of Potamos. That city, even in our days, continues to give fo many proofs of her benevolence and humanity, that the is defervedly admired and applauded by all the world.

CATO THE CENSOR.

IT is faid that Marcus Cato was born at Tufculum, of which place his family originally was, and that, before he was concerned in civil or military affairs, he lived upon an estate which his father left him near the country of the Sabines. Though his ancestors were reckoned to have been persons of no note, yet Cato himself boasts of his father as a brave man and an excellent foldier, and affures us that his grandfather Cato received several military rewards, and that having had five horfes killed under him, he had the value of them paid him out of the treasury, as an acknowledgment of his gallant behaviour. As the Romans always gave the appellation of new men * Ito those who, having no honours tranfmitted to them from their ancestors, began to diftinguish themselves, they mentioned Cato by the same style: but he used to say, he was indeed new with refpect to offices and dignities, but, with regard to the services and virtues of his ancestors, he was very ancient.

His third name, at first, was not Cato, but Prifcus. It was afterwards changed to that of Cato, on account of his great wisdom: for the Romans call wife men

*The jus imaginum was annexed to the great offices of state, and none had their ftatues or pictures but fuch as had borne thofe offices. Therefore, he who had the pictures of his anceftors was called noble; he who had only his own was called a new man; and he who had neither the one nor the other was called ignoble. So fays Afconius. But it does not appear that a man who had borne a great office, the confulate for instance, was ignoble, because he had not his ftatue or picture; for he might not choose it. Cato himself did not choose it: his reafon, we fuppofe, was, because he had none of his ancestors, though he was pleased to affign another.

Catos*. He had red hair and grey eyes, as this epigram ill-naturedly enough declares:

With eyes fo grey and hair so red,
With tufkst fo fharp and keen,

Thou'lt fright the fhades when thou art dead,
And hell wont let thee in.

Inured to labour and temperance, and brought up, as it were, in camps, he had an excellent constitution, with refpect to strength as well as health. And he confidered eloquence as a valuable contingent, an inftrument of great things, not only useful but neceffary for every man who does not choose to live obfcure and inactive; for which reafon he exercised and improved that talent in the neighbouring boroughs and villages, by undertaking the causes of fuch as applied to him; fo that he was foon allowed to be an able pleader, and afterwards a good orator.

From this time, all that converfed with him discovered in him fuch a gravity of behaviour, fuch a dignity and depth of fentiment, as qualified him for the greatest affairs in the most refpectable government in the world. For he was not only fo difinterested as to plead without fee or reward, but it appeared that the honour to be gained in that department was not his principal view; his ambition was military glory; and, when yet but a youth, he had fought fo many battles that his breaft was full of fcars. He himself tells us he made his firft campaign at seventeen years of age, when Hannibal, in the height of his prosperity, was laying Italy waste with fire and fword. In battle he ftood firm, had a fure and executing hand, a fierce coutenance, and spoke to his enemy in a threatening and dreadful accent; for he rightly judged, and endeavoured to convince others, that fuch a kind of behaviour often strikes an adversary with greater terror than the fword itself. He always marched on foot, and carried his own arms, followed *The Latin word catus fignifies prudent.

The epigrammatift, when he fays that he was ravòænerns, one that bit every thing that came in his way, plays upon his name of Porcius, quali Porcus, Hog.

only by one fervant, who carried his provifions. And it is faid he never was angry, or found fault with that servant, whatever he set before him; but when he was at leifure from military duty, he would ease and affist him in dreffing it. All the time he was in the army he drank nothing but water, except that, when almost burnt up with thirft, he would ask for a little vinegar, or, when he found his ftrength and spirits exhaufted, he would take a little wine.

Near his country feat was a cottage which formerly belonged to Manius Curius*, who was thrice honoured with a triumph. Cato often walked thither, and, reflecting on the fmallness of the farm, and the meanness of the dwelling, used to think of the peculiar virtues of Dentatus, who, though he was the greatest man in Rome, had fubdued the moft warlike nations, and driven Pyrrhus out of Italy, cultivated this little fpot of ground with his own hands, and, after three triumphs, lived in this cottage. Here the ambassadors of the Samnites found him in the chimney-corner, dreffing turnips, and offered him a large prefent of gold; but he absolutely refused it, and gave them this answer, A man who can be satisfied avith fuch a fupper has no need of gold; and I think it more glorious to conquer the owners of it than to have it myfelf. Full of these thoughts, Cato returned home, and taking a view of his own eftate, his servants, and manner of living, added to his own labour, and retrenched his unneceffary expenfes.

When Fabius Maximus took the city of Tarentum, Cato, who was then very young †, ferved under him.

* Manius Curius Dentatus triumphed twice in his first confulate, in the four hundred and fixty-third year of Rome, firft over the Samnites, and afterwards over the Sabines. And right years after that, in his third confulate, he triumphed over Pyrrhus. After this, he led up the lefs triumph, called Ovrtion, for his victory over the Lucanians.

*

+ Fabius Maximus took Tarentum in his fifth confulate, in the year of Rome 544. Cato was then twenty-three years old; but he had made his firft campaign under the fame Fabius five years before.

Happening at that time to lodge with a Pythagorean philofopher named Nearchus, he defired to hear fome of is doctrine; and learning from him the fame maxims which Plato advances, That pleasure is the greatest incentive to evil; that the greatest burden and calamity to the foul is the body, from which he cannot difengage herself, but by fuch a wife use of reason as shall avean and separate her from all corporeal passions; he became ftill more attached to frugality and temperance. Yet it is faid that he learned Greek very late, and was confiderably advanced in years when he began to read the Grecian writers, among whom he improved his eloquence, somewhat by Thucydides, but by Demofthenes very greatly. Indeed, his own writings are fufficiently adorned with precepts and examples borrowed from the Greek, and among his maxims and fentences we find many that are literally tranflated from the fame originals.

At that time there flourished a Roman nobleman of great power and eminence, called Valerius Flaccus, whofe penetration enabled him to diftinguish a rifing genius and virtuous difpofition, and whofe benevolence inclined him to encourage and conduct it in the path of glory. This nobleman had an estate contiguous to Cato's, where he often heard his servants speak of his neighbour's laborious and temperate manner of life. They told him that he used to go early in the morning to the little towns in the neighbourhood, and defend the causes of fuch as applied to him; that from thence he would return to his own farm, where, in a coarse frock, if it was winter, and naked, if it was summer, he would labour with his domeftics, and afterwards fit down with them, and eat the fame kind of bread, and drink of the fame wine. They related alfo many other inftances of his condefcenfion and moderation, and mentioned feveral of his fhort fayings that were full of wit and good fenfe. Valerius, charmed with his character, fent him an invitation to dinner. From that time, by frequent converfation, he found in him so much sweetness of temper and ready wit, that he confidered him as an excellent plant, which wanted only cultivation, and deferved to Vol. III.

be removed to a better foil. He therefore perfuaded him to go to Rome, and apply himself to affairs of state.

There his pleadings foon procured him friends and admirers; the interest of Valerius, too, greatly affifted his rife to preferment; fo that he was firft made a tribune of the foldiers, and afterwards quæftor. And having gained great reputation and honour in those employments, he was joined with Valerius himself in the higheft dignities, being his colleague both as conful and as cenfor.

Among all the ancient senators, he attached himself chiefly to Fabius Maximus, not so much on account of the great power and honour he had acquired, as for the fake of his life and manners, which Cato confidered as the best model to form himself upon. So that he made no fcruple of differing with the great Scipio, who, though at that time but a young man, yet, actuated by a spirit of emulation, was the perfon who moft opposed the power of Fabius. For being fent quæftor with Scipio to the war in Africa, and perceiving that he indulged himself, as ufual, in an unbounded expenfe, and lavished the public money upon the troops, he took the liberty to remonftrate; obferving, "That the expense itself was not the greateft evil, but the confequence of that expenfe, fince it corrupted the ancient fimplicity of the foldiery, who, when they had more money than was neceffary for their fubfiftence, were fure to bestow it upon luxury and riot." Scipio anfwered, "He had no need of a very exact and frugal treasurer, because he intended to fpread all his fails in the ocean of war *, and because his country expected from him an account of fervices performed, not of money expended." Upon this Cato left Sicily, and returned to Rome, where, together with Fabius, he loudly complained to the fenate of "Scipio's immenfe profufion, and of his paffing his time, like a boy, in wrestling rings and theatres, as if he had not been fent out to make war, but to exhibit games and shows." In confequence of this, tribunes were fent to examine into the affair, with orders, if the accufation proved true, to

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