It is almost superfluous to enumerate the unworthy successors of Augustus.
Their unparalleled vices, and the splendid theatre on which they were acted, have saved them from oblivion.

The dark, unrelenting Tiberius, the furious Caligula, the feeble Claudius, the profligate and cruel Nero, the beastly Vitellius, [50] and the timid, inhuman Domitian, are condemned to everlasting infamy.

During fourscore years (excepting only the short and doubtful respite of Vespasian's reign) [51] Rome groaned beneath an unremitting tyranny, which exterminated the ancient families of the republic, and was fatal to almost every virtue and every talent that arose in that unhappy period.
[Footnote 50: Vitellius consumed in mere eating at least six millions of our money in about seven months.

It is not easy to express his vices with dignity, or even decency.

Tacitus fairly calls him a hog, but it is by substituting for a coarse word a very fine image.