The Good Book_ A Secular Bible - A. C. Grayling [296]
22. Who, when his son was making many demands of him by means of the mother, said,
23. ‘O woman, the Athenians govern the Greeks; I govern the Athenians, but you govern me, and your son governs you; so let him use his power sparingly, since, simple as he is, he can do more than all the Greeks together.’
24. Another saying of Cato’s was that the Roman people did not only fix the value of such and such purple dyes, but also of such and such habits of life:
25. ‘For,’ he said, ‘as dyers most of all dye such colours as they see to be most agreeable, so the young men zealously affect what is most popular with you.’
26. He would say of men who continually desired to be in office that apparently they did not know their way around Rome,
27. Since they could not do without beadles to lead them along its streets.
28. He also reproved the citizens for always choosing the same men as their magistrates:
29. ‘For you will seem,’ he said, ‘either not to esteem government worth much, or to think few worthy to hold it.’
30. Pointing at one who had sold an inherited estate which lay near the sea, he pretended to express his wonder at this man’s being stronger than the sea itself;
31. For what it washed away with much effort, he drank away with great ease.
32. When the senate with a great deal of splendour received King Eumenes on his visit to Rome,
33. And the chief citizens strove who should sit nearest the king, Cato regarded him with dislike;
34. And when someone said to him that Eumenes was a good prince, and a friend to Rome:
35. ‘It may be so,’ said Cato, ‘but by nature this same animal of a king is a kind of man-eater’;
36. And added that there were never kings who compared with Epameinondas, Pericles, Themistocles, Manius Curius or Hamilcar Barca.
Chapter 55
1. Cato used to say that his enemies envied him because he got up every day before light, and neglected his own business to serve that of the public.
2. He would also say that he had rather be deprived of the reward for doing well, than not to suffer punishment for doing ill;
3. And that he could pardon all offenders but himself.
4. The Romans having sent three ambassadors to Bithynia, of whom one was gouty, another had his skull trepanned and the third seemed little better than a fool;
5. Cato, laughing, said that the Romans had sent an embassy which had neither feet, head nor heart.
6. He used to assert that wise men profited more by fools, than fools by wise men;
7. For that wise men avoided the faults of fools, fools would not imitate the example of wise men.
8. He would profess, too, that he was more taken with young men that blushed, than with those who looked pale;
9. And that he never desired to have a soldier that moved his hands too much in marching, and his feet too much in fighting; or snored louder than he shouted.
10. Ridiculing a fat overgrown man: ‘What use,’ said he, ‘can the state turn a man’s body to, when all between the throat and groin is taken up by belly?’
11. A man who was much given to pleasures desired his acquaintance, whereupon Cato begged his pardon, saying he could not be friends with a man whose palate was of a quicker sense than his heart.
12. He would likewise say that the heart of a lover lived in the body of another;
13. And he said that in his whole life he most repented of three things:
14. One was that he had trusted a secret to a woman;
15. Another, that he went by water when he might have gone by land;
16. The third, that he had remained one whole day without doing any business of moment.
17. Addressing an old man who was committing some vice, he said:
18. ‘Friend, old age has of itself blemishes enough; do not add to them the deformity of vice.’
19. Speaking to a tribune who was reputed a poisoner, and was very keen to bring in a certain law:
20. ‘Young man,’ cried he, ‘I know not which would be better, to drink what you mix, or confirm what you would put up for a law.’
21. Being reviled by a fellow who lived a profligate and wicked life:
22. ‘A contest,