Marcus Cato

And he exhorted them, in case it was through virtue and temperance that they had become great, to make no change for the worse; but if it was through intemperance and vice, to change for the better; these had already made them great enough. Of those who were eager to hold high office frequently, he said that like men who did not know the road, they sought to be ever attended on their way by lictors, lest they go astray.

He censured his fellow citizens for choosing the same men over and over again to high office. You will be thought, said he, not to deem your offices worth much, or else not to deem many men worthy of your offices. Of one of his enemies who had the name of leading a disgraceful and disreputable life, he said: This man’s mother holds the wish that he may survive her to be no pious prayer, but a malignant curse.

Pointing to a man who had sold his ancestral fields lying near the sea, he pretended to admire him, as stronger than the sea. This man, said he, has drunk down with ease what the sea found it hard to wash away. When King Eumenes paid a visit to Rome, the Senate received him with extravagant honours, and the chief men of the city strove who should be most about him. But Cato clearly looked upon him with suspicion and alarm.

Surely, some one said to him, he is an excellent man, and a friend of Rome. Granted, said Cato, but the animal known as king is by nature carnivorous. He said further that not one of the kings whom men so lauded was worthy of comparison with Epaminondas, or Pericles, or Themistocles, or Manius Curius, or with Hamilcar, surnamed Barcas.

His enemies hated him, he used to say, because he rose every day before it was light and, neglecting his own private matters, devoted his time to the public interests. He also used to say that he preferred to do right and get no thanks, rather than to do ill and get no punishment; and that he had pardon for everybody’s mistakes except his own.

The Romans once chose three ambassadors to Bithynia, of whom one was gouty, another had had his head trepanned, and the third was deemed a fool. Cato made merry over this, and said that the Romans were sending out an embassy which had neither feet, nor head, nor heart.

His aid was once solicited by Scipio, at the instance of Polybius, in behalf of the exiles from Achaia, and after a long debate upon the question in the Senate, where some favoured and some opposed their return home, Cato rose and said: Here we sit all day, as if we had naught else to do, debating whether some poor old Greeks shall be buried here or in Achaia.

The Senate voted that the men be allowed to return, and a few days afterwards Polybius tried to get admission to that body again, with a proposal that the exiles be restored to their former honours in Achaia, and asked Cato’s opinion on the matter. Cato smiled and said that Polybius, as if he were another Odysseus, wanted to go back into the cave of the Cyclops for a cap and belt which he had left there.