these troublemakers.

Do you dare, Aemilianus, to compare yourself with Avitus?

Will you attack for the crime of malicious magic the man whom Avitus calls "good," whose disposition of character he completely praises so highly in his letters?

Or should you grieve more than Pontianus would have grieved that I invaded Pudentilla's house and carried off her good things? Pontianus, who apologized to me for a few days' feud (which you instigated, of course), and also apologized in the presence of Avitus while I was absent -- who thanked me in the presence of such a great man? Imagine that I read the events that occurred at Avitus's house, not his letters. What charges could you or anyone else bring against me in this business?

Pontianus himself considered the things he'd accepted, given by his mother, to be my gift -- he was glad that I, his stepfather, reached out to him with such deep affection. But I wish that he had returned alive from Carthage. Or, since this had been decreed for him by fate, I wish that you, Rufinus, hadn't hindered his final judgment. How he'd have thanked me, either in person or in his will! Still, he sent me letters in advance from Carthage, even in his arrival there. Some were written when he was still healthy, some when already ill -- letters full of honor, full of affection. Please, Maximus, allow them to be read aloud for a short space, so that his brother, my accuser, might know how he is inferior in all ways to his brother -- that runs the race of life with a man remembered as excellent.

[97] Did you hear the names which your brother Pontianus gave me? He called me his father,
his master,
his teacher, at other times and at the end of his life?

I'd bring out similar letters from you, if I actually thought that a little delay was worth so much.

I would particularly like for the recent will of your brother, although unfinished, be brought forward anyway. In it, he remembers me most dutifully and respectfully. And yet, Rufinus didn't allow this will to be prepared or executed because of the disgrace of the lost inheritance, which he figured was the high price of a few months of being father-in- law to Pontianus.

Plus, he'd consulted with some Chaldeans about how he might marry his daughter off for money. As I hear it, they gave an answer that I wish hadn't been true: that her first husband would die in a few months. No doubt they made up the rest about the inheritance in response to their client's wish, as they usually do. And in fact, as the gods wished, he opened his gaping maw in vain, like a blind wild beast. For Pontianus not only did not designate Rufinus's daughter as an heir, since he found out that she was evil, but he didn't even assign a decent bequest. It seems that he had linen worth about two hundred pennies left to her to disgrace her. In this way, it would be understood that he set a value on her in anger, not that he forgot and passed over her. In this will, as in the earlier one (which was read), he appointed as his heirs his mother and brother. As you can see, Rufinus brings the same trick (his daughter) to the boy and hurls this woman -- much older and a recent widow of his brother besides -- at the poor kid and knocks him flat.

[98] But Pudens was captivated and possessed by the slut's charms and by the tempting lures of her pimp father. After his brother died, he moved to his uncle's, abandoning his mother, so that with us out of the way they could complete the things they had started more easily. For Aemilianus sides with Rufinus and wants to win. Oh, you give good advice: the good uncle weaves his own hope into this plan and looks after it. He knows that he would be a more legitimate heir of a boy without a will than he would be as an heir-to-be.

By Hercules, I would've preferred that this didn't come from me. It wasn't fitting for a person as moderate as I am to burst out openly with everyone's silent suspicions. You who suggested it did a bad thing.

If you want the truth, Aemilianus, many people are wondering openly about your oh-so-sudden devotion to that boy. Before his brother Pontianus died, you were so unknown to him that often, you wouldn't recognize your brother's son by sight when you ran across him. But now, you indulge him, and you corrupt him so greatly that you resist him in nothing. Through these actions, you confirm people's suspicions.

You took him from us as a boy; instantly, you made him a man. When he was guided by us, he went to school: now, with a flurried farewell he dashes into a dive and scorns serious friends. Though still a boy, he throws banquets with the most awful kids, with whores and goblets all around him.
Pudens is the ruler of your house,
he is the master of your household,
he is the chief at the banquet.
Also, as a frequent visitor to the gladiatorial school (as a res-pec-table boy, of course), he learns the names of the gladiators, of the fights, and of the wounds from the trainer himself. He never speaks except in Punic or something in Greek which he imitates from his mother -- he doesn't want and isn't able to speak Latin. You heard a little earlier, Maximus (the shame of it!) my stepson Pudens, brother of that articulate young man Pontianus, butchering single syllables with difficulty when you asked him whether his mother had given him the gifts which I said she'd given with my consent.

[99] I call you to witness, Claudius Maximus,
and you, who are in the council,
and also you, who stand with me at the tribunal,
that these injuries and disgraces to his morals must be charged to his uncle and to the candidate hoping to be his father-in-law. I'd consider it a good thing that such a stepson threw the burden of my attention off his back, and from now on I won't entreat his mother on his behalf.

Oh, I almost forgot. Very recently, when Pudentilla was in poor health after the death of her son Pontianus, she wrote a will. I struggled against her for a long time, so that she wouldn't disinherit Pudens because of so many conspicuous insults, so many injuries. By heaven, I begged her with earnest pleas to get rid of the most serious clause, already all written out. Finally, I threatened that if I didn't obtain the following things from her, I would leave her:

        that she grant this favor to me, 
		that she conquer her bad son with kindness, 
			that she free me from being the object of envy.  

I didn't stop until she did it.

I grieve that I took this uneasy feeling away from Aemilianus, that I proclaimed the matter to him so unexpectedly. Please note, Maximus, that when he heard these things, he was suddenly struck dumb, his face fell. He had supposed (and not without cause) that it would be much worse. He knew that the woman was poisoned by the insults of her son and was strongly attached to my love.

Regarding me, too, there was what to fear: even if they cared as little as I do for a bequest, most people still wouldn't have turned up their noses at revenge on such an irresponsible stepson.

And here's what they were most afraid of, and what made them accuse me: because of their own greed, they wrongly figured that the entire inheritance had been left to me. Let me relieve your concern for the past. In fact, I was swayed neither by the prospect of obtaining the inheritance nor by the thought of revenge. I fought with an angry mother -- a stepfather fighting for an evil stepson, just as a father would fight with a stepmother for a good son. And even that wasn't enough for me. I also curbed my good wife's liberal generosity towards me, well beyond the point of fairness.

[100] Bring out the will! The boy's mother when she was already at odds with her son. My opponents call me a pirate; yet, it was I who pleadingly dictated every single word. Order those documents opened, Maximus: you'll find that the son is her heir. A trifling amount was bequeathed to me as a token of esteem, so that if her son were to suffer a fatal accident, I would have my name on my wife's papers as her husband. Accept this as the will of your mother, a will that's truly irresponsible. Why? Because in this will she disinherited her very devoted husband, designated a most inimical son as her heir -- no, not even a son but Aemilianus's hopes and the marriage arranged by Rufinus, your drunken gang of parasites.

Take the will, I say, you son of sons; lay aside your mother's love letters for a little while and read this, instead. If she wrote anything while not in her right mind, you'll find it here starting right from the beginning:

"My son Sicinius Pudens is to be my heir."

I've got to admit, anyone who reads this will think it's insane.

--This son, the heir,
=>who invited a gang of depraved youths to his brothers funeral, but planned to shut you out of the home which you yourself gave him,
=>who was bitter and resentful that you were designated by his brother as coinheritor with himself,
=>who immediately abandoned you with your grief and mourning and ran off from your arms to Rufinus and Aemilianus,
=>who afterwards repeatedly insulted you to your face and did so with the help of his paternal uncle,
=>who bandied about your name before the courts,
=>who with your own letters tried to disgrace you publicly,
=>who accused your husband -- the man whom you had chosen and whom you loved passionately, as he himself objected -- of a capital crime?

Please, dear boy, open the will. By doing so you will easily prove your mother's insanity.

[101] Why do you shake your head, why do you refuse, now that you're no longer worry over your mother's legacy? But now, Maximus, I hurl these papers at your feet -- and I declare that, from now on, I'll be indifferent to whatever Pundentilla writes in her will. Let him prevail on his mother by himself from now on -- after all, he's left me no opportunity to intercede for him. He had the nerve to dictate offensive letters to his mother on his own, so let him mollify her anger on his own. If he can plead, he'll succeed.

And after all this, I'm not satisfied unless I've not only completely rebutted the charges against me, but have also uprooted the seeds of these proceedings -- namely, jealous inheritance-grubbing.

Now, I'm going to rebut your false charge, so that I don't appear to be neglecting anything before I finish. You've said that I bought a fabulous estate in my own name using my wife's money.

And yet, I maintain that it wasn't me, but Pudentilla, who bought a small estate in her own name for sixty thousand sesterces -- that it's Pudentilla's name on the deed -- and that the tax on this little plot is paid in Pudentilla's name. Corvinius Celer is present; he's the distinguished public quaestor to whom it was paid. The woman's guardian is also present, a most respected and faultless man, whom I name with all due respect: Cassius Longinus. Maximus, ask whose purchase he approved, and how much the wealthy woman paid for her small plot of land.

[Testimony is given by the guardian Cassius Longinus and the quaestor Corvinius Clemens.]

Isn't it just as I've said? Is my name written anywhere in this transaction? Is the price of the small estate something to begrudge -- and was it reported to me, anyhow?

[102] What's left, Aemilianus, that I still haven't refuted, by your judgment?

Did you discover the value of my magic? So why would I be trying to seduce Pudentilla with sorcery? What would I have hoped to gain from her -- a modest dowry rather than a large one? What brilliant magic spells! Or maybe I was hoping she would demand the return of this dowry to her sons instead of leaving it with me? What could be added to this magic? Maybe that she'd give her sons the greater part of her estate, on my advice, but not give a share to me -- even though she'd bequeathed none of it to them before our marriage? What breathtaking conjuring -- or should I say, what an unwelcome kindness! Or was it my hope that in her will, which she wrote in anger toward her son, she would designate as her heir a son she was angry with, instead of me, to whom she was much closer?

Let me tell you, I had a lot of trouble making this happen -- it took sooo many magic spells.

Imagine that you're not conducting this case before Claudius Maximus, a fair man who clings to justice. Instead, replace him with some other judge who's crooked and cruel, who champions accusations and is eager to condemn. Give him a course to follow -- even the least opportunity, disguised as truth, to deliver a verdict in your favor. Make something up, at least -- think up some answer to this.

And since there has to be a motive before any attempted action, riddle me this: if you're claiming that Apuleius seduced Pudentilla with magic charms, what did he wanted to get from her?

Why did he do it?

Did he want her for her beauty? No, you say. Ok, then, did he at least want her money?

The property deed says no,
the inheritance documents say no,
the will says no,

Why so speechless? Why are you silent?

Where is that indictment with its savage beginning, drawn up in the name of my stepson? "My lord Maximus, I have initiated before you the trial of this man." [103] So why not add: ". . . my master, my stepfather, my champion"?

But what then? ". . . a perpetrator of many egregious crimes." So, show us one. Give us something doubtful or obscure from those "egregious crimes."

And to these c-o-p-i-o-u-s complaints that you've made, I reply with, count 'em, two words.

"Gleaming teeth!"

Elegant speech.

Philosophers should.

It's permitted.

Aristotle's teaching.

Plato's advice.

It's legal.

It happens.

The dowry. The donation. The will.

If I have blunted all the complaints,

If I have refuted all the false accusations,

If I have completely exonerated myself of guilt in everything, not only in the charges but also in the insults,

If I have never detracted from the honor of philosophy, which is more important to me than my life, but kept it inviolate,

If these facts are as I say, I can revere your judgment with peace of mind, and not fear your power, because I consider it less fearful and formidable to be condemned seriously by a proconsul than to be condemned wrongfully by so good and faultless a man.

I rest my case.