1'For myself I shall claim nothing more than not to be counted after Valens and Caecina: yet do not scorn Mucianus as a partner because you do not find him a rival. 1I rank myself above Vitellius, and you above myself. 1Your house has a triumphal name and two young men, one of them already capable of empire and famous in his first years of service among the German armies too. 1It would be absurd not to yield the empire to the man whose son I would adopt, if I were emperor myself. 1Yet between us the lot of success and failure will not be the same: for if we win, I shall have whatever honour you grant me: risk and dangers we shall bear equally.
1Rather, as is better, you govern your armies, and hand over to me the war and the uncertainties of battle. 1Today the defeated live under keener discipline than the victors. 1The former are fired to valour by anger, hatred and the desire for revenge: the latter are growing dull through disdain and insubordination. 1The war itself will open and lay bare the hidden and festering wounds of the victorious side; 1nor do I place more confidence in your vigilance, thrift and wisdom than in Vitellius' torpor, ignorance and cruelty. 1But we have a better cause in war than in peace; 1for those who deliberate have already rebelled.'