Nero meanwhile summoned the Senate, addressed them in a speech, and
further added a proclamation to the people, with the evidence which
had been entered on records, and the confessions of the condemned.
He was indeed perpetually under the lash of popular talk, which said
that he had destroyed men perfectly innocent out of jealousy or fear.
However, that a conspiracy was begun, matured, and conclusively proved
was not doubted at the time by those who took pains to ascertain the
truth, and is admitted by those who after Nero’s death returned to
the capital. When every one in the Senate, those especially who had
most cause to mourn, abased himself in flattery, Salienus Clemens
denounced Junius Gallio, who was terror-stricken at his brother Seneca’s
death was pleading for his life. He called him an enemy and traitor
to the State, till the unanimous voice of the senators deterred him
from perverting public miseries into an occasion for a personal resentment,
and thus importing fresh bitterness into what by the prince’s clemency
had been hushed up or forgotten.

Then offerings and thanksgivings to the gods were decreed, with special
honours to the Sun, who has an ancient temple in the circus where
the crime was planned, as having revealed by his power the secrets
of the conspiracy. The games too of Ceres in the circus were to be
celebrated with more horse-races, and the month of April was to be
called after the name of Nero. A temple also was to be erected to
Safety, on the spot whence Scaevinus had taken his dagger. The emperor
himself dedicated the weapon in the temple of the capital, and inscribed
on it, “To Jupiter the Avenger.” This passed without notice at the
moment, but after the war of Julius Vindex it was construed as an
omen and presage of impending vengeance. I find in the registers of
the Senate that Cerialis Anicius, consul-elect, proposed a motion
that a temple should as soon as possible be built at the public expense
to the Divine Nero. He implied indeed by this proposal that the prince
had transcended all mortal grandeur and deserved the adoration of
mankind. Some however interpreted it as an omen of his death, seeing
that divine honours are not paid to an emperor till he has ceased
to live among men.