Res Gestae

During all this time, the notorious Palladius, the fomenter[*](Or curdler. Literally the rennet. ) of all these troubles, who, as we said at first,[*](1, 5.) was taken in custody by Fortunatianus, being by the very lowness of his condition ready to plunge into anything, by heaping disaster on disaster, had drenched the whole empire with grief and tears.

For having gained leave to name all whom he desired, without distinction of fortune, as dabbling in forbidden practices, like a hunter skilled in observing the secret tracks of wild beasts, he entangled many persons in his lamentable nets, some of them on the ground of having stained themselves with the knowledge of magic, others as accomplices of those who were aiming at treason.

And in order that even wives should have no time to weep over the misfortunes of their husbands, men were immediately sent to put the seal[*](Until the owner should be acquitted or condemned; in the latter case his house and property went to the fiscus. ) on the houses, and during the examination of the furniture of the householder who had been condemned, to introduce privily old-wives’ incantations or unbecoming

As a result, throughout the oriental provinces owners of books, through fear of a like fate, burned their entire libraries; so great was the terror that had seized upon all.[*](Cf. also Zos. iv. 14. In this way Valens greatly diminished our knowledge of the ancient writers, in particular of the philosophers.) Indeed, to speak briefly, at that time we all crept about as if in Cimmerian darkness,[*](See xxviii. 4, 18, note.) feeling the same fears as the guests of the Sicilian Dionysius, who, while filled to repletion with banquets more terrible than any possible hunger, saw with a shudder the swords hanging over their heads from the ceilings of the rooms in which they reclined and held only by single horsehairs.[*](Cf. Cic., Tusc. Disp. v. 21, 61 f.)