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4For Gaius invariably went so by contraries in every matter, that he not only emulated but even surpassed his predecessor’s licentiousness and bloodthirstiness, for which he used to censure him, whereas of the qualities he praised in the other he imitated not one. 2Though he had been the first to insult him and the first to abuse him, so that others, thinking to please him in this way, indulged in rather reckless freedom of speech, he later lauded and magnified Tiberius, even going so far as to punish some for what they had said. These, as enemies of the former emperor, he hated for their abusive remarks; and he hated equally those who in any way praised Tiberius, as being the other’s friends. 3Though he put an end to the charges of maiestas, he nevertheless made these the cause of a great many persons’ downfall. Again, though, according to his own account, he had given up his anger against those who had conspired against his father and mother and brothers, and even burned their letters, he yet put to death great numbers of them on the strength of those letters. He did, it is true, actually destroy some letters, but they were not the originals containing the absolute proof, but rather copies that he had made. 4Furthermore, though he at first forbade any one to set up images of him, he even went on to manufacture statues himself; and though he once requested the annulment of a decree ordering sacrifices to be offered to his Fortune, and even caused this action of his to be inscribed on a tablet, he afterwards ordered temples to be erected and sacrifices to be offered to himself as to a god. 5He delighted by turns in vast throngs of men and in solitude; he grew angry if requests were preferred, and again if they were not preferred. He would display the keenest enthusiasm about various projects, and then carry out certain of them in the most indolent fashion. He would spend money most unsparingly, and at the same time show a most sordid spirit in exacting it. He was alike irritated and pleased, both with those who flattered him and with those who spoke their mind frankly. 6Many who were guilty of great crimes he neglected to punish, and many who had not even incurred any suspicion of wrong-doing he slew. His associates he either flattered to excess or abused to excess. As a result, no one knew either what to say or how to act toward him, but all who met with any success in this respect gained it as the result of chance rather than of shrewd judgment.
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