The Portable Roman Reader (Portable Library) (27 page)

To this most solemn utterance of the state and of those men who think these same thoughts I will answer briefly. “If I judged that it were best, Conscript Fathers, that Catiline should be put to death,
I
should not give to that gladiator the enjoyment of a single further hour of life. For if our most noble men and most famous citizens were not stained but even honoured by shedding the blood of Saturninus, and the Gracchi, and Flaccus, and many men of ancient time, certainly I should not have feared that when this murderer of citizens has been slain any unpopularity would attach to me in after time. But if that did seriously threaten me, still I have always believed that unpopularity won by uprightness was glory and not unpopularity. And yet there are some in this body who either do not see the disasters which threaten us or pretend that they do not see them; these have fostered the hopes of Catiline by mild measures and they have strengthened the growing conspiracy by not believing in its existence; under their influence many ignorant men as well as villains would be saying that I acted cruelly and tyrannically if I had punished Catiline. Now I know that if he arrives at Manlius’s camp whither he is now making his way, no one will be so stupid as not to see that a conspiracy has been formed, no one will be so depraved as to deny it. But if this man alone is executed, I know that this disease in the state can can be checked for a little time, but it cannot be completely crushed. But if he shall take himself off, if he shall lead out his friends with him and gather together to the same place other derelicts now collected from all sources, not only this plague rampant in the state but even the roots and seeds of all evil will be obliterated and destroyed.

For many a long day, Conscript Fathers, we have lived and moved amid these dangers and snares of conspiracy; but in some strange way all these crimes and this long-standing madness and audacity have come to a head in the time of my consulship. If out of this great crowd of robbers this one man shall be removed, we shall seem perhaps for a brief time to be relieved of care and fear. But the danger will remain, and it will be hidden deep in the veins and vitals of the state. Just as often men sick with a grievous disease and tossed about in a burning fever drink cold water and at first seem to be relieved, but later are much more grievously and violently afflicted, so this disease in the state, though relieved by the punishment of this man, will grow much worse so long as the rest remain alive. Therefore let the wicked depart; let them separate themselves from the good; let them assemble in one place. And finally, as I often said, let them be separated from us by a wall; let them cease to lie in wait for the consul in his own home, to stand around the tribunal of the city prætor, to besiege the senate-house with swords, to prepare fire-spears and fire-brands with which to burn the city; finally, let every man’s thoughts of the state be written on his forehead. I promise you this, Conscript Fathers, that there will be such energy in us, the consuls, such authority in you, such courage in the Roman knights, such cordial agreement among all patriotic men, that after the departure of Catiline you will see all things made clear, brought to light, suppressed and punished.

With omens like these, Catiline, go forth to your impious and wicked war, bringing to the state the greatest of benefits, to yourself destruction and annihilation, and to those who have allied themselves with you for all crime and parricide, utter ruin. 0 Jupiter, thou who wast established by Romulus under the same auspices under which this city was established, rightly called by us the Stayer of this city and empire, thou wilt repel him and his allies from thy temples and from the other temples, from the dwellings of this city and its walls, from the lives and fortunes of all the citizens, and these men, enemies of the upright, foes of the state, plunderers of Italy, who are united by a compact of crime in an abominable association, thou wilt punish living and dead with eternal punishments.

F
OR, my dear Atticus, I may fitly speak to you in these self-same lines in which,
speaks to Flamininus. And yet I am perfectly sure that it cannot be said of you, as the poet said of Flamininus,

You fret and worry, Titus, day and night, for I know your self-control and the even temper of your mind, and I am aware that you brought home from Athens not only a cognomen but culture and practical wisdom too. Nevertheless I suspect that you, at times, are quite seriously perturbed by the same circumstances which are troubling me; but to find comfort for them is too difficult a task to be undertaken now and must be deferred until another time.

However, at the present, I have determined to write something on old age to be dedicated to you, for I fain would lighten both for you and for me our common burden of old age, which, if not already pressing hard upon us, is surely coming on apace; and yet I have certain knowledge that you, at all events, are bearing and will continue to bear that burden, as you do all others, with a calm and philosophic mind. But when I resolved to write something on this theme you continually came before my mind as worthy of a gift which both of us might enjoy together. To me, at any rate, the composition of this book has been so delightful that it has not only wiped away all the annoyances of old age, but has even made it an easy and a happy state. Philosophy, therefore, can never be praised as much as she deserves, since she enables the man who is obedient to her precepts to pass every season of life free from worry.

Now on other subjects I have said much and shall often have much to say; this book, which I am sending to you, is on old age. But the entire discourse I have attributed, not to Tithonus, as Aristo of Ceos did, (for there would be too little authority in a myth), but, that I might give it greater weight, I have ascribed it to the venerable Marcus Cato; and I represent Lælius and Scipio, while at his house, expressing wonder that he bears his age so well, and Cato replying to them. If it shall appear that he argues more learnedly than he was accustomed to do in his own books, give the credit to Greek literature, of which, as is well known, he was very studious in his later years. But why need I say more? For from now on the words of Cato himself will completely unfold to you my own views on old age.

SCIPIO: When conversing with Gaius Lælius here present, I am frequently wont to marvel, Cato, both at your pre-eminent, nay, faultless, wisdom in matters generally, and especially at the fact that, so far as I have been able to see, old age is never burdensome to you, though it is so vexatious to most old men that they declare it to be a load heavier than Ætna.

CATO: I think, my friends, that you marvel at a thing really far from difficult. For to those who have not the means within themselves of a virtuous and happy life every age is burdensome; and, on the other hand, to those who seek all good from themselves nothing can seem evil that the laws of nature inevitably impose. To this class old age especially belongs, which all men wish to attain and yet reproach when attained; such is the inconsistency and perversity of Folly! They say that it stole upon them faster than they had expected. In the first place, who has forced them to form a mistaken judgement? For how much more rapidly does old age steal upon youth than youth upon childhood? And again, how much less burdensome would old age be to them if they were in their eight-hundredth rather than in their eightieth year? In fact, no lapse of time, however long, once it had slipped away, could solace or soothe a foolish old age.

Wherefore, if you are accustomed to marvel at my wisdom—and would that it were worthy of your estimate and of my cognomen—I am wise because I follow Nature as the best of guides and obey her as a god; and since she has fitly planned the other acts of life’s drama, it is not likely that she has neglected the final act as if she were a careless playwright. And yet there had to be something final, and—as in the case of orchard fruits and crops of grain in the process of ripening which comes with time—something shrivelled, as it were, and prone to fall. But this state the wise man should endure with resignation. For what is warring against the gods, as the giants did, other than fighting against Nature?

LÆLIUS: True, Cato, but you will do a thing most agreeable to us both—assuming that I may speak for Scipio, too—if, since we hope to become old (at least we wish it), you will, long in advance, teach us on what principles we may most easily support the weight of increasing years.

CATO: To be sure I will, Lælius, especially if, as you say, it is going to prove agreeable to you both.

LÆLIUS: Unless it is too much trouble to you, Cato, since you have, as it were, travelled the long road upon which we also must set out, we really do wish to see what sort of a place it is at which you have arrived.

CATO: I will do so, Laelius, as well as I can. For I have often listened to the complaints of my contemporaries (and according to the old adage, “like with like most readily foregathers”), complaints made also by the ex-consuls, Gaius Salinator and Spurius Albinus, who were almost my equals in years, wherein they used to lament, now because they were denied the sensual pleasures without which they thought life not life at all, and now because they were scorned by the people who had been wont to pay them court. But it seemed to me that they were not placing the blame where the blame was due. For if the ills of which they complained were the faults of old age, the same ills would befall me and all other old men: but I have known many who were of such a nature that they bore their old age without complaint, who were not unhappy because they had been loosed from the chains of passion, and who were not scorned by their friends. But as regards all such complaints, the blame rests with character, not with age. For old men of self-control, who are neither churlish nor ungracious, find old age endurable; while on the other hand perversity and an unkindly disposition render irksome every period of life.

LÆLIUS: What you say is true, Cato; but perhaps some one may reply that old age seems more tolerable to you because of your resources, means, and social position, and that these are advantages which cannot fall to the lot of many.

CATO: There is something in that objection, Lælius, but not everything. For example, there is a story that when, in the course of a quarrel, a certain Seriphian had said to Themistocles, “Your brilliant reputation is due to your country’s glory, not your own,” Themistocles replied, “True, by Hercules, I should never have been famous if I had been a Seriphian, nor you if you had been an Athenian.” The same may be said of old age; for amid utter want old age cannot be a light thing, not even to a wise man; nor to a fool, even amid utmost wealth, can it be otherwise than burdensome.

Undoubtedly, Scipio and Lælius, the most suitable defences of old age are the principles and practice of the virtues, which, if cultivated in every period of life, bring forth wonderful fruits at the close of a long and busy career, not only because they never fail you even at the very end of life—although that is a matter of highest moment—but also because it is most delightful to have the consciousness of a life well spent and the memory of many deeds worthily performed.

I was as fond of Quintus Fabius Maximus, who recovered Tarentum, as if he had been of my own age, though he was old and I was young. For there was in him a dignity tempered with courtesy, and age had not altered his disposition; and yet when I began to cultivate him he was not extremely old, though he was well advanced in life. For he had been consul for the first time the year after I was born; and when he was in his fourth consulship I was a mere lad, and set out as a private soldier with him for Capua, and five years later for Tarentum; then, four years after that I became quæstor, which office I held while Tuditanus and Cethegus were consuls, and he, at that very time, though far advanced in age, made speeches in favour of the Cincian law on fees and gifts. Though quite old he waged war like a young man, and by his patient endurance checked the boyish impetuosity of Hannibal. My friend Ennius admirably speaks of him thus:

Indeed, with what vigilance, with what skill he recaptured Tarentum! It was in my own hearing that Salinator, who had fled to the citadel after losing the town, remarked to him in a boasting tone: “Through my instrumentality, Q. Fabius, you have recaptured Tarentum.” “Undoubtedly,” said Fabius, laughing, “for if you had not lost it I should never have recaptured it.” But, indeed, he was not more distinguished in war than in civil life. While consul the second time, unaided by his colleague Spurius Carvilius he, as far as he could, opposed the people’s tribune Gaius Flaminius who was endeavouring to parcel out the Picene and Gallic lands, contrary to the expressed will of the senate. And, although an augur, he dared to say that whatever was done for the safety of the Republic was done under the best auspices, and that whatever was inimical to the Republic was against the auspices.