Note 1741 — BOOK X.

Gerlach's reading and interpretation is followed: "Lucilius would not wish to have all the honors of that illustrious family heaped upon him, but make his own selection." Nonius also explains sumere by "eligere." Corpet reads, "Crassi" and "sicut describimus," and supposes the allusion to be to the eloquence of Crassus, son-in-law of Scævola. Cf. Cic., Brut., 38-44. But no doubt P. Licinius Crassus Dives Mucianus is here meant, who, as we learn from Aulus Gellius (I., xiii., 10), was famous for five things: he was the richest man in Rome, the man of noblest birth, the most eloquent, the best lawyer, and the Pontifex Maximus. Lucilius might well be at a loss which of all these he would choose.