Agricola as Hope for a Troubled Empire Essay -- Tacitus Agricola Essay

Agricola as Hope for a Troubled Empire Tacitus’ Agricola, though it traverses a significant part of Rome’s conquest of Britain, is primarily about the man from whom the book takes it title. Tacitus used British conquest to show the reader Agricola’s many virtues, and he explained why Romans should strive to follow Agricola’s example. At the same time, however, Tacitus echoed Agricola’s virtues to Rome, which, before and during the writing of his book, endured several tyrannical emperors. Tacitus’ book, besides praising an individual, suggested hope for an improved future to many troubled Romans when the virtues of the empire had decayed, and freedom that they once loved had largely disappeared. Despite the mostly laudatory writing in Agricola, Tacitus began the book on a melancholy tone. He expressed anger over what he considered autocratic ruling of Rome, suggesting that it was a terrible political fault. â€Å"An outstanding personality can still triumph over that blind antipathy to virtue which is a defect of all states, small and great alike.† (p.51) Tacitus expressed the idea that any state would carelessly disregard the virtues it once held as important, and by implication of the context he wrote in, find itself in a state of degradation similar to Rome’s at the time. He was not exclusively negative in that statement, however. His believed that one highly virtuous person could in fact successfully counteract a state’s decline. Agricola, he revealed throughout the book, was a paradigm for that person. Tacitus considered Agricola virtuous because he exhibited many qualities that Romans traditionally valued. Perhaps the most important virtue discussed was humility, or, as Tac... ...asting Domitian’s tyranny with Agricola’s equity, and specifically that the former resulted in disunity while the latter resulted in cohesion. Tacitus stated at the beginning of Agricola that it â€Å"†¦sets out to honor my father-in-law Agricola.† (p.53) One can not deny that Tacitus was successful in that effort, but it is also clear that he offered Roman readers much more than an inspiring story about a great man. At a time when many citizens of Rome were subdued by Domitian’s threats to opposition, Tacitus wrote in remembrance of Rome’s greatness and the freedom that Romans had previously enjoyed; and he wrote to inspire hope that they would experience both again in the future when the empire improved. Agricola embodied the ideals of that hope, and his example, Tacitus pointed out in chapter 46, would live forever with Roman destiny and its nobility.